#i remember she played for the stars way back and then moved to red melbourne but i can't remember her being in the team for wbbl04

[fazcinatingblog]

i legit just looked at the AUSvNZ cricket scores and wondered why satterthwaite and tahuhu are on the other team..... 

[a-man-for-hire-and-his-archives]

EXCLUSIVE: On Set With The Cast Of INXS: Never Tear Us Apart

LOCATION # 1:

New Council Chambers, Trades Hall, Carlton (7.30am)

Approximately 45 extras file down Lygon Street. There's an abundance of acid wash denim and it could be 1987 all over again. This morning, Trades Hall becomes the makeshift venue inside which one of INXS' college gigs as they targeted the US market is about to be recreated. During a previous shoot, Sidney Myer Music Bowl became Wembley Stadium. “Being on that stage and imagining what it would be like to play to 70,000 people” is a highlight from Ido Drent's experience portraying INXS drummer, Jon Farriss. Luke Arnold, who's perfectly cast as frontman Michael Hutchence, marvels, “It was pretty ambitious what we set out to do in the timeframe we had, really: turning Melbourne into places around the entire world over a couple of decades.”

As soon as Arnold heard about the project, he sent in some tapes “before they were even asking to cast anyone”. After auditioning other actors for the role, it was a tape of Arnold dancing “as Michael”. “I think it was on a Friday night while I was in Cape Town, after a big day of filming [Black Sails],” he remembers. “I set up my iPhone and filmed myself dancing around to an INXS song and that was the last thing that clinched the deal.”

Inside Trades Hall, the band cast of INXS: Never Tear Us Apart – which is rounded out by Nicholas Masters (Tim Farriss), Andy Ryan (Andrew Farriss), Hugh Sheridan (Garry Gary Beers) and Alex Williams (Kirk Pengilly) – get acquainted with the stage and their instruments. Masters wanders past and good-naturedly corrects us when we 'admire' his “dirty, rotten perm” (turns out they're his own natural curls). Williams wears a lot of Pengilly's “actual clothes” for the mini series, but the red billowy pants the actor sports today are brand new. “His red suit which he gave us was looking a bit tattered so we got another one made,” Williams clarifies.  

Drent actually learned how to play drums for a couple of years as a teen and took drum sticks along to the audition. “I was tapping away during the scene as if I was practising at home,” he recalls, “and that kinda worked 'cause – I didn't know about this, but Jon had requested that whoever plays him has to have at least played the drums along the line.” As Kick cranks through the venue soundsystem, hearing Hutchence's original snarling vocal makes his presence felt somehow. Onstage, Arnold's a bit more buff than the naturally streamlined Hutchence, but the actor has clearly done his homework.

INXS: Never Tear Us Apart director Daina Reid agrees. While filming this project, she says Arnold “has these weird moments where you go, 'Woah!'” because his resemblance to the beloved late INXS frontman is “quite uncanny at times”. And it's not just physical similarities; Arnold has perfected the Hutch strut, international accent and mannerisms. On his preparation for the role, Arnold shares, “I locked myself in a little house in Elwood and kinda got up every morning, had a beer, put on some INXS, watched every video that was available, read every book, listened to every song, read through all the lyrics and just kind of immersed myself in it and spent as much time as I could on his walk and his voice.

“Occasionally in the rehearsal room, I'd do something and Tim Farriss might be like, 'Oh, that! Like that!' If it jumped out at him that it reminded him of Michael, I'd kind of put a little pin in that and try and incorporate it in the show somewhere.” Although Sheridan spent a lot of time chatting with Beers, who is currently based in LA, via Skype, he confirms Farriss as “the go-to overseer of the whole thing”. ”I run everything by [Tim] and if he thinks I'm doing a good job then I don't care,” Sheridan laughs. “I go, 'Does this look like Garry?' and he's like, 'No, spot on!' I go, 'Thank god'.”

“It was great having the band there,” Reid acknowledges of their presence on set from time to time, “but I felt for them in a way because it seems like a long time ago, but it's not really, emotionally… You would see Kirk or Tim acting in a certain way [on set], and in a way I probably didn't expect, which would have to be confronting.”

Reid promises, “There's a lot of people who have a personal connection with Hutchence and we approached it in a very respectful way.”

UNIT BASE # 1:

Entrance driveway to Royal Exhibition Building, Rathdowne Street, Carlton

“Those girls were asking me who INXS are!” Sheridan points out a couple of the extras, 16-year-old twin sisters who originally thought he was Guy Pearce before correctly identifying him as “That guy from …Rafters”. “They were like, 'We've never heard of this band.'” The actor then busts out some footage of Reid teaching the 'band' some '80s moves. “I just had to get back and film it because I was like, 'This cannot be the job that I'm working on now',” he cackles. “I couldn't stop laughing. Look at how shit they are!? They're SO shit!”

LOCATION #2:

Wilson Street (near corner Macpherson Street), Princes Hill

As the minibus delivering us to this location rounds the corner, Arnold (styled immaculately as Hutchence circa 1981 in a flowing, red, long-sleeved shirt and jeans combo plus trademark cascading mullet-mane) is leaning back against a Citroen ID21 safari wagon ready to shoot the next scene. Definitely another 'Woah!' moment. When the production sound mixer hands us some cans, we can not only hear the scene's dialogue once action is called, but also Arnold and Jane Harber (portraying Michele Bennett, Hutchence's first love/girlfriend whom he referred to as his “touchstone”) engaging in banter between takes. They cheekily discuss whether or not Bennett should in fact put down her uni books and jump into Hutch's car to move to Sydney (as is scripted) given that there's probably crossover with Kylie Minogue just around the corner and history shows the pair didn't work out romantically.

Hutchence and Bennett remained lifelong friends, however. The final phone call Hutch ever made, from Room 524 in the Ritz-Carlton hotel, was to Bennett. When asked how the star's death is handled in the mini series, Reid responds, “Because the world is divided, we cannot take a stance either way on that and it's not for us to do… Just because we are observers into someone else's life there will always be our own version of the truth. We're presenting the facts as they came to us from the band, but no one knows what went on in that room – nobody – so there cannot be a judgement. There just cannot be. There can be things people said, things that we know or heard, you know, a sequence of events and a result, but then we have to step back from that slightly.”

Arnold is acutely aware of the profound effect that the aftermath of Hutchence's 1992 motorcycle accident in Stockholm – following an altercation with a taxi driver – had on the singer. “When you're condensing someone's life into a story, you're looking for those big turning points,” he tells. “That really changed so much of who he was and his essence.” Hutchence suffered a fractured skull as a result of the incident and permanently lost his sense of smell. “When you talk to anyone about it, too, that's the moment where things just changed and, whether he always had demons or they were new, his ability to control them – the way his emotions worked – just changed after that.”  

When he contemplates watching the finished product, Arnold sounds tentative. “When I wanna see Michael, I'm gonna see me. I mean, I have real faith in everyone that I worked on this with, but this is probably gonna be the toughest thing for me to sit back and watch at the end because it means so much [to me] as a role… I'm sure it's gonna be great and I'm sure everyone's gonna love the show, but I'm gonna be over in Africa with my phone turned off I think,” Arnold laughs, thankful that Black Sails will have commenced filming on season number two in Cape Town. - The Music Australia

[enz-fan]

‘Split Enz On The Road’ story written for ‘Rip It Up’ magazine by lighting director, Raewyn Turner. Circa 1982.

“SPLIT ENZ – ON THE ROAD STORY

Raewyn Turner has been lighting director for Split Enz since 1975. She painted the cover for Frenzy and last year at Dennis Cohn Gallery exhibited drawings in her show entitled ‘On The Road Again’. Raewyn has written for Rip It Up, about behind-the-scenes- staging the 1982 Time And Tide tour of New Zealand.

Six months in a leaky boat and that story nears its end for the second time in two years, as Split Enz round the bend on their last lap of touring, finishing in New Zealand. The past five months have been a variety show, the star hosts mingle with us, briefly, from their conveyer belts, flanked by the extras who are directed to have walk-on and bit parts for the day. The many famed and fabled buildings and cities roll on the big rollers past the car windows, and lots of people pass us, in a hurry, to and fro, people with different accents, different smiles, clothes, lifestyles. While we sit and stand, walk and work, moving from car to aeroplane, airport to motel to theatre, the big rollers roll in the world’s projection room, on to the screens, which are our windows.

Split Enz, the audience, the judge, in the van with the video sensurround windows. The selection committee. In a chartered plane, seated in rows until a kind man appears and opens the exit door, ushering us into another windows room. We sit there, breathing in the muted greens and browns and admiring the blue sky, until we’re told to get out and into another room, where soft musak whispers that life is a breeze. Water flows from taps, milk is instant non-dairy whitener, food is but a phone call and an hour’s wait away, all-night television to lull to sleep, air comes from an air conditioner.

10.00 am on Monday, August 16 in Melbourne, and the band are making a film clip, ‘Never Ceases To Amaze Me’, that Noel has worked out with the director over long phone calls from Darwin. It doesn’t finish until 6.00 pm. Last night at the same time, the band had just come off stage, completing the last date of their Australian tour, an ‘Under-18s’ show in Melbourne.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 17

Melbourne, 7.00 am. Grant Thomas, the tour manager, dutifully makes wake-up calls and in six homes scattered over Melbourne, the entourage is busily preparing and packing to make the flight, leaving at 10.00 am to Auckland. 9.00 am we’re at the airport, tired and grizzly, only to learn that the plane has been delayed for five and a half hours. Back home for some more sleep, while the road crew opt to stay at the airport and busy themselves making badges to display their membership of an exclusive social club – the crew’s very own ‘Split Enz Sports And Social Club’ – crew only.

The same day, 10.30 pm, ‘arrive Auckland and proceed to Hamilton, going by the itinerary. Oops. Noel has left his bag at the airport, so we have to double back. Check into hotel, and the band settle for some sleep while I go down to the Founders Theatre to set up for the first show of the NZ tour. The stage set, which has some technical peculiarities, has to be explained and put up and the special effects projectors babied out of their case and wheeled around. Although the lighting plot was sent over a month in advance, the rigging, cabling and colouring of lamps takes forever on the first set up, so we do all but focus tonight. 6.00 am we call it quits and go back to the hotel for a few hours’ sleep. Laurie Bell, the production manager works on, there are many details to be taken care of before the stage and sound people begin work at 9.00 am.

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 18

Sound check is early, everyone expecs the first show to be difficult because of the new, unfamiliar NZ equipment – PA, foldback and lights. The Finn elders arrive, Finn cousins playing with the beach balls backstage.

The dressing room is newly painted and most of the band find they have severe headaches the next day. But battle dress donned, they take the stage with enthusiasm and anticipation, because it’s great to be on home soil. The audience is quiet, polite and serious. It’s been a whole year since Split Enz toured NZ and they’re playing new material, working hard. There are a few technical difficulties, but only minor ones. Back to the hotel for some hot chocolate with friends, before retiring.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 19

1.30 pm. Wake up, and Eddie and I go down to the theatre to work on improving our computer programmes (Eddie’s synthesisers are digitally controlled and store many different sounds in computer memories). Computers and synthesisers are relatively new developments and computers, like humans, were not designed for the rigours of the road. Just as Eddie wanders around his hotel, wondering where he is and what he is doing there, these computers become similarly vacant and he is often to be found in a state of panic, trying to reprogramme his sounds minutes before a show. The lighting desk computer is but 120 channels of memories which can be reprogrammed for particular lighting scenes or progressions of lighting changes. However, it too has a habit of becoming vacant, or worse, storing more than its share, which means it could reveal the total lighting show at the press of one memory button.

The sound crew have been working all day, trying ti iron out the creases in last night’s sound.

Ed and Noel go off for a walk into town, looking for water pistols. The Ed Water Pistol Collection has swelled to number 120 over three years.

Soundcheck, dinner – Noel enthuses over the six veges – back to the paintstricken dressing room an hour before the show, to put on the ‘cossies’ (costumes), paint the faces, discuss song lists, tell a few jokes, wet the whistle (or sip a lemonade), do armstretches and leg raises, eat some peanuts or whatever is offering in snacks. The show goes ‘averagely well’ (probably ‘very good’ in another’s words), but we have our own rating system.

FRIDAY, AUGUST 20

6.00 am, get up and drive to Auckland. The car breaks down on the way, but is fixed by a kind mechanic, free of charge. We feel that this could only happen in NZ. The production crew have been waiting outside the Logan Campbell Centre since 8.00 am, but the truck doesn’t arrive till 10. They begin work frantically and irritably, but still able to make light-hearted jokes, and the stage set slowly appears.

Meanwhile, Noel has gone to visit his folks. Tim and Neil arrive in Auckland with theirs, to spend the day together. Nigel, being the most boring (he is aware of the fact) member of the band, has experienced nothing of any interest whatsoever since arriving in NZ, not on this day, except for a sleepy interview with Colin Hogg. Eddie visits his sister and his friend Paul Crowther and they spend the rest of the day babbling about synths.

Backstage in the dressing room the champagne arrives – a greeting from the record company. The band have another of their ‘average’ performances, the crowd was ecstatic but the band are tired. The sound men aren’t feeling happy, so they make plans to spend all day tomorrow on improvements, to further dampen the echoes.

Back to the White Heron, now affectionately known as the Red Herring (no offence meant), for a few drinks with friends in the Carriage Bar. This is the first piece of glamorous living I’ve experienced for about a month or more – other people might call it just having a drink – but it means a lot being able to have the luxury of changing from work clothes to casual and being with friends.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 21

1.30 pm. Wake up and with Noel and Eddie go to Parnell Village where we have breakfast with Noel’s folks, who are in Auckland for both shows. A flying visit to a friend strapped in traction in hospital and it’s on to soundcheck and an early show.

Nigel has spent the day sleeping, jigging and walking, his three favourite pursuits. Neil and Tim are having dinner with their folks at the table over from us. They bribe the resident pianist into playing ‘Feelings’ as an after-dinner tribute to the band. (This song was on the top of the list for singing at the top of one’s voice while bumping along in a van through North America.)

SUNDAY, AUGUST 22

9.00 am. Depart the hotel for the airport, 9.55 flight departs Auckland for Palmerston North, without breakfast.

Tim feels detached from everything, and so opts for the hair-of-the-dog treatment, which will see him through until the end of the performance. The drinks backstage in the dressing room are there to be a starter motor, to kick a tired man into action. It’s an early show again, and it feels good to commence the performance about an hour after soundcheck. It’s still early enough to relax afterwards over dinner and watching TV.

MONDAY, AUGUST 23

10.30 am. Bags are being loaded into five cars, room bills are being paid, and we’re off to Christchurch. It’s a day off, everyone is anticipating what they’ll do, and probably they’ll do nothing. We’ve taken all the back seats in the plane and Ian Magan’s (tour promoter) Air New Zealand voice (fondly remembering “Ladies and gentleman, have you seen this?” on flights to London) booms from three seats away. Tonight he has promised the entourage a free dinner.

Eddie and I miss the free dinner – we’ve been invited to his brother’s house. This is one of the advantages of this job – seeing family and friends in all corners of the world at least once a year – where distance and fares would normally prohibit this. The visits are, however, usually too short and sweet.

The band enthuse over the selection of old cars in ‘perfect condition’ being driven around Christchurch, reeling off the makes as we drive around. Austin, Morris, Zephyr, Vanguard… Tim’s been after a Studebaker and is delighted to hear that people in the entourage have spotted three so far. Back home the Split Enz Club boasts a green FJ Holden (Neil’s), a black Mark II Zephyr (Tim’s), a pink Morris Major Elite 1963 (Eddie’s), a 1950 Black Triumph Renown (Noel’s) and a brown 1954 Fiat station wagon (Nigel’s).

Today Noel went shopping and got the costumes drycleaned. Nigel went for a five-hour walk along the Avon, Neil joined the road crew for a trip to the snow, there they used big plastic rubbish bags for sliding down hills and threw snow at each other.

Tim stayed in and did an interview, then cruised around, went for a walk, I think. Ed, Clark Flannigan (Polygram Records’ man on tour) and I finally got ourselves away from the hotel and went swimming at the QEII pool. It’s the first day of the school holidays and Ed and Clark get swallowed up in the crowds queuing for the hydrotubes. Clark can do 50m overarm in 35 seconds, he tries out the high diving board, but Ed and I only manage the lowest. End of day off.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 24

7.00 am. Get up, shower and down to the Christchurch Town Hall by 8.00 am. It’s a beautiful day, warm with blue, blue skies, the smell of blossom, cold air and woodsmoke, peculiar to NZ.

The stage set is constructed quickly and looks good. I’d anticipated, with sinking stomach feelings, that as far as equipment and organisation of technical details go, the NZ section would be the worst and most difficult of this six-month tour (probably because it has previously been that). However, there have been vast improvements made in the expertise of the hired technical personnel and in the equipment to be found here since we toured last year. It has taken a lot of hard work to elevate it to this level, and although the equipment is different to the systems currently available in Australia, this in no way makes for a compromise situation.

At 10.30 am, I offer to get the food – three dozen donuts, one dozen cream buns, three dozen filled rolls, a bag of apples. We work on until 4.00 pm and soundcheck is at 4.30. After a while, the band drift into playing their oldies, searching for the perfect replacement for ‘Hard Act’, which they’re sick of.

The band are tired. After five months of constant touring and only two weeks off in the period – no weekends – they are finding it hellish to think clearly and with enthusiasm about their shows. They want to try a new set, a different way of playing particular songs, but the energy somehow keeps being channelled the same way. They shone for the Auckland shows and will probably shine for the rest, but they try to break out of their feelings of exhaustion and automatic gear.

Tonight’s performance is once again good, although lacking the fire that the band are striving hard to produce. The audience is enthusiastic. The band and crew and managers return to the hotel bar, where we tell each other jokes until the small hours, winding down for sleep after a long day.

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 25

8.00 am. Woken by chainsaws, jackhammers and the noise of concrete being made in a wheelbarrow. These are quite regular occurrences in hotels where we have stayed, so I drift back to sleep. But Eddie has had enough and has decided to move over to the posh hotel, where Tim and Neil have recently moved, to escape the noise. The hotel is twice the price and offers a complimentary morning newspaper, but we prefer the squat NZ motels, having spent too long in high-rise hotels, with Coffee-Mate (powdered non-dairy whitener) for ea milk.

Soundcheck at 4.30, still the search for the perfect song replacement. ‘In The Wars’, ‘Jamboree’, ‘Under The Wheel’ and a few others are fiddled with and discarded.

