Shakin' to the rhythm til everybody falls.
- AC/DC, 1988
My attitude was: It didn’t kill us. Ergo, it made us stronger. I was quite confident that it could never get as bad as that on stage, ever again. I was wrong, but at least I didn’t know any better. The Duffer just let it wash over him. Marty and Sam, though, took it pretty hard. Uncle Sam needed a lot of consoling and ego-massaging from Andrea - not the ideal personality type to supply such attention, I would have thought - while Marty just sulked, and refused to consider ever stepping on stage again, with us or anyone else.
Next week, if we made it that far, wouldn’t be another triple-header of one-night stands. We only had one date pencilled in - the SCU union band comp on the Saturday night, to mark the end of semester one. So only twenty minutes’ work, rather than ten hours. And we didn’t have to play Blister In The Fuckin' Sun, either. Of the half-dozen bands that had been accepted into the event - some evidence of pre-culling by the organisers - we’d drawn second-last slot. Actually, to say we ‘drew’ second-last slot suggests that the process was random in some way, or at least, not a complete and utter rort of due process.
Of the six bands, there were two who stood a realistic chance of claiming triumph (and not the insult comic dog from the Conan O’Brian show).
They were Razorslash, those behemoths of hard-core death/speed/thrash/scrap metal who we'd already crossed swords with, and Sagittaria, an all-girl three-piece with strong folk and Celtic influences - like Enya but a lot less crap, not least because they were all fairly hot (particularly their lead singer) in a daughers-of-Aquarius, hippie Earth-mother kind of way. And they also threw in a little psychedelia-influenced stuff as well to keep the male punters interested, sounding a little like the trippier elements of Hendrix or Zeppelin, just without so much of the electrified gee-tar. I could have offered to help out on that count I guess, but I don’t think Jessica would have appreciated my interest in their affairs. Anyway, Sagittaria had a solid groundswell of support behind them from the local folkie community, who were both numerous (blame the proximity of Byron and/or Nimbin) and loyal.
This being a student union, the organisers had a steering committee to deliberate over who should play and when, consisting of the same committee who were down to judge on the night, just given a different and even more stupid name. The committee was chaired by SCU Union president and women’s advocacy representative Mandela-Jane
Vanderkuyt (Mandy to her friends in the sisterhood) and rounded out by SCU music lecherer and local industry identity Mr Christopher Kurtin, and for a bit of local rock-celeb colour, Phil Jamieson from Grinspoon. However Phil couldn’t make it to (or more likely couldn’t be arsed with) the pre-selection deliberations on the Thursday prior, so it was a straight arm-wrestle between Chris, who managed Razorslash, and Mandy, who despised them. Originally they just tried drawing names out of a hat, but that left Sagittaria playing last and Razorslash just before them. Mandy, who was yet to lose an argument in four years of student politics, declared that there was no way the Union would allow an aggressive, misogynistic heavy metal band to play immediately before Sagittaria and their peace-loving, urban-gypsy audience. She predicted violence, rape, pillage and general Ugly Shit as Razorslash’s disaffected white-boy audience thrashed around hyperactively in a sea of muslin skirts and braided ponytails. Kurtin, whose Zoloft prescription had run out that morning and was a bit cranky, said that was garbage. President Mandy threatened to pull rank and have the ‘Slash dumped from the competition altogether, based on their aggression, misogyny etc.
“What misogyny?” Kretin demanded to know.
Mandy read flatly from a sheet in front of her. “Buried alive bitch, I bury you alive; buried alive bitch, scratch against your coffin lid; buried alive bitch, choke on maggots like you choked on my…”
“Okay, okay. They have the odd female issue, but hey, don’t we all.”
To break the stalemate Kretin put forward the name of Flange Gasket as a transitional act who could act as a buffer in space and time between the metal-heads and the Earth-mothers, as we stood to offend only the Young Nationals.
Mandela-Jane Vanderkuyt, who hated the Young Nationals even more than Razorslash, concurred.
