Dave Warner's Blog, page 4

ANOTHER LOVER

Still on the As and this week you get a little pearler ‘Another Lover’ which was written around 1985 for my rock musical Planet Pres' that played at Perth's Playhouse Theatre. The conceit of the play was, I still believe, ripper: sometime far into the future an intergalactic war breaks out. The good planet Zexon is fighting a losing battle against the bad Caponites. Their one chance of saving the world is to convince the neutral Planet Pres to help guide their supply ships through the galaxy. Nobody knows the backroads like the Presnoids. The Presnoids are all teens or early twenties and their social mores are based around “The Visions” which were found inside the “sacred relic”. This turns out to be Elvis’ gold cadillac. The visions are old Elvis movies.

So the idea of the play is classic musical. Hero, head of the Presnoids falls in love with Yolindra the Zexon anthro-officer. The head of the Zexon delegation, Ambassador Hordstrum, demands Yolindra use her love as a weapon to get Hero to help their cause. Hero, confused and in love agrees, but then he finds out Yolindra has been using him. Actually, she tried to tell him but was too late. Now remember, Hero has based his persona on Elvis so when he finds out and is heartbroken he performs a country number ‘Another Lover.’

This track comes from a demo tape I did with some musician friends (including some of the cast of the play and others who had been in the Sensational 60s like the singer here Frank Genovese). I had Frank playing Elvis in the Sensational 60s pub revue and his voice is perfect. I never got another professional performance out of the play which is one of the most disappointing stanzas of my career. More on that in other posts. Lyrics below

ANOTHER LOVER (Warner)

I have another, another lover

She looks exactly like you

She walks the same has the same name

The only difference is she’s true.

This other lover wouldn’t hurt me

I knew that from the moment we kissed

My only worry is I got a feeling

My other lover don’t exist.

So I can’t love you

Though I might want to

For another has captured my heart

She wouldn’t cheat me and I won’t cheat her

Though it hurts

Each and every moment we’re apart.

This other lover’s someone special

And I’ll wait forever if need be.

The only problem is

I got a feeling

This other lover don’t love me.

Yet I believe in Santa Claus and other miracles

And I hope one day

They she’ll come back

Though perhaps I’m just a fool.

If you see her

Say I miss her

Say I love her still

And ask her if she’ll release my heart

And I pray she’ll she never will

For I don’t mind loving phantoms

I fell in love with a dream

And I would rather die lonely

That find she wasn’t what she seems.

AMSTERDAM

‘Amsterdam’ represents a turning point in my songwriting. My first songs were mainly observational songs (Wine Parlour), anarchic rock (Throbbing Knob) or persona songs. ‘Lonely Sailor’ and ‘Vignettes’ marked the beginnings of autobiographical songs but `Amsterdam’ was the first time I harnessed a particular emotional event and tried to record that through song.

The genesis of `Amsterdam’ is explained fairly thoroughly in my audiobook ‘Mugs Game: A Suburban Odyssey.’ To recap, my first real girlfriend Y had broken off with me in my first term at Uni (1971). While devastated, some part of me accepted this as a natural turn of events and told me I had to knuckle down and find a new girlfriend, even though I doubted I could ever find one comparable. However, after seventeen successive rejections (Suburban Boy) I had lost faith. Somehow or other Y and I remained very close and when her life galloped from engagement to a crumpled marriage we hooked back up. This was when Pus was at its zenith and I’d decided to decamp to London to try and make the big time. So, just as romance was flourishing I had to abandon it. Never mind, Y decided she would come over and meet up with me after I’d spent a few months touring with my great travel companions Des and Larry. Not having a lot of savings she got a job on a ship and worked her way across. The ship was due to originally dock in London, then changed to Rotterdam, and finally Amsterdam.

From London I caught the train and then ferry to Holland to meet her. As I waited the night before the ship docked I had a dreadful feeling in my gut that I was doomed. I had an unerring knack of knowing when girls I was intoxicated by would bring down the guillotine.

Regretably I wasn’t wrong. I spent freezing hours with some kind Dutch stevodores in their little office. When the ship finally docked in the early hours, and I went onboard, Y was surprised to see me, and not in a good way. I was toast. I travelled back to London. I doubt I ever felt more alone than that twenty-four hours.

One good thing was that she had brought Tiesco my electronic organ with her. I carted it back to Brixton, set it up in my bedroom and began writing songs. This was the first of them, and remains one of my favourite songs. It was also one of the first songs we rehearsed and played in the Suburbs but fell out of the repertoire when we had to compete with boozy punters and big pubs. It is more suited to a concert. Sadly, I don’t have a Suburbs recording of it. A shame becuase Stuart Davies-Slate and John Dennison in particular were great on it.