Tim, Neil, Eddie and I drive off for dinner and discuss our fatigue and the artistic value (or not) of the song produced under pressure of having to be sold by a record company. The issue of touring arises and they talk about giving it up in Australia and NZ for two years, except for the occasional ‘spectacular’ – an alternative that would provide opportunity for lots of ideas to be exercised. Or perhaps they’d like to do a film, taking a year off to make it and write songs, using that period to develop their musical ability as individuals.

Showtime, the crew are lying around on couches drinking coffee and the first band are pounding away. Eddie is in the dressing room playing his other favourite song, ‘Loving You’ by Minnie Ripperton, accompanied by Neil singing. He breaks away into Chopin.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 26

A day off for some, but the three lighting technicians leave Christchurch at 9.00 am and arrive at Invercargill at 7.00 pm. (The truck has a sleep and they take turns at driving.) The rest of the crew fly down at 11.00 am and spend the rest of the day in the hotel’s spa pool. At 8.00 pm, Laurie, Glen (the set and projects man) and three loaders unpack the truck, having first to remove a fleet of five city council vans that were parked across the stage door. Glen gets to work putting up the stage set and is back at the hotel by 11.00 pm.

Tim, Neil, Clark, Eddie and I have made plans to drive to Akaroa for some fish and chips and scenery, but Eddie and I spend until 2.00 pm buying second-hand furniture for future use, by which time Clark isn’t to be found. The free day has just about slipped away. We make rearrangements with the cars and Tim and Neil go to Akaroa. Noel, Eddie and I take a drive that meanders along a peninsula beyond Lyttleton, and we end up driving along a tractor path up a mountainside. The green pastures, trees in blossom, the mountain and valleys, we can’t wait to settle back here and enjoy the countryside. Tim and Neil return with tales of spectacular scenery, quite in awe of the beauty of the countryside. Neil, in surprise, says it’s always so much better than he’s remembered. Of course, all this talk about ‘nature’ crops up in our conversations especially after a few months on the road, staying in orange and purple hotel rooms. At the same time, the touring lifestyle has another advantage – it provides the blinkers and forces a total commitment to work.

FRIDAY, AUGUST 27

9.00 am. Wake up call from Grant, we move quickly and tiredly into the day.

Arrive Invercargill and greeted by an over-officious officer on the sidewalk at the airport. Magan has an argument with him and Neil throws him a coin as we drive away. Later, Magan receives a speeding ticket from the same officer.

Stop off on the way to the hotel, at the art gallery for a typical photo of the band posing next to a huge anchor for the local papers.

I go straight to work. The crew, having become accustomed to the equipment, are working very fast these days and focus is early. The set works well in the Civic Centre, because the tiers of balconies tower over the stage, which is shallow and therefore the sail has a steep incline. I don’t have a good show, getting my fingers jammed in the faders, despite a grand performance by the projector operators, Glen and Keith, who are by now quite skilled.

Noel apparently just about falls backwards off his drums, fatigued and the rest of the band are tired. But there are only 11 more shows to do, so they attack each one with enthusiasm.

After the show, the musos’ club is less than hospitable, hassling the band at the door. Eddie, Tim and Neil leave and end up helping Magan, who is hosting a three-hour radio show.

The road crew have busily packed clean socks for the Saturday soundcheck before heading off to Queenstown in search of the thrillseeker jetboats. Bed.

Part two of this feature will appear in next months ‘R.I.U’.”

[katiebruce]

year of the wildflower

I can’t believe it’s fucking February and I have yet to sit down and reflect on the end of yet another year. 2018.

Two Thousand and Eighteen.

What a glorious, glorious year you were for me. (It was the ten-year anniversary of 2008 after all, so I probably should have seen that one coming. Hindsight is a fickle beast I’ve yet to learn to tame.)

I started the year off with a lot of newness—preparing to move out of my apartment of seven years, for example.

Though I knew it was time for a new beginning, the months leading up to this move were hard for me. I felt like I was separating myself from some former version of myself; a hermit crab shedding her proverbial shell.

The moment we found Hoegarden, however, I knew it was the right choice.

Only four blocks up the street (a six-minute walk; I timed it) from my old place, it felt like the comfort of home laced with the thrill of a new start.

And so, I packed.

I purged.

And the week before I moved, I flew to India. (I am nothing if not wildly ridiculous at a seemingly predictable rate: life change? Leave the fucking country!)

I have been talking about going to India obsessively since the eleventh grade (I had learned about Holi and became obsessed with Eastern culture quickly after.)

Though I paraded around with arrogance, I was quite intimidated to plan this trip. It was something I don’t think I realized was happening until we had landed, disembarked, and had been rushed into the chaotic Delhi streets at midnight before it really hit me—that I was here, and I couldn’t be afraid.

So, I wasn’t.

I had only one bad experience that night, and I handled it—I learned to say no. As an American, millennial, feminist, I thought this was something I was already good at.

Turns out, I was not.

But I got better. And by the end of my trip, I felt so completely safe, so enamored by the sights, the smells (rich dirt moist with the smell of sweat, the sultry scent of saffron, sweetened candy from the streets…curry!) that I was sad my time was over so soon.

This trip prepared me for Morocco—the adult I had to be, the sticky situations I had to diffuse, middle eastern culture. I wandered those golden, enchanted markets thirsty for authenticity, and I always seemed to find it, for better or for worse.

There was lots of yelling. Lots of jetlag. And lots of running for flights.

But between these two trips, these two monumental events in my life, I walked away and felt growth. I felt proud of where I’d gone and what I’d seen. And that, though I was accompanied by friends (and oh, the friends we made!) I had accomplished this feat mostly alone, planning and ultimately orchestrating both trips by my lonesome, endlessly researching cultural customs, Indian cuisines and transport, Ramadan rules (because we were in Morocco during the holiday) and I had fucking succeeded.

I flew again to London (London, London, London, alwaysLondon) and Scotland and finished up my year by going to Australia.

Five continents in one year.

I spent an entire day running around Jaipur, my phone almost being stolen by a monkey, and I tried to get an Uber in a place where elephants are considered vehicles and you can order a tuk-tuk via the app.

I bathed, fed, and walked a rescued elephant—Chin Chin—and felt her two-ton belly swollen with babies (twins!) as she made me laugh by playing with my hair and squirting water on my head when I wasn’t playing with her.

I was welcomed into the home of strangers and fed a home cooked meal; the best I had in all of India.

I made friends with the soda-shop boys near our palace of an Airbnb and left them with all of my change upon leaving the country. (This would leave me completely screwed at the airport where the vendors did not accept credit cards, but alas—who am I if not starving and stressed about non-reving out of another country?)

I woke up at four in the morning and rode all the way to Agra to bask in the wonderful Taj Mahal. I dipped my toes in it’s gorgeous lakes and dreamt of a love so big someone would construct a monument to celebrate it someday that would put this silly marble slab of stone to shame.

I returned to Spain and wandered the streets of Barcelona and Madrid like a pro; how quickly three years had passed, how recently it seemed upon returning.

We flew down to Morocco and booked a famous riad with a driver and were escorted through the airport like queens (gluttons, really.) We wandered the many rooms of our new home excitedly, pretending to be princesses and bursting into wine-induced fits of laughter when the first Ramadan calls came over the loudspeaker and bellowing down into our open-aired fortress.

We wandered the gardens of Yves Saint Laurent and I impressed Lauren and Beebs with my correct pronunciation of the designer’s name (thanks, Cardi.)

We took a horse drawn carriage through Marrakech and were swindled by henna artists in the streets (it was still worth it.)

We boarded a ten-passenger caravan and took a trek that took us through the northern African mountains, the many small villages and ruins, learned about the art of rug making and sipped on delicious mint tea.

And then I was proposed to. His name was Watik. Once again, I said no. Albeit a more forceful one.

We drove directly into a sand storm and learned how to adorn our heads with a “passport to the desert” to protect us from the harsh conditions.

And then we rode camels through the fucking Sahara Desert.

We camped in giant rooms and dined under the stars (the most delicious of the tangines we had, though it’s honestly hard to pick) and listened to our guides play African drums under the moonlight.

And then we went adventuring into the night.

I remember climbing to the top of a dune, digging my toes deeper into the sand and being amazed at how bright the moonlight shone over the dessert sands.

(We watched the sunrise in the morning, and I was equally in awe of nature’s subtle beauty.)

We wandered the ancient city of Fes with our newly married friends and took in the smells of sweet mint leaf and the curing of animal hyde in the tanneries.

I took a few weeks off traveling and fucking prepared for what would be my mother’s first trip abroad: The UK.

I got to see the excitement fill her eyes upon seeing the London skyline, see some adolescent excitement light up in her upon taking her to her first protest (baby Trump riot—yes, it was as amazing as it looked on television) and watched her fall in love with old, ancient English streets, the ones I’ve loved for so many years, watch her accept my longing, my desire to make this my home, as she fell completely head over heels in love with it, too.

I drank violet gin and watched bagpipers play in the street and climbed to the highest part of Edinburgh just so I could turn around and look down at it in awe.

I watched Paul Simon say farewell, with another 500,000 fans in the royal gardens and wept with emotion when he opened his set with “America.”

I came back and saw Paramore with my strawberry, I saw St. Vincent in all her glory, Twin Peaks and First Aid Kit and even flew to Denver to see Ryan Adams play Red Rocks.

I stressed, a lot.

And yet somehow always made it through.

I celebrated my Dad’s sixtieth birthday and got to finally show him around Chicago, my home, and watch as he pieced together a new aspect of me he never seemed to understand before.

I flew to Denver to meet up with my best friend for a road trip to Salt Lake to see Panic. We cuddled and laughed and jammed and danced under the stars in beautiful Big Sky.

And then there was Australia. Rainy, jungle-esque Australia.

Noodle night in the muddy park and Aussie pizza (twice, because it really was that spectacular.)

Twin Peaks at an abandoned skate-house and teenagers blacking out around us.

Ferry rides hopped up on Nyquil. Books read in cafes.

Beautiful, beautiful Melbourne.

Lauren laughing at me because of fear of all the various vicious birds we encountered. My allergies through the roof, throat closing in the royal gardens.

Not one single fucking kangaroo.

There was San Francisco and fleet week and the Mystic Valley Band at a winery in Sonoma. (The most beautiful sunset I’d ever seen—and that wine!)

I left the country so many times this year with no more than pennies to my name, no place to stay when I landed, nothing but an inspiration and the courage to make myself show up for a flight.

I took myself to the Opera and felt bougie for sipping on black coffee the entire time and sitting alone.

I relaxed.

I found myself hiding away in my new home, no school to attend (because again, I fucking GRADUATED COLLEGE) and no trips to take and I felt… peace.

An old friend came to town and I met up with him for drinks and now Taylor is my boyfriend.

Me; a boyfriend.

Me; in love.

I held his hand at Chriskindel market and consoled him after an eventful first Thanksgiving together. I rubbed my hands through his luscious hair and kissed his forehead where the small patch of gray grows in with the eager fervor of old age. (My old man.)

I let him love me, all of me, and sat back in amazement as I lowered my walls, my protection, and let this one man weasel his way through the booby traps I had planted long before.

(He detonated them all.)

I watched, silently—though often times conflicted—as the light in his eyes grew familiar, listened as his sweet, humble snoring cooed me to sleep.

I fell in love.

And through all of the fantastic adventures 2018 took me, through every corner of the world, I did not know that what I had been looking for all along was him. My love, my prince, my sweet, sincere, annoying, handsome, smart, idiot, adorable boyfriend Taylor.

And now I feel so whole.

2018 was a big year for me—in every way imaginable. I even started grad school (I’m a masochist, I must be). But it was the last year I would be in my twenties.

In February, I turned twenty-nine and began preparing myself for the start of a new decade. I felt unaccomplished and somehow proud of what I’d done—scared yet eager to grow older.

Weeks before my birthday, I marched proudly with thousands of others through the streets of my home, my city, protesting our asshat of a president and the suppression of women’s rights. I remember walking through the streets, sign in hand, feeling like a fully actualized version of myself; I was finally the person I had always wanted to be.

It just took me longer than I had expected to get there.

My twenties were a tumultuous time (something eerily familiar about the terrible two’s, no?)

Where I lost myself and tried on new versions of myself for extended periods of time.

I dropped out of college and worked three jobs.

I moved cross-country with my best friend to live in a big city like I had always wanted to.

I became a flight attendant.

I went back to college and graduated. Then I got into fucking grad school.

I fell in love with four boys: the first, my first. The truest, the purest; a complete and total heartbreak. The second, from afar—that spark, that magnetism—now a friend engaged himself, and I couldn’t be happier for him and his wife-to-be. The third, my German—a wrong fit I tried so desperately to squish into all of my open, healing wounds. And the fourth, my love—my Taylor. My partner.

I slept with some awful people (two; M & T).

And kissed plenty more.

I lost friends I thought I’d never lose and met friends I thought I’d never have.

I discovered what it is to be broke.

Brutally, honestly, broke.

And yet I traveled.

I visited fifteen countries in those ten years and did it all on my own terms. I saw Stonehenge, the Sahara, the Taj Ma-Fucking-Hal, went to Oktoberfest, played Sega in Japan and even saw Alex Turner a whopping four times in one decade. (What a facetious little man.)

I cried in bathroom stalls and did coke in bathroom stalls and danced so much I felt invincible and once upon a time even owned the streets of Ybor.

I did acid on tinder dates and even dated a girl, my only girl, my Kelli.

I watched as my sister got engaged and our little family grew by one.

I lost my Cody, my baby, and felt his spirit in a haunted hotel in South Dakota (hi, baby.)

I wandered many foreign streets and stumbled my way through foreign languages and ordered foreign food I couldn’t pronounce the name of and didn’t like the taste of.

I went to so many concerts I’ll probably be deaf, and probably soon.

I was so surrounded by love and so alone at times I silently cried myself to sleep in a new city.

I cut off my hair, got six tattoos and went to so many different music festivals.

I was wild; I was timid. I was fierce; I was afraid. I was whole; I felt alone.

(Walt Whitman isn’t the only one who can contain multitudes.)

[buckner-in-australia]

Day 28: June 23, 2017

Oh my gosh y'all! The end of our trip is coming so quick! It seemed like it took forever to get to Monday, but now it's Friday and it's full steam ahead! I still can't believe tomorrow is our last day in Australia!!

Before I begin recalling my day, I have been thinking. After spending nine days in Melbourne and about 7 in Sydney, I do believe in my heart that I enjoy Melbourne much more. Both of the cities are great, but yet so different. Before coming to Australia I only knew of Sydney and Bondi Beach. I didn't even have a clue what or where Melbourne was. The proximity of everything, the street art, the culture, the free tram system, everything about Melbourne I loved. There was also so much to do there both in the city and the suburbs. To me it seems like Melbourne was much less touristy and wasn't as massive a Sydney. With the harbor dividing the city into halves, it expands for miles it seems. Also in Sydney there really isn't much to do besides the Bridge Climb and the Sydney Opera House. I really do appreciate being able to see both cities though. A lot of trips only focus on one area/landscape, but on this trip I have been able to see just about every part of the country. It has been amazing.

Anywho, back to my day. This morning we had the Walking Tour of Sydney's Public Art, but thankfully Dr. Miller made it optional. We really have been hitting the ground running since the day we touch down in Sydney. Between classes, essays, homework, and group activities we really haven't had that much time. I really appreciated this because we were able to sleep in again.

Since we slept in until about 11, we headed to Circular Quay for lunch. I really do wonder why we didn't stay over there because we are literally over there everyday. Thank the Lord for Opal cards, they have truly been my best friend! For lunch we ate at this Italian place right off the harbor called East Bank. It was really good and we also ran into Dr. Miller, Dr. Dove, and Saorise. Once again, we grabbed some gelato from Gelatissimo. They have some bomb flavors. I tried this one called Macadamia and Sea Salt Carmel. It was hella sweet, but very good. Nya would have loved it! I ended up having vanilla and sea salt caramel, not my usual but amazing as well.

After gelato we headed to the Museum of Sydney. This museum, which was also guided, was very interesting and symbolic. Every pedestal and stone had a meaning. Where the museum stood was where Arthur Phillip, the first governor of Sydney staked his land and built himself a house. Over the years by the surrounding tiles, you could see how the home expanded as newer governors rolled in. Even though he stood for colonization, I do have to say that he had a great view of the harbor from his front door lol. The most interesting entity of this museum was the articles that reflected the 29 Aboriginal tribes of the harbor region. Before entering the museum, there was a wooden and metal column structure to symbolize the intertwining of the two cultures and how the Aboriginal way of life would never be the same again. Carved  into the wooden beams were words and the names of the clans, and there was also a recording playing as well. The steel beams represented the colonizers and how this was the one entity that the Aboriginal people did not possess.

I love how there were two pieces of artwork featured in the museum from Dr. Miller's pre-departure bootcamp.  I can't remember the artists right now, but the painting with the blue landscape is my favorite. Though both pieces are moving, that one in particular strikes a chord. After being in the bush surrounded by him trees and being up close and personal with the gums of Sydney, I could only imagine how it would feel to see full blown sails from peering behind one of the trees. Both in sheer curiosity and fear, I wouldn't know what to think honestly. I also wouldn't think that my life would change forever.

After the guided tour we were free to roam as we'd like. The museum also offered a "Sand In The City" so you know all of us rushed over there as soon as possible. It was like we were all kids again, playing in the moon-sand and building Lego masterpieces. I spent a little time playing with Saorise, she has quite the imagination. While I was playing with her some of my peers constructed "Sydney ASU" with a red pitchfork on the Lego wall. It was iconic! Of course we all took pictures with it. Needless to say, ASU always leaves their mark no matter where we go lol. I also made a drawing that said Bondi Beach for the wall their to be on display.  Oh the joys of childhood lol.

After the museum, me and Ash found out that we could climb the pylons of the Sydney Harbor Bridge for $15 rather than the $150 it takes to the climb the whole thing. So you know what we did? We headed for the bridge (after we got directions of course)! So then we headed to Circular Quay.    

LORD HAVE MERCY! It was so many stairs!! Not only did we have to climb 3 sets of stairs to get to the bridge but we also had to climb about 200 stairs to get to the top of the pylon! Your girl was WORN DOWN! Lol, but y'all it was so worth it! We made it just in time for the sunset! And we took some fabulous pictures! I mean, you can never have enough photos of the Sydney Harbor Bridge and the Sydney Opera House in your phone right? We even met some girls from Chicago who had been in Australia for 6 months studying in a local university. They said the expectations were so much higher here and that grading was even more of an adjustment. I couldn't imagine being away that long.

