Laughing Clowns are performing the next days of January 2010 in Australia (21/22th Melbourne, 25th Brisbane, 26th Sydney) with Dirty Three but in the waiting to get some live pics I would like to share with you today a friendly message I got a few weeks ago from an Australian journalist : Adrian Cunningham, who was at a show at The Paris Theatre in Sydney in November 1980 with Laughing Clowns sharing the bill with The Birthday Party (later Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds) and Go-Betweens !!!
Adrian sent me a few live pics he took during that show as well as a very interesting report about that creative family of Australian musicians : an obvious interesting report when you will read such a sentence in his text : “the Clowns were my favourites – and before them the Saints, so Ed is number one living national treasure”…!!!
I invited you (with his agreement) to read now his whole message to me :

“Hi Annie, Your enthusiasm is truly infectious. Yes, the photos (while pretty bad from a technical quality point of view) are pretty interesting historically. The Paris Theatre concert in Sydney is now legendary and I am pretty sure that there was no one else there with a camera that night. Sadly, these four photos are the only ones I took.

 
 
Ed Kuepper - Laughing Clowns; Nick Cave and Tracey Pew (now deceased) – Birthday Party; Ben Wallace-Crabbe (bass – now deceased) and Jeffrey (drums – sporting a very fetching pencil moustache!) – Laughing Clowns; Rowland S Howard (deceased December 30th 2009) and Nick Cave – Birthday Party - Paris Theater November 1980

That concert at The Paris Theatre was the best gig I ever saw and was the Clowns’ last gig as a ‘big band’ with Bob, Dan, Ben and Peter Doyle on trumpet. They were playing with the Birthday Party (their first gig back in Sydney after moving to England) and the Go-Betweens (their first gig in Sydney after moving down from Brisbane). The Go-Betweens were nervous as all get out - I recall Lindy Morrison looking like she wanted to hide behind the curtains at the back of the stage. The Theatre was only half full - unbelievable for such a lineup - I had got there hours early to ensure my ticket and had crept in through the stage door to listen to the soundchecks without anyone noticing. The Birthday Party and the Clowns really respected each other and wanted to impress each other, so both bands soared into the stratoshpere that night… (more…)

 

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In this first podcast of 2010, the interview with Chris Bailey from The Saints Part 2 with still more rock and roll and some lovely noises. We keep talking about Chris’ music, life and projects for the new year with a few recordings ready to be released eventually under his own new label who knows ?

The Saints with Chris Bailey, Peter Wilkinson and Caspar Wijnberg in 2005 in France near Lyon at the festival Oulala

I started with a surprising and nice version from Nights in Venice proposed in one of Chris’ last albums “Bone Box”, then I played two melancholic songs “Bridges” (written in Berlin in 89 after the fall of the wall) and “Photograph” (from one of his solo albums “Encore” in 1995) which were in harmony with my current sadness after having learnt my friend Mick Cocks’ (Rose Tattoo) death the last days of December; the day of Mick’s funerals December 30th, another great and talentuous Australian musician passed away due to the same sickness (a bad liver cancer) : Rowland S Howard (The Young Charlatans with Jeffrey Wegener) The Boys Next Door, The Birthday Party, (with Nick Cave and Mick Harvey), These Immortal Souls (with Genevieve McGuckin, his partner in the life too) and a lot of other bands : it was pretty hard to want and sound happy, I’m sorry, I stayed true…and I will try to do something special for them later; now it’s too hard for me.
But don’t worry, I used some energetic Saints’ songs like “Je Fuckin’ T’aime” (Imperious Delirium 2006) “Erotic Neurotic” (Live at Paddingtown Hall in 77), and our mutual Swedish friend Lars Wallin’s performance on the didgeridoo to keep the spirits high; I finished with “Just Like Fire Would” : a beautiful melody with dark lyrics though…
A luck Chris’ talk was as funny as usual and I’m sure you will appreciate his Irish humor one more time !! : I wish you an Happy New Year with still more Love, Friendship and good Rock and Roll !

Chris’ Godess cat on his computer : Try to send her some e-mails…:)

By The Way : if you live in Australia, don’t forget Ed Kuepper’s next tour with The Laughing Clowns from Januray 21th to 26th in Melbourne, Brisbane and Sydney, sharing the bill with Warren Ellis and his Dirty Three!!