So what you have is me just sitting at the piano doing a very rough version, but pretty much how it would have been that first time I wrote it – except not on Tiesco. Here is ‘Amsterdam'. (black and white photos Bleddyn Butcher 1976 - the girl is ‘Y’)

ALL THE SANDS IN CAIRO

This song I wrote around about 1991. Hard to be more precise but it was in with a batch of country songs and around the same time as tracks like Old Guitars. It’s quite a simple song from the point of view of a lover who has been spurned or deceived and vows it won’t happen again.

I’m happy with the lyrics in this and recently decided that it should actually have a fiddle and maybe banjo break, so it sits somewhere between country and folk. I don’t have any demos of it so have just done a rough recording with the organ here but you’ll get the idea.

original handwritten song

ALL THE GIRLS IN THE LADIES

In 1986, off the back of Banarama’s success, and sensing the arrival of what was going to be a tsunmai of female oriented pop, I set out to write a bunch of songs that would work for an all-female band. I wanted the challenge of writing great original songs to a particular market. I auditioned a number of singers in Perth and found three tremendously talented young women ‘Slinky', ‘Kinky’ and `Yummy.’ (Angie, Samantha and Nicole). I wrote a bunch of songs and reinvented some male-pop classics for the repertoire. I enlisted Neville Dowling (The Expression) to arrange and record backing tracks for the girls to sing to. In fact we did a version of the Troggs’ Love Is All Around that preceded Wet Wet Wet by 20 years but was almost identical in style.

The band slayed it at the Amercia’s Cup and received a number offers to tour east but on the eve of departure Angie and Samantha had a very severe car crash. Samantha escaped okay but Angie was too injured to be able to tour, and the tour had to proceed with just Slinky and Yummy. They did a great job but the fabulous harmonies they did as a three piece couldn’t be replicated.

This song All The Girls In The Ladies was a pop song with an edge of fun. The recording is of a rehearsal, a cassette recording of vocals live to the backing track.

ALL THE GIRLS IN THE LADIES (1986) (Warner)

There’s a new boy on the scene

They say he’s tall and dark and lean

Got brown hair eyes are blue

There’s nothing that he cannot do

They say he kisses fast and hot

There’s simply nothing he ain’t got

When he moves he’s like a lion

Nerves of steel fists of iron

All the girls in the ladies they talk about him

And the way he kisses

All the girls in the ladies talk about him

The way he never misses

All the girls in the ladies All the girls in the ladies

All the girls in the ladies do 

Is talk about you

Talk about you        

At his feet like little birds

Fall girls stunned by his lovely words

But every word contains an arrow

Just ask this little sparrow

All the girls in the ladies they talk about him

And the way he kisses

All the girls in the ladies talk about him

The way he never misses

All the girls in the ladies All the girls in the ladies

All the girls in the ladies do

Is talk about you

Talk about you

And Charlotte did you hear?

And Jasmine did you hear?

And darling did you hear?

About you About you About you

All the girls in the ladies they talk about him

And the way he kisses

All the girls in the ladies talk about him

The way he never misses

All the girls in the ladies All the girls in the ladies

All the girls in the ladies do

Is talk about you

Talk about you.

`AFTER THE FLOOD’ REVIEWS

So the book is out and the tour is complete. A fabulous time at the Kununurra, Armadale, and Big Sky Writers Festivals and then so many great shows in between at West Australian libraries, plus a fab event for Dymocks Busselton at The Shelter Brewery.

Gibb River Rd scene of many Dan Clement adventuresLake ArgyleBOYA LIBRARY – always greatclick on Gemma Nisbet link belowBig Sky authors hanging outThe Kimberley Crew

And the reviews are indeed out. And very, very positive. Here are a few samples: Bookgirl, Beauty and Lace

Better Reading , Gemma Nisbet

THE AUSTRALIAN

Overall I’d say After the Flood has been the best received of all my books and I hope it drives new readers to discover all my other favourites, not just Dan Clement but Georgette Watson (Over My Dead Body), Rick Boski (Exxxpresso), Blake Saunders (River of Salt), Fleur & Lizard, Ray Shearer and John Gordon (Big Bad Blood and the upcoming Summer of Blood) and of course Snowy Lane.

Thanks to all who have bought a copy or took the trouble to come and see Tony and me. It is much appreciated. My books are pretty much everywhere in Australia if you ask. Most are available from Fremantle Press. Big Bad Blood for the moment is only available as an e-book but that may change soon. Exxxpresso and my volume of short-stories ‘Briefly’ can be obtained from my website (signed) Murder In The Groove will soon be available from Booktopia.

