Suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
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4 episodes with narrabeen
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5 episodes with narrabeen
2 episodes with narrabeen
2 episodes with narrabeen
4 episodes with narrabeen
3 episodes with narrabeen
2 episodes with narrabeen
2 episodes with narrabeen
Join Thomas Sims and Jonathan Vescio live as they dissect the first quarter of 2025 in the real estate world. Discuss top sales, hot suburbs, and what's next for Quarter 2!The Australian property market is showing fascinating movement in early 2025, with significant disparities between houses and apartments across the Northern Beaches and Lower North Shore. We've analyzed every sale, tracked every trend, and compiled comprehensive insights on what's driving these changes.Palm Beach and Whale Beach have emerged as the quarter's star performers with an astonishing 18.5% growth for houses, despite limited stock with just 11 sales recorded. Meanwhile, Narrabeen surprised everyone with 5.7% growth, signaling shifting buyer preferences. The affordability factor continues to drive interest in the Belrose/Frenchs Forest area, where houses have seen 4% growth and apartments a remarkable 10% increase, as buyers seek modern living spaces without the premium coastal price tag.The luxury market continues to break records, with Manly's Bower Street witnessing a jaw-dropping $22 million sale in just four days, while Mosman's apartment market topped out at $15 million for a spectacular penthouse in "The Castle." These sales establish new benchmarks that will influence surrounding property values throughout 2025. The current buyer's market presents genuine opportunities, but we predict a rapid shift post-election as interest rate cuts increase borrowing capacity and unleash pent-up demand. With housing affordability concerns persisting and international economic factors creating uncertainty, timing your next property move becomes crucial.Whether you're considering selling into the coming boom or looking to secure your next home before prices escalate further, reach out to us at Novak Properties. Our on-the-ground insights can help you navigate these dynamic market conditions and position yourself for success in what promises to be an exciting second quarter.
Check our upcoming events: https://bit.ly/3whDgVo Tweetable quote from Cooper “Be kind to your mind, be kind to others, and be kind to the environment.” Summary In this episode, Dr Espen is joined by professional surfer and mental health advocate Cooper Chapman who opens up about his journey and insights on mental health. He talks about the daily rituals that keep him grounded and the concept of "flow state" in surfing. Cooper also shares how his family's history has shaped his understanding of mental illness. Dr Espen steers the conversation, emphasizing mindfulness and proactive mental health practices. They discuss the difference between mental health and mental illness, promoting daily habits for well-being and the importance of staying present in life.
Cooper Chapman is the smiley human behind The Good Human Factory, a company which teaches science-backed skills such as mindfulness, gratitude, kindness, empathy, and taking responsibility to thousands of people around the world. I've had the pleasure of attending a couple of Cooper's events, and his passion for helping people manage their mental health and find mindful moments within each day is inspiring and infectious.Growing up in Narrabeen, Cooper was a professional surfer for more than 10 years. His interest in mental health was prompted by his father's bout with depression and the suicide of two family friends. Meditating on a regular basis and practicing mindfulness helps Cooper manage his anxiety and perform at a high level, whether he's competing in a contest or giving a speech.Through his workshops, podcasts, merch and community, he inspires people to think differently about mental health and wellbeing.In this episode, Cooper and I chat about our similar upbringings, as we both grew up in competitive industries, being in the acting and surfing worlds. We chat all about self reflection, values, mindset, comparison, curiosity, kindness, gratitude and how we can all dedicate 1% of our day to looking after our mental health. It's an inspiring episode that will have you feeling motivated to do better and be better! To connect with Cooper and learn more about the 1% Good Club and all the other amazing things he's got going on, follow his links below:The Good Humans Podcast on Apple here, and on Spotify here. Cooper's Instagram Good Human's Instagram Pass Around the Smile's Links below View my website here! (My very own oracle cards, journals, meditations, courses + more magical stuff!)Join my Facebook community group here!Find me on Instagram here! @passaroundthesmile @cleomasseyThe Pass Around the Smile podcast is recorded on Bundjalung Country, in South East Queensland, Australia. We acknowledge the Yugambeh people of the Bundjalung Nation, the traditional owners of this land. We pay our respects to Elders past, present and emerging.
Is the skyrocketing cost of housing in Sydney making home ownership seem like a distant dream? Learn how new state planning proposals might just turn that dream into reality. This episode dives deep into the government's innovative reforms designed to make buying and renting more affordable. We'll explore how permitted dual occupancy development in R2 low-density zones could revolutionize suburban living by introducing flexible housing options like townhouses, terraces, and apartments. Plus, discover how the size of local supermarkets plays a role in defining town centers and the significant changes new non-refusal development standards could bring to residential areas.Ever wondered how the picturesque Northern Beaches might evolve in the face of the housing crisis? We examine the criteria and potential impacts of multi-dwelling developments in key town centers like Mona Vale, Narrabeen, DY, and Manly Vale. Learn how these areas could experience a housing boom if properties align with dual occupancy and manor house criteria, supported by streamlined approval processes. Stay tuned for details on how to access crucial documents we've mentioned and join us on social media for continued engagement and updates. Let's tackle Sydney's housing challenges together!
On today's episode i am joined by Cooper Chapman, who was an ex Pro surfer for more than 10 years, Cooper grew up in Narrabeen in New South Wales, Australia. Now Cooper runs his own mental health organisation called the Good Human Factory. Cooper has a great story, Cooper's interest in mental health was prompted by his father's bout with depression and the suicide of two family friends. Meditating on a regular basis and practicing mindfulness helps Cooper manage his anxiety and perform at a high level, whether he's competing in a contest or giving a speech. Lots to unpack in this episode so please enjoy. Find Cooper at: IG- @cooperchapman @goodhumanfactory Website: https://www.thegoodhumanfactory.com/pages/about Podcast: goodhumanpod https://tr.ee/OLgSIHlm9D
Welcome to a Wide World of Sports update. A snapshot of the latest sport stories from the 9News team including: Dockers ready for home challenge against the Swans Champions League semi-finals set for epic finale World-class surfers arrive at Narrabeen for Sydney Surf Pro The biggest sport stories in less than 5 minutes delivered twice a day, with reports from the 9News team across Australia and overseas. Subscribe now to make it part of your daily news diet.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Welcome to a Wide World of Sports update. A snapshot of the latest sport stories from the 9News team including: Dockers ready for home challenge against the Swans Champions League semi-finals set for epic finale World-class surfers arrive at Narrabeen for Sydney Surf Pro The biggest sport stories in less than 5 minutes delivered twice a day, with reports from the 9News team across Australia and overseas. Subscribe now to make it part of your daily news diet.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Have you ever considered how the threat of a rising tide could sweep away your property's value? My colleague Stevan Bubalo joins me this week as we unravel the often underestimated influence of flood zones on real estate. We're peeling back the layers of Sydney's recent rains to reveal their profound impact on properties once deemed secure. Stevan and I take you through the resourceful journey to determine if your dream home could be submerged in financial woes by using tools like the NSW Planning Portal, and we discuss the broader implications for those looking to buy, sell, or just stay afloat in the market. Narrabeen and other picturesque coastal suburbs serve as the backdrop for a deeper exploration into the challenges of building in flood-prone areas. From construction costs that seem to climb with the water levels to insurance premiums surging like the tides, we analyze what it really means to erect a home where nature asserts its power. We share vivid tales from properties where floodwaters left their mark, providing a stark canvas for understanding how such risks factor into the valuation and appeal of waterfront properties. Yet, through it all, we celebrate the resilient spirit of communities that embrace these elemental hazards, adding to the unique charm of living by the beautiful but sometimes tempestuous Australian coast.