After our photo shoot, we headed back down and snagged something to eat then went back to APX. Since this is our last Friday in Sydney I knew that I definitely wanted to go out, have a good time, and dance. Ashley was luckily on the same page so once we got back we chilled and then we were off to Star Bar. Surprisingly throughout this whole trip Ashley and I have been on the same wavelength so we knew that we didn't want to go far and Star Bar was the right fit for us. We got there a little bit too early, but once our area turned into the dance club it was on and popping! Of course every time we go somewhere to dance we show out & that we did! Even though the dance culture is very obscure here, I had to notice that many people tried to replicate our infamous American dance crazes. Oh what a sight it was! Lol, needless to say we had a great time!

After Star Bar, Ashley, Morgan, Dakota, Ashley, and I walked back home. We were exhausted!

Then it all sunk in...

Tomorrow is our last day in Australia! Like where has the time gone?? I'm ready to see my mom and family but I'm not ready to go home home. Oh the agony!

But until then... I can't wait for tomorrow! I will be seeing humpback whales in the middle of the ocean and it will be our last/closing night dinner as a family! *tear* (both sad and happy)

Things I've learned - McDonalds sells macaroons - The dance culture is so weird in Australia - Some people don't understand the concept of personal space on the dance floor - English convicts were first sent to America, then the war of Independence changed that and they started prepping to send them to Australia - Sydney exists on a big rock of sandstone - Sandstone is the rock of Sydney - Costumes for one Opera take a year to make - Need to watch "Zach's Ceremony" - NITV is a channel about Aboriginal peoples like BET - Today is the first time I've turned on a tv since being here

[thisisheffner]

MEREDITH MUSIC FESTIVAL 2019

Don’t Ever Doubt Aunty, She Knows How To Throw A Party

Words: Bec Grech and Sally Lewis Photos: Chelsea King

This is Bec’s fourth and Sal’s first Meredith Music Festival. Here is who and what they saw during a wonderfully wacky weekend at the coveted Supernatural Amphitheatre. 

FRIDAY

Cleansing smoke from the smoking ceremony filled the Supernatural Amphitheatre, signalling the start of Meredith Music Festival in its 29th edition, held on the land of the Wadawurrung. In a MMF first, Uncle Barry Gilson along with other traditional custodians of the land performed a beautiful Welcome To Country. Stories, singing and dancing. In a minutes silence, the Sup’ stood in solidarity to pay respect to their recently lost Elder, Aunty Mary. Thank you Uncle Barry and the Wadawurrung people for sharing your stunning land with us for the weekend and welcoming us all with open hearts. 

Photo: Meredith punters walking through the Smoking Ceremony held by Wadawurrung people, the traditional custodians of the land on which Meredith takes place.

Jesswar opened the festival with an explosive, tough as nails performance. Her hard-going hip hop had all the bad bitches move to the front. And move to the front, we did.

Karate Boogaloo, the funky and oh-so funny four-piece served up a set of their finest and fruitiest jams. Sweet, sticky, ooey-gooey goodness. Kay-Bee’s unconventional funk and fusions of psych and RnB, had the Sup’ swaying and smiling ear-to-ear. Carn the Boogers! 

With housekeeping out of the way (courtesy of FEE B2 and Shania Twain), Julia Jacklin instantly warmed and wowed the crowd. Equally composed and expressive, Jacklin’s voice has the power to deliver a performance that can be simply summarised as, stunning. Singalongs to ‘Pressure To Party’, ‘Don’t Know How To Keep Loving You’ and ‘Pool Party’ had our hands to our hearts. 

Aunty Meredith, thank you for putting together a lineup with set times that allow us to jump from the dreamy, indie pop of Julia Jacklin to the electric rockabilly of Tokyo’s Stompin’ Riffraffs. Seriously, the screams, the masks, the blazing theremin solos. Unreal. Check them out. 

I was quite perplexed by the disregard of Meredith’s ‘No Dickhead Policy’ when Liam Gallagher was announced as a headliner… After a couple of tracks I swapped out his set for some downtime at the Ecoplex Cinema and was witness to an odd Christmas movie where Santa hosted an international kindergarten rock eisteddfod inside a grand organ, then proceeded to invade an innocent child’s dreams that were influenced by Satan. I was happy with my decision, but hey, I’m sure most people in the Sup’ were having the time of their lives, and that’s great too. I stayed for the Friday night headliner and the set was, strange? With two decent enough albums behind him, Liam Gallagher surprisingly leaned heavy on the Oasis classics but not the ones I was expecting. ‘Wonderwall’ of course came out, as did ‘Cigarettes And Alcohol’, ‘Rock N Roll Star’ and ‘Stand By Me’, but Gallagher chose to skip over a huge mix of mega hits. Admittedly I may have fallen asleep in the deep comforts of a cosy couch as Gallagher played, but I suppose there’s something cool about being woken up to a crowd of festival goers singing along to some iconic 90s Brit-pop. Special mention to the unaware punter yelling “play Wonderwall!” as Gallagher and his band were belting out that man’s very request right in front of him. “Who are you looking forward to seeing at Meredith?” they all asked. My instant reply, “Close Counters”. The Tasmanian duo played their biggest crowd to date and utilised their deep synths and drilling basslines to get the Friday night party started with their crazy good fusion of house, jazz and soul. Mmmm Moog synths rule. Elle Shimada also made an appearance to slay the violin, as well as Francesca Gonzales who leant her vocals.

Logic1000 whose debut EP dropped only weeks before our supernatural adventures carried us into the early morning, floating between deep house and ambient electronic moments. Oops! Bed time for me. Closing out the night was Vanessa Worm. I was meters away from my tent when Vanessa’s wacky vocals permeated through the campsite. It sounded too good to be true, and impossible to miss. I made the trip back to the dance floor to witness her set in the flesh. Gritty electronic beats provided a background to some incredibly silly vocal stylings that appeared to be emanating from a puppet who had gained awareness of it’s strings and was making every attempt to rid itself of it’s puppet master. They definitely expelled some of their inner demons. Fantastic, I wanted to put my boot up but held onto it for some strange reason, which I have now come to regret. 

“Time for you to be still” – listening to Vanessa Worm, I hit the hay too.

SATURDAY

Scott and Charlene’s Wedding was the most wonderful soundtrack to waiting in line for coffee. A very blissful morning indeed.

U-Bahn was up next and boy, not only did they look good (hats off to outfit coordination and killer eye makeup) they sounded bloody brilliant. Having caught these synth-punks around Melbourne town a few times previously, their moment on the Sup’ stage may just be my favourite performance of theirs yet. 

“Where are you camping?” is apparently every third question asked at Meredith, so for the sake of this article.. I ran back to our castle/camp at Bluegums to refuel and unfortunately missed seeing River Yarra, but thanks to there only being one super loud stage, I was able to listen to their pops of percussion fuelled, experimental electronica. Wobbly, wonky, I liked what I heard.

Cate Le Bon on a sweet Saturday afternoon was sublime. Uniquely impassive in their own kooky fashion, Le Bon and her band in their performance slip in twinkles of magic and stubborn eccentrics. It was truly dazzling and full of heart. Plenty of boots up in the air for this set.

It seemed like the entire festival flooded the amphitheatre for DJ Koze on Saturday afternoon. An incredible turn out for a last minute addition to the lineup. Koze must have raided the local Meredith nursery, going full bush on the set design – it looked and sounded amazing. Potentially the crowd favourite? Sally, please blast ‘Pick Up’ as you scatter my ashes through a forest somewhere. 

Can do! Bec and I both gave our boot to the German DJ, as we boogied our bums off to Koze’s impeccable selection of beats and bangers. I’m having flashbacks. Might go cry to the memories of Meredith right now… 

Following Koze’s wild hour and a half were some marvellous afro house beats, courtesy of Digital Afrika. I didn’t realise just how much dancing could be squeezed into one afternoon. The Eqyptian Lover then whipped the crowd into a frenzy with their powerful stage antics. Forcing the crowd to scream “eight oh, motha effin, eight”. They proceeded to play nothing but that drum machine for fifteen minutes straight while thousands of smiling faces ferociously shook their booties. 

I was also one of those booty shakers and I aspire to dance as The Egyptian Lover dances… He’s got the moves I tell ya. *Flicks hands left and right*. Viagra Boys. WOW. The five-piece punkers from Stockholm, Sweden, had everyone in the palms of their hands as they bashed through their catalogue of witty post-punk belters. Frontman Sebastian Murphy is a crazy character, he threw himself around the crowd and all about the stage as he sang and shouted his lampoons on life. Push ups into a microphone as he yelled “sports!” during the ‘Sports’ outro, very, very impressive. Special shoutout to the saxophonist of the band who bloody slayed that thing all set long. I admire a punk band who indulge in using bongos. Absolutely wild times. I may have given DJ Koze my boot but Viagra Boys have my heart.

Photo: Viagra Boys frontman Sebastian Murphy singing into the front row of people. 

Dead Prez were up next, who blew us all out of the park. Gangsta Brooklyn political-rap pairs very nicely with samples of Red Hot Chili Peppers and Pink Floyd.

Amyl and the Sniffers came in stinkin’ hot (and slightly late) with an ARIA tucked under their mullets. Two years ago the local punks opened Meredith on Friday night. This year they cut loose during a headline time slot. My. Oh. My. They delivered. A set equally as punchy and wild as it was wholesome. In between heavy breaths the band made it pretty clear how special it was for them to be playing another Meredith. Props to Amy for creating a safe space in the mosh for everybody except creeps. She is a force to be reckoned with. Footage of buff kangaroos fighting while Amy sung “I wanna be your little angel” along with a live Chat Roulette video stream displayed throughout the set, sent me (and I’m sure many others) into fits of laughter. The joy of short and sharp punk songs is that nearly every single Amyl and the Sniffers hit can be squeezed into a 45 minute set; ‘70 Street Munchies’, ‘I’m Not A Loser’, ‘Monsoon Rock’, ‘Gacked On Anger’, ‘Cup Of Destiny’. All killer no filler.

Photo: Amy Taylor of Amyl and The Sniffers on stage during their Saturday night headline slot.

Irish alt-pop/disco sensation Roisin Murphy who you’d recognise from Moloko (‘Sing It Back’) blew us away with an impeccably controlled vocal delivery and performance. It was a real treat to see her delve into the sonic world of her solo endeavours – swaying between chiming, glittery, lush synths and the squelchier sounds of ‘Overpowered’. Upwards of 4 costume changes? What a party. There was also some kind of silver alien that Murphy hugged and danced with. It was confusing but I loved it. After that, I only remember dancing. 

Two hours of solid dancing to incredible house followed, soundtracked by Eric Powell. Thank you. Just, thank you. German producer and DJ Helena Hauff, whose appearance at Meredith had been years in the works, mixed the entirety of their set on vinyl. Starting dark and brooding, we were quickly plunged into dark, fast and heavy selections accompanied by intensely curated visuals. “Are you ready to RAMBL?!” … No, I’m so sorry but by body can’t do it. Dancing for upwards of 15 hours had me beat. I did however enjoy the local DJ’s diverse mixes of house, disco, funk and techno from the comforts of my tent AND as I woke back up at 7am for a cheeky run to the loo. There was no better way to wake up Sunday morning than with another lil’ dance.

SUNDAY

We all rolled out of our tents slowly late Sunday morning with sore heads, full hearts, and dropped jaws, recovering from the breathtaking talent that graced the Amphitheatre the night before and we headed down to catch Gordon Koang. As much as he insisted he loved the crowd very much, I think we loved him more. Koang had the amphitheatre standing up and clapping their hands (despite how rough we all undoubtedly were feeling at this point in the weekend) before he even played ‘Stand Up (Clap Your Hands)’ which on stage featured a string of the cutest dancers possible. Two disco ball headed dancers also joined the party on stage and now I need a disco ball head toot sweet. 

I’m not going to lie, I had no idea what The Gift was. I didn’t even think to ask. Holy. Moly. Not only is the Sup’ the perfect place to let your hair down but also, your pants. Nude racing around the Amphitheatre by those with brave souls and bare bums. Meredith truly is a magical place. Speaking of…

MAGICAL MOMENTS

Interstitial DJs – the unsung heroes of the dancefloor. Adriana selects the most wonderful international boogie gems and only FEE B2 can get away with mixing ‘Come on Eileen’, into drum and bass, into disco.

The People – Ingrained in its philosophy, everyone is welcome at MMF. With open arms Aunty Meredith and the Wadawurrung people allow festival goers to indulge themselves in music, art and community. The people at MMF are united bunch of loose bananas who have the best fun, and who importantly look after each other while doing so. No dickheads. No worries. 

The amount of ‘overheards’ and ‘seen ats’ could be endless. I loved seeing the endless array of dolled up punters and groups of friends in highly coordinated outfits; women in 80s business attire passing around a cheese board in the midst of a Swedish punk set, a crew dressed in life jackets and helmets carrying their mate on an inflatable raft who paddled and parted the Sup’ like the sea, netballers, cricketers, flight attendants, birds, disco dancers, you name it and someone was probably dressed like it at Meredith. The Return of Doof Sticks – This year the doof sticky things were removed from the banned items list (as long as their heads were no larger than that of a cauliflower). They lined the Sup’s horizon to make a spectacle of lights and crafty work. Even some cauliflowers on sticks were spotted. The Boot – My first time at Meredith, I was relieved and heart-warmed by the concept of giving an act your boot/shoe. Thankfully not a suggestion of a shoey, but an act of admiration. 

Cricket – Who doesn’t love an impromptu game of bat n’ ball in the rise of the Sup’? Meredith is the only place the police and punters sporting ‘eff the police’ shirts can come together for an over. Couches – How have I survived past music festivals without one? A place to chill out and enjoy the music from afar, or dance on top of, or start a party at, or make as a meeting point. Genius. Also, I hope the guy we found asleep on our couch Sunday morning is doing fine and found his friend Sarah.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Despite comments in the lead up that MMF 2019’s lineup wasn’t as strong as previous years (which we never once bought into) and the ticket swapping page being swamped with heavily discounted tickets – it is pretty damn clear by the success of the weekend that; 1) don’t ever doubt Aunty, 2) She knows how to throw a party, and 3) those who sold their tickets missed out on a stellar weekend. During every set there were boots being held up left right and center. With every twist and turn someone beside you was having the time of their life.The Supernatural Amphitheatre is without a doubt the most magical place for live music in Australia.

Thank you Aunty Meredith. Thank you to the Wadawurrung people for sharing your land. Thank you to the lovely friends we met and made. We are already counting down the days ‘til Golden Plains.

The post MEREDITH MUSIC FESTIVAL 2019 appeared first on SYN Media.

This content was originally published here.

[robbieinterviews]

Our kind of woman: Margot Robbie on backpacking, Brexit and being at home on the Northern Line, 2016

When she’s not on the red carpet, you’ll find Margot Robbie backpacking round the Philippines. The star of Suicide Squadtells Stylist why she just can’t sit still

Margot Robbie doesn’t notice the man at the hotel bar staring at her, his tongue practically hanging out of his head, cartoon style, throughout the hour we spend together. Her eyes never flicker uncomfortably, she doesn’t betray that itchy, crawling feeling you get when a stranger’s eyes are baring into you. I’m certain it’s not simply because she’s used to male attention. It would be unjust and offensive to suggest it. Rather I wonder if it’s because her head, and schedule, are so busy that she is utterly focused on the task in hand: our chat, and in a wider sense, navigating this life-dominating new world she’s inhabiting.

This fierce focus is one that has dominated Robbie’s career, ostensibly taking her from Australian soap actress to Hollywood’s biggest breakout star in a not oft repeated move. Because for every Isla Fisher or Melissa George, there are many who haven’t made it out of Ramsay Street. Combine this with acting prowess (including an excellent mastery of accents) and sheer, bloody likability and it’s clear to see why Robbie has become a thoroughly modern force to be reckoned with.

The freshly turned 26-year-old also has me charmed within approximately 30 seconds. Our interview is at 5pm on a Monday, and she orders a Hendrick’s and tonic, as she’s “drunk so much tea all day, I can’t drink any more”. And yes, she is beautiful, but unlike the gentleman at the bar, that’s not why I’m won over. She’s funny and shrewd; laid back in that stereotypical way we expect of Australians, but with a steely ambition simmering below the surface. It’s also heartening that, despite the Hollywood trappings, Robbie worries about the same things as other 26-year-olds: house prices, Brexit and missing out on fun.

Robbie grew up modestly on the Gold Coast in Australia, with her three siblings and physiotherapist mother until a move to Melbourne at 17. There she paired couch surfing and a job in Subway with coldcalling the producers of Neighbours until she eventually got the part of Donna Freedman – a one-off appearance that morphed into a three year stretch. A strategic move to LA and a role in Pan Am followed. But it was her voracious turn as the wife of a corrupt banker (played by Leonardo DiCaprio) in the Martin Scorsese-directed The Wolf Of Wall Street in 2013, that blew everything out of the water. There are few actresses that could so sublimely torment DiCaprio with the line: “Mommy is just so sick and tired of wearing panties,” let alone one so juvenile in her career.

This summer things have shifted up another gear. Firstly in The Legend Of Tarzan as Jane to Alexander Skarsgård’s eponymous hero. And next, and this is the exciting one, is Suicide Squad alongside Will Smith, Jared Leto and Viola Davis. A comic book adaptation about imprisoned supervillains recruited to carry out black ops missions, Robbie plays Harley Quinn, a psychotherapist turned psychopath after falling in love with the Joker. It’s all dark anti-heroes rather than glossy buffed world savers and if rumours are to be believed – which Robbie nimbly dodges when I ask – she’ll also take centre stage in a spin off.

All this means she’s not spent much time at home: South London, where she rents with three others including her boyfriend Tom Ackerley, an assistant director she met filming Suite Française, and her pet rat, called Rat Rat. “The Northern line will always have a special place in my heart” she laughs, before admitting to a fondness for ‘legendary’ Clapham nightclub Infernos. Interestingly the roomies have recently become business partners, with the four of them setting up a production company, LuckyChap Entertainment, which is currently working on I, Tonya about ice-skater Tonya Harding, who Robbie will also play, and Terminal, a dystopian thriller.

With her star firmly in orbit, Stylist asked her what it means to be living the Hollywood dream…

Was the world of comic books something you were interested in growing up? Not at all [laughs] just because I wasn’t exposed to them. Then at 24 I became a comic book nerd! People hand me comics to sign, and when it’s one I haven’t read I’m like, “Wait, where did you get that?” And try to remember so I can look it up online later.

What’s the appeal? They are really smart and can convey so much in one little frame plus the DC comics are really, really dark sometimes.

Are you a natural reader? No, my attention span is not so good. But if I love a book I will read it repeatedly – the Harry Potter series, I have read probably 30 times.

Are you more visual then? I have a really vivid imagination, I have the weirdest dreams every single night. I have written them down a few times and frightened myself so I stopped. I literally ripped out the piece of paper because I thought, ‘Someone might put me in a mental asylum if they read this.’

