Nice place to visit … glad I don’t live there

March 14, 2013
by Rodney Olsen
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cassette

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

I did a lot of living back in the eighties but these days my greatest connection to the decade fashion forgot is some of the music from that era. I hear a lot of eighties music but now and then I hear a song from that period that I haven’t heard for so many years that it just transports me back there. It wasn’t all good, in fact there was some appalling music released in the eighties, but there were some classics.

A lot happened in that 10 years. In 1980 I turned 17, got my ’72 TC Cortina and the license to drive it. I even drove it, with a couple of friends, all the way across Australia to see Sydney and Newcastle.

The eighties took me from my teen years into my mid-twenties.

I completed my apprenticeship and became a qualified chef. I then left cooking behind and went looking for a real job.

On special occasions I would wear a three piece suit. It was brown.

I learnt what George Harrison meant in his song Teardrops, when he said, “In the heart of the lonely man, in and out of love more often where most others can.” Unrequited love is never easy.

My hair was various lengths throughout the decade. I still have photos of my incredible mullet.

I hung out with some great friends and shared houses with some good mates. I discovered some excellent music and went to dozens of concerts.

Later in the eighties my mother died. I cycled across Australia for the first and second times. The girl who’d held my heart for many years finally decided she wanted to be more than friends. Eleven months later we went back to being friends.

The eighties was also the decade that I finally organised myself to get into the radio industry, which is where my heart was all along.

A lot happened in the eighties. It was a decade of discovering a little bit more about who I was and who I was becoming.

So would I want to go back there? No thanks.

I wouldn’t want to go back there because I didn’t meet Pauline until January 1992. We married in December the same year.

It would have been so wonderful to have shared those times with Pauline. They were amazing years with some incredible highs and lows but all that time the real love of my life was living just 20 or so kilometres away. I wish our paths could have merged so much sooner. Maybe the connection wouldn’t have worked if we’d met earlier – I don’t know – but I really do wish that we could have had those years together.

What were the eighties for you? A time of happiness or regrets? Highs, lows or both?



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Soundtrack of my Life – Let the Day Begin

September 22, 2012
by Rodney Olsen
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SoundtrackofMyLife.jpgThe Call were one of my very favourite bands and so when lead singer and bass player Michael Been passed away in August 2010 at the age of 60 it was a sad day indeed.

Although The Call were never megastars, you might remember some of their songs such as The Walls Came Down or Let the Day Begin.

Let the Day Begin is the title track from their 1989 album. The song reached number one on the US Mainstream Rock chart, by far their biggest hit. While none of their other songs reached those heights on the charts, they built a strong catalogue of stunning music.

The Call formed in Santa Cruz in 1980 by vocalist/guitarist Michael Been, Scott Musick, and Tom Ferrier. Been and Musick were originally from Oklahoma. Been was previously a member of Chicago band Aorta, and then, between 1969 and 1971, of Lovecraft, the successor band to the psychedelic rock group H.P. Lovecraft.

Beginning with their self-titled debut in 1982, the Call went on to produce a total of 10 albums by 2000. The eponymous premiere album was recorded in England, and Been later recalled that the band was in an exploratory phase at this point. Been noted in a 1988 interview, “The Call was a compassionate album, but it probably came out as anger.” Peter Gabriel liked the band so much that he asked them to open for him during his 1982 “Shock the Monkey” tour. – Wiki

They never classed themselves as a ‘Christian’ band but their music causes has always caused me to stop and think. It still causes me to re-evaluate my relationship with God and to feel deeply about stuff in a way that most ‘Christian’ music can’t. Here’s a snippet from an article run in Contemporary Christian Music Magazine quite some years ago.

Though the Call is marginally connected with Christian music, Been’s not given to aligning himself with it. In fact, he says he never even heard of the Cornerstone Festival before The Call’s slot on the fest’s Encore stage in July.

“I’m not even aware of that world, really,” Been explains. “I found the Christian market to be a whole different culture, and I didn’t care for it very much. It hasn’t been very exciting or interesting or innovative, although I love Over the Rhine, Bruce Cockburn and Mark Heard. I just find it sad that we make distinctions with music – to me it’s depressing that there’s even black music and white music.

“I [wish] Christian musicians wrote more about their life experiences instead of trying to be so ‘on the nose’ with spiritual language. It doesn’t give people room to be who they are at the stage they’re at in life. I like to write with the feel of parables, not in strict language. I’m attracted to people who tell me a story, and then I see what it stirs up in my own life. But putting Psalms to music? Taking 30 lines from the Bible for a song? That’s why I like religious books, for instance, rather than books on religion.”

Unfortunately, at least one recent development has further soured Been to Christian music. “Of the 10 major Christian market radio stations, six have refused to play the Best of The Call because of my involvement in The Last Temptation of Christ,” says Been, who played the role of John the Baptist in the film. “I never thought the movie was blasphemous. We were trying to do something important. Of course, if I publicly denounce and regret my involvement in it….

“It just doesn’t feel good, these rules and regulations and laws. There’s a whole lot of language you have to be hip to. I’m always asked, ‘Have you accepted the Lord?’ ‘Are you saved?’ All these codes and passwords. Well, you know, there was a different question asked many years ago in Ireland or Scotland, and it’s more to the point: ‘Do you believe in the blood?’ My answer? ‘Yes. I believe in the blood.’ I’m not quite sure what that other stuff means, but hopefully we won’t go ‘I got it! I got it!’ during our lives because once you say that, you’ve just proven that you haven’t got it.”