Embark on a journey to the heart of Indian culture with our esteemed guest Nirup, the maestro of flavors from the Spice Bazaar Indian takeaway in Narrabeen. For a quarter-century, she and her husband have been enchanting the palates of locals with their culinary masterpieces. In our latest episode, Nirup unfolds her tale, from her initial steps as a qualified chef to the triumphs of entrepreneurship. She invites us all to the upcoming Bollywood party, a night where the spice of Indian dance meets the savor of authentic cuisine, promising an unforgettable dive into one of the world's most spirited cultures.Prepare your taste buds for a story that's not just about food, but about the journey of an iconic dish that's claimed the hearts of Narrabeen residents - the signature Chicken Tikka Masala. As Nirup shares the secret behind the symphony of spices that has customers lining up, you'll find yourself planning your next meal at Spice Bazaar. We wrap up by setting our sights beyond the shimmering coastline of Narrabeen to the vibrant land of India, where Nirup leads cultural tours that can redefine the art of travel. Don't miss this episode where we celebrate the glory of Indian heritage, the thrill of rhythmic footwork, and the allure of a cuisine that speaks directly to the soul.
After sharing his insurance ordeal on-air, Dean from Narrabeen sees progress in the repair of his property damaged by a landslide two years ago. The incident highlights the impact of media scrutiny on insurance company responsiveness.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
We know from the research that highly effective schools apply their resources – such as staff and school time, expertise, and facilities – in a targeted manner to maximise outcomes for students. For instance, resources are prioritised towards evidence-informed strategies aimed at improving student outcomes; leaders are making the best possible use of available expertise to meet student needs; and a flexible approach is taken with resource deployment. In this episode of School Improvement I'm joined by Belinda Norrie and Jacqueline Hampson. Belinda is the relieving Deputy Principal at Narrabeen North Public School, a primary school in north Narrabeen, which is a beachside suburb in northern Sydney. Jacqueline is Head Teacher Secondary Studies over at Narrabeen Sports High School. Both schools are members of the NEST collaboration, where NEST stands for Narrabeen Elanora Student and Teacher. NEST also includes two other local schools – Narrabeen Lakes Public School and Elanora Heights Public School. For the past few years, staff and students in the 3 primary and one secondary school have been sharing facilities to enhance learning opportunities and fostering relationships between staff. In this episode, Belinda and Jacqueline share how the collaboration began, why it extends across K-12, and their advice for other school communities looking to collaborate in a similar way in the future. Host: Dominique Russell Guests: Belinda Norrie, Jacqueline Hampson Sponsor: MacKillop Seasons
Our guest today is the effervescent Laura Enever. In the following conversation, Laura discusses growing up in Narrabeen, her early passion for gymnastics, negotiating the volatilities of pro tour life and transitioning to the realm of big wave surfing. Laura also talks in detail about the wave she rode in the last Hawaiian Winter, which is widely believed to be the biggest wave ever paddled by a woman.Subscribe to Tracks and receive a tactile tome of surfing treasures delivered to your doorstep. https://tracksmag.com.au/subscriptions Check out our range of apparel, photo prints and classic covers at the Tracks Mag Store. https://tracksmag.com.au/store Go to https://tracksshacks.com.au/ to view an accomodation platform custom made for surfers.
Ever wanted to eavesdrop on seasoned real estate experts as they reveal the secrets of the trade? Brace yourselves as we walk you through the labyrinth of the current real estate market, revealing why a property in DIY fetched a record-breaking price per square meter for a three-bedroom unit. We'll also let you in on the inside scoop of some upcoming listings - an extraordinary property in Warriwood and a rare dual occupancy waterfront in Narrabeen. Plus, we'll take you on a tour of Narrabeen's charming village atmosphere and the stunning North Narrabeen beach.We've got some thrilling updates from the recent Rugby World Cup with France and Wales claiming center stage. Curious about twilight open inspections? Wondering if they could be the next big thing in real estate? We'll be discussing it all. But it's not all business; we also have a heartwarming story to share about how being nice led us to one of our most sought-after listings in Narrabeen. So, sit back, relax, and join us for an engaging conversation about real estate, rugby, and more.
