Simply The Best, ‘s’all I wanna say. The woman is a genius, having recently sang for Oprah’s 50th birthday, which would have been like de ja vu for Tina, having turned 50 herself only twenty years ago. Last week I channelled Tina’s spirit at a karaoke bar in Sydney by singing my all time favourite Tina tune, “Private Dancer”. The lyrics to that song, they are so scathing, so real. What a life Tina has had. She’s survived Ike, Mad Max 3, Rugby League (perhaps the last time a woman involved with the NRL escaped unmolested) and more haircuts than I’ve had private dances. Sure, “We Don’t Need Another Hero” has a few good moments, including that sax solo, but it’s not a patch on PD. Yarn and Sarah both reckon, though, and this is my final word on the subject, that “Simply The Best” would be the perfect wedding song. The sax solo is, imho, superior to WDNAH. So SOTAR.
Category: Davey Dreamnation (page 12 of 31)
Davey Dreamnation (not pictured) was conceived during the playing of a Genesis L.P. in April 2001. A legend in his own signature drawstring jarmies, a colossus of lo-fidelity, a harbinger of jitches and drum fills and ‘the Skylab of his generation’, Davey describes himself as an Australasian pirate who lives in the third person, and that’s good enough for us. Davey is apparently fluent in Esperanto and enjoys ice hockey and Joy Division. Read posts from the last five or ten years, then consider for a moment a world without Davey. Sad, isn’t it?
After two years of hard slog, outrageous fortune, sharp barbs and three-cornered jacks, Davey Dreamnation is said to be considering his future in the music biz. Just minutes after landing the Number 1 spot on mp3.com.au he was heard to mutter: “Well, it’s not fair to the kids, is it? I mean, I just waltz in there, hit number 1 then disappear. It can’t be good for cricket.” The deluded pop nut is reported to be considering his options, including writing his memoirs, retiring for a few years, retiring altogether, selling his famous signature guitar, moving into acting, performing unplugged, performing nude, not performing, performing only occasionally, moving to another genre, becoming an interpretative dancer, becoming a vegetarian or just writing more songs. “Obviously, it’s a difficult time for me. Despite all the efforts I put into Recognition of Prior Learning, I just don’t think I’ve brought the fans along with me. I might as well be making milkshakes. Former pop stars including Sting, Chris de Burgh, Nik Kershaw, Lamahl, Milli, The Wonder Stuff, Tears For Fears, Bruce Hornsby and the Range, Black, Punky Brewster, Ned’s Atomic Arsehole, Slowdive, Ride, Pixies, The Waterboys and N*Sync are reported to be quite relieved that Dreamnation will no longer be pulling on the signature jarmies. “He may have one more trick up his sleeve, however,” cautioned an understandably nervous Alf from Home and Away, “I hear Davey’s recorded a swansong EP and it’s a killer man, killer.”
Seething words greeted shocked journalists queued outside the Tribesco compound this morning, having been invited to attend a secret slap-dash interview press conference with the increasingly erratic Davey Dreamnation. It seems success has bypassed his head and gone straight for the jugular, as the journos soon found out. “I’m pretty happy with the second album actually. We were going for a harder, more spaced out pogo sound that was also softer and focussed on reality. That probably sounds like a tall order – just ask the engineers! But seriously, with Islands…, we knew we had something special there, it was just a matter of coaxing it out of its pen. Turned out that something special was a llama, so with Recognition …, we decided to ditch the llama and hire professional musicians instead. The results speak for themselves. Not a bum note in sight. I haven’t had quiche lorraine for three months. I’m fit, healthy and sane. The llama is gone, I’ve even forgotten his name. I just have so many songs inside my head at the moment, and I’d like to make sure that from now on a few more of them are my own. It’s always difficult coming up with a sophomore album. That’s why we went for the third year album instead. Our graduation album is coming up next, followed by postgraduate, doctoral, post-doctoral and professorial albums. But it’ll be the chancellor’s album where we finally break through, I believe. The Tribesco compound turned out to be just the tonic for us after the gruelling sessions we endured at Camp Davey trying to turn Islands… into something listenable. While I don’t think we ended up achieving that, in a way I’m pleased. I mean, who knows what people will make of it anyway. I try not to talk about my lyrics because everyone has their own interpretation of them. I try not to play my guitar when I’m singing in the shower because that’s just stupid. Anyone can do it, that’s why no one does.”
