I can’t believe the year is getting away like it is! It’s already …what? ... er, Monday the 9^th of January ... it’s like time is just going day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute by minute by minute I keep holding on, I keep holding on....  Minute by minute, and so on...whatever happened to the Doobie Brothers. They were a rock band, weren’t they... then Mike McDonald came along and turned them into girlies.

Anyway, despite the Dewpie Bros and Old Father Time gnawing away at the young bones of the year, this is a week or two of delicious old bones to gnaw on.  The Gov is serving up a trifecta of great live music treats…

 Friday January 13 is Roots night at the Gov.  

Featuring The Yearlings, The Huckleberry Swedes and The Streamliners – a trifecta of three of Australia’s best roots/blues/country/soul bands. Regular readers will not need any information about the Streamliners.... they are unique, wonderful musician, great songwriters and brilliant interpreters of blues and RnB music and should be part of any music aficionado’s memory.  The Swedes are another band to add to your live music experience. The Yearlings bring a glowing international reputation to the local stage and round out an unforgettable presentation of brilliant live music.

For the money – a lousy twenty bucks – you should do yourself a great favour.

A NIGHT OF ROOTS MUSIC - Fri Jan 13th @ THE GOV

Featuring The Streamliners, The Yearlings and The Huckleberry Swedes.
Doors open at 7.30pm bands on around 8.30sh
$20 on the night or Pre sales $18 + booking fee (link below)

http://admin.moshtix.com.au/event.aspx?id=52374&ref=moshtix&skin
See:  The Streamliners http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=_lOuDjKBnlI www.thestreamliners.net

See: Huckleberry Swedes http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xw-IQyPkio0 www.huckleberryswedes.com

See: The Yearlings http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnkIX3mw8n8&feature=related www.theyearlings.net

Friday January 13^th also puts the Steve Brown Band on stage at the Semaphore Workers Club. Brownie is one of the great blues/soul groaners with a voice to murder for. The band comprises some of the States finest musicians and performances are renowned for spontaneous outpourings of musical wizardry and stuff.  The Semaphore Workers Club is the home of Blues and Roots music in South Australia. Live music kicks off around 9 pm.

Friday January 13 Hoy Hoy! at the Whitmore Hotel, city. Texas Blues at its finest from the Hoys.

Saturday January 14  - The Steve brown Band plays the Mt Compass Supper Club.   This venue – gig – has become a ‘destination’ for bands that perform roots music. It's the new 'vibe' in entertainment for people to whom 'doof-doof' means 'boof-boof'. Don't know how you go about getting tickets but I guess I could find out... if I tried a bit harder. Not hard to find though; in the old community hall on the Western side of the Victor Harbor Road almost in the middle of the village. 8 pm kick off. Might see you there.

Sunday January 15 and it’s The Cats’ Pyjamas back at the Robin Hood Hotel. Playing both Rock and/or Roll music loud and crazy, the Cats Pyjamas open the year with a cracker at The Hood. Be there at 4 pm to see the Cat’s Pyjamas still fukking around with the PA and having a beer or two. Rock to the sounds of “Testing one-two-three” and “Can I get that a bit louder, please”.  But be there and get ready because once the Cats start they only stop for beer and toilet breaks. Family-friendly except when the Preacher gets a bit narky and drops a stinker or two. 

Sunday 15th January - Rodney Hutton EP Launch at The Promethean, 116 Grote St, City.   Doors open 6:30pm; Tickets $20 (includes EP) Available through MoshTix or at the door. (support by Emily Davis.)

The Wheatie (Thebarton) always has great live music. Check: http://wheatsheafhotel.com.au/gigs

Looking Ahead….

Saturday February 4 The Gov. presents the return of a local favourite – Ronnie Taheny in '!Score – 20 years solo'.

Ronnie – who has clocked up appearances with Fairport Convention and Ani diFranco and David Gray, Luka Bloom, Tom Robinson, Aimee Mann and Billy Bragg – brings her musical exuberance to Adelaide’s Governor Hindmarsh Hotel for one show, kicking off her 2012 “!Score” tour. Ronnie promises to deliver a zesty selection of satire-driven gems from her past two decades of work, lubricated with some of the ‘inspirational dirt’ that helped create the songs. She will be joined on stage by Jarrad Payne on drums.