The extraterrestrial comedy podcast where we probe the Narrabeen Monster which may or may not be but probably is an alien elephant. We also learn a lot about elephants because we are educational bastards on But It Was Aliens. The Narrabeen Lake near Sydney in New South Wales, Australia, was visited by one of these little beautiful decrepit elephants in 1968. Mabel Walsh and Mabel's nephew, John, saw this visit taking place. John by the way was extremely handsome, honourable and trustworthy. Mabel and dashing John wouldn't be the only experiencers of this experience however… When things get credible, the big UFO researchers get involved. But can the alleged experts tell us whether this is a case of VampAliens or EleVamps? All that and more on this week's file. Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/butitwasaliens Store: https://butitwasaliens.co.uk/shop/ Probe us: Email: butitwasaliens@gmail.com Instagram/Threads @ ButItWasAliens Twitter @ ButItWasAliens Facebook: @ ButItWasAliens - join Extraterrestrial Towers Music: Music created via Garageband. Additional music via: https://freepd.com - thank you most kindly good people. For, we believe, the second time on this podcast, as we discussed Old Gregg discussion, we included a snippet from Love Games from the Mighty Boosh comedy troupe. This song featured in BBC Three series two episode ‘The Legend of Old Gregg' performed by Old Gregg and Howard Moon (Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt). Have you ever drunk Bailey's from a shoe? We finished up with the 'Staff Roll' aka credits theme from Nintendo's 1990-1992 Super Mario World from the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, composed by Hero of Sound Kōji Kondō. Main source: https://mysteriousuniverse.org/2016/07/the-strange-elephant-humanoids-of-australia/
Today on the podcast, Cooper Chapman, the founder of The Good Human Factory, joins Kirsten for an honest conversation about mental health. Cooper, a professional surfer for over 10 years, grew up in Narrabeen in New South Wales, Australia. His interest in mental health was prompted by his father's bout with depression and the suicide of two family friends. Meditating on a regular basis and practicing mindfulness have helped Cooper manage his anxiety and perform at a high level, whether he's competing in a contest or giving a speech.Today, with his low-key, caring manner that connects with all audiences, Cooper has trained thousands of Australian students, teachers, athletes, and corporates to increase their mental strength and resilience. In this episode, we discuss how meaningful conversations with those we love can greatly impact mental health. You can find and connect with Cooper at: https://www.thegoodhumanfactory.com/via Instagram @cooperchapmanor tune into this podcast Good Humans with Cooper Chapman Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
“The act of confidence comes before the feeling of confidence.” -Cooper ChapmanWondering how you can enhance your mental resilience to achieve your goals and live a fulfilling life?Get ready for an inspiring conversation with Cooper Chapman, a professional surfer and founder of The Good Human Factory. Join us as we delve into the daily practices that can enhance your mental resilience and strength, helping you overcome challenges and embrace a more fulfilling life. Discover how to combine gratitude and resilience to create a powerful mindset that empowers you on your journey toward personal growth and fulfillment.Episode Highlights:00:00 - Episode trailer04:00 - The 1% Good Club: Giving Time for Mental Health07:14 - How the Good Human Factory came into existence10:42 - Finding Confidence in Speaking Engagements14:10 - How One Person's Opinion Doesn't Define You16:59 - Overcoming Inexperience and Challenges in a speaker career20:32 - Why are Suicide Rates High among young people22:50 - Happiness Beyond Wealth25:00 - Three characteristics shared by all successful entrepreneurs 27:53 - Practicing self-appreciation and celebrating achievements32:29 - Taking responsibility for our mental health34:45 - Intentional gratitude: moving beyond a mere habit44:04 - How to Build Daily Mental ResilienceAbout our guest:Cooper Chapman is a professional surfer for more than 10 years, he grew up in Narrabeen in New South Wales, Australia. Cooper's interest in mental health was prompted by his father's bout with depression and the suicide of two family friends. Meditating regularly and practicing mindfulness helps Cooper manage his anxiety and perform at a high level, whether competing in a contest or giving a speech.With a low-key, caring manner that connects with all audiences, Cooper Chapman has trained thousands of Australian students, teachers, athletes, and corporates to increase their mental strength and resilience.Find out more about CooperWebsite: https://www.thegoodhumanfactory.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cooperchapman/Join the Dream Out Loud Facebook Communityhttps://bit.ly/2RSBKVFFollow me on Instagram herewww.Instagram.com/morgantnelsonSubscribe to my YouTube channelhttps://www.youtube.com/@morgantnelson
Adios to Snake Tales and a big welcome back to Mikey C aka The Unholy Potato checking in live from Stab Highway Europe. In this weeks show Stace G & Snake break down the second challenger series event from North Narrabeen. Following that Stace dials in Mikey C to talk all things Surf Ranch Pro. A note from our sponsor BetonlineAG. BetOnlineAG will be donating $10,000 to the flood relief efforts in Tahiti, they will also be donating every dollar spent on the upcoming Surf Ranch Pro.
Presented by Quiksilver The boys are back in the Lipped Studio to go through all the highs and lows of the Australian Challenger Series events at Snapper and Narrabeen - illuminated by Dragon Lumalens. Plus a look ahead to the Surf Ranch Pro, Top 5 Challenger and CT plus World Title predictions, why 2% is what it's all about and what to ride in a wave pool. All this plus so much more - it's so surf it hurts and it's fuelled by Heaps Normal
Welcome back to the show. This week Stace G and Snake breakdown all of the important moments from the Snapper Rocks Challenger Series Event plus a preview of the stop number 2 on the series the Sydney Surf Pro at North Narrabeen.
James Griffin is the Member for Manly and NSW Environment and Heritage Minister. He has been hugely influential in protecting our oceans and promoting the sport of surfing in NSW. James is responsible for environmental initiatives such as replanting seaweed in the Sydney Harbour, Banning single-use plastics, and incentivizing electric vehicles in NSW. He helped secure the WSL QS pro in Manly and the WCT Pro event in Narrabeen. We sat down to speak about all this and more!
