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Behind the Rock and Beyond. Leon Isackson
Читать онлайн.Название Behind the Rock and Beyond
Год выпуска 0
isbn 9781456604592
Автор произведения Leon Isackson
Жанр Учебная литература
Издательство Ingram
For a lot of these dances, during Leon’s first week, we had to use other singers instead of Dig as he was still recovering from the accident and only did the most important shows. For instance, at Brookvale we used Lonnie Lee one night and Ray Hoff the next. The Brookie dances were worth six quid (£6) each.
Sunday night: Phyllis Bates Ballroom in Pitt Street, City. This was one of our regular dances and this night we used Lonnie Lee instead of Dig. Six quid (£6). (Reminds me of a joke about a ‘sick squid’.)
Monday night: Teen Time, Dale Wayne as support act again this week. Six guineas (£6/6/-).
Tuesday afternoon: Band practice at Northbridge Masonic Hall, then at night, Marrickville Kings Theatre with Dig. I’ve gone blank on this gig. I have no recollection of it at all. But if it’s in Leon’s “Crazy Book”, we did it! Ten quid (£10)!
Wednesday night: Cabramatta Civic Hall, with Dig, Kitten Dwyer and Mark Rebel & the Vampires. Six pounds, five shillings (£6/5/-).
Thursday arvo: Practice at Northbridge again and then Chatswood Dispensary Hall at night. The R’Jays and Lee Rivers. Seven pounds, ten shillings (£7/10/-).
Friday night: Lithgow Showground Hall with Dig. Drawn a blank on this one too. Strange, Lithgow’s such a memorable town! Twenty-one pounds (£21)!
Saturday night: Back to Brookie for another dance, this time with Ray Hoff filling in for Dig. Six quid (£6).
Sunday night: Phyllis Bates with Lonnie Lee filling in. Another sick squid (£6).
At this time Lonnie had a hit record in the charts called Ain’t It So. He also had a beautiful sister, Liz who was sort of going out with Warren Williams at the time. I desperately wanted to “sort of” go out with her too but I never succeeded because she was stolen away by our newly-found drummer Leon ... you grasscutter!
Monday: Well folks, that’s the end of two weeks with Dig & the R’Jays and the “Baby Drummer” as Leon was called. Back to Teen Time with only Dig on this week. Six guineas (£6/6/-). 53
So over this two-week period I made a total of 133 pounds, 12 shillings (£133/12/-), which in 1959 was not bad bread and a whole lot better than “don’t give up your day job!” We’re off to Melbourne tomorrow and I’m going to meet a lovely girl called “Mouldy Marlene”.
THE ONE YOU MISS...
The Silver Top taxi weaved precariously through the mid-morning Melbourne traffic on our way from Essendon Airport to the Melbourne Town Hall for a lunchtime concert. We sat in the cab excitedly talking about the differences between Melbourne and Sydney, like the silly right-hand turns, the trams and the safety zones that go with them, and the really tarted-up looking girls.
“Tell us, is that Dick Richard really a poofta?” Now this is one of the standard cab driver questions along with “What’s Johnny O’Keefe really like?” and “There’s a lot of pooftas in the entertainment business, isn’t there?” Maybe we’ll get around to answering these questions for you later on, guys! Meanwhile, keep your eyes on the road! Fortunately Dig was in the cab in front and we satisfied the inquisitive cab driver with “No, he’s as normal as you and I mate!”
“Well y’never can tell with these types can yers?” he said as we bumped across the tramlines.
There was a large queue of Melbourne’s finest waiting to get into the Town Hall. Some of them screamed, “There he is, there’s Dig!” and “That must be the R’Jays!” Some of them broke away from the queue and started to chase the cabs but we turned into the back of the Town Hall and lost them. I kind of wanted them to catch us but I knew that we could easily lose some clothing or anything else they could get their sweaty little hands on for a souvenir.
We found out there were two shows to do. Supporting us were two local bands the High Marks and the Hi-Fi’s (most confusing) and Frankie Davidson who was a pretty big star in Melbourne at the time. “Hi,” said Frankie. “You guys certainly caused a bit of a stir out the front!”
“Not nearly as much as we’re going to stir up out there, Frank,” said Dig, pointing towards the stage. We did stir them up a little as well! The lunchtime concerts were always grand occasions and they became the inspiration for the so-called “live” EP Dig Richards At The Melbourne Town Hall. Well I think the applause was “live” anyway! Melbourne Town Hall is a bit like Sydney Town Hall in that the acoustics are lousy but the atmosphere is great. You certainly don’t have to use much echo there, which was lucky because we didn’t have any! Echo was a luxury in sound that was strictly reserved for the recording studio. In fact, at that time, our equipment compared to that of Melbourne bands was sadly lacking. But what we lacked in equipment and band size (The Thunderbirds was about a ten-piece band) we made up for in popularity which did tend to make those Melbourne bands a little pissed-off.
Show over, we headed off to our hotel, the London, for well-earned drinks, relaxation, food and, hopefully, SEX! Some of the girls had found out (or maybe we told them?) what hotel we were staying at and they followed us back. Hotel policy definitely did not condone girls in the rooms and in those days they enforced the rule pretty heavily. Undaunted, we led some of the girls up the fire escape and in through a window to our rooms.
“You can’t do this!” said our Melbourne tour manager Chris Diprose. “You’ll get us thrown out.” Panic, panic! “Shut up,” I said. “There’s one for you too!”
“Well get them into the room quickly before someone comes down the hall.” More panic, panic!
It’s interesting to note at this point the method we adopted for culling out the less broad-minded of the female fans. This was accomplished by a series of “party tricks” each one guaranteed to get rid of a certain percentage of guests. These were as follows:
DANCE OF THE FLAMING ARSE HOLES, which consists of sticking the local newspaper up your arse and lighting it, then dancing around the room. In some towns the local rag is a little small, which results in a burnt bottie. Deterrent value: 50% at least.
ERIC BAUME: For all of you that do not remember him, Eric Baume was a rather bad-tempered current affairs expert of the time on TV and radio who later was the Beast on Beauty And The Beast. He had thick horn-rimmed glasses and a very thick moustache. To perform the trick, all one has to do is place a pair of horn-rimmed glasses on top of one’s genitals. Preferably, one should have dark hair and be past the age of puberty. Deterrent value: 25%
W.O.W!: This one is performed by borrowing lipstick from one of the remaining guests and painting a large ‘W’ on each cheek of your arse. When you return to the room you may not be good-looking but when you bend over ...“WOW!” Deterrent Value: 25%.
The inventor of the first two tricks had all of these attributes plus the horned-rimmed specs as well! He is none other than the famous (or infamous!) John Bogie of the Joy Boys who later made an instrumental record of The Dance Of The Flames. He is the inventor of many famous party tricks, some of which we weren’t even game enough to perform, such as DOCTOR BEAUJAIS’ ANATOMY TEST and the BUM LAMPSHADE. If ever there was a lull in proceedings, Peter Baker would exclaim in a loud Shakespearian voice: “Oh for the joys of SEXUAL INTERCOURSE!” This was usually followed by a couple of nervous girls scurrying for the door while the more stout-hearted ones remained.
Sometimes the party tricks would all go wrong and ALL the fans would be horrified and leave but “that’s show biz!”
Meanwhile, back at the London, one room as usual was designated The Party Room. It’s a good idea not to let it be your room because not only do you have all the mess in the morning, but you have to take your bird, if you get one, into someone else’s room (decadent party hint No.1). Well, in the party room there were about six girls remaining. Two of them were Jackie and Marlene. Jackie came from Collingwood. I went to her place on a later trip. Marlene