I walked to the freeway in a damp T-shirt. I lost my watch while hopping the fence. Work crawled by at a snail's pace. I was pissed off when, at 4.00pm, Norm looked at me as if to say, "Why are you still here?" I had to run for the bus. Not a good day, you may say. Not so bad, after all.
I'm currently in the midst of a drinks party with Ken, Takashi and Kazu. We've consumed an unhealthy amount of gin already and are carrying on with the same intentions for the remainder of the evening. Should be good.
Roger Waters is on TV. "The Wall" live in Berlin a few months back, to commemorate the fall of the Berlin Wall, has just started. My friends are very intrigued by it all, but I couldn't really care less. I'm more interested that I'm seeing in a new year in a new land, a new home.
Sometimes, it's as if I have only just become aware of my situation: I break into fits of laughter, finding it hard to believe that I'm really living 10,000 miles away from my 'home'. Or maybe it's the alcohol.
Right now, I couldn't ask for anything more from life than to be here with my friends.
...
We appeared to be the only people in the building celebrating the New Year last night. When we ventured out of the flat at the stroke of midnight, it seemed that everyone else had gone to bed. Takashi and I stumbled around, drunk and aimless, but Ken and Kazu dashed off.
Ken returned moments later, exclaiming that Kazu had become trapped on the roof, so we all raced to the seventh floor.
At the top of the stairwell was a retractable set of steps leading to a doorway and the roof. Kazu had gone through only to discover that the door had a one-way spring lock. Ken was too drunk to attempt to climb up to the retractable steps, and whilst I was squinting in an effort to see just one of him, Takashi leapt up without a second thought and grabbed the steps. Ken and I pulled both down to the ground, and Takashi freed Kazu. Unsurprisingly, Kazu was considerably more sober following this experience.
We returned to the flat and in an attempt to signify this moment of friendship, unity and heroic stupidity, we all had a glug from my bottle of Newcastle Brown Ale. We watched pop videos on TV until 2.00am, and we all passed out.
...
That was me in Perth, Australia, 1990 going into 1991, twenty years old and on my first really big adventure. The only time in my life that I've kept a diary. The picture above is adapted from the sole photo I took on NYE 1990: Ken, my flatmate, and our friends Takashi and Kazu, presumably before the gin consumed us all.
Not the most rock 'n' roll New Year's Eve, perhaps, but the setting and company were once-in-a-lifetime experiences.
Fast forward to NYE 2024, swap Western Australia for South West England, my Japanese friends for Clan K, gin (and Newcastle Brown Ale) for whisky, and Roger Waters for Sophie Ellis-Bextor on TV, and it wasn't all that different.
Fortunately, we were less drunk, neither Mrs. K or Lady K got trapped on the roof and we went to bed before 2.00am, so I'm thankfully in a less fragile state in 2025 than I was in 1991.
This inevitably got me thinking about a Dubhed selection of Australian music that I was listening to during my time in the great continent. And so, for your listening pleasure, twenty songs and eighty minutes of sounds, mostly from 1990, with a few either side.
I came to Australia with a Walkman and a clutch of DIY compilations, such as a 'best of' The Go-Betweens. According to my diary, I bought CD singles by Big Pig and Stephen Cummings on 4th January 1991; later purchases included The Hummingbirds, Clouds (who featured here last summer), Tall Tales And True, INXS and Icehouse, as well as a 1987 compilation called Used And Recommended By.
Triple J was my go-to radio station at home, although the place where I worked blasted out the usual ad-heavy commercial crap you will find in every country. The former offered proof - and hope - that there was an alternative to Jimmy Barnes' strangled and strained singing.
I only went to one gig in Perth, but it was a good one: Ramones, supported by local heroes Ratcat. It was a great night and I wrote about it in 2022.
I should have included Divinyls' huge crossover hit, I Touch Myself, in today's selection and to be honest, I would have but I forgot!
I also wanted to include Ruby's Arms by Killing Time, a Top 10 indie hit in Australia in early 1991. However, I didn't buy the single at the time and I've been unable to track a copy down...at least, in the couple of hours since I first had the idea for this post.