The first couple of bands weren’t too bad. Both were skate-punk threesomes, easily distinguished on the basis that the first band’s frontman had green hair and a Hurley T-shirt, while the second band’s frontman had blue hair and a Independent T-shirt. But they knew their Green Day-esque riffs, played nice and tight, and threw themselves around in a context-appropriate manner. It wasn't until the second lot were heading off-stage that I recognised the snotty, hyperactive little bass player for the second outfit as the Duffer’s snotty, hyperactive little brother Duncan, who was in first year this year. We went to find Phil and tell him, but he was still at home trying to coax Marty out of his room. I’m not coming out to play, Marty insisted. Third cab off the rank was a reggae-dub act with about nine members, including a brass trio, so that lot were buggered if they won - splitting $500 between nine guys would have barely left enough to get off-chops after the show.
The Bob Marley Nine (not their real name; that, in fact, was much more stupid) began to decamp from the stage we were due to play on, as the crowd turned through 180 degrees to watch Razorslash’s set on the other stage at the far end of the union hall. Aggressive and misogynistic didn’t really do them justice, I felt. They were a bunch of absolute fucking charmers. They played a set which sounded like the bowels of the Earth opening up around us; if one wanted to continue the ‘bowel’ metaphor to its logical conclusion, you might guess how the four members of the band fitted (or floated) into it. I couldn’t tell one song from another, let alone where one ended and another began, but I was reliably informed that they finished their twenty-minute set with the beautiful and touching Hack Up Your Daughters, a parable for our times.
Phil and Marty had finally turned up with little time to spare - the tension had practically sent us spare as it was - but Marty still didn’t look like he wanted to go through with this. I told him about tonight, about how we were going to exorcise some demons, how we would lay down the gauntlet to those who’d challenged us. I then told him about the last-minute change to our set list which McCarthy and I had worked through while enduring Razorslash’s barrage of Earthly bowel movements. For some strange reason, this didn’t reassure him like we thought it would.
With a lovely welcoming touch, little Steve Bennett let out one final gutteral roar, then declared, “Just fuckin’ try and top that, Fag Gasket.” And lo, the pissed bogans rejoiced.
It’s reasonably odd staring at the back of a few hundred peoples’ heads. I almost felt like shouting ‘Behind you, behind you,’ Christmas panto-style, but didn't, as it would have been shit. No need in the end, they turned around sharply after McCarthy smashed a sustained E chord out of his Epiphone with the Big Muff
flat to the floor; and let the bastard hang in the confined space of the Union complex until the feedback threatened to make the new front row's heads begin grenading.
“Think I got their attention,” he confided.
“G’day folks,” I said. “Thanks for coming out... we’re Flange Gasket, and can we just say, thanks very much to Razorslash for that kind welcome.” Marty began to tinker around with some incidental music on keys - I think we told him to play the intro bit from Everybody Needs Somebody, that song off the Blues Brothers movie. Chat-to-the-people music. “You know, it takes a special kind of talent to play hard-core death metal these days, and a special kind of man to sing about defiling disembodied corpses with the business end of his night tools. And that man is Steve Bennett, folks. A big hand for our man Stevo, please.”
“And Angus, you know the most beautiful thing about his art?”
“What’s that, Uncle Sam?”
“He writes entirely from his own experience...”
At which point Phil cracked the seamy night air open with a sustained machine-gun blast of double-kick, speed-metal drumming fury. One hell of a full-scale twin metal guitar assault followed, picks splintering with the insane power and furious speed of the onslaught, churning and chundering out riffs heavier than God’s own dick. Think mid-90s Pantera covering early ‘80s Metallica covering late ‘70s Motorhead and you’re in the neighbourhood.
From somewhere deep in the blackness of my soul I conjured the most throat-tearingly evil vocal I could, knowing McCarthy would be doing the same. It was a simple call-and-response, really. We knew it well. For something we'd just made up five minutes before.
“FATAL DEATH FATAL DEATH!” I bellowed.
“EXPLODING ARSE EXPLODING ARSE!” McCarthy roared.