Happy reading.

HOME TOWN UMPIRING: The usual story

For around the last twenty years I’ve been keeping simple stats on Home Town favouritism in AFL umpiring. Remarkably, the stats are incredibly consistent year after. Very rarely there will be a slight change in bias but year in year out it’s the same story.

First, what data do I use and what parameters am I looking at?

I use the simple free-kick stats published by the AFL. I split all games into one of these categories:

Vic Home Team v Vic Away Team

Non-Vic Home Team v Vic Away Team

Non-Vic Home Team v Non-Vic Away Team

Vic Home Team v Non-Vic Away Team

Away Team Derbies/Showdowns

Neutral Ground games where no team has an obvious crowd bias.

I then look at two sets of data. Firstly overall free-kick percentage. Secondly, the amount of Games Of Large Differential in free kicks and whether these favour home or away sides. I define games of large differential (GOLD games) as those in which one side gets 56% or more of free kicks.

Invariably the stats show these consistent results:

a) There is unquestionably home-team bias. b) The bias is minimal between Victorian teams playing one another c) While all teams playing away interstate suffer, Non-Victorian teams get a worse deal than Victorian teams – regardless of whether they are playing Victorian home teams, or Non-Victorian home teams. Even in local derbies, the Non-Victorian home team gets a worse deal.

The 2022 was an absolute Xerox of the norm:

Home Vic v Away VicHome Non Vic v Away VicHome Non-Vic v Away Non-VicHome Vic v Away Non-VicLocal Non-Vic DerbyNeutralhome team percentage of free kicks50.8252.3652.7353.4554.2556.5percentage of GOLD games in favour of home team 57.1473.688084.21100100GOLD games Home Team with greater frees161481631GOLD games Away with greater Frees1252300

So it’s ridiculous for the AFL to try to defend an accusation that umpiring isn’t biased. I can show them these figures year after year. And it is also spurious to suggest that Victorian teams don’t benefit overall. True, the bias againstb Vic teams playing interstate is awful but for Non-Victorian teams it’s even worse!

There is no reason why games between two Victorian clubs should show less bias other than the timidity of umpires to anger an overwhelming home crowd.

Let’s just hope we don’t get a repeat of the disgraceful bias shown in the 2016 Grand Final when sentimental Victorian home-town Bulldogs were given a free ride by a 20-8 free kick count.

Incidentally in that year the GOLD games in favour of Victorian Home Teams reached an all time high of 90.47% when 20 of 22 GOLD games went to the Victorian home team.

ALL BECAUSE OF YOU

Another in the Dave Warner song anthology

All Because Of You comes from my prolific 1990s songwriting period with Martin Cilia when I was writing a lot of country oriented material with a view to doing some albums in that vein. I felt then, and still largely do, that country/rock was about the only area left for narrative songwriting. Pop had given way to vocal gymnastic jingles, and while I appreciated rap I felt it was culturally specific to urban America. The rock stuff of that era was very highly produced and clinical, very American. You needed a big studio for it.

I heard this song as a kind of swampy Doctor John fun R&B thing and was lucky that through my friendship with Mal Green (Spily Enz) we could get him (drums) and the talented Don Hopkins (piano and vocals) to do a version for us. Martin did all the hard yards producing. I hope you enjoy

ALL BECAUSE OF YOU

ALL BECAUSE OF YOU

All the heads start turning when you walk through that door

The guys stop being boring and the girls stop being bored

Suddenly there’s action and they’re dancing cheek to cheek

And my old heart is thumping every time our fingers meet

All the joint starts jumpin’ when you sway through that door

Quiet guys start talking like they never did before

The pool balls start a clickin’ and the dancing starts to groove

All these joints start jumpin’ and it’s all because of you

All because of you, all because of you

This whole world is different and it’s all because of you

All because of you the air I breathe tastes sweet

All because of you I am suddenly complete

I’m dancing where I used to sit and I’m laughing through and through

Someone switched on all the lights and that someone girl is you.

BREAK

All the joint starts jumpin’ when you walk through that door

The whisky goes down sweeter than it ever has before

In every corner of the bar it’s like a comet lights the sky

Everyone starts having fun and I know the reason why

All because of you, all because of you

This whole world is different and it’s all because of you

All because of you the air I breathe tastes sweet

All because of you I am suddenly complete

I’m dancing where I used to sit and I’m laughing through and through

Someone switched on all the lights and that someone girl is you.