Harley is a comic book heroine – which we haven’t seen much of previously. Is that important? Totally! And it’s not just comic book films, it’s all films. I think the industry has recognised that half the ticket sales are female moviegoers, so you need to provide. It is important to have characters like Harley; it is super important to be flawed, no-one is perfect. It’s a bold thing to tackle and I am glad we did it.

I’m from the generation that religiously watched Home And Away, then Neighbours and then had our tea. As a soap alumna, what was your experience? I didn’t watch much TV, I watched movies all the time. I joined the show to play a guest role, I didn’t even know that you could do acting as a job. When I got there [Neighbours] I talked to people saying, “So you have been here for 17 years and you don’t have another job?” I thought, ‘Wow, you bought a house and supported your family. I could do this for a job. That is amazing.’

Tina Fey says she loves working with soap actors because they “make a choice and don’t overthink it”. Is there truth in that? Oh for sure, I love it too. When you are working with someone who is actively thinking ahead, I want to know that too because it means we’ll have a 40 minute break and what could I get done in a 40 minute break? A lot of actors don’t work that way and I think that is good but they will chat with the director and there are 200 people waiting and then they have just wasted $30,000 to have a conversation but everyone is so scared of ruining the creative process…

Is money something you are sensitive to?

Yeah, when I see something like ‘half price drinks’ I am like, ‘Brilliant we should get twice as many then’.

I noticed when the waiter came over, you didn’t order prosecco because it’s only sold by the bottle. You don’t like waste?

I grew up in a family where you can’t leave food on your plate so that would make me anxious.

So is it nice now that you can help out your family financially? It’s literally the best part of the job, 1,000%. But it’s also a really weird position. Someone who has been in the industry longer than me explained it. They said, “It’s like giving out medicine and too much is not going to help, you could end up killing someone by overdosing them, you need to give them enough to achieve what they need at that moment.” I asked, “But how do you know?” There is no perfect way of doing it, it is just something to be aware of.

Not long after leaving Neighbours you got The Wolf Of Wall Street. That’s like if I had graduated from university and went straight into being Anna Wintour... That is a wonderful analogy. It was like diving in headfirst, it was thoroughly overwhelming.

When you do something so huge so early in your career, is there ever any fear of what you then work towards? I know, I remember thinking, ‘What could I possibly do after this?’ But you just keep going. What are you going to do? Stop altogether? Drop the mic? I thought, ‘I will never enjoy a character as much as this one,’ and then you play another character and I’m like, ‘I love this character’.

As a film fan, what is the best thing you have seen recently? I have been in Budapest [filming Terminal] so I haven’t seen a movie in three months. Usually I like going to the movies about twice a week and yet I haven’t seen something in so long, it is really depressing.

Is that something that you can rectify anytime soon? I can’t even get half an hour to make phone calls at the moment so not right now, but hopefully at some point it will mellow out. I think in August…

How does it feel to have so much of your life mapped out? It’s actually weirdly comforting because [as an actor] most of the time you don’t know what you are going to be doing the next week. But it changes so quickly. You promise someone you’re going to come to their wedding or whatever it is and inevitably you never can. There are so many times when you have to let people down. It is really hard to make your friends who aren’t in the industry understand, if I had the power I would [be there] but I literally don’t get a say in it. I am not allowed to pick my nail polish colour let alone tell you if in four months’ time I will be in Australia, it’s really hard.

Are you able to spend much time with your mum? Nowhere near enough, I get snippets of a phone call. But I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t want to. And there are times when I draw the line. In 10 years I don’t want to look back and think I missed anything important, so if that means getting on a plane and flying for two days to spend 18 hours at home I’d rather do that. Like my mum’s 60th and my friend’s wedding in a couple of months, I’ll fly back for one day and fly all the way back after. I got it written into my contract because if you just ask for the days off they say, “Well we’ll lose $50,000 if you do that,” and obviously you don’t want to be the d*ck who’s like, “Sure, I don’t care if you lose $50,000”.

Are you a good negotiator? Fortunately I don’t have to negotiate that kind of thing, my attorney does. I am too much of a pushover.

Does it feel like something you should get better at? I am getting better at saying no to things. Maybe it’s just part of getting older?

Perhaps but equally some people are able to separate saying no, with worrying about what people think of them… Oh my god yes, even a stranger… I won’t sleep that night, worrying ‘I think they thought I meant that and I didn’t’. It stresses me out.

What’s your go-to news site to stay informed? TheSkimm. You get an email every day with an overview of everything that is happening in the world. It is so, so good

How are you feeling about Brexit and the aftermath? I am so bummed. That was really shocking. The repercussions are massive. It sucks but it is such a good wake-up call to everyone about what is going on in the political climate and to vote. For a while I was like, ‘Should I buy a house [in the UK]?’ And now I am like, ‘Nope, probably not!’ I love London no matter what. London is its own thing, it’s not all of England. But it sucks.

Any favourite London haunts? Kurobuta, a Japanese restaurant on the King’s Road, is so good; Pitt Cueis the greatest – I’m the biggest carnivore – and Brickwood in Clapham has these pulled pork sandwiches that I crave when I’m away.

It’s a big year for sports. Will you be watching the Olympics? Yeah! I find pole vaulting fascinating, because it is one of those things I have never done and I don’t understand the physics. But my favourite sport to watch is ice hockey, I support the [New York] Rangers. I discovered it by watching The Mighty Ducks – we didn’t have ice hockey on the Gold Coast so I played field hockey at school and then when I moved to LA I could finally play it. My insurance [company] won’t let me play now.

Australia, LA, London… travelling seems to be a real Australian state of mind. They love it! Literally anywhere you go in the world, half the hostel will be Australian, I’m like, ‘Is there anyone left in Australia?’ I have always loved travelling but I didn’t have the opportunity to do it when I was younger. Fortunately, I had friends who would go on a nice holiday and invite me because they knew I hadn’t really got to travel much. I don’t know if they knew what they were doing for me: it’s life-changing going overseas. I picked Italian at school because that meant I could do an exchange trip for two months when I was 16.

Can you remember the first trip that opened your eyes to the world? South America with my boyfriend at the time and his family. Machu Picchu looked like one of the levels in Mario. I was so mind boggled that somewhere in the world existed like that. I wanted to go home and scream at everyone, “You need to go see this!”

Would you like to repeat one of those big adventures now? The trips I did when I was 19 are so different now that I am older. We were in the Philippines last year backpacking for a month, but even the activities like jumping off a waterfall I was like, ‘This is dangerous’! And I never thought about that ever – I would talk to anyone, get in any car, go anywhere. Now I am older I do stop and consider, ‘Is this a good idea?’

But you still favour backpacking… I spend so much time in hotels and a nice hotel is the same in any country. But if you go backpacking and stay in houses that belong to the locals, and meet other travellers who have spent more time in that country and can tell you about some sort of secret walking path, that is when you really experience a country.

On the same note why do you still live with friends now you can afford not to? I grew up in a very busy household so I find comfort in that. I hate quiet, I hate being on my own. I think I want it all the time because I am never, ever alone but all I need is five minutes and then I want to know what everyone is doing.

Are you worried you are missing out? I have massive FOMO all the time and I hate not being productive. If I sit still for five minutes I can think of 35 things I should be doing. I write lists all the time so I always have the next thing in priority order of what I need to be accomplishing.

Have you always been a planner? I hate the idea of wasting time, it petrifies me. Even on school holidays I would write everything I could accomplish that day: build a cubby, go for a swim, have lunch, make a birthday card… I envy friends who, when I ask, “What are you doing today,” say, “Oh, I am just going to chill”. I am like, “But chill doing what?” And they are like, “Nothing”. I am like, “I would love to do nothing. What is nothing?”

Do you think that helped you get your career to where it is now? Yeah I’d probably be sitting on a beach somewhere going travelling, never coming back. I would probably be having a lovely life, just a different one.

[borisherrmann]

Episode 9: Veganism

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Show Notes

Phillips, S. M. (2016). The impact of protein quality on the promotion of resistance exercise-induced changes in muscle mass. Nutrition & Metabolism, 13, 64. http://doi.org/10.1186/s12986-016-0124-8

Podcast Transcript

Greg:            Welcome to the Body Science podcast. Again with me is a Dietitian rock star, Harriet Walker — harrietwalker.com.au for anyone looking for some cool notes at the end of this podcast.

Today, we’re hitting the big topic of Vegan Diet. So it’s moved on from flexitarian. Is that the right word? Have I use that correctly?

Harriet:         Yes. Flexitarian is a thing.

Greg:            Which was popular to Vegan dominating the world. And just so much so that even when creating products here at Body Science — we’ve got three basic rules. If we can make gluten-free, make them gluten free. If we can make them Vegan, make them Vegan. And if we can… What’s the other one? I make the products. I’ve forgotten what the third…

Harriet:         Sugar-free.

Greg:            Thank you. If I can make them sugar free, make them sugar free. So vegan is a major part of our plan going forward too, like making tablets, not using lactose as a…

Harriet:         Gelatin caps.

Greg:            Exactly. Just moving away from that product altogether.

So they’re saying at the moment, Harriet, that 2 million Australians are pretty much living an animal-free diet.

Harriet:         That’s pretty compelling figure. That’s… What’s the population of Australia, 20 million?

Greg:            Yeah. Actually that’s Roy Morgan Research, and it’s 2.25 million, aged 18 and over, living a meat-free diet.

Harriet:         That’s crazy.

Greg:            With Melbourne and Sydney obviously having the most restaurants because they’re leading the charge.

Harriet:         There we go. So that’s what brings us here today is we’re going to look at a little bit more detail about the Vegan approach to diet.

Greg:            It is the new gluten-free.

Harriet:         It is the new gluten-free.

Greg:            I’m going to get hate mail for that. But that’s life.

Harriet:         But we’ll look at some of the considerations we need to take into account when looking at making the dietary change, if that’s something that you’re interested in doing. But basically let’s look at just primarily what the different vegetarian and Vegan types of diets there are. Because there are a few, and you’ve touched on one before.

So flexitarianism — basically noncommittal way of having meat sometimes, but not all the time. Why do people cut out meat from their diet…

Greg:            Probably not a bad way to live.

Harriet:         No. Probably not. Meat aversion is quite common. Some people just don’t like eating meat. I don’t like that texture. Some people it’s just red meat. They really like the idea of eating it. And then for other people there’s ethical reasons as to why they might reduce or completely exclude animal products from their diet, starting from the most sort of loose end, which is a flexitarianism. They might do like a meat-free Monday. They might only eat fish, and occasionally red meat, less commonly. Then you’ve got your lacto-ovo vegetarians. We were talking about this with Summer. They eat dairy products. They eat eggs, but they wont eat meat products — meat, fish, poultry. Then you’ve got ovo-vegetarians who eat eggs but no dairy products. And then we move into full veganism where there is no animal-based products at all. So no dairy, no cheese…

Greg:            No honey.

Harriet:         No honey. No B-12.

Greg:            Are we going to jump on that now or wait for later on that?

Harriet:         Wait for later. [laughs]

Greg:            I’m keen to find out where you get your B-12 for your vegan diets.

Harriet:         Yeah. Well it’s interesting…

Greg:            Fortified… [laughs]

Harriet:         Fortified products. Definitely. We’ll come back to that.

But basically, yeah, there’s no animal products. And again, some people can do it for ethical reasons. Other people do it purely for the food aversion. And then there’s the sort of the theme coming through that a Vegan diet may be a more healthy way of living. Which remains to be seen as to whether it is the healthiest way to be eating. Some people are using it for weight loss.

So that’s the probably the broad strokes of veganism right there. But I think it’s important to look at a few key points when we’re looking at a Vegan diet.

Greg:            And to look at where we are looking at this data too. Because Google trends have 90 percent increase in the word Vegan being searched these days, over vegetarian.

Harriet:         Yeah, absolutely. I worked with my auntie. She makes cakes at the markets, the most beautiful cakes, and I remember about 10 years ago I was working there while studying, and someone asked us for a Vegan cake. And we were like — eat an apple, mate.

Greg:            [laughs]

Harriet:         That was then. That was the first time I made a raw vegan ball, because people kept on asking us. I was like — bugger it, OK, I’m going to have to figure out how to do this — so I’ve got the dates out, I got Chia seeds, I got pumpkin seeds, I did it. And that was the first time that…

Greg:            It tasted good, didn’t it.

Harriet:         I wish our buddy patented that recipe, because I would have been a rock star.

Greg:            You would have been a rock star.

Harriet:         But anyway, you miss. If you don’t jump on early, you miss out on the ship.

Yeah. There’s plenty more people trying to approach it. We’ve got a couple of prominent figures who are going the Vegan direction.

Greg:            Beyonce.

Harriet:         Oh, I didn’t know Beyonce was Vegan. Oh Gosh. If you like it then you should’ve put a steak on it. No, like, Gaga is definitely not vegan. I know that from her dress.

Greg:            I believe Beyonce led the way veganism in a big way.

Harriet:         Oh, I didn’t even know she was Vegan.

Greg:            Not that I’m an expert in that area. Morgan, our production manager, would be way more technical in that area than me. But you got your, Ms Paltrow.

Harriet:         Gwyneth.

Greg:            Yeah Gwyneth. Mike Tyson.

Harriet:         Mike Tyson? No Way.

Greg:            Yeah. So we’re talking back in 2013. They could have had 15 diets since then for all I know, but obviously have had some big names jumping behind it.

Harriet:         Absolutely.

Greg:            You know, for brands like ours to take on… One of the three things we want. Don’t even talk to us about it. If we can do it, that’s the way we do it.

Harriet:         Yeah, absolutely. So it’s obviously a big trend coming through. Then we see the raw vegan slices going gangbusters. They are delicious. So I understand that.

Greg:            And you look at the plant-based protein sales in retail stores these days, big time.

Harriet:         Yep. Most brands will be bringing out a plant base, so there is a demand for it. And looking at where it’s coming from. I think social media has got a really big play in it. People especially looking at the chicks on the Vegan Diet, you know, you’ve got Freelee the Banana Girl with her abs out. So I think people look at that and see, OK, is this something that I should be following? Is this your weight loss trend? Rightly or wrongly, people are taking up because like they like what they see. However, I think it’s really important to sort of dig a little bit deeper before you even start to consider becoming a Vegan or vegetarian and actually look at, OK, what do you need to consider before making a dietary change?

This is something I bang on about pretty much every dietary approach is — what are you missing out on? Or what are the considerations you need to take into account before you even consider it? Because everything’s valid as long as you can do it properly.

So the first thing is, is looking at, OK, what does the Vegan Diet look like? So basically we’re emphasising plant-based foods. So legumes, whole grains, nuts, seeds, cereals — are going to be the basis of their diet. You’ll notice straight away that the protein intake is going to be a lot different in a vegan diet versus an Omnivore, omnivorous diet, so somebody who eats plants and meats.

And you can see there’s plenty of Vegan bodybuilders out there, so I mean anything is possible.

Greg:            And there’s plenty of really cool Vegan proteins coming to market now too.

Harriet:         Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So we are getting a little bit more techie with the Vegan approach and if people want to do it for ethical reasons, then that’s definitely… People are looking at, OK, how much water, food, land does it cost to raise a cow, versus to…

Greg:            2,400 gallons, I think it was, when I looked earlier.

Harriet:         That’s a lot of water.

Greg:            Versus 25 gallons for cows

Harriet:         So they argument is for eating more a plant-based diet, are we saving saving some of the resources we have on the earth. And again, there’s plenty of people who have calculations to sort of refute those sort of claims as well. So there’s definitely people who are pro veganism.

Greg:            Oh there’s lovers and hater of Vegan.

Harriet:         Absolutely. It’s a very polarising diet. And I think you’ll find that people who are Vegan —

Greg:            Are very loyal to the cause.

Harriet:         — are very, very Vegan.

But then there’s also the people… Like I’ve got Vegan, the athletes that I work with and you don’t really know about until like — they have to tell me because it’s really critical to their performance that we know about this.

But then there are other people who really grasp onto it and it is quite emotional for them, and generally that’s the ethical side of things. If people are that passionate about something, then all power to you I think.

But yeah. So protein intake…

Greg:            V-gains. Some good words coming out now.

Harriet:         My V-gains…

Greg:            Do you have a lot of vegan programs?

Harriet:         I run a few. It’s becoming more popular. Actually, I’m seeing it more. I’m working with a couple of Vegan athletes at the moment. I’ve had a couple of Vegan power lifters. Basketball. Cycling. It’s a few. They are, definitely.

Greg:            Mainly male? Mainly female?

Harriet:         Mainly female. Actually, so far. I do know of a few male vegans. I hang out in some pretty cool circles. Yeah, mainly so far it’s been females. That’s not to say that that’s sort of the representative of the complete demographic.

So what I’m looking at in their diet straight off the bat when we’re looking at a Vegan diet is what are we missing out on that we get, that are required from animal products that we’re not getting in the Vegan Diet? So straight away the protein profile is going to be slightly different, B-12, as you alluded to earlier, is not present in a Vegan Diet. We can get some in a vegetarian diet, but mainly Vegan diet that’s going to be supplemented fairly quick smart. Iron is another one that we can get from plants. However, we can go into a bit more detail about why plant iron is slightly different to animal based sources of iron. Then we’re looking at Omega-3 fatty acids, as well as being sort of a little bit more deficient in the Vegan Diet. And calcium. So obviously not having dairy products, we are missing out on sources of calcium in their diet. So they’re probably the key nutrients that we have to look at in order to create a diet that is going to meet the nutrient requirements of the human body.

Greg:            Does it take you longer put a Vegan diet together in the clinic? Versus…

Harriet:         Yes. First of all… I mean, the couple that I have worked with are doing a really good job on dietary analysis. Once I’m looking at their diet in the software, it straight away — boom, boom, boom, boom, boom — half their iron requirements are being met, half of their calcium requirements are being met, B-12 is deficient. Things like selenium can be quite low. And then also making sure that if they’re trying to put on lean muscle mass and they’re not meeting that protein intake, that can be quite… And it actually can be quite hard to meet your energy needs as a Vegan as well. I actually went Vegan for three weeks once. I was supposed to go for a month just with a friend of mine who’s Vegan. So I thought I’d give him a little bit of love and see what they’re talking about. I lasted three weeks. I was training in quite heavily at the time and I’d lost three kilos in that time. And that for me was a no-go. I wasn’t trying to lose weight. I couldn’t keep up with my energy needs without eating copious amounts of bread. [laughs] And that didn’t agree with my stomach. I ate bread on the regular, but I couldn’t keep up with my nutrient requirements without my training suffering. So I had to kind of back off from it.

But there are plenty of vegans out there who do a really good job at meeting their energy requirements.

Greg:            And there are heaps of restaurants too.