Cooper Chapman is a professional surfer for more than 10 years, Cooper grew up in Narrabeen in New South Wales, Australia. Cooper's interest in mental health was prompted by his father's bout with depression and the suicide of two family friends. Meditating on a regular basis and practicing mindfulness helps Cooper manage his anxiety and perform at a high level, whether he's competing in a contest or giving a speech. Cooper Chapman Instagram - www.instagram.com/cooperchapman/ Website - www.thegoodhumanfactory.com Podcast - www.thegoodhumanfactory.com/pages/podcast Contact Email - hello@producey.com Instagram - @dylbuckley @dylandfriends Youtube - www.youtube.com/dylandfriends Facebook - www.facebook.com/dylandfriends Twitter - www.twitter.com/dylan_buckley Dyl & Friends is produced by Sam Bonser, Sam Dalton and Darcy Parkinson. Video and audio production by Producey. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
We talk to Matt Corbett Principal and Monique Treder, Buyers Advocate from Propertybuyer https://www.propertybuyer.com.au/ about Sydney's Northern Beaches with prices rising 38.5% over the Covid period. Exclusive areas like the Palm Beach enclave or the surf break at Narrabeen, and world famous Manly Beach. ► Subscribe here to never miss an episode: https://www.podbean.com/user-xyelbri7gupo ► INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/therealestatepodcast/?hl=en ► Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100070592715418 ► Email: myrealestatepodcast@gmail.com IF YOU LIKE THIS PODCAST please head to iTunes and Subscribe, Rate & Review the Real Estate Podcast #sydneyproperty #Melbourneproperty #brisbaneproperty #perthproperty
Former Championship Tour surfer and Outerknown Tahiti Pro wildcard Nathan Hedge joins the podcast to talk about Tahiti and his career in surfing. He describes how he stayed busy in Tahiti before the competition began, his longtime connection to the island, getting back into “contest mode,” and the younger surfers to watch. He breaks down the challenging wave at Teahupo'o, tells the story of his worst wipeout, and shares the keys to success for how to conquer nerves and thrive in such a heavy break. He looks back at his career, traveling with the Rip Curl team as a grom, being shaped by the Narrabeen community, competing for seven seasons on the CT, and facing the challenges of life after the tour. “The Hog” also touches on his ambassadorship with Outerknown, the ongoing process of working through addiction, being inspired by Kelly's win at Pipe at age 50, and what's next for him. Learn more about Nathan here and follow him here. Watch the Outerknown Tahiti Pro live August 11-21 Join the conversation by following The Lineup with Dave Prodan on Instagram and subscribing to our Youtube channel. Stay up to date with all things WSL. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Police have commenced a large-scale search as part of an ongoing investigation into a man missing from North Narrabeen.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Pelangi di Depan Mata Oleh. Andrea Ausie (Pemred NarasiPost.Com) Voice over talent: Dewi Fitriana NarasiPost.Com-Hmm … Pelangi adalah fenomena alam yang merupakan proses optik terbentuknya matahari yang melibatkan tiga tahap, yaitu refleksi, dispersi dan refraksi. Seringnya kita melihat pelangi selepas turun hujan, kan? Eh ternyata ada juga “pelangi” yang tidak terbentuk dengan proses optik, lho. Yang kumaksud adalah mereka yang jeruk makan jeruk atau pisang makan pisang alias para LGBT. Ngomong-ngomong soal kaum pelangi, aku jadi teringat dengan pengalaman hidup bersama mereka. Eits, bukan berarti aku termasuk kaum pelangi. No way!! Ssstt, biar enggak penasaran, yuk baca kisah pengalamanku, ya. Tahun kedua di Sydney, aku mendapat tawaran kerja dari perusahaan yang bergerak di bidang kesehatan milik Alexis dan Betrict. Perusahaan ini mendapat predikat terbaik kedua di Australia. Ada 48 cabang dengan 142 orang staf. Aku ditempatkan di kantor pusat, yaitu di Narrabeen, New South Wales. Gajinya cukup tinggi dan biasanya aku dibayar per jam. Sebenarnya aku sudah memiliki pekerjaan tetap di Vaucluse, di mana waktu kerjaku selama 5 hari dalam seminggu. Sementara pekerjaan di Narrabeen cuma dilakukan 2 hari dalam seminggu. Praktisnya aku tidak pernah memiliki waktu libur. Naskah selengkapnya: https://narasipost.com/2022/06/01/pelangi-di-depan-mata/ Terimakasih buat kalian yang sudah mendengarkan podcast ini, Follow us on: instagram: http://instagram.com/narasipost Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/narasi.post.9 Fanpage: Https://www.facebook.com/pg/narasipostmedia/posts/ Twitter: Http://twitter.com/narasipost
This week I am joined by Cooper ChapmanA professional surfer for more than 10 years, Cooper is from Narrabeen in New South Wales, Australia. Cooper's interest in mental health was prompted by his father's bout with depression and the suicide of two family friends. Meditating on a regular basis and practising mindfulness helps Cooper manage his anxiety and perform at a high level, whether he's competing in a contest or giving a speech. Cooper founded The Good Human Factory which aims to inspire others to become aware of and take care of their mental health. They provide young people with the tools to continually grow and improve their quality of life through the power of reflection, sharing stories with their peers, and connecting with and learning from others.Make sure to check out Cooper on Social MediaThis podcast is free all I ask is that you like, share and subscribe.You can also support the podcast by purchasing merchandise from our website.Support the showConnect with Nick:Instagram TikTok YouTube
Prime Minister Scott Morrison is still as yet to set a date for the upcoming Federal election, but we know that it will have to take place sometime in May. In preparation, Mamamia asked you what the most important issues are when it comes to deciding how you will vote, and perhaps unsurprisingly climate change came out as the number one priority. So in this election special, The Quicky speaks to all three of the major parties, and an Independent candidate to find out where they stand on climate change, and what they will do if you vote them in to power. CREDITS Host: Claire Murphy With thanks to: Angus Taylor - Federal Liberal Member for Hume, and Minister for Industry, Energy and Emissions Reduction Adam Bandt MP - Federal Member for Melbourne and Leader of the Australian Greens Chris Bowen MP - Australian Labor Party Federal Member for McMahon and Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy Dr Sophie Scamps - Practicing GP in Sydney, Independent candidate for the Federal seat of Mackellar who is supported by Climate200 - a group raising funds to support up to a dozen underdog candidates who stand for cleaning up politics and following the science on climate change Producer: Claire Murphy Executive Producer: Siobhán Moran-McFarlane Audio Producer: Jacob Round Subscribe to The Quicky at... https://mamamia.com.au/the-quicky/ CONTACT US Got a topic you'd like us to cover? Send us an email at thequicky@mamamia.com.au GET IN TOUCH: Feedback? We're listening! Call the pod phone on 02 8999 9386 or email us at podcast@mamamia.com.au Mamamia acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures. Just by reading or listening to our content, you're helping to fund girls in schools in some of the most disadvantaged countries in the world - through our partnership with Room to Read. We're currently funding 300 girls in school every day and our aim is to get to 1,000. Find out more about Mamamia at mamamia.com.au Support the show: https://www.mamamia.com.au/mplus/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Hij heeft het gehaald! Na 164 dagen, bijna 5,5 maand, en zo'n 3000 kilometer op blote voeten te hebben gelopen, is The Barefoot Dutchman thuis. SBS Dutch liep de laatste etappe van Narrabeen naar Manly (NSW) met Anton mee.
In this episode, artist Sean Ruttkay speaks with Australian Surf Photographer Matty Dunbar of Narrabeen, NSW, Australia. Matty details his time shooting on tour with the World Surfing League (WSL), gives us his history from curious kid to expert water lensman, and informs us how he goes about shooting the epic breaks of Australia. Join us now for this intriguing conversation.
Jimmy Smith Was Joined By Manly Warringah Sea Eagles Player Karl Lawton To Discuss How The Side Is Travelling.
