Trial By Fire… The hope and expectation weigh heavily on the faithful… It’s just a game…
#1 In the heartland, the hot and dreary suburbs where the faithful worship, in fibro shacks on overgrown plots and brick veneer two-bedders fronting onto rumbling through-roads, this is where the pain is felt most keen. The pain of two torturous years in which respite has been rare, with little to celebrate and even less …
2020: Savage Reflections On An Election…
And so it ended much as it began; as a bad joke, a parody of itself, something at which to laugh, long and loud, if not for the four years of carnage – financial, social, economic, racial, environmental – that had preceded it. And sandwiched between a funeral home and a sex shop, no less, …
The Broncos, 2020 – A Eulogy…
There are times, in life, where one must let go. Times where, despite the passion and fervour inherent in one’s worship of an ideal, an institution, an expectation perhaps, that one just has to stop; to breath deeply; to accept. I’ve watched, as have many others, the demise of a behemoth. And yet no one …
The Sickness…
The players are sick. They have, to a man, been infected with something vile and insidious, something which one doesn’t catch from a mere exchange of airborne contagions, the result of wintery affliction. No. You could see it on their faces last week, eyes downcast and heads hung low. Hands on hips and faces set …
The Dawning Of A Realisation…
Most days, when you first wake in the morning, arising from a deep sleep, there’s that blissful second or two of disorientation. That short time where anything is possible and everything is within your grasp, a blank slate to be filled with whatever it is your heart desires. Quickly, of course, your brain sets itself, …
Anxious Times Before Kickoff… A Contest Ensues… This Cruel Mistress That Is The Game We Love…
The text message comes in moments before kickoff. ‘Talk to me, mate. What’s going to happen tonight?’ It’s a question I’m unable to answer as I watch the two teams stream onto the park, Manly looking fit and confident, Brisbane somewhat nervous, not sure themselves of what’s to come. As the pandemic has eased …
Wherefore Art Thou, Maroon & Gold?
It’s late, sometime after ten, when the malaise sets in. My phone, now silent, lies on the table amidst the debris; two or three empty beer cans, a half full bottle of Makers, the overflowing ashtray. Claire has long since gone to bed and I’m left in the semi-dark to contemplate the cruel nature of …
1990s Music Still Sound As Ever…
The 1990s. Musically, a monster of a decade. A bustling local scene, myriad venues thriving, people spilling from pubs and clubs creating a happening soundtracked by the most powerful of sounds ever to be wrenched from electric guitars, bass and drums, thudding and raw, a real time. Indeed, truly the greatest musical decade of all, at …
This Christmas, The ‘Where’ Is Just As Important As The ‘Who’…
[Published on Medium, December 31] They say that, at this time of year, it doesn’t matter where you are. It matters more who you’re with, family and friends, loved ones, people you travel vast distances to spend time around; those you might not see regularly throughout the year, and so when the festive season lands …
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Worrying About The Future
[UNPUBLISHED] A little after midnight on a Friday, almost a week into the new year, our daughter was born. Our first child, she entered the world in a flurry of flailing limbs, eyes wide in surprise at being wrenched from the warmth of the womb, howling like a freight train out of control on dark …
Trumped
[UNPUBLISHED] The rain has stopped. It’s cooler now, the aroma of wet earth rising and mingling with the cigarette stench and the smell of fish off the barbeque, long since eaten, digested; we’re on to bourbon now, beer chasers, rolling new smokes and lighting them with the stubbs of the old. A clutch of moths …
Crowded Solitude No Place For New Year’s Resolve
[Published in the NEWS REVIEW section of The Sydney Morning Herald, January 09/2016] Around a year ago, I took up running. Most mornings, around seven o’clock, I’d rise and don the appropriate footwear, shorts and a t-shirt, and I’d head out, do a few stretches then jog my way down the road, do a few laps …
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What Came Out Of BigSound
[An alternate version of this story ran on Crikey, Friday September 13, 2013 – click here] BigSound Fortitude Valley, Brisbane September 10-13, 2013 Sitting on the bus into Brisbane’s Fortitude Valley for the final night of BigSound – Australia’s reasonably modest answer to the behemoth that is Austin, Texas, music industry shindig South By South West …