Harriet:         Absolutely. And it’s a lot more easy, thinking about back in 2006 when I was working with my Auntie, a Vegan cake was like — good luck. But these days it’s dime-a-dozen. Like, it’s becoming all that more popular now, that it’s actually quite easy for people. Most restaurants will have the little vegan symbol next to the meal indicating that it’s Vegan friendly. So obviously the demand is there from the population. I mean there’s definitely some really great positive points with the Vegan Diet as well.

I think any diet that makes people think a little bit more about what goes in their mouth is not a bad thing. I think it really puts the emphasis on plants — getting enough fruits and vegetables, and we know that a lot of Australians and not eating adequate amounts of vegetables. So if there is an approach where maybe you can do Vegan or vegetarian a couple times a week, that would be sort of re-calibrating your intake, and actually getting you to think about, OK, what’s going into my mouth, what’s this providing me? I think that’s a good thing really.

But yeah, so then we’re looking at iron intake and that’s definitely something that both the athletic population and non athletic population need to be aware of, especially females. So females are very…

Greg:            What are you doing for their iron?

Harriet:         Again, it will be supplementing. If full Vegan, I would be getting them to get their, obviously, blood tests done on a regular basis. If they’d been Vegan for a long time, I would probably bet that they would be on the lower end, if not deficient, the serum ferritin levels would be on the decline. If they’re new vegans, new vegetarians, chances are they probably haven’t dropped to critically low, but I’d be checking them once every sort of three months if they’ve been deficient, and on a regular basis if they are just choosing that lifestyle long term.

Greg:            What are signs that we’re looking for?

Harriet:         It can be a lot of different things, but most of the biggest ones for iron deficiency would be dizziness, fatigue, get some dark rings under the eyes. Memory can go as well, and I’ve personally have experienced this recently. I’m not even vegan, vegetarian — low iron, it feels pretty crappy. Definitely makes you want to nap more. But it takes about three months to six months to get them back up again. So depending on how low they have been, it’s a really critical mineral for oxygen utilization across the body. So you do notice when you are iron deficient, your energy levels are pretty poor. That’s an important one to look out for. And females tend to be a little bit more susceptible to iron deficiency. So that’s definitely one to sort of consider, and also that vegetarians actually have a higher iron requirement, and this is because Vegan/vegetarian diets are using plant based iron, so this is non heme which is not as bioavailable. So basically our body can’t take it up as readily as the animal heme iron is recommended that vegetarians and vegans have around 1.8 times the RDI, Recommend Daily Intake, of iron to make sure that they’re getting that iron intake. Because as little as 5 percent of the iron from food, so we’re looking at iron-rich foods like — spinach is a big one, nut seeds, we can get little bits of irons from those as well, the green leafy vegetables are rich sources of non heme iron — but we’re not necessarily absorbing as much. Almonds is another one. Dried figs can be another source of vegetarian, non heme iron. But we need to make sure that they’re trying to get it from food where possible, but taking into account that not all of that iron is going to be absorbed from the plants. And also complementing it with vitamin C. So if somebody is taking a supplement or if they’re Vegan or vegetarian and they’re trying to maximize the absorption of that plant-based iron, 50 milligrams of vitamin C, say can actually help absorb.

Greg:            OK. What are we eating for 15 milligrams of vitamin C? Just for those people out there that don’t know.

Harriet:         One tomato. Or —

Greg:            So you’re feeding me spinach and tomatoes so far.

Harriet:         That’s a salad. Delicious. So fruits like Kiwi fruit, oranges, strawberries. Fruit is really high in vitamin C. Citrus. Yeah. So that’s what we’re looking at.

But then we also need to look at what inhibits the absorption of iron and there’s definitely a good list. So calcium actually inhibits the absorption of iron, so we want to be making sure that we were having that away from any iron-rich foods. The tannin in tea and coffee also inhibit the absorption of iron. So again, making sure that we’re having tea and coffee away from iron rich meals is really important.

Greg:            It’s a dumb question — what’s a ways? Half an hour, an hour, three hours?

Harriet:         I would say an hour, give or take. So you want to make sure that the digestion has occurred, but a couple of hours would probably be safe with that one there. Because of the fiber rich diet that is Vegan-vegetarian, some of the phytates that are contained in those foods can actually inhibit absorption as well.

I mean, you can’t really do too much about that, but it��s about being aware of what might enhance and what might inhibit in the Diet when it comes to iron absorption specifically.

Greg:            So should a young female be very aware of snacking more regularly on a Vegan Diet?

Harriet:         As long as… Well, it depends on the sort of preferred eating patterns, but they probably would require more frequent meals because the general basis, again, that plant based high fiber, it’s going to be highly satiating. So they’re going to get full quick. And they’re going to feel probably full for a long time. So making sure that you’re having regular meals and meeting their energy requirements might mean that they’re having regular snacks. Otherwise I might not be meeting that energy total across the day.

Greg:            Because it sounded like was a mixture of energy total and timing of some foods.

Harriet:         Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So again, this is when working with somebody who’s going to be looking at — when are you having those iron rich foods? When are you having calcium supplements, if you need to be having that with a Vegan Diet? You’ve got to be looking at when that’s all happening. It’s really important to be aware.

So straight away you can see that it’s actually a lot that goes into being vegan. It’s not just — I’m not having anymore. A little bit of planning can make the difference between a really healthy healthful vegan diet, which is what all of the studies are showing. It can have heaps of great benefits for myriad of reasons. But if it’s done poorly it can mean a lot of really poor health outcomes as well. So nothing is bulletproof. It comes down to being aware and actually planning properly.

That’s probably the nutrient side of things that’s really important. And I think from where we’re sitting, protein intake is probably the next stop. So what sort of proteins have you got in the plant-based protein?

Greg:            Got a new one coming out that won’t be much longer aft this, where we’ve definitely playing with the pea protein. A lot of people just run a straight pea protein, which is a bit of a no-no, if you ask me. We like to blend it with rice. But we’re also hitting the organic ancient grains these days. That’s our next venture. And I’m just a big fan of mixing those Aminos as much as I possibly can.

Harriet:         Yeah. Fantastic. And that brings up a really good point in terms of the availability of amino acids in plant proteins. We’ve got our suite of amino acids and then we’ve got our essential amino acids, and plant based proteins aren’t always a full suite of amino acids, which means we do need to profile.

It used to be the sort of thing where you had to make sure that each meal has a blend of protein. So you might have a limiting amino acid inside quinoa. So you have quinoa with some brown rice and you’re getting the full suite.

Greg:            How do you know that?

Harriet:         You can actually get food data that shows what the amino acid profile of specific foods are. It’s actually quite complicated. But some of the key amino acids that you will find are low in plants. They’re going to be methionine, lycine, tryptophan, and leucine can be quite low as well. When it comes to protein, we’re only as strong as our weakest link, and if we’re missing or if we’re low on one of the amino acids, we’re not going to be getting the full benefits of having all those other amino acids there if we’re missing one or two because our diet is not complete.

So this is why having that sort of variety in the Diet, being aware of where you’re getting your protein from, what the different sources are and how you can profile them. We don’t need to profile in every single meal. But we do need to make sure that across the day we are meeting those amino acid profiles on the whole in the diet.

Greg:            Question. A young adult wants 20 grams of protein in a meal. So they’ve made their meal plan. They want some Vegan, some V-gains.

Harriet:         V-gains. Yep.

Greg:            What do they put it on their plate to get 20 grams of protein?

Harriet:         Look, I mean I’d be looking at using some brown rice. I’d be looking quinoa as a way of…

Greg:            Where we at so far?

Harriet:         In terms of per gram? Let me get my Fitness Pal out.

Greg:            Sorry. Yep. Ball-parkey. Are we over five yet?

Harriet:         Yeah. Potentially. So let’s look at maybe nine grams per hundred in brown rice. It’s pretty high, but I’d be making sure that I’ve got maybe some quinoa, maybe some tofu, and then some vegetables in there which provide us a small amount of protein but not a huge whack.

Greg:            So it’s not that hard. Really.

Harriet:         20 grams of protein. It’s not hard to hit with a vegan-vegetarian diet at all. I would require people to actually, yeah, have a look what some of the good quality sources of protein. So we would be looking at things like Tofu, tempeh, quinoa, nuts and seeds, but keeping in mind that some of those foods are quite calorific, so you can go over the top with the calorie content little bit. Obviously nuts aren’t protein source directly. They are more of a fat source, but we can use them in a Vegan and vegetarian diet as the source of protein. So that’s…

Greg:            Any particular nuts we should trend more towards an another type of nut?

Harriet:         They’ve all got different levels of protein. Almonds tend to be the higher protein, peanuts aren’t bad either. And you can get some products, I know peanut butter, they’re doing high protein peanut butter now, so they’re fortifying the protein with extra peanut powder to increase the protein intake. So it’s definitely something that people are across and aware of. Looking at the amino acid profiles of different plants when you’re first becoming a Vegan or vegetarian is super important. Just being confident that you know what’s missing and what’s not and working with a professional to help you do that be very beneficial. Definitely.

I think also to point out that when we’re using our vegan proteins, we want to make sure that if you’re an athlete or if you’re somebody who’s looking to put on some lean muscle mass — don’t have to be an athlete. You can just be a regular gym goer — the vegan vegetarian gym goer would have to be making sure that… So I said that leucine might not be as high. And leucine is that amino acid that is associated with our muscle protein synthesis.

So there are studies showing — Van Loon did a great study comparing, relooking at the way in which Vegan vegetarian proteins trigger muscle protein synthesis after a meal, and they were comparing soy protein versus whey protein, and we know that whey protein is a really rich source of leucine and has a really great effect on raising amino acid levels in the blood to trigger muscle protein synthesis. However, soy isn’t as great at doing it — again, profiling and making sure we’re getting that critical mass, so it might mean putting a little bit of extra leucine in a Vegan, vegetarian protein as well to make sure that they’re hitting that leucine threshold as well. That’s something to keep in mind with the Vegan Diet. A few considerations there.

Greg:            OK. So obviously B-12 is a big one.

Harriet:         Yes. B-12.

Greg:            The vegan population.

Harriet:         Yeah. So B-12 is pretty much used in almost every single cell in the body, is associated with DNA production, RNA cell health in the body, and it can be produced in our gut, but we also need to be getting it from external sources, so dietary sources.

Greg:            Tough one to get for a Vegan?

Harriet:         Tough one to get for a Vegan. We were discussing this earlier, and my mind was blown just a little bit, because I was like — oh, where do vegans get B-12? Well, obviously, where does the B-12 from Vegan supplements come from? I feel like you might —

Greg:            We don’t talk about that.

Harriet:         [laughs] We don’t talk about that.

Greg:            No. Even the products that they say comes from a fortified.

Harriet:         So it was looking at things like brewer’s yeast, Vegemite is a good source of B-12. Yeast products.

Greg:            B-12 tablet is a good source of B-12.

Harriet:         And I will put most, if not all vegans, straight onto a B-12 supplement straight off the bat for that one.

Greg:            I played vegan for a while.

Harriet:         Yeah? What did you experience?

Greg:            Well this was years ago. We first started making a vegan range in 2013. So just to see what it was like, my daughter was talking along those lines back then as a young, very young teenager. She was very much against the animal being used in food. So I thought I’ll do it with her and that way you know, we can share cooking —

Harriet:         Watch and learn.

Greg:            — and do the things together. And I became very low on B-12. I went and had the blood tested, all things, and had to supplement. Felt a million bucks once I did.

Harriet:         Isn’t it amazing. I was saying before, my iron was on the floor just a few weeks ago, and I’m currently supplementing with iron. The difference, I mean it’s been a month now I’ve been supplementing, and the rates of nappage has reduced drastically, which is great. I feel a lot better. So we ignore that these sort of deficiencies actually really do impact well being. So being aware and being…

Greg:            That’s how it is. It’s not like a negative. “Don’t not think vegan” because of these things. Just be aware.

Harriet:         Absolutely. And chat to your medical professional, chat to your nutrition professional, making sure that you’re across it and that you’re being diligent with your blood tests, just making sure that you’re not dipping under. If you’ve been deficient, getting tested once every three months just to make sure that you’re dipping back up, athletes will get tested coming into an event or a big race and they’ll also get tested coming into like say attitude to training just to make sure that they’re making the most of that as well, that adaptation, because if we are experiencing any kind of deficiency our body’s not going to be adapting as well as it should be. So it’s pretty important. But…

Greg:            How visible is the Vegan trend for you in the Dietitians Australia perspective?

Harriet:         We get a lot of questions about it.

Greg:            You do?

Harriet:         It becoming increasingly popular. And it’s a social media aspect, I think, and I get asked a lot. I used to get asked a lot about coconut oil. Moving away from coconut oil, and now it’s Vegan, people want to know what it is, what to do. And some people are doing it for the right reasons and then there are the people who are maybe looking at it for probably the wrong reason that it’s purely for weight loss perspective.

There’s lots of different ways —

Greg:            So if I’m eating a lot of nuts and I’m eating a lot of rice and I’m eating a lot of breads, and…

Harriet:         Well. Oreos are vegan. Barbecue shapes are Vegan as well.

Greg:            Wow.

Harriet:         Sugar is Vegan. White flour is Vegan. And these are all the things that we’d associate with a less optimal diet.

Greg:            Absolutely. So how do we lose weight there?

Harriet:         Well, you probably don’t. Unless you’re not eating enough, and then we’re looking at nutrient deficiencies. So really you can do it badly. You can lose weight. But you can also end up really unwell. If you do it well make sure…

Greg:            That’s any diet.

Harriet:         That’s any diet. Absolutely. So we’re not saying this is any different to that.

Greg:            So it’s not the holy weight loss grail.

Harriet:         It is not the holy weight loss grail.

Chances are by following a Vegan Diet, you are cutting out two or three food groups. You are limiting your access to calories and therefore you’re probably creating a calorie deficit. So if you’re doing it for weight loss and you do it properly, then good — probably emphasizes more of those beneficial vegetables and fruits and whole grains and all those nutrients. Things that we should be eating. You know, if you’re going Vegan and you’re eating Oreos, white bread and white rice, you’re going to end up in trouble. But that’s just the same with everything. You know what I mean?

A long, long time ago when I first started nutrition, I was being supervised and I was doing a nutrition consultation with a Vegan who was obese, and we were going through his diet history, going like — why? Why would this be the case? And it came out he was having five jumbo, soy Chai lattes per day. You know, that’s a calorie surplus, easy. He was drinking, probably close to two liters of the soy milk, and then if you look at Chai powder, it’s horrendous. It’s cream, there’s sugar. There’s all sorts of things in there. Just goes to show you can think you’re doing the right thing, but unless you actually look at it from all angles, it’s hard to be objective with your own diet. Absolutely. You know, it’s not until you really dig deep and ask those questions that you find out that soy Chai lattes aren’t necessarily a weight loss tool.

Greg:            So outside of iron, B-12, calcium — anything else I should be focusing on if I want to try a vegan diet?

Harriet:         Well, the Omega threes is probably that next one. So we’ve got…

Greg:            How does a plant based omega rank to say a fish-based omega?

Harriet:         It’s a similar story to iron. So we’ve got the plant based Omega threes and sixes and… So we’re looking at things like — the essential fatty acids coming from plant based sources are going to be one walnuts, flax seeds, Chia seeds. Nuts and seeds. Basically. Algae is a rich source of Omegas. That’s down the bottom of the food chain for the fish. That’s where they’re getting it from. So we’re making sure that we’re also balancing out the Omega threes because it can be quite hard unless you’re having oily fish, be heating those essential fatty acids in the right mixture, plant-based diet tends to be high in Omega Sixes, which isn’t necessarily always ideal out of balance with your Omega threes.

Greg:            Are there any dangers there? For the people who don’t know.

Harriet:         There’s some research to say that potentially when we’re eating a high level over mega sixes, that might be proinflammatory, we know omega threes —

Greg:            Which is probably a reason why a lot of people start vegan diets in the first place.

Harriet:         Well, yeah. The reducing inflammation, a plant based diet can be a way to do that. There’s so much information out there that conflicts left, right and center, but we know omega three fatty acids are, and have an anti-inflammatory property. So when they’re out of balance it may be tipping the body over. But again, if we’re eating a variety of foods and looking at the sources of where we’re getting those nutrients from, we can be sort of reducing the risk of falling. And when we do all or nothing sort of approaches that we tend to fall into those sort of gaps.

So yeah, the essential fatty acids are probably one that we’d also need to look at. And then again, calorie content, making sure that we’re in within our calorie budget.

Greg:            So in a traditional diet, where we’re eating anything, all food groups, we can definitely have what’s said to be a poor diet or a bad diet or an incorrect diet, whichever word you want to use. What are we throwing into a Vegan diet that puts it in that category?

Harriet:         Oh, man. I would say it’s the Vegan products. There’s a lot of highly processed vegan foods. The first thing I’d be looking at is chips. They’re Vegan. Potato chips, they’re fried in vegetable oil. They’re potatoes. They are covered in salt. Or as, like I said before, there are products that are Vegan. There are lollies that are Vegan. So obviously most lollies will contain gelatin, which is an animal product, but we can get Vegan lollies. And then lots and lots of processed white flour, white bread, that kind of stuff in nutrient-poor energy-dense foods. Whereas good Vegan Diet is focusing on those good quality protein sources. We’re profiling protein. We’re getting adequate amounts of the legumes and the whole grains — rice, quinoa, buckwheat, those kinds of things. A couple of pieces of fruit and vegetables, nuts as snacks. It’s pretty easy and you can look at the plate and see that it’s healthy. The poor Vegan Diet, you look at the plate and it looks pretty white. That’s the same with all sort of poor diets. There’s a lack of color. There’s a lack of variety and there’s a lot of processed foods involved. You can look at your plate and tell most of the time, whether you’re on track or not, and I think that can be quite a powerful tool for people just to see how much color is on their plate.

Again, things like cereals feature quite heavily in a Vegan vegetarian diet, but we all know that cereal can be an absolute pack a sugar punch, depending on how processed they are, how much added sugar they are.

So I think it’s important just to look at food quality, again, flying the flag for food quality. Looking at compliance. Like if you’re following a Vegan diet purely for the sake of weight loss and you find yourself — restricting, restricting, restricting — and it is causing issues to quality of life or it is those sorts of negative impacts of any kind of diet, then review — is this working for me? Some people find it really easy to follow and it’s like a second skin. Other people, they think… They’re following it for the wrong reasons and they find it really difficult and they end up binge eating on chicken nuggets. Not ideal. That’s the sort of signal when a diet probably isn’t working for you. It should be a positive aspect of your life and it should only be a small aspect of your life. Veganism is one part of it. Probably is, in terms of all the diets, the one that has a more sort of ethical backbone to it and as such has a bit more of emotion attached to it. But also, I am friends with all sorts, and I’ve got vegan friends and you wouldn’t know they were Vegan until they bought it up, and they do their own advocating in their own ways, and it’s not an issue if you’re not Vegan. But then you get other people who, again, they’re holding onto it quite tightly and it becomes a point of contention with people. And it’s like, well, anything like that, that causes a lot of friction the way you eat — I would question whether or not that’s a positive.

