When my nephews were little, i thought the standard kids records of the day were pretty boring, so i used to sit them down, and scratch mix the records for them. Instead of your standard ‘Ugly Duckling’ i’d be varying the speed, then playing parts in reverse, they seemed particulally fond of the animals in reverse (can’t say i disagree). The following two clips are from the tapes i mixed up for them, if you listen closely you can hear my nephews giggling in the background, and me all fang and hiss at them, threatening to (caringly) throttle them if they didn’t stop giggling. Honestly, i’m too nice for my own good .. and seriously, who else had an uncle cool enough to scratch mix Puff N Toot for them.
Click the highlighted links below:
“Nature never repeats herself, and the possibilities of one human soul will never be found in another.”
― Elizabeth Cady Stanton
What else to do on a freezing, rainy, Sunday afternoon, but list the first five seven inch singles ever given to me, or that i purchased. I have no shame on this list, in fact i couldn’t be prouder, and wouldn’t change one of them.
#1
The EP of South Pacific, given to me by my eldest sister Dianne. ‘Some enchanted evening’ really is the first piece of music i can remember hearing.
#2
A childrens record, i have no idea where this came from, maybe my mum. The opening song ‘Boys and girls come out to play’ was always my favorite, many years later i had it as my answer machine music.
#3
‘Long haired lover from Liverpool’, i’m pretty sure this was gifted to me by my sister Rhonda. I have a memory of being able to, and actually singing this all the way through when i was little, i probably still could .. for the right money.
#4
‘Ben’ by Michael Jackson, this may have been the first song i heard on the radio, and asked someone to buy for me.
#5
‘Hey Paula’ by Ernie Sigley and Denise Drysdale. Without question, this is the very first record i ever purchased, some would feel mortifying shame, i only feel boundless pride, such is the camp value, such is the musical terror, the utter wrongness, that i wear this reality as a badge of filth honor. I vividly remember going up to Corrimal and purchasing the record, it was in a little recod shop up a side ally.
It cost me fifty cents, and i almost wore it out, mostly from playing it backwards. I guess i was about nine when i got this, i had a little record player and cassette machine in my room, i used to make weird tapes, and years before i heard about them, or they probably even existed, i would make ‘Scratch’ recordings, where i would drive the record player backwards using my thumb, and record it onto tape.
I would find a rhythm and rock my thumb backwards, and forwards creating a beat. I was off school one day when i was little, with a chest infection. I was playing with my tapes, and while scratching an ‘Alf Garnett’ comedy album of him singing, i accidently recorded a cough, which came out on the tape looped.
Over the last week while preparing to move, i found a box of ancient cassettes, on some of them were some of these backwards, and scratchy tapes.
Is it any wonder i was a loner and ostracized as a child?, most other kids were outside kicking a ball, i was in my room playing Alf Garnett, and Alice in wonderland records backwards.
You can hear “Hey Paula” HERE
And my looped coughing fit, and guitar, mixed with Alf Garnett titled “Primal Garnett” HERE
Only this morning i was discussing with a mate the very first concert i ever attended, Sherbet at Wollongong Town Hall. I was only eleven, but i remember it so well. Later this afternoon in an unrelated post on Facebook, someone posted an ad for the concert, and their memories .. too weird 🙂
Photo courtesy of the Lost Wollongong Facebook group.
Today i purchased my first apartment, that’s a pretty grown up thing to do. It’s a huge downsize in space from where i’m living now, but that is a good thing, for the longest while i’ve been overwhelmed by the detris and flotsome one collects over a lifetime. For the past six months i’ve been shedding myself of these material burdons, or items which once brought me temporary pleasure, but now hold little interest to me. It’s been so cleansing, and something of a relief to let these things go, i want to make room for whatever lays ahead, clear the decks as it were. For the past year i’ve been looking at properties with an eye to purchase, i had a definate financial limit, and as i’ve found when looking for a place, compromises have to be made, and options weighed up. I chose a smaller place, but in an area that feels like home, is familiar to me, and about a five minute walk away from North Wollongong Beach, i’ll trade that for square metres any day. I walked in, and this place felt ‘right’ to me, it was renovated exactly as i would have done it, Shi Shi kitchen, with pale lime glass spalsh back, and a nice white bathroom, the vanity is even white porcelain (i’m sorry, i’ve done my share of polyurethane basins, i deserve smooth surfaces). So, a new chapter begins, onward, and upward.
