yesterday i bought a remastered version of "stoneage romeos", the classic & quirky 1984 debut album from australian band, the hoodoo gurus. 20 years ago i first got a copy - taped onto blank cassette by a friend - of this album, while in high school. then it disappeared into the ether a few years later, as did my taped copies of their 2nd & 3rd albums. i got to see the hoodoo gurus live a few times while at university in brisbane during 1989-1991, and was never disappointed.

stoneage romeos - u'd go a long way to find a more solid debut album and funnily enough, the best comparison that comes to mind now is that of the stone roses (similar names & all). there's plenty of good short energetic rockin numbers, with quite a healthy dose of e.g. rockabilly, surf-type guitars, and garage/psychedlic rock influence at times, as well as plenty of snappy pop melodies ... and a couple of 'slower numbers'.

the rather unique subjects explored by many of the songs are interesting, obscure & impressive as well (in addition to a couple of unrequited love songs). for example:
- "dig it up": 'my girlfriend lives in the ground, my friends ask why she's not around ... '
- "zanzibar": 'did u offer my a dutch cigar? must have thought u were so bourgeoise; are u who u say u are?'
- "in the echo chamber": 'slowly i recovered, my head was achin bad! i was layin on the capret inside this madman's lab.'
- "leilani": 'his native girlfriend died a death quite violent, a tribal sacrifice made to the earth.'
- "death ship": 'near hidden reefs we appear in the gloom, luring mariners to their doom.'
- "i was a kamikaze pilot": ' ... they gave me a plane, i couldnt fly it home.'

i could go on - there isn't a bad track - but won't. suffice to say, this album was straight out of leftfield in the context of my musical world 20 years ago and it is a classic in my mind, particularly given it's a debut effort. for the record i do like the hoodoo gurs' 2nd album "mars needs guitars" a little more than this one, but that's another story.

"stoneage romeos" is kinda like some fun, kaleidosopic collage of the ramones with a bit of johnny b goode & maybe dick dale thrown in on a hollow-bodied guitar, and a good amount of b-grade sci-fi movie & comic-book-like themes. it's brilliant! and after a long absence, my album collection is more complete with it.

oh yeah - i only just read about this - but last year some great australian bands did covers of the songs of this album and called it "stoneage cameos". this bit's mostly for dan: you am i appear, doing a cover of "tojo". and other artisits involved include spiderbait, dallas crane, and davey lane.

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i was talking mobile phone-related matters the other day, in the post before last.
now for another post involving my mobile phone.
rivetting!

anyhow, in general i do not consider myself to display significant obsessive-compulsive tendencies, but with one or two key exceptions. one such exception regards my frequent checking of whether or not my mobile phone is (still) in my 'work bag' while on the way to & from work. that bag is an old laptop case with a velcro-fastened flap on a large pocket on the top/front of the case. i put my mobile in there when on the way to & from work. (i usually can't stand wearing/keeping the phone on my person unless it's virtually unavoidable.)

so, in an average day i reckon i check that the phone is in that pocket on my bag about 3 times, or maybe 2-3 times, both on the way to AND from work.
it's kinda weird, and i know that, but i continue to do it nonetheless.

still, i guess there are substantially worse habits that one could have!?

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kids are great! (most of the time, anyhow ...)

how else would i end up mimicking dee snyder of twisted sister, repeatedly singing the chorus of "we're not gonna take it!", with a 3-foot-long piece of yellow plastic tubing being the microphone and fists punching the air?!? ... and all within 10 minutes of getting out of bed in the morning, dressed in a pair of dirty board-shorts, bags still under eyes and hair looking something like an epileptic, protein pineapple!

my son was on lead guitar, and thoroughly enjoying our performance too!

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it's all about the big issues today.

u know what i often find annoying? well, one thing which does anyhow, time after time. it's the fact that, after typing & sending a text message on my mobile phone, i always have to do no less than seven presses of one button or another, just in order to 'exit' out of everything, every menu option, etc., and get back to the regular 'desktop' on the phone. it really is starting to pi$$ me off at times. could there no just be one short-cut button press i could execute in order to bypass all that extraneous pressing? as it is, i could one day end up with r.s.i. in my left thumb (yes i'm left-handed) and a result of all that additional pressing i'm doing - or at least, end up with r.s.i. a little sonner than i otherwise might ...

well, that's my gripe for now - gee i feel better for having got that off my chest!

on another note, song of the week for the past week is 'resolve' which is on the latest foo fighters' (double) album. i have never been much into the foo fighters, although have not minded most of their singles i've heard on radio/tv; but i recently got copies of their albums from a friend and have enjoyed listening to most of their tracks.

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it is perhaps not the very best idea in the universe to aim to create & upload a blog post when one has had a few vinos ... or is it?
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get this:

i thought about this earlier today ... if u turn 'time' backwards, u get ...
'emit' !

which is kinda interesting, considering that emit means, well, to emit, exude, spit out, etc. whereas time pretty much sucks us in; it's a great, (evidently) irresistsable force, a black hole, a vortex ... pretty much the anitthesis of emission in many ways, or so it would seem at least ...

"time takes a cigarette,
put it in your mouth ..."

unless of course one is fortunate enough to be able to see 'across' larger expanses of time

not me - well ,not really ...

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i ain't no jeremy irons, folks!
and nobody has painted my portrait to date ...
so, instead, here's another MRI pic of my head, showing my beady eyes looking out on the world around me ...



maybe that's enough of the self-portraits via MRI?

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the following is especially for lee, as she likes jeremy irons. this was painted by a 'friend of a friend', and is at least 7 feet tall! have u ever seen the movie, 'dead ringers'?



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this isn't nicotine stain on my fingers - it's
turmeric!

last night i cooked with raw turmeric (as opposed to the powedered form found on spice racks) for the first time. interesting ... it looks kind of like ginger, although the flesh seems more orange than i had expected - more like sweet potato in colour. but once you grated it up and get it into the frying pan, it takes of that more familiar brightish yellow tinge ...

there u have it -
turmeric!

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let's go [insert here name of n.r.l team from brisbane which has the same mascot/talisman as the n.f.l. team from denver]!
this pic taken from my car driver's seat this morning just a few hundred metres up the road from the clubhouse of the aforementioned brisbane team ... the morning after that team won another grand final ... ;-D
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