I think that’s probably on the whole, the picture when it comes to veganism. It’s plant based diet, looking at specific nutrients that we might not be able to get from the plants. We’re looking at protein, iron, Omega threes, calcium, B-12 — other than that, we can do it really well, or we can do it poorly. I think that’s probably the basics of it.

Greg:            Nice. I reckon that probably covers.

Harriet:         Most of the aspects of it. Yeah, definitely. I don’t think it has to be easy or as complicated as you like it, but I think that’s probably the key when you’re starting out.

Greg:            A little bit more planning for those people that probably aren’t planning as much as they should be.

Harriet:         Absolutely. And anything that makes you sort of concentrate more on the quality of your diet, always good by me.

Greg:            Perfect.

Well that buzzword has just been chatted. I’d love to hear a lot about Vegan. If you look at the sheer amount of data in relation to where sports nutrition’s going to. They definitely the plant based Vegan is a growth category. Major companies are buying Vegan brands. And our brand is definitely got a major play towards Vegan if we can.

Harriet:         Yeah.

Greg:            I assume you’re going to be writing of female vegan diets.

Harriet:         Here we go. Bring it on. [laughs]

Greg:            So that’s harrietwalker.com.au.

Harriet:         That’s the one. That’s the one. And harrietwalker@athleticeating. Instagram.

Greg:            Well, there you go. Happy days guys. Thanks heaps to join the podcast.

Harriet:         Thank you.

Episode 9: Veganism published first on http://www.bodyscience.com.au/

[getseriouser]

20 THOUGHTS: Super Saturday

RATHER important Saturday coming up. Going to be on for young and old in Mayo, Longman, and at Yarra Park as well 

It’s going to be as big in the Adelaide Hills between Xenophon’s mob and the daughter of the country’s longest running Foreign Minister as it will be between two suburban tribes at the MCG, the reigning premier against one of the very finite group of contenders.

My tip? I reckon Sharkie gets her seat back.

 1.       Yep, the Giants are coming. The Cats dropping games to the likes of the Bulldogs, the Power losing to Freo, Hawthorn losing to Brisbane, all these have given the Giants a fast path up the ladder to ominously now be in the race for the top four where a month ago just making the eight seemed a challenge. They sit half a game off fourth, which is held by the Swans, a team they are definitely better than and they’ll have the chance to frank that when they host the next local derby in a few weeks’ time. The Demons in the last round looks the only real chance for a slip up for the Giants on the way in, so their form into September will be as cherry ripe as any. Big threats.

2.       The midfield quintet of Shiel, Ward, Whitfield, Kelly and Conglio is the best group of five mids in the comp by a street. Remember, this is a team that late in the third term on Preliminary Final day last year was only two kicks off the eventual premier, and had lost Dylan Shiel early in the game to concussion. With Jeremy Cameron back in a week, if they keep this all going as planned, the Tigers wouldn’t be as thrilled to dance to a deep September tune with the orange tsunami again this time round.

3.       Mind you, we’ve been lucky so far given the danger we were warned of years ago, that the Giants or Suns for that matter haven’t saluted on Grand Final day for the scenes post-match would be just weird. No noise from the crowd, no romantic story to fuel emotion, a lap of honour with the cup to a largely empty stadium; yeah let’s avoid that if we can for a little while yet please?

4.       Melbourne. Round 23 last year, then a number of occasions this year, they are a good footy side without the results to back it up. But geez, they are stiff, if nothing but the Geelong losses in themselves – the Dees would be top four with a bullet, the Cats would be on the slide despite their favourite sun returning. Sliding doors much?

5.       Still on the Cats – lucky they are in the eight really. Yes, let’s acknowledge the missed opportunity against the Dogs after the siren, but it’s not clinical for Geelong in 2018. Saturday night Gaz had 31 but Selwood was squeezed out a little, well held, but it seems he is having less influence on matches because of the presence of Ablett. And for mine, if we isolate duos only, Selwood and Dangerfield in the middle looks better than Ablett and Dangerfield, despite the two-time Brownlow medallist’s last term helping get that win no doubt.

6.       Big tick to Travis Boak this week, wearing his old number 10 and not 1 as per the tradition for the captain at Port Adelaide. Why? Boak gave the honour of wearing the 1 at Alberton to cancer sufferer Henry Mickan, who was the nominal captain on the day. Great gesture, well done Boak and the Power, just grouse.

7.       Rising Star watch, yep, Stephenson kicked three for the Pies whilst Ronke didn’t trouble the goalscorers. But Alex Witherden in the narrow loss to the Crows, 31 touches and 12 marks. This form continues and he’ll pip them at the post for mine.

8.       The Swans have lost their midfield. Yes Kennedy had 33 but looks sore, Parker had 29 and kicked two, nice, but after that, what? Jake Lloyd has been industrious all year in the middle but after that it’s mega thin. Heeney has been brilliant but quiet of late, you can’t ask too much off Florent, it’s all looking a bit dire at Sydney.

9.       Their run home too is awful. Of the five games left, right now, you’d have them favourites in maybe two of them, and even those odds would be anything but short. They’ll still win their fair share and all will not be completely lost, but they could so easily lose more than they win and their grasp on a top eight spot could go just like that.

10.   If there’s smoke, there’s fire – mega legend of Australian netball, Sharni Layton, retired from the sport this week, only turned 30 this year, looks destined now for a stint in AFLW. She did play football as a junior, that’s the key, it wouldn’t just be about publicity Usain Bolt Central Coast Mariners-style, but the girl has got the skills and would probably be stellar. Keen to see her have a go if she so wishes.

11.   Quick one on rule changes, I don’t want to be a broken record on this but bloody hell the footy has been good since the bye rounds, leave it alone would you please? Remember when flooding was ruining the game 15 odd years ago, we didn’t legislate the game to eradicate that and who even mentions the word these days? Seriously before the boys got stuck down the cave in Thailand, I hadn’t heard flooding mentioned since watching a Terry Wallace-coached Bulldogs all those years ago.

12.   Unconvinced on where the Pies stack up compared to not just their rivals but also their ladder position but to defeat a decent side in North by 66 points is one thing, to have the ball more (+29) but then win tackles 83-47, bloody hell that’s some discrepancy. As impressive a stat for the Maggies as alarming for the Roos.

13.   Ben Cunnington, who is just a truck, and Jed Anderson had 12 tackles between them, so that’s 35 tackles made by 20 of their teammates. Five of those 20 didn’t register one all day. Whereas the Pies had nine players register five or more.

14.   Port Adelaide had a busy offseason, brought in Rockliff as a free agent, traded for Watts and Motlop, got Thomas and Trengove in as mature-aged recruits for the rookie list. Specifically the first three to be fair, as they are senior-listed players, have they made any real difference? Aside from Motlop’s winning goal in a Showdown, I’d say non grata.

15.   Meanwhile, Essendon, further down the ladder, but all three big recruits are wins for mine. Saad looks great down back, Smith’s amongst their most important mids already, and Stringer will look even better next year, win them a few games off his own boot like he did for the Dogs a few years ago down forward. Just the bad losses holding the Dons’ progress back, lots to like about them but you can’t forget they’ve handed Carlton their only win for the year.

16.   Also, Orazio Fantasia is close to the best small forward in the comp – he plays a full year next year he kicks 50 plus easy.

17.   Ryan Schoenmakers. He may be judged really stringently by the Hawks match committee but gee he looks a rock solid CHF for 2018. 14 touches, 8 marks, two goals on the weekend, 27 years old, a great mark, a reliable set shot, those sorts of big blokes are worth their weight in gold. He’ll probably stay loyal at year’s end if the Hawks don’t secure Tom Lynch but for those other clubs who might be in the race for Lynch and miss or just could use a new target up forward one could do a lot worse.

18.   Hawks play the Cats in Round 21 and that’s probably an early elimination final. Loser will be relying on results and maths whereas the victor is probably safe bar a shocking loss in the final fortnight. Always a big game between those two, this will be another chapter in that story.

19.   As for big games, how we have 1st v 3rd on Saturday afternoon at the MCG not on free to air is awful. Did we notice that Channel Seven, who always had four games a round dropped down to three when there’s no Thursday night or special game to cover? I know we can’t move the game at last minute to prime time, but we are getting the Dogs-Power balltearer from Ballarat Sunday on Seven. Can’t we send that game to Fox Footy and get Seven to take the Tigers-Pies instead the day prior, surely that’s a better result?

20.   And finally this week, Francis Leach. Why? Well its to do with the fact four or five blokes got in a decent shove on the Kardina Park terraces Saturday night. Not good, it is a problem with scuffles in the crowd, not dire but not great, so I’m glad its being picked up and hopefully addressed.

But Francis, heads on to the ABC Sunday morning and cynically said “that’d be a page one, two and three of the Herald Sun for the next three days (if it happened in the A-League), that’s not going to be on the front page the next three days”.

Firstly, the Herald Sun did make it front page the next day, it’s still in the press as of today, and we had fan segregation columns and everything. Sure, not three front pages, it wasn’t Thai boys getting stuck down a cave lets be frank. And yes, the Murdoch press has been unkind to the round ball code over the journey no doubt, but who has the tabloid industry missed, often unfairly, over the journey? Ask any African living in Melbourne at the moment, Francis?

But then too stop worrying about appropriate media coverage when the sport you’re needlessly comparing too, soccer, is pushing an Olympic sprinter as the saviour for the upcoming domestic season, not because he is a genuine onfield talent but because he is a novelty who might put bums on seats that otherwise are attracting cobwebs. That sounds like the exact recipe for a circus. If Kevin Muscat wears a red wig and face paint on the sidelines this season I call Bingo, Gin and Yahtzee.

The narcissistic, precious soccer society needs to stop worrying about Usain Bolt, stop demanding a Royal Commission for the lack of playing time Tim Cahill got in Russia, and stop critiquing whether an incident in a completely different code has been adequately covered by the media and start worrying about getting the world’s most loved sport working in this country again, because right now the way it’s going an unfair and undesirable bit of publicity again on a Tracy Grimshaw program would actually be a good result.

Francis. Take the lemon out of your gob and try and smile. To deflect the real issue onto sorrow into soccer looks as good as your haircut.

(originally published 24 July)

[martin-duran]

For years Amma suggested we visit Sydney and Perth for the Gourmet Escape event in Margaret River (which is actually a 3 hour drive from Perth). It seemed like an ambitious trip and frankly, the long flight scared the hell out of me. 

Between Oprah’s Australian Special years ago and a postcard from Sydney I found amongst my dad’s old keepsake box, the timing seemed right.

This trip came at a great time. It gave us something to look forward to during & after the big move/home renovation of our place in Silver Lake. 

I was also a bit concerned traveling with a group. Tere & I are typically a travel duo but Rocky, Annie, Cat, Dave & Amma helped create one of the most memorable adventures of our lives.  

The Flight: Three movies and a benedryl

It wasn’t all that bad. Maybe it was the anticipation of exploring a new city. 

The oddest adjustment was landing in Sydney and the time difference was NINETEEN hours ahead of Los Angeles Time. Talk about time traveling. 

First impressions:

Sydney is clean and people seem pleasant. 

Armed with our Opal cards, courtesy of Raul & Enrique, we made our way to Circular Quay (key)- the center of the city. 

Kudos to the city planner for building the airport so close to the center of Sydney.  Day 1:

Though it may seem touristy, the hop on/hop off bus is the most expedient way to get to know a city. 

The Sydney Harbour is the cutest. I say that because it sort of reminds us the San Francisco Bay & San Diego harbor but on a smaller scale. 

After looping the entire city we stroll around the Royal Botanical garden, it’s there we get the best view of the Sydney Harbour Bridge & The Sydney Opera House. Both are breath taking and I got goosebumps seeing them in person. 

On our first night we also arranged for a dinner meet up with Rand’s aunt Andee and her much younger boyfriend at a Lebanese restaurant in Surry Hills near her home. We had a blast listening to how she came to live in Sydney.

Turns out her life played out like a movie. (Left L.A cause FBI was looking for her due to a questionable AFI Film Program....she fled to China with 2nd husband who had a breakdown after taking some hallucinogens...he was fired from teaching at the University, she dropped him off in Amsterdam and she wound up staying in Sydney after meeting up with a friend. At least that’s what I remembered). 

Surprisingly we weren’t jet lagged after dinner & soaking in the city. In fact we embarked on our own Pub Crawl after the Hop On Off bus driver pointed out a few favorite watering holes. The Waterloo (bartender showed us the shanghai tunnel) The Brewery Hotel and the Palisades rooftop bar

Day 2:

The Koala Crew is here! 

Tapas Lunch near The Marriott Hotel 

Walk in the Park, drinks overlooking the harbour, first night at the Wydam...Thai Food to tackle the cold I caught.

Day 3:

The Crew spends the day at Bondi Beach while I rest up at the hotel before we embark on planned events. 

Day 4:

Taronga Zoo- In search of the Kwaka

Meet up with Andee her local bar. We head to a Tapas bar with Live Flamenco. The gang loses their mind when they see her library.

Amma- “You knew Octavia Butler?”

Andee- “ Yes.” 

She provides us space cake which we indulge in later in the trip. 

Day 5:

The Sydney Bridge Climb with Rocky, Cat & Dave.

Pete is the best tour guide. It took an hour to prep and gear up for the climb.

Pics of Kate Blanchett, Katy Perry, Will Smith, Oprah in the same gear we put on got us psyched up. During our climb we started singing Bill Wither’s “Lovely Day”. I hope it reminds me of that day for the rest of my life. I’ll never forget that view of the harbor. 

Spontaneous Ferry Trip to Manly Beach.

The search for Sushi, Are those bats in the tree? they’re loud as hell. 

Free Magic show at 4 Pines Brewery.

Dave is addicted to Chocolate and we discover this at the shoppe near the dock.

Day 6:

Alas we meet Sydney Opera House!

News Flash, the exterior is not one singular piece but rather tiled pieces. 

Drinks at the Benelong, “The Merchant of Venice” Play.

Rocky, Cat & I eat one of Andee’s space cakes. At a bar across the street from the hotel we realize we’re on the moon! Amma chats with me about meditation. Stillness seems like a good idea. We had back to the hotel but not before Tere takes me on a small goose chase for a bottle of wine. No luck! 

At one point we make our way back to the hotel and we start discussing violating at cantaloupe...it’ll be sold as the Honey Do Me! Laughter ensues for a good 10 minutes. 

For most of the week we notice Dave paying attention to driving in the city. He’ll be taking the wheel (they drive on the left side and steering wheel is on the right side) when we get to Perth. Three hours in the dark. Even I was afraid for him. 

Day 7:

Cross country flight to Perth. It’s almost like L.A. to N.Y.

Did you know 80% of Australians live on the East Coast Side/Pacific Ocean Side? Neither did I. It’s no wonder the West Coast side of the country seems far more chill. 

We land near sunset and embark on a 3 hour drive to Margaret River. En route Dave almost hits a kangaroo. 

Day 8:

The private beach bbq with Curtis Stone at Castle Rock.

Rock Star parking was a sign of good things to come.  

The location, the staff and the food were all superb.

Getting the private cabana was the way to go. Curtis chilled with us in our private lounge and chat with us for a bit. On lookers sat envious and we loved it!

Day 9:

Bike Ride with Tere

Sunday. nov 19th Margaret River. Met Martin’s friend at the cafe. Kenneth. Leeuwin winery. Jackie Browne. Location of the MR festival. WA = Western Australia Vas Felix wines well done.   Camel on the Manchugarup on the way to airport Robert. Gentleman we met at the Curtis Stone beach event. First event of the festival. Valle, friend in LA. Guru will be speaker in northern cal and southern cal. New port beach. Fri. February 23rd. Three day event. Friday to Sunday. Sunday do dinner in LA. 25th. Writes for conde’str. Timeout ISNA All about the Bao Hay Shed Hill. Wine. Jayme Gallaher and Chris. (FB name James) Saturday Cat and Dave have to leave Bar & Bear at Bunker Beach House Naturaliste 6:30 pm. Jayme is taking us to some spots Skipper sip is designated driver serving Cowarup for candy. Candy Cow. Diving gold cow. We tried crocodile, venicen, kangaroo, and emu. Chorizo and salamis. Venicen chorizo. Coat of arms salami has both kangaroo and emu. Brekey = breakfast. Hay Shed Hill. Margaret River. Lunch and wine. We saw Chef Luke there. Animal farm petting zoo Roos for Kangaroo Distillery the Grove Friday. Nov 17 Met cats friend. Jayme Gallaher Massage with Amma Anita Beisler. Inga’s daughter. Tina Margaret River Gourmet Escape Wine Chapel. Pray the wine never runs out. Why don’t they make bottles of wine bigger so two people could have a drink. Inspector Chile sol. Cat put Chile under nose Fermented Vietnamese fish sauce. Secret ingredient or favorite sauce for Luke. Luke Nguyen. Andy Allen and Ben Melbourne. Andy won Master chef. Red Lantern. eight now. Dysentery. Saigon cooking school. Sunset beats and bites. White Elephant Cafe Gnarabup, presented by Audi DJ Sarang.  Walked to a bar called The Commons. Pool table bar. Thursday. Nov 16 Haley mentioned. Wine Henchsky. Black barrosa region Vasse Felix. Drive down Margarett river. Ask for cab or Shiraz. Shiraz drink in winter near a fire. Southwest Coast line. Reserve for ride to Perth airport. Indian Ocean. Waterside Beach Bike ride. With Annie. Marty and Terri Australian Mexican maraca birds Jacuzzi. Amma’s dive. Black lizard. Snake lizard Audi Gourmet Beach BBQ Castle Rock Beach Dunsborough Dinner by Curtis Stone. Book signing Lamb, chicken tajien, veggie, brownie. Pork. Chickpea salad. Beef sausage. Laura. Reann Selena, Robert. Haley Wed Nov 15 Sydney to Perth. Perth to Donburough. Picked up the car. Almost hit a baby kangaroo Ramada Inn Dave’s bday Cat Cafe catmosphere Gay marriage equality AUS World Cup Royal Albert hotel Le Monde brunch Sent postcards. Tuesday Bridge walk. Song choice. lovely Day Bill Withers Monday Taronga zoo. Took ferry. Came back and took another ferry to Manly Beach The sushi place we wanted was closed for a private party so we found another one. Then walked to the warf again had a beer and magic at a Brewery. 4 Pines. Or something like that on Magic Monday. Took the ferry back and talked to a guy from Perth on the bow of the boat. Herbs. Warm cantaloupe. Honey doo me.  Watermen strap on. She drink Shiraz. Quaka Love. Sydney Bitches. The points guy. Check out his blog. Annie’s friends friend Sunday. Sydney Opera. The Merchant of Venice. The Rocks. Palisades. Sydney Cove Movie Ava. A wrinkle in time. Irsa gelyn. Book. I was just there. Good book name. Suggestion for her. Dinner with Andy Andre Reese 2005. Worst. Year. Her daughter Candice passed. Lou R. Old boyfriend. Boyfriend had second heart attack and passed at 43. Octavia Butler. Her good friend passed. Saturday. Free day. Bondi Beach. No marty. Icebergs. Saltwater Pool Friday Met Terri and Marti at their Hotel near the Rocks Walked to royal Botanical Gardens. Mrs. Macquaries Chair. Check in at Wyndham. Suggestions. Near Elizabeth Quay The Esplanade Climb the Harbor Bridge Umbilical brothers. Not in town Australia. 2017 Sydney and Perth. Going to Margaret River Fri to wed in Sydney Wed we fly to Perth. 3hrs to Margaret river Nov 9. Even. 10:35pm SFO to Sydney direct flight United arrives. Sat morning 863 flight United Perth. On 15th. Out of Perth 20th. To Sydney. Am.