“FATAL DEATH FATAL DEATH!!”
“EXPLODING ARSE EXPLODING ARSE!!”
“FATAL DEATH!!”
“EXPLODING ARSE!!”
“FATAL DEATH!!!”
“EXPLODING ARSE!!!”
“FATAL ARSE EXPLODING DEATH AAAAARRRRRGHHHHHH!!!!!” we screamed in unison over the massive metal crescendo of our fully eighteen-second-long set opener.
“Right, that’s enough of that,” declared Uncle Sam abruptly. The sudden silence was steamrolled by an encouraging swell of drunken cheering at our engaging attempt to out-‘Slash the ‘Slash. I was sure even the Razorslash fans were giving us the thumbs-up, though it may have been another digit they were waving in our direction.
“So, anyone here know how to swim?”
A cheer of recognition.
“It’s fuckin’ easy, really. Angus here can tell you about it, he was taught by a former Liberal Prime Minister. Sadly I was taught by Bob Cuntliffe, so I tend to drown in my own bullshit...”
He cranked right into that gorgeous little riff with enthusiasm like I’d never seen, not even when he was duck-walking over the back of the couch on recording day at Chateau Dodgy. He was absolutely shredding, throwing Big Rock shapes with axe and hips alike, twisting and shaking like he was routed directly into 240 volts, while I began telling the story of our surfin’ protagonist with the panelvan
and the skills and stuff.
Squinting through the dust haze, I saw something I never really thought I’d see. Lips moving. Hundreds of them. All mouthing the same words, at the same time. I couldn’t hear them, but I knew what they were singing, because I was leading them. There was apparently no need to go and do the bolt, because according to a fair percentage of these lovely people, I’d learned to swim with Harold Holt.
Well I’ll be fucked, I thought. I suddenly realised the enormity of what we’d achieved, and have to say I was momentarily overwhelmed. I almost forgot to sing the line about not getting crabs in your pubic hair, which would have been a cardinal sin - it was clearly what everyone in the building was hanging out for.
I let McCarthy loose for his solo, not that he needed any encouragement, and decided to be real brave when he came back.
“You’re in fine form tonight ladies and gents. In fact, you’re in such good form, I’m gonna let you sing so I can skive off work for a bit… Ready?”
No need to go and do the bolt, I learned to swim with Harold Holt…
Thus bellowed by a hall-full of drunken students, accompanied only by the Duffer’s open hi-hat, sounded quite impressive.
I didn’t want it to end. Damn McCarthy and damn me for writing three-minute rock songs instead of 15-minute transcendental post-modern operettas. But we reached the end, reluctantly, and allowed the audience to scream at us for a little while.
“Jesus fuckin’ Christ folks, you are one awesome audience. Where the fuck were you lovely people on Sunday night, that’s my question.”
“Not at the bloody Gollan, it would seem,” Marty piped up behind us, to much amusement. Our Italian contingent was back on deck.
We charged through Sketchy at Best, seethed through Nirvana In Pyjamas, and grooved through Git The Led Out. We had a fuckin’ ball.
“Folks, you’ve been tops, and we’ve been Flange Gasket. On the skins has been Phil Duff, on the keys has been Marty di Biagini…”
“Are we already has-beens then?” The Italian Stallion with more comedy gold! He’s on fire tonight ladies. He's here all week, try the veal. Though he'd probably prefer you try the pork.
“That guy over there with the axe has been Uncle Sam and I’ve been Andy. Though,” I mused, “sometimes I wish I was someone else.”
“Yeah, Andy? How so?”
“Well, sometimes,” I segued leadenly, “I’d prefer to be Angus Young...”
We’d written I Wanna Be Angus Young that week. It sounded like a Bon Scott era AC/DC riff that had been unearthed after 20 years in a time capsule with a case of KB, 
a carton of Winnie Blues and a bottle of Stone's Green Ginger Wine. It fuckin' rocked. I don’t need to say anything more about it, really.
Our time was up. Coincidentally, we were out of material, and Sagittaria looked like they were quite prepared to take over from us on the stage across the way.