Some artists of course went on to enjoy global success: INXS, Midnight Oil to a lesser extent, and Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, although the prospect of Nick being with us in 2025 let alone continuing to release vital albums seemed unlikely back in 1990/91.
Paul Kelly's label were hoping for worldwide fame. 1987 album Gossip was prepped for a major push in the US, with R.E.M. producer Scott Litt drafted to remix several songs, including Tighten Up. Paul's band were called The Coloured Girls, allegedly named jokingly after the line in Walk On The Wild Side by Lou Reed. Nah, thought the label, and the Stateside release of Gossip was credited to Paul Kelly & The Messengers.
Closing the compilation is a song from one of my favourite records of all, the 4-track Resisting Calm EP by Melanie Oxley & Chris Abrahams, released in 1990 on the independent label Spiral Scratch. Triple J played Benchtop (actually track 3/B1) to death, I was hooked and I had to track the record down. I bought Resisting Calm on 12" vinyl and eventually got it shipped by surface mail back to the UK.
Benchtop is a fantastic song and by rights should be on today's selection. That said, all four songs are wonderful and in the end, I chose Siren, the EP's opening song and fittingly, the closing moment here.
Enough looking back, time to look forward! I wonder what wonders 2025 will bring?
1) Miss Freelove '69 (Album Version By Hoodoo Gurus & Ed Stasium): Hoodoo Gurus (1990)
2) Man o' Sand To Girl o' Sea (Single Version By John Brand): The Go-Betweens (1983)
3) That Ain't Bad (Album Version By Nick Mainsbridge): Ratcat (1990)
4) Yes Sir, I Can Boogie (Album Version By Tim Cole): Not Drowning, Waving (1987)
5) Throw Your Arms Around Me (Re-Recorded Version By Hunters & Collectors & Clive Martin): Hunters & Collectors (1990)
6) Blue Sky Mine (Food On The Table Mix By Nick Launay): Midnight Oil (1990)
7) Rhythm Rude Girl (Live @ The Horden Pavilion, Sydney, Australia): The Angels (1990)
8) If A Vow: The Hummingbirds (1991)
9) Dream Baby (7" Version By Mike Duffy) (Cover of Roy Orbison): X (1987)
10) Hell (You Put Me Through) (7" Version By Stephen Cummings, Robert Goodge & Shane O'Mara): Stephen Cummings (1990)
11) Justifier (Single Mix By Daddy-O & Femi Jiya): Big Pig (1990)
12) Tighten Up (Re-Mixed Version By Scott Litt): Paul Kelly & The Coloured Girls (1987)
13) Lock It (Album Version By Falling Joys & Adrian Bolland): Falling Joys (1990)
14) Miss Divine (Album Version By Nick Launay): Icehouse (1990)
15) Suicide Blonde (Earth Mix By Paul Oakenfold & Steve Osborne): INXS (1990)
16) Black Betty (Cover of Leadbelly): Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds (1986)
17) White Rabbit (Cover of The Great Society with Grace Slick): The Shower Scene From Psycho (1985)
18) Superstition Highway (Single Version By Nick Mainsbridge): Tall Tales And True (1990)
19) Cloud Factory (Single Version By Clouds & Tim Whitten): Clouds (1990)
20) Siren (Single Version By Melanie Oxley, Chris Abrahams & Guy Dickerson): Melanie Oxley & Chris Abrahams (1990)
1983: Man o' Sand To Girl o' Sea EP: 2
1985: White Rabbit/Cinnamon Girl EP: 17
1986: The Singer EP: 16
1987: Cold And The Crackle: 4
1987: Dream Baby EP: 9
1987: Gossip: 12
1990: Beyond Salvation Live (VHS): 7
1990: Blue Sky Mine EP: 6
1990: Cloud Factory EP: 19
1990: Code Blue: 14
1990: Hell (You Put Me Through) EP: 10
1990: Justifier + Taste EP: 11
1990: Resisting Calm EP: 20
1990: Suicide Blonde EP: 15
1990: Superstition Highway EP: 18
1990: Throw Your Arms Around Me EP: 5
1990: Tingles EP: 3
1990: Wish List: 13
1991: If A Vow EP: 8
1991: Kinky: 1