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How Edinburgh changed British comedy – BBC News

Image caption Lee Evans won the top comedy award in Edinburgh in 1993

Comedy did not feature at all when the Edinburgh Fringe began but over the past three decades it has become the “spiritual home” of Britain’s funny folk.

While London lays claim to being the birthplace of “alternative” comedy in the 1980s, it was the Scottish capital where the new generation of comics received their education before transforming British humour.

Image caption Sarah Millican is one of the many stars to have broken through in the past decade

Comedy talent such as Steve Coogan, Lee Evans, Bill Bailey, Alan Davies, Harry Hill, Jo Brand and Al Murray all got their big breaks in Edinburgh.

According to comedy impresario Nica Burns the “golden year” was 1991 when Frank Skinner won the Perrier Award, beating Eddie Izzard, Jack Dee and Paul O’Grady’s character Lily Savage.

Some found fame quickly while others such as Graham Norton and Michael McIntyre slogged away in Edinburgh for years before getting their big break.

Despite constant claims of its imminent demise, the Edinburgh Fringe has continued to be a unique showcase for comedy talent over more than 30 years.

Image caption Jack Dee was nominated for the Edinburgh comedy award in its “golden year”

In more recent times John Bishop, Sarah Millican, Kevin Bridges, Ross Noble, Russell Kane and many others have seen successful Edinburgh runs springboard them to TV fame and arena tours.

Image caption Bridget Christie won the Edinburgh comedy award in 2013

This year’s Fringe features more than 3,000 shows and more than a third are comedy.

That means more than 1,000 comedy acts from all over the world will be in the city during August.

Nica Burns, who took over the Perrier’s, the awards that became synonymous with Edinburgh comedy, says: “When I started with the awards in 1984 I used to personally go and see all the shows. You could not start to do that now.”

Image caption Steve Coogan returned to Edinburgh to present the Edinburgh comedy award in 2013, two decades after winning it

These days she employs a judging panel to go around the 700 eligible comedy acts and make a shortlist for the award, now sponsored by lastminute.com but still coveted by comedians.

Richard Herring, who has appeared in Edinburgh for most of the past 30 years, does not qualify for the comedy award because it does not include people who have already had a TV series.

He broke into TV in the mid-90s with Stewart Lee in Fist of Fun but even though he is a 50-year-old Fringe veteran he says: “Sometimes I’ll be annoyed I’ve not been nominated – then I remember that no judge has seen my show because I’m not eligible.”

The Edinburgh hour

Image caption Richard Herring, here with Arthur Smith in 2011, says the Edinburgh hour was important leap for comedians

Herring says that the Fringe is still the “best arts festival in the world” but it has changed beyond recognition since he first performed in a student revue in 1987.

He says that sketch shows by Oxbridge students such as him were coming in for a lot of stick from the new wave of comedy stand-ups who were starting to see the Fringe as their domain.

They saw it as a place to come for three weeks, hang out with other performers and hone their material.

Herring says one of the major changes that Edinburgh developed was the one-hour comedy show.

Even in the late 1980s it was rare for stand-up comedians to do a full hour-long show on their own and they would often partner up with other performers to fill the Edinburgh hour.

Image caption Nica Burns, seen here in 1993, has been in charge of the comedy awards for 33 years

Nica Burns says: “The Edinburgh Fringe became the learning ground because in the clubs you could only do part of the show.

“You started with a five-minute guest spot, if you were any good you could do 10 minutes and work up to 20 or 30 minutes for the headline act.

“For that jump to a whole show, to be able to play in a larger theatre, to be able to go on the road, you need to develop your material live.

“Comedians suddenly realised that Edinburgh was a fantastic place to come and book yourself a hall.

“That’s the great thing about the Fringe, it’s not curated, so anybody can do it.”

Image caption Simon Munnery has been appearing at the Fringe for 30 years

Comedian Simon Munnery, who has also been performing in Edinburgh for 30 years, says: “The hour-long slot gives you more space to experiment. For most comedians it’s a big step to go from 20 minutes to an hour.

“When you are doing that sort of time there is more pressure to have some sort of theme or to have something to say.”

Fred MacAulay first appeared at the Fringe in 1989 as part of a collective of Scottish comedians called the Funny Farm.

Image copyright Robert Perry

Image caption Fred MacAulay said the move to doing an hour-long show was a big moment for comedian

For his first four Fringes he was part of a composite show with other comedians, taking a bigger time slot each year.

He says: “It is always there very much on the horizon for you as a new stand-up that the target is to do an Edinburgh hour.”

“I always thought it was very much like a skiier,” he says.

“You are skiing on the blue runs but out of the corner of your eye you can seeing a red or a black run and you know ‘I’m going to have to tackle that one day’.”

MacAulay says that a few festivals around the world, such as Melbourne in Australia, have followed Edinburgh’s comedy model but the Fringe remains unique in its scale and scope.

Political movement

Image caption Karen Koren has been running the Gilded Balloon for more than 30 years

Karen Koren was there at the start of Edinburgh’s comedy boom.

She founded the Gilded Balloon venue in 1986, which along with The Pleasance and The Assembly led the 1980s comedy boom.

“I was certainly there at the beginning of the stand-up comedy surge,” says Koren, who set up her first comedy club because her friends were looking for a place to perform “alternative” comedy.

“I blame Margaret Thatcher myself,” she says.

“It was really satirical and political back then.

“Nowadays anything goes but then it was quite serious comedy, with the likes of Mark Thomas and Mark Steel, Jeremy Hardy and Kevin Day. Although there have always been silly performers as well.”

Image caption Alexei Sayle, one of the originators of alternative comedy, is back at the Fringe this year

Nica Burns agrees that the Edinburgh comedy boom was fuelled by acts who were reacting to the politics of the time and Prime Minister Thatcher.

But she says they were also seeking to overthrow the old comedy establishment.

Burns says: “It was a really exciting time because alternative comedy was a political movement.

“For the original comics, such as Alexi Sayle, it was about changing what comedy stood for – no more homophobic, racist or sexist jokes.

“Within a very short time they had run off all the old comics and TV moved into the new era.”

Burns says that the new comedy movement may have begun in London but Edinburgh was the “school for clowns”, where they learned to how to perform.

Comedy around the clock

Image copyright PA

Image caption Al Murray won the Edinburgh comedy award in 1999

Koren quickly went from running one studio theatre with 150 seats to 14 venues of various sizes dotted around the Cowgate.

To maximise use of her spaces Koren wanted comedians to perform day and night.

She says: “I remember that stand-up was always considered to be for the evening.

“No performers wanted to go on before 7pm and they didn’t want to go against each other.

“I had to push that concept to them all. The more the merrier. Think about your own show and what you are doing.”

As well as getting to perform your own show there was another factor that attracted comedians to Edinburgh – the camaraderie.

Munnery says: “It’s wonderful to be in the same place at the same time as all these other people who are in the same sinking boat.”

Funny women

Image copyright PA

Image caption In 2005, Laura Solon was the second woman in 25 years to win the Perrier

For Herring his early appearances are as memorable for the nights out with fellow comedians as they are for his shows.

Koren says: “I started a show called Late ‘n’ Live. It ran from midnight to four in the morning.

“We had the latest licence on the Fringe. It became a place where people came to see other comics die.

“It was where all the comics got drunk and had a great time together. That type of camaraderie that was around then really enhanced it and pushed it forward.

“There was lots of young kids going ‘I want to be like that guy up on stage’.”

Image caption Jenny Eclair was the first solo female winner of the Perrier Award

And it was usually a guy.

Despite Burns and Koren being a strong female presence on the comedy scene they both agree that it was very much a “boy’s club” in the early days.

Burns says: “The number of women doing shows was so small you could count them on one hand at the beginning.

“When it started it was much harder for women.

“There was a real feeling that when a woman came on there was a collective folding of the arms by the audience, and they were saying ‘OK, show us you are funny’.

“The audiences was very male because it involved smoking and drinking as well and quite a lot were above pubs.

“There was nowhere to get changed back stage, certainly nowhere for women, they had to get changed in the toilet. It was a tough environment and a tough way to learn your craft. They had to overcome a lot of hurdles.”

The first women to win the Perrier Award was Jenny Eclair in 1995 and it was another decade before the next, Laura Solon.

However, Burns feels that recent years have seen a breakthrough and women, who still only make up less than a third of comedy performers, do not have to persuade audiences they can be funny any more.

Adventurous audiences

Image caption Ed Bartlam has been running the Underbelly since 2000

Female comedy performers, just like their male counterparts, are cashing in on a comedy boom that has seen more and more of them touring large venues.

As comedy has become big business, festivals have sprung up all over the UK but Edinburgh has maintained its position as the number one place for comedians.

Ed Bartlam, who founded the Underbelly venues in 2000, says: “Edinburgh has been a platform for alternative comedy and that is still the case.

“The Edinburgh audience and the Edinburgh critics are adventurous and they like to see something different. Edinburgh is a great example of a festival that manages to fit both the mainstream and the alternative very nicely.”

Underbelly runs comedy venues on the South Bank in London but it is Edinburgh that acts as a feeder for new talent.

Bartlam says: “In Edinburgh we have got 17 venues ranging in size from 50 seats to 400 seats, therefore we can show lots of different acts at different levels.

“In London we have got two tents and they have both got 400 seats.

“Inevitably it means we are programming shows we think can sell that amount of tickets.

“In Edinburgh we’ve got this broad range of venues so we can programme interesting new material which might only sell 50 seats.

“Edinburgh is so important because it allows those at the beginning of their career to play in small spaces.”

Constantly evolving

Image caption John Kearns started his career on the Free Fringe

Another factor in Edinburgh’s reinvention has been the rise in the Free Fringe over the past decade.

Free Fringe shows, which are predominantly comedy acts in the spare rooms of pubs, allow the audience to watch for free and they are invited to make a contribution at the end.

It is a cheap way of getting to perform on the Fringe and has led to comedy careers for a number of new comedians such as Imran Yusuf and John Kearns.

Herring says his generation of comedians often wonder if they would have made it if there had been the same amount of competition when he was starting out.

He says the current crop of comedians are much more polished and professional than the acts of the 1980s.

“In 1992 I came up with shows I was still writing,” he says.

“By the end of Edinburgh I hoped to have a good show but now you can’t really behave like that. You need top be good on day one.”

Image caption Imran Yusuf has also progressed from the Free Fringe to larger paid venues

He says many comedians these days keep themselves fit and don’t drink.

“The performers from the 1980s and 90s would find that very strange,” he says.

Another major change has been the costs involved.

“It was bit cheaper for everyone in those days – for the punters and for the acts,” Herring says.

He says he has lost thousands of pounds on Edinburgh shows but always hoped to win enough work to make up for it later.

The gig economy

Image caption Russell Kane won the Edinburgh comedy award in 2010

For Fringe veterans such as Koren, whose Gilded Balloon venues were forced to move to the Teviot after a devastating fire in 2002, the peak was in the late 80s and early 90s.

“Now everybody wants to be a star and not everybody is going to become a star,” she says.

Munnery says some aspiring comedians go to extreme lengths to get noticed.

He says: “There are some ridiculous things like huge twice-human size posters for a show and then venue is some portable cabin.

“They are spending more on advertising than they can possibly make back at the box office.

“I used to be with an agent like that,” he says.

“They tell you that you are investing in your future and at some point you have to ask ‘when is my future going to start?’.

Munnery adds: “You basically go to Edinburgh, lose thousands of pounds, spend a year paying it off and then go and do it again.

“It would probably be illegal to be employed on that basis but because you are employing yourself it’s alright. It’s the gig economy, literally.”

Despite the skyrocketing costs of Edinburgh rents and they increased competition for audiences, performers keep coming back year after year.

Herring says: “Even when I’m negative I’ve never said it’s not amazing.

“It’s the best festival in the world and it is an amazing thing to be a part of.

“I’ve spent two years of my adult life in Edinburgh just by coming to the Fringe.

“It’s a phenomenal festival and it’s breath-taking how good the shows are.”

Read more: http://ift.tt/2vBgJkC

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[mavwrekmarketing]

Image caption Lee Evans won the top comedy award in Edinburgh in 1993

Comedy did not feature at all when the Edinburgh Fringe began but over the past three decades it has become the “spiritual home” of Britain’s funny folk.

While London lays claim to being the birthplace of “alternative” comedy in the 1980s, it was the Scottish capital where the new generation of comics received their education before transforming British humour.

Image caption Sarah Millican is one of the many stars to have broken through in the past decade

Comedy talent such as Steve Coogan, Lee Evans, Bill Bailey, Alan Davies, Harry Hill, Jo Brand and Al Murray all got their big breaks in Edinburgh.

According to comedy impresario Nica Burns the “golden year” was 1991 when Frank Skinner won the Perrier Award, beating Eddie Izzard, Jack Dee and Paul O’Grady’s character Lily Savage.

Some found fame quickly while others such as Graham Norton and Michael McIntyre slogged away in Edinburgh for years before getting their big break.

Despite constant claims of its imminent demise, the Edinburgh Fringe has continued to be a unique showcase for comedy talent over more than 30 years.

Image caption Jack Dee was nominated for the Edinburgh comedy award in its “golden year”

In more recent times John Bishop, Sarah Millican, Kevin Bridges, Ross Noble, Russell Kane and many others have seen successful Edinburgh runs springboard them to TV fame and arena tours.

Image caption Bridget Christie won the Edinburgh comedy award in 2013

This year’s Fringe features more than 3,000 shows and more than a third are comedy.

That means more than 1,000 comedy acts from all over the world will be in the city during August.

Nica Burns, who took over the Perrier’s, the awards that became synonymous with Edinburgh comedy, says: “When I started with the awards in 1984 I used to personally go and see all the shows. You could not start to do that now.”

Image caption Steve Coogan returned to Edinburgh to present the Edinburgh comedy award in 2013, two decades after winning it

These days she employs a judging panel to go around the 700 eligible comedy acts and make a shortlist for the award, now sponsored by lastminute.com but still coveted by comedians.

Richard Herring, who has appeared in Edinburgh for most of the past 30 years, does not qualify for the comedy award because it does not include people who have already had a TV series.

He broke into TV in the mid-90s with Stewart Lee in Fist of Fun but even though he is a 50-year-old Fringe veteran he says: “Sometimes I’ll be annoyed I’ve not been nominated – then I remember that no judge has seen my show because I’m not eligible.”

The Edinburgh hour

Image caption Richard Herring, here with Arthur Smith in 2011, says the Edinburgh hour was important leap for comedians

Herring says that the Fringe is still the “best arts festival in the world” but it has changed beyond recognition since he first performed in a student revue in 1987.

He says that sketch shows by Oxbridge students such as him were coming in for a lot of stick from the new wave of comedy stand-ups who were starting to see the Fringe as their domain.

They saw it as a place to come for three weeks, hang out with other performers and hone their material.

Herring says one of the major changes that Edinburgh developed was the one-hour comedy show.

Even in the late 1980s it was rare for stand-up comedians to do a full hour-long show on their own and they would often partner up with other performers to fill the Edinburgh hour.

Image caption Nica Burns, seen here in 1993, has been in charge of the comedy awards for 33 years

Nica Burns says: “The Edinburgh Fringe became the learning ground because in the clubs you could only do part of the show.

“You started with a five-minute guest spot, if you were any good you could do 10 minutes and work up to 20 or 30 minutes for the headline act.

“For that jump to a whole show, to be able to play in a larger theatre, to be able to go on the road, you need to develop your material live.

“Comedians suddenly realised that Edinburgh was a fantastic place to come and book yourself a hall.

“That’s the great thing about the Fringe, it’s not curated, so anybody can do it.”

Image caption Simon Munnery has been appearing at the Fringe for 30 years

Comedian Simon Munnery, who has also been performing in Edinburgh for 30 years, says: “The hour-long slot gives you more space to experiment. For most comedians it’s a big step to go from 20 minutes to an hour.

“When you are doing that sort of time there is more pressure to have some sort of theme or to have something to say.”

Fred MacAulay first appeared at the Fringe in 1989 as part of a collective of Scottish comedians called the Funny Farm.

Image copyright Robert Perry

Image caption Fred MacAulay said the move to doing an hour-long show was a big moment for comedian

For his first four Fringes he was part of a composite show with other comedians, taking a bigger time slot each year.

He says: “It is always there very much on the horizon for you as a new stand-up that the target is to do an Edinburgh hour.”

“I always thought it was very much like a skiier,” he says.

“You are skiing on the blue runs but out of the corner of your eye you can seeing a red or a black run and you know ‘I’m going to have to tackle that one day’.”

MacAulay says that a few festivals around the world, such as Melbourne in Australia, have followed Edinburgh’s comedy model but the Fringe remains unique in its scale and scope.

Political movement

Image caption Karen Koren has been running the Gilded Balloon for more than 30 years

Karen Koren was there at the start of Edinburgh’s comedy boom.

She founded the Gilded Balloon venue in 1986, which along with The Pleasance and The Assembly led the 1980s comedy boom.

“I was certainly there at the beginning of the stand-up comedy surge,” says Koren, who set up her first comedy club because her friends were looking for a place to perform “alternative” comedy.

“I blame Margaret Thatcher myself,” she says.

“It was really satirical and political back then.