Ronnie Taheny “!SCORE!” tour 2012 starts at The Gov., Sat Feb 4^th then bounces into Europe from April till June.

Tickets: The Gov., Moshtix and Venue*Tix 

Table reservations: 0413 450521 or This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it   See: ronnietaheny.com

The Cricket.

It’s good to see the cricket back where it’s worth watching. The slashing triple century of that feller the other day brought to mind a yarn my dear old Grandfather Ogilvy used to tell me about how the family found its fortune. Quite by accident but it was all due to a cricket match. The story went back to when WC Grace was out here on holidays back in 1883. He was visiting a cousin who had a rock farm at Thargomindah when he waltzed into the middle of a grudge match between the Dubbo Drongos and the Ceduna Front Bottoms being played on neutral territory near the two states’ border at the end of the Barrier Range at the place called Broken Hill. The township at the time comprised only tents and rocks and people travelled there in horse and carts but they made the journey to see the well-publicised two States' Test match.

 Grandad Og was the Ceduna Front Bottoms demon fast bowler and the team was built around him.  Some of the others were fair players but there were a couple of dubious appointments: Darrell the Barrel was disastrously put in charge of the drinks trolley – skulled the lot before morning tea and fell down drunk on a bull ant nest – and one-hand Wassie from Whyalla was made the wicket keeper.

“Why’d yer give him that job,” whined Og. “He can’t keep wickets with one hand!”

“He keeps chickens, don’t he….? Can’t be much difference,” Said Dudley the Dud, the team manager.

As it turned out on match day Wassie stopped more balls with his head than his mitt but Og was the leading wicket taker having killed and maimed a fair number of the Drongos before lunch. Then Grace turned up for a look and was nabbed by the Drongos and sent in to bat.

The dynamic of the game quickly changed as Grace Hammered Og mercilessly all over new South Wales, Victoria and South Australia, running up a s score of three thousand and sixty-five when, Twatface,  the captain of the Ceduna Front Bottoms told Og to pull out the ‘big guns’. 

“Righto,” said Og, “I’ll lengthen me run up.”

“And,” whispered Twatface, “Give him a grubber. He’ll never hit it!”

Grandad Og stepped out a fair old run, kicked a line in the dust at the edge of the Mungo Lakes and took off.  The team boiled a billy while Og steamed in, faster and faster. They had a smoko while he swam across the flooded Darling River and swapped a few Pommie Jokes with Grace when all of a sudden a dust cloud was seen on the horizon.

“Here ‘e comes,” drawled Twatface. “Eyes on the ball, chaps.”

When Og hit the crease he was runnin' so fast the dust under his feet was catching fire. He slammed that ball so hard it dug into the ground and travelled at the speed of sound thirty feet under the surface. There was no way Grace was gonna hit the fukker when all of a sudden there was an almighty underground bash and the ball rose up out of the earth right in front of Grace who eyeballed for a split second and clouted the fukker into Far North Queensland.

Og complained of an uneven subsurface to the pitch but as the batsman was able to play the ball the umpires overruled him.  The game went downhill for the Ceduna Front Bottoms from then on. After the jubilant celebration by the Drongos that arvo Og went back to see if he could find out what caused the ball to rise. He dug down under the pitch and discovered the biggest deposit of lead pencils in the universe. 

Orders came in from every high school and bookie in the land and the family fortune was made. Grandfather Og became an overnight thousand-aire (Millions hadn’t been invented then) and built the first two-story tent in Broken Hill. He also commissioned the construction of the first two-storey horse and cart and famously forgot to build a two-story garage in the tent. He came home stonkered one night from the Broken Hill working men’s club brought the whole lot down when he drunkenly crashed the two-storey horse and cart into the one-storey garage and set fire to it with the cigar he was puffing on at the time.

That’s it. Bit of a shit ending, isn’t it? What if I added: And he never played cricket again.

There…that’s better.