“Folks, you’ve been awesome. We’re Flange Gasket, we’re outta here… we leave you in the capable hands of the beautiful and talented Artemisia, and the girls from Sagittaria. Cheers.”
The lights died around us, our mikes were faded out, and again, we were presented with the backs of a couple of hundred peoples’ heads. Something of an anticlimax, really. Sagittaria’s melodies swelled to fill the room, as Artemisia rather sweetly thanked us for our gentlemanly welcome.
The Duffer clambered out of his drumkit, Marty wandered around from behind his keys, and the two of us switched off our guitars and set them down. For a moment, we just stood around and looked at each other in the darkness. We were all on a high from such an awesome show, having so many people screaming our name, and even our lyrics as we thundered through our silly little songs, written in our garage, about former Play School presenters and Prime Ministers who couldn’t swim. McCarthy was the first to break the moment’s silence, summing up in a few words the intensity of the experience which had been shared that evening with each other, and with all those wonderful shining faces out there.
“Can’t believe I fucked up the solo in Sketchy,” he grinned ruefully.
We were no chance. We knew we were no chance by the fact that the judging panel were situated in front of the stage… at the other end of the hall, where Razorslash and Sagittaria had been scheduled to play. From our vantage point, we could barely see the light glinting off Chris Kurtin’s bald head. It was at that far end of the hall, the ‘main stage’ in all but name, where the presentation was due to take place shortly after Artemisia and the girls finished up. We packed up - only a small-scale lug-out this time, seeing as though the PA was theirs and staying - and made our way up to the big boys’ end of town to try and score some free piss, should there be any in the offing.
“Drunken Duff!” McCarthy declared. Since last we'd seen him (at the Chateau Dodgy housewarming, since you asked), Phil’s younger brother had dyed his hair jet black and was wearing cargo pants, faded Chuck Taylors and a sweaty Millencolin T-shirt. He was living the new-skool-punk cliché so enthusiastically you’d have thought he’d just been spat out of a Vans Warped Tour
moshpit. We caught up with Duncan over a couple of warm cans of VB (cheers SCU Union, you cheap pricks) in traditional fashion - we slagged off his band’s performance and he slagged off ours.
“Actually,” he eventually admitted, “you weren’t bad out there for a fat old man, Angus. Granted, Jeff shits all over you for technique, but at least you can sing, he’s appalling… he couldn’t hold a tune if it had handles. And Phil actually kept time for once, even if he is a walking non-event.”
A little later, while off trying to find more warm cans of VB (I’m a glutton for punishment, and free beer IS free beer after all), I was accosted by a worldly, intense-looking little girl in a magnificent floaty red dress.
“Hi, you’re Andrew aren’t you… the one they call Angus?”
Artemisia Bailey was even more of an uber-babe from close range. Raven-haired with green eyes, she was a striking looking girl. But that was hardly my concern, I had Jessica at home (or at work, in the case of tonight, but she’d be along later, she promised.)
“Sure am... Artemisia, isn’t it. I did pronounce that right earlier on?”
She offered a sweet smile as affirmation. “I just wanted to say,” she began, “thanks for your lovely words of introduction, it was very kind and respectful. Particularly as you guys weren’t treated with the same respect yourselves.”
“Oh, that,” I shrugged dismissively. “Hardly worth worrying about. Steve has a few issues, but I’m sure he’s seeking help. And we give as good as we get, as you probably heard. Hey, I like your frock, it’s gorgeous,” I commented. It wasn’t a pick-up line, obviously, because I was already dating Jessica.
“What, this old thing?” she replied. Artemisia was softly spoken, her voice low and musical, yet charged with quiet intensity. You had the impression that everything she said was carefully considered, and deeply profound. Jessica, by contrast, was confident and engaging, and spoke her mind; Andrea, Uncle Sam’s girlfriend, spoke like a Cessnock coal-miner’s daughter. “Madeleine, our cellist, calls this my Wuthering Heights outfit.”
“It is a bit Kate Bush, isn’t it?”