“Nowadays anything goes but then it was quite serious comedy, with the likes of Mark Thomas and Mark Steel, Jeremy Hardy and Kevin Day. Although there have always been silly performers as well.”

Image caption Alexei Sayle, one of the originators of alternative comedy, is back at the Fringe this year

Nica Burns agrees that the Edinburgh comedy boom was fuelled by acts who were reacting to the politics of the time and Prime Minister Thatcher.

But she says they were also seeking to overthrow the old comedy establishment.

Burns says: “It was a really exciting time because alternative comedy was a political movement.

“For the original comics, such as Alexi Sayle, it was about changing what comedy stood for – no more homophobic, racist or sexist jokes.

“Within a very short time they had run off all the old comics and TV moved into the new era.”

Burns says that the new comedy movement may have begun in London but Edinburgh was the “school for clowns”, where they learned to how to perform.

Comedy around the clock

Image copyright PA

Image caption Al Murray won the Edinburgh comedy award in 1999

Koren quickly went from running one studio theatre with 150 seats to 14 venues of various sizes dotted around the Cowgate.

To maximise use of her spaces Koren wanted comedians to perform day and night.

She says: “I remember that stand-up was always considered to be for the evening.

“No performers wanted to go on before 7pm and they didn’t want to go against each other.

“I had to push that concept to them all. The more the merrier. Think about your own show and what you are doing.”

As well as getting to perform your own show there was another factor that attracted comedians to Edinburgh – the camaraderie.

Munnery says: “It’s wonderful to be in the same place at the same time as all these other people who are in the same sinking boat.”

Funny women

Image copyright PA

Image caption In 2005, Laura Solon was the second woman in 25 years to win the Perrier

For Herring his early appearances are as memorable for the nights out with fellow comedians as they are for his shows.

Koren says: “I started a show called Late ‘n’ Live. It ran from midnight to four in the morning.

“We had the latest licence on the Fringe. It became a place where people came to see other comics die.

“It was where all the comics got drunk and had a great time together. That type of camaraderie that was around then really enhanced it and pushed it forward.

“There was lots of young kids going ‘I want to be like that guy up on stage’.”

Image caption Jenny Eclair was the first solo female winner of the Perrier Award

And it was usually a guy.

Despite Burns and Koren being a strong female presence on the comedy scene they both agree that it was very much a “boy’s club” in the early days.

Burns says: “The number of women doing shows was so small you could count them on one hand at the beginning.

“When it started it was much harder for women.

“There was a real feeling that when a woman came on there was a collective folding of the arms by the audience, and they were saying ‘OK, show us you are funny’.

“The audiences was very male because it involved smoking and drinking as well and quite a lot were above pubs.

“There was nowhere to get changed back stage, certainly nowhere for women, they had to get changed in the toilet. It was a tough environment and a tough way to learn your craft. They had to overcome a lot of hurdles.”

The first women to win the Perrier Award was Jenny Eclair in 1995 and it was another decade before the next, Laura Solon.

However, Burns feels that recent years have seen a breakthrough and women, who still only make up less than a third of comedy performers, do not have to persuade audiences they can be funny any more.

Adventurous audiences

Image caption Ed Bartlam has been running the Underbelly since 2000

Female comedy performers, just like their male counterparts, are cashing in on a comedy boom that has seen more and more of them touring large venues.

As comedy has become big business, festivals have sprung up all over the UK but Edinburgh has maintained its position as the number one place for comedians.

Ed Bartlam, who founded the Underbelly venues in 2000, says: “Edinburgh has been a platform for alternative comedy and that is still the case.

“The Edinburgh audience and the Edinburgh critics are adventurous and they like to see something different. Edinburgh is a great example of a festival that manages to fit both the mainstream and the alternative very nicely.”

Underbelly runs comedy venues on the South Bank in London but it is Edinburgh that acts as a feeder for new talent.

Bartlam says: “In Edinburgh we have got 17 venues ranging in size from 50 seats to 400 seats, therefore we can show lots of different acts at different levels.

“In London we have got two tents and they have both got 400 seats.

“Inevitably it means we are programming shows we think can sell that amount of tickets.

“In Edinburgh we’ve got this broad range of venues so we can programme interesting new material which might only sell 50 seats.

“Edinburgh is so important because it allows those at the beginning of their career to play in small spaces.”

Constantly evolving

Image caption John Kearns started his career on the Free Fringe

Another factor in Edinburgh’s reinvention has been the rise in the Free Fringe over the past decade.

Free Fringe shows, which are predominantly comedy acts in the spare rooms of pubs, allow the audience to watch for free and they are invited to make a contribution at the end.

It is a cheap way of getting to perform on the Fringe and has led to comedy careers for a number of new comedians such as Imran Yusuf and John Kearns.

Herring says his generation of comedians often wonder if they would have made it if there had been the same amount of competition when he was starting out.

He says the current crop of comedians are much more polished and professional than the acts of the 1980s.

“In 1992 I came up with shows I was still writing,” he says.

“By the end of Edinburgh I hoped to have a good show but now you can’t really behave like that. You need top be good on day one.”

Image caption Imran Yusuf has also progressed from the Free Fringe to larger paid venues

He says many comedians these days keep themselves fit and don’t drink.

“The performers from the 1980s and 90s would find that very strange,” he says.

Another major change has been the costs involved.

“It was bit cheaper for everyone in those days – for the punters and for the acts,” Herring says.

He says he has lost thousands of pounds on Edinburgh shows but always hoped to win enough work to make up for it later.

The gig economy

Image caption Russell Kane won the Edinburgh comedy award in 2010

For Fringe veterans such as Koren, whose Gilded Balloon venues were forced to move to the Teviot after a devastating fire in 2002, the peak was in the late 80s and early 90s.

“Now everybody wants to be a star and not everybody is going to become a star,” she says.

Munnery says some aspiring comedians go to extreme lengths to get noticed.

He says: “There are some ridiculous things like huge twice-human size posters for a show and then venue is some portable cabin.

“They are spending more on advertising than they can possibly make back at the box office.

“I used to be with an agent like that,” he says.

“They tell you that you are investing in your future and at some point you have to ask ‘when is my future going to start?’.

Munnery adds: “You basically go to Edinburgh, lose thousands of pounds, spend a year paying it off and then go and do it again.

“It would probably be illegal to be employed on that basis but because you are employing yourself it’s alright. It’s the gig economy, literally.”

Despite the skyrocketing costs of Edinburgh rents and they increased competition for audiences, performers keep coming back year after year.

Herring says: “Even when I’m negative I’ve never said it’s not amazing.

“It’s the best festival in the world and it is an amazing thing to be a part of.

“I’ve spent two years of my adult life in Edinburgh just by coming to the Fringe.

“It’s a phenomenal festival and it’s breath-taking how good the shows are.”

Read more: http://ift.tt/2vBgJkC

The post How Edinburgh changed British comedy – BBC News appeared first on MavWrek Marketing by Jason

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[trendingnewsb]

How Edinburgh changed British comedy – BBC News

Image caption Lee Evans won the top comedy award in Edinburgh in 1993

Comedy did not feature at all when the Edinburgh Fringe began but over the past three decades it has become the “spiritual home” of Britain’s funny folk.

While London lays claim to being the birthplace of “alternative” comedy in the 1980s, it was the Scottish capital where the new generation of comics received their education before transforming British humour.

Image caption Sarah Millican is one of the many stars to have broken through in the past decade

Comedy talent such as Steve Coogan, Lee Evans, Bill Bailey, Alan Davies, Harry Hill, Jo Brand and Al Murray all got their big breaks in Edinburgh.

According to comedy impresario Nica Burns the “golden year” was 1991 when Frank Skinner won the Perrier Award, beating Eddie Izzard, Jack Dee and Paul O’Grady’s character Lily Savage.

Some found fame quickly while others such as Graham Norton and Michael McIntyre slogged away in Edinburgh for years before getting their big break.

Despite constant claims of its imminent demise, the Edinburgh Fringe has continued to be a unique showcase for comedy talent over more than 30 years.

Image caption Jack Dee was nominated for the Edinburgh comedy award in its “golden year”

In more recent times John Bishop, Sarah Millican, Kevin Bridges, Ross Noble, Russell Kane and many others have seen successful Edinburgh runs springboard them to TV fame and arena tours.

Image caption Bridget Christie won the Edinburgh comedy award in 2013

This year’s Fringe features more than 3,000 shows and more than a third are comedy.

That means more than 1,000 comedy acts from all over the world will be in the city during August.

Nica Burns, who took over the Perrier’s, the awards that became synonymous with Edinburgh comedy, says: “When I started with the awards in 1984 I used to personally go and see all the shows. You could not start to do that now.”

Image caption Steve Coogan returned to Edinburgh to present the Edinburgh comedy award in 2013, two decades after winning it

These days she employs a judging panel to go around the 700 eligible comedy acts and make a shortlist for the award, now sponsored by lastminute.com but still coveted by comedians.

Richard Herring, who has appeared in Edinburgh for most of the past 30 years, does not qualify for the comedy award because it does not include people who have already had a TV series.

He broke into TV in the mid-90s with Stewart Lee in Fist of Fun but even though he is a 50-year-old Fringe veteran he says: “Sometimes I’ll be annoyed I’ve not been nominated – then I remember that no judge has seen my show because I’m not eligible.”

The Edinburgh hour

Image caption Richard Herring, here with Arthur Smith in 2011, says the Edinburgh hour was important leap for comedians

Herring says that the Fringe is still the “best arts festival in the world” but it has changed beyond recognition since he first performed in a student revue in 1987.

He says that sketch shows by Oxbridge students such as him were coming in for a lot of stick from the new wave of comedy stand-ups who were starting to see the Fringe as their domain.

They saw it as a place to come for three weeks, hang out with other performers and hone their material.

Herring says one of the major changes that Edinburgh developed was the one-hour comedy show.

Even in the late 1980s it was rare for stand-up comedians to do a full hour-long show on their own and they would often partner up with other performers to fill the Edinburgh hour.

Image caption Nica Burns, seen here in 1993, has been in charge of the comedy awards for 33 years

Nica Burns says: “The Edinburgh Fringe became the learning ground because in the clubs you could only do part of the show.

“You started with a five-minute guest spot, if you were any good you could do 10 minutes and work up to 20 or 30 minutes for the headline act.

“For that jump to a whole show, to be able to play in a larger theatre, to be able to go on the road, you need to develop your material live.

“Comedians suddenly realised that Edinburgh was a fantastic place to come and book yourself a hall.

“That’s the great thing about the Fringe, it’s not curated, so anybody can do it.”

Image caption Simon Munnery has been appearing at the Fringe for 30 years

Comedian Simon Munnery, who has also been performing in Edinburgh for 30 years, says: “The hour-long slot gives you more space to experiment. For most comedians it’s a big step to go from 20 minutes to an hour.

“When you are doing that sort of time there is more pressure to have some sort of theme or to have something to say.”

Fred MacAulay first appeared at the Fringe in 1989 as part of a collective of Scottish comedians called the Funny Farm.

Image copyright Robert Perry

Image caption Fred MacAulay said the move to doing an hour-long show was a big moment for comedian

For his first four Fringes he was part of a composite show with other comedians, taking a bigger time slot each year.

He says: “It is always there very much on the horizon for you as a new stand-up that the target is to do an Edinburgh hour.”

“I always thought it was very much like a skiier,” he says.

“You are skiing on the blue runs but out of the corner of your eye you can seeing a red or a black run and you know ‘I’m going to have to tackle that one day’.”

MacAulay says that a few festivals around the world, such as Melbourne in Australia, have followed Edinburgh’s comedy model but the Fringe remains unique in its scale and scope.

Political movement

Image caption Karen Koren has been running the Gilded Balloon for more than 30 years

Karen Koren was there at the start of Edinburgh’s comedy boom.

She founded the Gilded Balloon venue in 1986, which along with The Pleasance and The Assembly led the 1980s comedy boom.

“I was certainly there at the beginning of the stand-up comedy surge,” says Koren, who set up her first comedy club because her friends were looking for a place to perform “alternative” comedy.

“I blame Margaret Thatcher myself,” she says.

“It was really satirical and political back then.

“Nowadays anything goes but then it was quite serious comedy, with the likes of Mark Thomas and Mark Steel, Jeremy Hardy and Kevin Day. Although there have always been silly performers as well.”

Image caption Alexei Sayle, one of the originators of alternative comedy, is back at the Fringe this year

Nica Burns agrees that the Edinburgh comedy boom was fuelled by acts who were reacting to the politics of the time and Prime Minister Thatcher.

But she says they were also seeking to overthrow the old comedy establishment.

Burns says: “It was a really exciting time because alternative comedy was a political movement.

“For the original comics, such as Alexi Sayle, it was about changing what comedy stood for – no more homophobic, racist or sexist jokes.

“Within a very short time they had run off all the old comics and TV moved into the new era.”

Burns says that the new comedy movement may have begun in London but Edinburgh was the “school for clowns”, where they learned to how to perform.

Comedy around the clock

Image copyright PA

Image caption Al Murray won the Edinburgh comedy award in 1999

Koren quickly went from running one studio theatre with 150 seats to 14 venues of various sizes dotted around the Cowgate.

To maximise use of her spaces Koren wanted comedians to perform day and night.

She says: “I remember that stand-up was always considered to be for the evening.

“No performers wanted to go on before 7pm and they didn’t want to go against each other.

“I had to push that concept to them all. The more the merrier. Think about your own show and what you are doing.”

As well as getting to perform your own show there was another factor that attracted comedians to Edinburgh – the camaraderie.

Munnery says: “It’s wonderful to be in the same place at the same time as all these other people who are in the same sinking boat.”

Funny women

Image copyright PA

Image caption In 2005, Laura Solon was the second woman in 25 years to win the Perrier

For Herring his early appearances are as memorable for the nights out with fellow comedians as they are for his shows.

Koren says: “I started a show called Late ‘n’ Live. It ran from midnight to four in the morning.

“We had the latest licence on the Fringe. It became a place where people came to see other comics die.

“It was where all the comics got drunk and had a great time together. That type of camaraderie that was around then really enhanced it and pushed it forward.

“There was lots of young kids going ‘I want to be like that guy up on stage’.”

Image caption Jenny Eclair was the first solo female winner of the Perrier Award

And it was usually a guy.

Despite Burns and Koren being a strong female presence on the comedy scene they both agree that it was very much a “boy’s club” in the early days.

Burns says: “The number of women doing shows was so small you could count them on one hand at the beginning.

“When it started it was much harder for women.

“There was a real feeling that when a woman came on there was a collective folding of the arms by the audience, and they were saying ‘OK, show us you are funny’.

“The audiences was very male because it involved smoking and drinking as well and quite a lot were above pubs.

“There was nowhere to get changed back stage, certainly nowhere for women, they had to get changed in the toilet. It was a tough environment and a tough way to learn your craft. They had to overcome a lot of hurdles.”

The first women to win the Perrier Award was Jenny Eclair in 1995 and it was another decade before the next, Laura Solon.

However, Burns feels that recent years have seen a breakthrough and women, who still only make up less than a third of comedy performers, do not have to persuade audiences they can be funny any more.

Adventurous audiences

Image caption Ed Bartlam has been running the Underbelly since 2000

Female comedy performers, just like their male counterparts, are cashing in on a comedy boom that has seen more and more of them touring large venues.

As comedy has become big business, festivals have sprung up all over the UK but Edinburgh has maintained its position as the number one place for comedians.

Ed Bartlam, who founded the Underbelly venues in 2000, says: “Edinburgh has been a platform for alternative comedy and that is still the case.

“The Edinburgh audience and the Edinburgh critics are adventurous and they like to see something different. Edinburgh is a great example of a festival that manages to fit both the mainstream and the alternative very nicely.”

Underbelly runs comedy venues on the South Bank in London but it is Edinburgh that acts as a feeder for new talent.

Bartlam says: “In Edinburgh we have got 17 venues ranging in size from 50 seats to 400 seats, therefore we can show lots of different acts at different levels.

“In London we have got two tents and they have both got 400 seats.

“Inevitably it means we are programming shows we think can sell that amount of tickets.

“In Edinburgh we’ve got this broad range of venues so we can programme interesting new material which might only sell 50 seats.

“Edinburgh is so important because it allows those at the beginning of their career to play in small spaces.”

Constantly evolving

Image caption John Kearns started his career on the Free Fringe

Another factor in Edinburgh’s reinvention has been the rise in the Free Fringe over the past decade.

Free Fringe shows, which are predominantly comedy acts in the spare rooms of pubs, allow the audience to watch for free and they are invited to make a contribution at the end.

It is a cheap way of getting to perform on the Fringe and has led to comedy careers for a number of new comedians such as Imran Yusuf and John Kearns.

Herring says his generation of comedians often wonder if they would have made it if there had been the same amount of competition when he was starting out.

He says the current crop of comedians are much more polished and professional than the acts of the 1980s.

“In 1992 I came up with shows I was still writing,” he says.

“By the end of Edinburgh I hoped to have a good show but now you can’t really behave like that. You need top be good on day one.”

Image caption Imran Yusuf has also progressed from the Free Fringe to larger paid venues

He says many comedians these days keep themselves fit and don’t drink.

“The performers from the 1980s and 90s would find that very strange,” he says.

Another major change has been the costs involved.

“It was bit cheaper for everyone in those days – for the punters and for the acts,” Herring says.

He says he has lost thousands of pounds on Edinburgh shows but always hoped to win enough work to make up for it later.

The gig economy

Image caption Russell Kane won the Edinburgh comedy award in 2010

For Fringe veterans such as Koren, whose Gilded Balloon venues were forced to move to the Teviot after a devastating fire in 2002, the peak was in the late 80s and early 90s.

“Now everybody wants to be a star and not everybody is going to become a star,” she says.

Munnery says some aspiring comedians go to extreme lengths to get noticed.

He says: “There are some ridiculous things like huge twice-human size posters for a show and then venue is some portable cabin.

“They are spending more on advertising than they can possibly make back at the box office.

“I used to be with an agent like that,” he says.

“They tell you that you are investing in your future and at some point you have to ask ‘when is my future going to start?’.

Munnery adds: “You basically go to Edinburgh, lose thousands of pounds, spend a year paying it off and then go and do it again.

“It would probably be illegal to be employed on that basis but because you are employing yourself it’s alright. It’s the gig economy, literally.”

Despite the skyrocketing costs of Edinburgh rents and they increased competition for audiences, performers keep coming back year after year.

Herring says: “Even when I’m negative I’ve never said it’s not amazing.

“It’s the best festival in the world and it is an amazing thing to be a part of.

“I’ve spent two years of my adult life in Edinburgh just by coming to the Fringe.

“It’s a phenomenal festival and it’s breath-taking how good the shows are.”

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