Spectrum and Madder Lake Waddle the Walk at the Oakleigh Lounge
26.7.22 - Maria and I decided to go separately to our first Double Bill gig for a while at the Oakleigh Lounge (formerly the Caravan Music Club at the Oakleigh-Carnegie RSL) so she could be spared the sound check with its interminable tuning of the drumkit, amongst other things.
As I walked into the familiar hall, optimistically laid out for a full house, our sound engineer, the legendary Pixie Michael, was indeed fine-tuning the kick drum sound with Madder Lake’s drummer, Luke, patiently punching his foot-pedal like some grossly amplified agitated heartbeat – so, as I walked back out I prudently inserted my ear protection.
I’d remembered on the drive in that I’d left my new you-beaut folding trolley at home and had rung M to ask her to bring it with her for the load-out at least, so I was glad when the genial Steve Georgiou intercepted me as I staggered through the door with my god-awful heavy Hot Rod amp and offered to carry it the rest of the way to the stage.
Sound check was inevitably running behind, but we had a decent-sized stage for a change so I was looking forward to stretching out, physically and musically, after the prolonged COVID-induced break.
Unfortunately Spectrum had only begun sound-checking after the doors had been opened to the public and we didn’t really have time to adjust the stage set-up, so the frontline of Daryl, Bren and Broc was crammed on stage right with me on my own on stage left, so it wasn’t a vastly different experience from some of the tiny stages at smaller venues.
I have to admit that I was very, very cranky about that, but thankfully managed to channel my anger into the performance and actually found myself enjoying it.
We premiered a couple of revivals; the instrumental Launching Place Part 1, originally recorded on the I’ll Be Gone session at Bill Armstrong’s 100 Albert Park Rd studio, (but subsequently ‘lost’ for a couple of decades), and What the World Needs (is a New Pair of Socks), or simply Sox, from the Milesago album, a song that encapsulates the odd-ball humour of my songs from that era.
They both went pretty well too, but the small crowd on hand was struggling to sound like an actual crowd. Nevertheless, they gamely joined in with the standard singalongs, Red Hot Momma, Esmeralda and I’ll Be Gone and we flounced off stage (well, I flounced anyway) - after Keaton Robertson’s impromptu Blues in A that is – feeling we’d done the best we could.
Sadly, now things are looking ever-bleaker, (we just found out that Broc's contracted COVID - and he was the most assiduous of the band in masking up), and I suspect it’s only going to get more difficult over the next weeks and months. It’s not just the music scene, although you might think that we’re doing it harder than some other sectors from all the squealing, (music does squealing really well). Given the recent surge in cases, the next Double Bill show booked at the Rochford Winery on Saturday the 6th of August could be under threat. (I'll let you know, of course).
In the meantime, Spectrum and Madder Lake wish you and your families all the very best of health. As well as ourselves. As Bill Putt wrote, 'It’s a lottery my friend..'