A light plane has conducted a dramatic emergency landing on Collaroy Beach. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Bóia # 97 A volta do "The Search" ou um tapa-buraco com cenário idílico? Júlio Adler, João Valente e Bruno Bocayuva não respondem a pergunta mas gastam uma boa prosa sobre quase tudo que aconteceu em Strickland Bay, na Ilha de Rottnest. Entre o constrangimento de ver os ícones (Fanning em Narrabeen e Burrow em Rottnest) aceitarem o convite para festa da WSL e comparecerem sem a fome adequada e o outro patamar imposto por Gabriel Medina, lá se foi meia hora de podcast - que é um sopro de tempo pros padrões do Bóia. O ritmo só voltou ao normal quando o trio revisitou o passado, vestindo a camisa 97. Júlio lembrou de uma temporada com muita água salgada nas ideias e a ruptura com as competições, enquanto João mergulhou na perna portuguesa do circo da ASP em clima de Rave, com direito a um porre homérico do Slater, que garantiu o Penta bem antes do fim do ano ajudado com uma penca de vitórias na temporada do seu quinto título. Bruno acariciou o início de um farto ciclo de viagens para cobrir eventos internacionais, passando pela Austrália, Europa e outras quebradas. Eles também não esqueceram de mencionar o épico Pipe Masters dominado por dois celebrados veteranos, Boy Gomes X Michael Ho, primeira final na história do evento entre dois (coroas) trialistas. Os embalos musicais ganharam o vulto de Manifesto com uma turma da pesada que incluiu James Brown acompanhado do Afrika Bambaataa e a mitológica banda da Pavuna, Zona norte carioca, União Black. Como disse Chico: - Modernizar o passado é uma evolução musical. Saravá! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/boia/message
John “Chubby” Welsh was a legendary figure on the Northern Beaches of Sydney. If you didn't know him as the mechanic or the incredible family man and friend, chances are you have seen for yourself, or heard the stories about his tireless charity work, his annual Santa parade in Narrabeen or his endless support to the local sporting organisations. He touched every person he crossed paths with, and the local community is still recovering from his shock passing in 2018. His 2 sons, Troy and Clint, give an incredible insight into how they have dealt, and continue to deal with, the loss of the real life Peter Pan. It's an incredible raw and honest episode, with Browny and Luke sharing a rich 20 year friendship with the Welsh family. Troy repeatedly talks about gratitude in this episode, well my friend, we are grateful for you & Clint. Also listen to the end to hear Clint make a promise to himself that we all need to help him keep. Mad love to Lyn, Kristy, and the whole Welsh family. The Chubby legend will live on forever.
Today's episode features all the Fantasy Surf Nerdom you could ever wish for! Featuring Frothcast regulars and Surfival League Ambassadors Taylor & Chad plus my good mate, fellow Les Myrts band member, and the winner of Narrabeen in 'The Frothcast Fam' league Mr Shanman Waller! Take a Mr Toad's wild ride with us all as we look back and dissect what went down at The Rip Curl Narrabeen Classic and look forward to what will go down at the Boost Mobile Margaret River Pro. It's all fun and games until Gunther's hamster gets sick... Tune in for surf, sarf, surfing, and everything in between yeeeeeeeee ------- @Thefrothcast Chad - @C2had Taylor - @Surfival_Leaague Shanman - @ShanmanWaller --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/thefrothcast/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/thefrothcast/support
Nas semanas passadas, Junior Faria, Carol Bridi, Rapha Tognini e meio mundo dedicaram-se a debater se Ítalo completou ou não o aéreo em Narrabeen. Mas é possível que muita gente tenha pensado: e eu com isso? Por isso, essa semana voltamos a questão à nós mesmos. Qual o efeito do fenômeno da competição esportiva sobre nossas vidas, e o que exatamente faz com que dediquemos atenção a questões tão alheias à nossa própria sobrevivência diária na prática? Heróis e anti-heróis confundem-se em suas posições numa construção narrativa que provoca instintos diante de um show estimulante aos nossos sentidos primitivos de conquista e sobrevivência. Nada de novo no horizonte. A disputa é feita disso. Envolvidos nos fatos da narrativa, nos vemos absortos em questões meramente virtuais quando comparadas às nossas realidades individuais. Nenhum erro também em buscar amenidades disfarçadas em uma realidade paralela para aliviar o foco das nossas questões pessoais mais profundas. Afinal, o esporte é um fenômeno social inevitavelmente presente em nossas vidas e a competição é sua forma máxima de expressão.Mas vale tomar consciência dos mecanismos que promovem tamanho envolvimento com fatos do espetáculo do surf que, no frigir dos ovos, nada mudam de forma prática na vida dos seus fãs. Então, dá o play neste episódio do Surf de Mesa e vem saber do que é feito o negócio da WSL e como ele nos afeta.Foto | John John Florence - WSL_Matt Dunbar @wsl @mattydunbar
“Dovevo chiudere almeno 1 dei 4 backside air-reverse che ho provato, solitamente ne sbaglio pochi”. Leo Fioravanti è deluso della sua prestazione a Narrabeen, fuori già al round 2 in una heat ampiamente alla sua portata. Lo sa e non cerca scuse, guarda ai suoi errori più che alle polemiche perché, conferma, “in questa gara sono successe cose strane”. Come l'altro chiacchieratissimo air reverse, quello di Italo Ferreira, “che secondo me non ha chiuso”, e nella puntata ci spiega perché. Leonardo è uno straordinario agonista e per questo accettare una sconfitta del genere non è stato facile. Sapete come se l'è fatta passare? Un piccolo indizio:
Welcome back to Post-Script, a brief yet thorough overview of each event on the WSL championship tour. Today, a recap of event #3 of the 2021 season, The Rip Curl Narrabeen Classic presented by Corona. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome back to Post-Script, a brief yet thorough overview of each event on the WSL championship tour. Today, a recap of event #3 of the 2021 season, The Rip Curl Narrabeen Classic presented by Corona. Follow @SurfSplendor Sponsor: AthleticGreens.com/surf Sponsor: Kaenon.com promo code “KaenonCast15” for 15% off your first pair The post 366 – Post-Script: Rip Curl Narrabeen Classic appeared first on Surf Splendor.