She nodded with a little smile. “Next thing you know,” she deadpanned self-deprecatingly, “I’ll be dancing about on the moors singing Heeeeathcliff, it’s meeee, it’s Cathieeeee, I’ve come home…” Judging by her Kate Bush impressions, Artemisia didn’t take herself anywhere near as seriously as I’d expected. She sipped elegantly from a bottle of mineral water, green eyes sparkling; for an instant I was glad to be rid of the green-can-o’-Satan which would have clearly denoted me as a desperate bogan. Not that I was concerned about how I appeared to her, of course. I already had a girlfriend.
Artemisia smelled fantastic, exotic, like Arabian spices. I’d grown accustomed to Jessica coming home from work, reeking of sweat (not so bad) and stale smoke (not so good). “Hey, I gotta get back,” she indicated, “but it was cool to meet you. You guys are awesome - not usually my thing, but your Zeppelin medley was especially cool. Don’t you ever worry, though, that people won’t take you seriously?”
I shook my head. “I’m very worried people might start taking us seriously. It’d be a clear sign the world was about to end, I think. Nostradamus predicted that as a portent of the coming apocalypse, didn’t he? I’m sure there was something in there about four idiots singing about Harold Holt.”
She gave me a farewelling smile, and sashayed away, wavy raven hair and swishy red frock disappearing into the backstage throng. I was tingling. Why was I tingling? I shook it off. Standard issue post-show adrenalin rush. What I needed was another beer. Or for Jess to escape work and get here. Preferably with the keys to one of the deserted SCU teaching labs in her hot little hand so all this pesky adrenalin could be put to good use.
We didn’t win. But then again, neither did Razorslash. Sagittaria claimed first prize, not unexpectedly, and were allowed back onstage to play a final farewell song - we’d guessed they were morals for the Big Cheese On Offer
given that they’d not actually been asked to pack up after their set. The most interesting thing was that Razorslash not only hadn’t won, but hadn’t even come second. Flange Gasket had outpointed the ‘Slash for the silver. In fact, the crowd response at this result seemed to be evenly split between meathead bogans booing Razorslash’s demotion, and actual members of the human species who thought we were more deserving of aforementioned grand fromage than my new friend Artemisia and co. So, we'd come second. Not a bad result. The ladies like it, I'm told.
Steve Bennett hadn’t had the worst of days, all told; at least it’d been better than Saturday. At this afternoon’s band rehearsal (and subsequent pissup/smokeup) he’d successfully started a rumour, bound to race through the local muso communuity like a bushfire, that the previous Saturday evening’s guest judge, Phil from the Grinners, was in fact giving it to Sagittaria’s spunky blonde cellist Madeleine in the arse, therefore explaining why he and Mandy had overruled Chris Kurtin in the deliberations. All had agreed, convinced there was no way it could have been because their band was actually rather shit.
Staggering home, vaguely realising he was far too drunk for a mid-week afternoon (given that he was supposed to clock on at Woolies nightfill in four hours and was on his final warning), Steve Bennett was rather surprised to find an envelope stuffed through his letterbox. His surprise welled from the fact that he didn’t usually get mail that didn’t have ‘Final Notice’ stamped across it. In truth, this almost looked like personal mail. Maybe even... fan mail?
Curiousity piqued, he ripped it open on the spot.
The envelope contained no letter, no note - just a small rectangle of blue-patterned cardboard. It was, in fact, a ‘Chance’ card from an ancient, incomplete Monopoly set, originally found behind a downstairs cupboard in the Chateau Dodgy laundry, and used only as a source of fake betting cash
for drunken late-night poker games. None of us were good enough, loaded enough or stupid enough to contemplate using actual money, for fuck's sake.
Bennett turned it over and read the inscription:
You have won third prize in a beauty contest. Collect $10.
Those fuckin’ Fag Gasket poofs, he thought, and stormed up the overgrown path to his front door. Taped to the door was a ten dollar note. In Monopoly money, of course.
You can’t say we weren’t thorough.
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