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David Campbell talks about Let’s Go

November 22, 2011
by Rodney Olsen
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There are four CDs that have taken an absolute hammering in our home over recent years. The Swings Sessions, The Swing Sessions 2, Good Lovin’, and On Broadway.

All these albums come from one artist – David Campbell.

Now there’s a new album to add to the list. David has gone back to the eighties to bring us a dozen stunning songs under the banner of Let’s Go.

Personally for David, LET’S GO represents the missing link in the songs that helped shape him into the singer he is today.

“I was schooled in this music,” says David. “This was the time where I was hitting puberty, taping songs off Countdown onto my VHS tape and watching them over and over. For me, it’s primal party music, but with style.”

The Style Council’s “Shout To The Top”, John Waites’ “Missing You”, Yazoo’s “Only You”, Spandau Ballet’s “True” – these are the songs that struck an emotional chord with the artist as a young man and provided a counter-balance to the old school swing and Broadway influences David was soaking up from his grandmother’s record collection. As Gran taught David the classics, his mum and aunt fed him a healthy dose of Style Council and Dexy’s Midnight Runners [“Come On Eileen”].

These are the songs that make up the soundtrack to David’s adolescence. “‘A lot of these songs have different memories for me,” he says. “‘Shout To The Top’ I went to my aunty’s engagement party, they put it on the stereo and I was like, ‘Wow, what the hell is that?’ I did my first school dance to ‘True’, for goodness sake,” he laughs.

He joined me on the line during today’s Morning Cafe on 98.5 Sonshine FM. Just click the play button on the audio player below to hear today’s interview.

[audio:http://mpegmedia.sonshinefm.ws/feeds/MOR221111_0951.mp3]

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Soundtrack of My Life – You Are in My System

November 1, 2010
by Rodney Olsen
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SoundtrackofMyLife.jpgYouTube is full of memories. The video below of Robert Palmer takes me back over 25 years to the days when I’d walk into Happy Granny’s at Scarborough Beach sometime after midnight with a couple of good friends. It was a hamburger place and even before I got to the counter Ursula would be calling my order into the microphone. “One Tri-Burger, no salad, large chips, and a caramel thick shake.” Yes, I was really that predictable and I really did eat that badly.

Once I’d paid for my late night munchies I’d walk over to the video juke box and put in my money so that I could play Robert Palmer’s You Are in My System. I could watch it over and over again.

Back in those days we would sometimes be sitting around at home at 1:00 a.m. and decide to head off to Happy Granny’s for a burger. For the life of me I can not work out why any more. Back then 1 or 2 in the morning seemed like a perfectly reasonable time to grab something significant to eat. These days, the idea of being awake, let alone eating anything, at 11:00 p.m. seems completely unthinkable.

If I could swap one day from 2010 to revisit those times I’d probably do it, but I certainly wouldn’t want to go back there permanently. I’ve got great memories of those times but life is so much better here and now.

As for the song, I’ve never even owned a copy. I’ve got a couple of Robert Palmer CDs but neither contains You Are in My System. Maybe I should find a ‘best of’ that has it some day or maybe it’s just one of those songs that will remain a memory that I can find online every now and then when I want to wander down memory lane.

What songs make up the soundtrack of your life? What memories come flooding back when you hear a particular song?

Robert Palmer died way too soon in 2003 at the age of just 54 from a massive heart attack. An enormous loss to the entertainment world.

Enjoy watching the video …. and make sure you turn it up really loud.



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Remembering the Eighties

June 23, 2008
by Rodney Olsen
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Rubiks_Cube.jpgIt was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

I was listening to some music from the eighties a few days ago and found myself feeling a little sad. Not a lot … just a little. I started missing the decade that style forgot and I wondered why. I hear a lot of eighties music but now and then I hear a song from that period that I haven’t heard for so many years that it just transports me back there. This time it was Lost Weekend by Lloyd Cole & the Commotions.

A lot happened in that 10 years. In 1980 I turned 17, got my ’72 TC Cortina and the license to drive it. The eighties took me from my teen years into my mid-twenties.

I completed my apprenticeship and became a qualified chef. I then left cooking behind and went looking for a real job.

I learnt what George Harrison meant in his song Teardrops, when he said, “In the heart of the lonely man, in and out of love more often where most others can.” Unrequited love is never easy.

I hung out with some great friends and shared houses with some good mates. I discovered some excellent music and went to dozens of concerts.

Later in the eighties my mother died. I cycled across Australia for the first and second time. The girl who’d held my heart for many years finally decided she wanted to be more than friends. Eleven months later we went back to being friends.

The eighties was also the decade that I finally organised myself to get into the radio industry, which is where my heart was all along.

A lot happened in the eighties. It was a decade of discovering a little bit more about who I was and who I was becoming.

So why was I sad? Did I want to go back there? No thanks.

I realised that it was more about the fact that I didn’t meet Pauline until January 1992. We married in December the same year.

It would have been so wonderful to have shared those times with Pauline. They were amazing years with some incredible highs and lows but all that time the real love of my life was living just 20 or so kilometres away. I wish our paths could have merged so much sooner. Maybe the connection wouldn’t have worked if we’d met earlier – I don’t know – but I really do wish that we could have had those years together.

What were the eighties for you? A time of happiness or regrets? Highs, lows or both?



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