HEAT 1: WAS ITALO ROBBED AT THE RIP CURL NARRABEEN CLASSIC? HEAT 2: IS GABRIEL MEDINA THE GNARLIEST COMPETITOR OF ALL-TIME? HEAT 3: BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT ON THE LEADERBOARD SO FAR? GOING DEEP: ARE NEWCASTLE AND NARRABEEN EXACTLY WHAT THE TOUR NEEDED, OR LET'S NEVER GO BACK HERE AGAIN? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
De tempos em tempos despontam novas situações que levantam um tema inerente ao surf de competição: a subjetividade envolvida nos critérios de julgamento. O assunto independente do contexto histórico. Foi assim desde 1976, com a IPS (International Professional Surfer). Continuou assim nos tempos de ASP (Association of Surfing Professionals) a partir da década de 80. E não seria diferente agora, com a WSL (World Surf League) e sua saga pela construção de enredos que nutrem os sentimentos ideais (bons e ruins na medida certa) para o bom entretenimento, garantindo a freguesia sempre atenta.Desta vez, numa sequência de etapas que não deixa dúvidas sobre o ritmo com que brasileiros voltaram às competições após adiamentos e cancelamentos, a interpretação sobre a volta ou não do aéreo de Ítalo Ferreira nas oitavas de final da etapa de Narrabeen deixou geral incrédula. Junior Faria, Carol Bridi e Rapha Tognini aproveitaram o gancho para falar sobre a eterna questão da subjetividade e o quanto ela pode ser afetada por coisas que vão além de qualquer compreensão racional.Nesse episódio do Surf de Mesa, a conversa correu pelas impressões do momento que vive o tour e algumas de suas principais estrelas. Dá o play e vem viajar com a gente nessas ondas sonoras.
Big wave surfer and former Championship Tour competitor Laura Enever talks about her transition to big wave surfing, the differences between charging big swells and small wave performance surfing, the specific training, and her first time at Jaws and Shipstern Bluff. She discusses her film “Undone” which follows her journey from the CT to the big wave scene and her personal evolution along the way. She looks back at her rise to her seven-year run on tour, from growing up at Narrabeen to getting pushed competitively by her family to surfing on the Nike team. She also touches on which tour surfers have been standouts at her local break before the Rip Curl Narrabeen Classic, breaks down the new waves being added to the women's schedule, and looks forward to the Red Bull Cape Fear contest at Shipstern. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Narrabeen, Newcastle, Yallingup. It's all on this week across the country and the boys dive in! Jake Patto joins us and gives us his unique viewpoint on the comps being held across this big brown land. We also have the Clive Palmer Cup, Steve Irwin Salute and Bronte's Beat. So grab yourself a Cheeky Monkey and jump in!
Narrabeen, Newcastle, Yallingup. It's all on this week across the country and the boys dive in! Jake Patto joins us and gives us his unique viewpoint on the comps being held across this big brown land. We also have the Clive Palmer Cup, Steve Irwin Salute and Bronte's Beat. So grab yourself a Cheeky Monkey and jump in!
Narrabeen, Newcastle, Yallingup. It's all on this week across the country and the boys dive in! Jake Patto joins us and gives us his unique viewpoint on the comps being held across this big brown land. We also have the Clive Palmer Cup, Steve Irwin Salute and Bronte's Beat. So grab yourself a Cheeky Monkey and jump in!
Jimmy Smith Was Joined By Australian Surfer Morgan Cibilic To Discuss His Performances In The WSL
Narrabeen, Newcastle, Yallingup. It's all on this week across the country and the boys dive in! Jake Patto joins us and gives us his unique viewpoint on the comps being held across this big brown land. We also have the Clive Palmer Cup, Steve Irwin Salute and Bronte's Beat. So grab yourself a Cheeky Monkey and jump in!
Narrabeen, Newcastle, Yallingup. It's all on this week across the country and the boys dive in! Jake Patto joins us and gives us his unique viewpoint on the comps being held across this big brown land. We also have the Clive Palmer Cup, Steve Irwin Salute and Bronte's Beat. So grab yourself a Cheeky Monkey and jump in!
Narrabeen rendeu, Medina reinou, Tati cresceu e quem ganha somos nós!! E aí, vamos falar de Surf?! #vamosfalardesurf
Bicho pegou em Narrabeen!! Round de Eliminação masculino e feminino, e início do round dos 32!!! Teve polêmica, tubarão e gringo calando a boca!!!
Narrabeen começou e nós trazemos a análise desse primeiro round, com foco principal nos brazucas!!! Além disso tem curiosidades, previsão das ondas e programação da sequência do evento!! #vamosfalardesurf
Gabriel's claim for 3, Carissa's anti-claim for 9.9, Morgan's surfing to diminishing returns, and Italo's impending slum, David and Scott everything that was the Newcastle Pro, complete with apologies and wagers on Narrabeen. Plus strap-ons, sonic souvenirs, roller skates and so much more! Enjoy! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Russell Barwick Was Joined By Former Pro Surfer Michael Lowe As They Discuss The WSL Events In Australia.
Like the Ghost of Christmas past, the World Surf League's Rip Curl Newcastle Cup came and went faster than Pokémon go! We saw new heroes rise and old legends fall as rookies like Morgan Cibilic and Isabella Nichols gaboojlered their way into the Semi Finals and Finals respectively. With so much drama in the NS-Dubs, it's kinda hard tryna' find some fantasy love. If you're anything like me, and didn't fare so well with your WSL or Surfival League teams, have no fear Mr Meehazler & the Surfival Squad is here. This episode has 2 parts. The first is a sit down chat over the cybernet with my mate Mr Metal Meehan who was the winner of the Rip Curl Newcastle Cup in my WSL league called ‘The Frothcast Fam'. By winning that event, he is also your new number 1 in my league! We discuss his strategy for winning Newcastle, how he's preparing for the Rip Curl Narrabeen Classic, AND are utterly surprised by a special 2 time world champion calling up the show to have a chat! The second part of this show is with my good friends Taylor & Chad over at Surfival league and Surf Heater. Taylor updates us on Surfival league numbers and joins me in the losers lair while Chad basks in his victory glory and we all prophesize about whats to come for the next WSL events! Lots of fun and games with these lords, please enjoy --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/thefrothcast/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/thefrothcast/support
The second leg of the Rip Curl Aussie Quaddie kicks off this week with the Rip Curl Narrabeen Classic. The boys are joined by wildcard Dylan Moffat to chat the WCT's return to Sydney plus some North Narrabeen history and folklore. We look at Fantasy plus we breakdown all the news, views and banter from our Instagram feed post Newcastle including Newy v Bells, scoring, Morgs, the emergence of Stace Galbraith and THAT AIR. As always fuelled by Salt Lager and supported by Dragon.