All because of you, all because of you

This whole world is different and it’s all because of you

AFTER THE FLOOD

The Latest Dan Clement novel

The third in my series of books featuring Broome based detective Dan Clement is now out there for public consumption. `After The Flood’ while still a mystery, has plenty of action and thrills and I’m super excited it has been getting terrific reviews. Apple Books have also made it a What To Read for the month of August, so check it out and grab a copy here if it sounds like your thing. Rather than write about it, let me tell you all about it now.

And thank you all for your ongoing support.

ROADIES

DAVE AND JOHNNY COMEDY 1980s

Worn out after five years of rehearsing and performing in pubs all over the country, Johnny (Leopard/Ryan) and I began to explore comedy as a new creative outlet. We wrote a bunch of comedy sketches that might run anything from 2 to 8 minutes, might require costuming or not. Then we began perfoming these at places like Ricardos in Northbridge and The Chelsea Tavern in Claremont.

We were aided and abetted by the likes of David Zampatti, Geoff Kelso and Atilla Ozsdolay before Cathy Jennings and then Damien O’Doherty became part of our `bi-sexual’ troupe.

This sketch was written circa 1983 and recorded around 1988. Transferred from casette to digital by Tony Cooper. Hope you enjoy ROADIES.

SURVIVING THE REVIEW

Don’t let a malicious review destroy you. Readers and history might be on your side.

A first-time novelist is a very vulnerable critter. I know that while I was enormously excited back in 1995 when my first novel ‘City of Light’ was published, I was also nervous about any pending reviews. I doubt any author knows they can write, you hope you can, you hope your publisher and editor were right to support you, and then you hold your breath. The first review I got, from a fellow Perth crime-writer was about as lacerating as you could imagine and I reproduce the second page of it here for you to zoom in on. I think it’s fair to say the review went far beyond the scope of a normal book review’s focus on text to personally attack me as ‘cowardly’ and ‘unethical’ before this final gem “City of Light isn’t just a good mystery ruined, it’s a sad book because the only corruption revealed is in the writer himself”.

Not only did ‘City of Light’ go on to sell a lot of copies, it is still selling, twenty-seven years on, and perhaps more importantly in this case it was judged the best fiction work in the West Australian Premier’s Award for 1996. That was unheard of for a crime novel back then. Reviews have their place but they are simply opinions written by other people who bring a whole heap of their own preferences, backgrounds and prejudices to the table. Hopefully readers, listeners and viewers are strong enough to make up their own minds, but it can be devastating for an artist/writer/musician to cop a vicious review, and it may discourage them from pursuing something for which they have a great talent.

Having spent more than a few years in the music industry I was used to bad reviews. One that still rankles is the Rolling Stone review for my fourth album ‘This Is My Planet’ by Ed St John who went on run Warner Music – who ironically controlled my old Mushroom Records catalogue for a time. That album contains some of my very best, and most loved songs – A Million Miles From Home, Bicton versus Brooklyn, UK Euchred, Buried In My Own Backyard, Kookaburra Girl and Car Park, which St John fallaciously claimed ripped-off the riff of Summertime Blues. While I wrote Car Park to emulate Summertime Blues with its simplicity and energy and as a cornerstone of a raw old style rock-album, my guitarist Bob Searles deliberately worked up a riff that was not the same but made you think it might be. But in the context of a whole album would it have even mattered if it was the same? The reviewer completely missed the point, not just about that song but the whole album and its desire to return to the energy of the roots of rock and roll at the height of synths of drum machines. Unfortunately, for me at the time, struggling to get FM airplay from the likes of the “cool” stations like MMM, and battling severe asthma induced by cigarette smoke, it was yet another reason to give up full-time music. In the end, an artist needs champions in the media to expand their audience, not personal attacks.

Interestingly, despite the reviewer vilifying me for writing a book that focused on police corruption, subsequent judicial enquiries have called into question police integrity in relation to real events I used as touchstones to my fictional story. Police of the time have been implicated in murder and cover-ups. I also had a very senior politician later ask me privately, who had been my source, because the goings on I had written were apparently so close to the truth on some matters. Contrary to what the reviewer claimed, while I like many other writers may be inspired and emotionally charged by real events and real people that doesn’t mean I’m merely changing a name.

History has come down on my side in the case of City of Light. Ultimately that particular review perhaps said more about the insecurities of the reviewer than the text but artists and audience should never lose sight of the fact that is always the case. Even if an artist/writer gets a good review, and I am fortunate to have had far more of those than negatives, it is still best to judge for yourself.