Hold onto your jarmies, all ye fans of Davey Dreamnation. Today, for the second time, a full-length record by Davey Dreamnation has reached Number 1 on the mp3.com.au Lo-Fi album charts, astounding critics, chiropractors, cotton pickers and chopper pilots. Long-term fans will recall that the last time this happened, Davey was halfway through his debut US tour, and was thus forced to cancel several sound checks in order to attend a hastily-arranged press conference in the deadbeat surrounds of downtown Buffalo, New York State. This second #1 position finds Davey relaxed and comfortable in his new-look Tribesco compound, complete with seventy foot walls to discourage journalists and llamas from peeking inside. What makes this time around different is that the album in question, the seething Recognition of Prior Learning, has only been on the charts for three weeks in total, prompting calls from fellow lo-fi artists for Davey to “move up a division”, possibly to the “indie” or “pop” category. While Dreamnation himself remains, as ever, tight-panted, sources close to the troubled walnut suggest the news has sent him spinning out of control, like a slinkie trying to get out of the World Trade Centre. “I realise that’s in very poor taste,” admitted a crestfallen Stung, who refused to believe the news, “but I don’t care. My new album will be called Smear and will feature personal attacks on Boz Scaggs, Billy Field, Neu! and the artist formerly known as Shannon Numbnuts.” RPL now sits at #36 on the cross-genre Alternative charts. Most improbably, it’s ranked as the #128th most popular album overall. The album’s success comes hot on the heels of the phenomenal streaking star that is Boost Bass, Free Quincey, a song that has now been streamed over 150 times, but actually downloaded only once. “I think that pretty much sums it up,” chuckled an obviously drugged Scaramouche from his new Pissweak World franchise just outside of Wogonga.
Davey Dreamnation’s popularity is at its highest since his infamous breakthrough to #1 on the mp3.com.au charts in October 2002. Recognition of Prior Learning, the astonishing aural experience that has been described by Howard Jones as “theft – pure and simple”, by Chris de Burgh as “Not a patch on Eastern Wind” and by Stung as “seething” has climbed to #2 on the Lo Fi Album charts, only one step away from #1, obviously. BBFQ, meanwhile, has crept up a notch or two since last week also. The “out-take” track now trembles on the edge of greatness, at #6, with Maple Lanes also making a charge, sitting just outside the top ten. The success of RPL is seen by some as vindication of Davey’s decision not to appear on Sigue Sigue Sputnik’s come-back album. Others, however, see the whole affair as a hoax. “Well, what proof have we got that it’s not just Davey downloading his own songs?” seethed an exiled Scaramouche from a paddock adjacent to the Hume Weir near Albury. “Davey’s a cheat, and you can quote me on that, all day long.” Sources resident in Tribesco suggest that Dreamnation has another album already recorded, though of course spokesperson and gifted flautist Stung is saying nothing at this point. Rod Stewart also weighed into the debate yesterday, making an unexpected attack on his former friend and lacrosse partner. “Look, my greatest fear is that Davey will switch to covering old standards and dressing in a tuxedo. So far I’ve managed to corner that part of the market, but if I start to get competition, well there goes my weekly perm and bleach job. I’m seething, and I can understand why Stung is seething too. I taught him the meaning of the word. My larynx is wilting under the strain.” Dreamnation meanwhile refused to comment on Stewart’s “absurd verbal diahorrea”, claiming that “that tosser’s ‘music’ can’t even speak for itself.”