Narrabeen tá chegando!!! Medina tá relax, Kelly tá no role disfarçado e o Fanning no páreo!!! Com a adição do Rafael elevando os comentários!! #vamosfalardesurf
Two-time World Champion Damien Hardman talks about the “Girls Can't Surf” documentary, responds to his comments in the film, and discusses the Championship Tour in the 1980s and 90s. The Narrabeen local describes what fans can expect at the Rip Curl Narrabeen Classic presented by Corona, breaks down the wave and the surf scene in his hometown, gives his predictions for the favorites going into the event, and discusses Mick Fanning's chances as the Event Wildcard. “The Ice Man” then looks back at his own career, how he started surfing, his rapid rise to success, winning his two World Titles, and what it took to be an exceptional competitor. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Fletch's birthday today and we have a massive show lined up. Monday A-Grades as usual the boys will review the games of footy from over the weekend. Ronnie Blakey from the WSL will drop by the show to preview the WSL competition starting this weekend at Narrabeen. Sean Ormerod will be on later on the show to betting markets thanks to Sportsbet.
WSL commentator Ronnie Blakey caught up with the boys ahead of the upcoming stop on the WSL tour at Narrabeen.
We're smack bang in the middle of The Malkmus Conundrum Quarter Finals and there's another hour and 40 minutes of stupid nonsense for your ears. Paul, Mark and Chris have a lot on their minds, from the tyranny of geography to spiders laying eggs on our brains. Fortunately they have drafted in Friend of the Show, Duncan Robertson, to help assess five more matchups. There's drama, there's insight, there are arguments and added Leather McWhip. Follow us on Twitter if that's your bag: @thegallatron @themarkedwards @thepaulcarlin @knacknud Made with love AND RESPECT for SM & Jicks.
WSL commentator Joe Turpel talks with Championship Tour veteran Michel Bourez during their 14-day quarantine before the upcoming Australian events. Michel describes growing up in French Polynesia, raising his kids in Tahiti, and gives his prediction for the island’s next Championship Tour challenger. He shares stories from across his great career, from surfing at Narrabeen in the World Junior Championships, to beating Andy Irons in his very first CT heat, to competing against close friend Jeremy Flores in Code Red surf at Teahupo’o. Michel also breaks down his quarantine training regimen and explains how he watches past heats to motivate himself during workouts before taking on Turpel’s trivia. Watch Michel at the Rip Curl Newcastle Cup presented by Corona April 1-11 on worldsurfleague.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In the premiere episode, WSL commentator Joe Turpel talks with standout rookie surfer Jack Robinson at the start of their 14-day quarantine before the Australian leg of the Championship Tour. Jack describes his experience at his first event on tour at the Pipe Masters and what he’s been up to in Hawaii since then. The West Australia local then gives a preview of the upcoming Australian leg, breaking down the East Coast beach breaks of Newcastle and Narrabeen and the two events near home at Margaret River and Rottnest Island. Finally, he takes the Quarantine Quiz and answers some WSL Charter Flight Trivia. Watch Jack at the Rip Curl Newcastle Cup presented by Corona April 1-11 on worldsurfleague.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
1990 World Champion and women's surfing pioneer Pam Burridge talks about the upcoming “Girls Can't Surf” film about the trailblazing group of female professional surfers in the 1980s. She describes the early days of the women's tour and the intense struggle to take on the male-dominated pro surfing world to achieve equality. She dives into her surfing origins, turning pro at the young age of 15, and almost winning a title in her first year on the Championship Tour. She breaks down winning the World Title in 1990 and what it will take to get more Australian titles. Then, she touches on Narrabeen as a stop on the upcoming Australian Leg of the tour and how adding heavy water waves like Pipeline and Teahupo'o to the women's tour will change the dynamic. “Girls Can't Surf” will be in theaters around Australia on March 11 and New Zealand from April 8. For more information please go to: madmanfilms.com.au/girls-cant-surf/ Find us on twitter: @thelineuppod Find us on Instagram: @thelineuppod Want a shoutout on the pod? Fill out this form: https://forms.gle/M3q11juNpwpncAcJ8 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
This week on "Getting Heated" with three-time World Champ Mick Fanning and New School icon Ross Williams it's all about the return of the Championship Tour as all eyes are on Australia and all roads lead to the WSL Finals. For this round of fiery banter, the legendary duo break down what it means now that the Championship Tour will not be going to the Gold Coast and Bells Beach -- two of the most iconic Australian surf breaks on Tour. That spurs a passionate debate about lies ahead with the change in schedule and how a couple of new spots could mix things up. Mick and Ross then go to debate who is the best surfer in the world NOT on the championship. The answers will surprise you. That leads into a spirited discussion about is there a modern day Andy Irons vs Kelly Slater rivalry on tour, if so who is it? Finally, with the tour moving on from traditional locations Is the WSL thriving to having added Narrabeen and Rottnest Island to tour. The new episode of "Getting Heated" is here. Mick and Ross are chomping at the bit. The rundown is locked. Let's do this: **HEAT 1:** IMPACT OF LOSING GOLD COAST AND BELLS BEACH **Heat 2:** BEST SURFER IN THE WORLD NOT ON THE CHAMPIONSHIP TOUR **Heat 3:** IS THERE A MODERN DAY ANDY VS KELLY RIVALRY? **Going Deep:** THRIVING AT NEW LOCATIONS: NARRABEEN & ROTTNEST ISLAND. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Our surfing expert joins us for the latest news on the WSL choosing to move to Newcastle and Narrabeen this year
The 2 for 1 Mystery Bag Monday! ALIEN APEMANThis brief, yet harrowing encounter between an American teen and this ostensibly extraterrestrial entity has many of the earmarks of a prototypical Bigfoot sighting; save for a few key attributes, which make this case one of the most perplexing accounts flow down the Pacific Northwest crypto-pike in decades. HUMANOID ELEPHANT OF NARRABEENAustralia has long been known for its unique fauna—both known and unknown—but there are few beasts bizarre enough to rival that of the bipedal, elephantine entity that managed to strike terror in the hearts of local motorists, fishermen and children of New South Wales; a creature that some feel to be a cryptid; others believe to be of unearthly origin... and still other's are convinced may be of diabolical lineage. Help Cancer Tiger ( Dave Storrs ) Kick Out Cancerhttps://www.gofundme.com/f/cancertiger The Cryptonaut Podcast Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/cryptonautpodcast The Cryptonaut Podcast Merch Store:Hellorspace.com Stay Connected with the Cryptonaut Podcast:Website - Twitter - Facebook - Instagram
152: National Records at Doha Diamond League This episode of Inside Running Podcast is proudly brought to you by New Balance. Visit www.newbalance.com.au Julian gives his steady progress to recovery while trying to sort everything wrong in his body. Brad shares his tales from the gym after the pouring of tributes throughout the week. Brady keeps the running flame alive and eyes the NSW 10,000m Champs. Jessica Hull is the first in Australian athletics to hold the 1500m, 5000m and now the 3000m national records in a successful season, completing the trifecta at Doha Diamond League with a time of 8:38.06. Gen Gregson posted 9:07.40 in the same race. https://www.instagram.com/p/CFlIZf7laK-/ Stewy McSweyn broke the long standing 1500m National Record 3:30.51, running with the pacemakers and asserted his dominance from gun to tape. Ryan Gregson, the previous record holder was also in the race running 3:37.75https://www.instagram.com/p/CFl_sYmnK8-/ Peter Bol competed in the Men’s 800m 1:45.74 paced by Joseph Deng. Deng then followed up with racing in the 1500m B Race with a time of 3:47.39 Full Doha Diamond League Results https://www.runnerstribe.com/latest-news/stewart-mcsweyn-is-doing-a-mottram-and-hull-claims-the-3000m-australian-record/ Gen and Ryan Gregson wrap up their seasons taking out the Milton Keynes 5000m PB Special. https://www.instagram.com/p/CFpnpv-H6vi/ Results Sydney Athletics Academy held Twilight Track Meets out at Narrabeen hosting races from 400m to 10K, featuring the likes of Joe Burgess, Tom Do Canto, Jenny Blundell and Paige Campbell. Results Listener question of the week asks about how the professionals go about planning and funding their seasons and Moose on the Loose laments the loss of fitness on the comeback trail. The boys conclude with a preview of the London Marathon next week, making predictions on who will win out of the headline match-ups and what the Aussies Brett Robinson, Sinead Diver and Ellie Pashley can do on the day. Details about how to follow the race via the Bankstown Watch Party are given towards the end and the link to the facebook group is here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/DRNSW London Marathon Elite Men’s Field London Marathon Elite Women’s Field Patreon Link: https://www.patreon.com/insiderunningpodcast Opening and Closing Music is Undercover of my Skin by Benny Walker. www.bennywalkermusic.com For shoes or running apparel contact Julian at: https://www.facebook.com/therunningcompanyballarat/ Join the conversation at: https://www.facebook.com/insiderunningpodcast/ To donate and show your support for the show: https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=9K9WQCZNA2KAN
http://www.sonicobjects.com/index.php/2019/12/16/sonus-maris/ You will need either big sub-woofers or some audio actuatiors bolted to something big to listen to this :) Technical Notes. Sonus Maris is the result of an Art and Science collaboration with the scientists and engineers of the Water Research Laboratory of the University of New South Wales. The artist worked with data relating to the movement and deposition of sand on the beach at Narrabeen (in fact this is the world’s longest observation of sand deposition – taken over a period of 43 years) and is accompanied by tidal data and wave height. The artist quantised these data and then assigned a range of tonal values, that are played via audio actuators fitted to four Chaldini plates* and which excite various particulate matter on the plate’s surface. Sonus Maris sonifies and visualises abstract data sets across the four plates operate at very low frequencies generating a palpable and visceral experience. The project has been extremely popular with both the general public and with the scientists and engineers of the laboratory – so we shall continue our collaborations. * Ernst Chaldini (1756 – 1857 Hungarian/German) developed Robert Hook’s experiments of 1680 where he had observed nodal patterns manifest on vibrating glass plates (he employed flour activated by a violin bow stroking the edge of the glass). Chaldini patterns or figures are a method to demonstrate nodal boundaries in vibrating surfaces and have similarities with the solutions of the Schrödinger equation for one-electron atoms.
Today, we continue the conversation with a social entrepreneur – one who likes to push the boundaries, test the validity of the rules and be a non-conformist – and she’s from Switzerland! This woman eats “contrasts” for breakfast!! One minute, she’s dressed up for a speaking engagement in Sydney CBD, and the next, she’s riding her motorbike through on a dirt track in Turkey! Franziska Iseli’s jump into entrepreneurship began in 2008 with a phone call from her brother Reto in Switzerland where he had to break the terrible news that their 58yr old father had suddenly passed away from a heart attack. She broke down… As she began walking the cliffs of the Northern Beaches, the question that kept visiting her was: ‘If I was to die right now, would I be happy with my life?’ She had to confess that ‘No! I can do better than this, I can make a bigger impact.’ So she quit her career in advertising and started her current company Basic Bananas which is “small business marketing made simple”.Her main purpose in life is to have an impact, add value and make people smile. Whether its her “Ripple Effectors” brand or her new inspiration “Moments of Humanity” or her upcoming book launching early next year on Courage, this girl continues to challenge the status quo and somehow manages to be a non-conformist who FITS IN!Thanks Franziska for taking some time out of your day to share the adventures that make up your life so far…Meet Franziska:Franziska Iseli sat crossed legged on her living room floor eating breakfast after an early morning surf at Narrabeen on Sunday 17 February 2008 when her phone rang. It was her brother Reto calling from Switzerland. He told her their father had suddenly passed away from a heart attack—he was 58. ‘I have no idea how my brother made that call to me,’ Franziska says. ‘It must have been so hard to share such incomprehensible news with his little sister across the other side of the world.’Franziska’s world broke down for her. She spent a lot of time in the following months walking along a cliff top on the Northern Beaches. She was soul searching, questioning the way she lived her life. ‘If I was to die right now would I be happy with my life?’ was a question that kept coming up. ‘No! I can do better than this, I can make a bigger impact.’ So she quit her career in advertising and started Basic Bananas.Identifying a gap in the marketFranziska’s first step in setting up Basic Bananas was to identify a market need. She knew from working in advertising agencies there was a gap in the market for small to medium sized businesses to access marketing and advertising services on a smaller budget. Small businesses are the engine room of our economy and 44 per cent of Australians work in them. But most run on a shoestring and they can’t afford to pay advertising agencies for the marketing advice they need to grow and prosper. Franziska decided to take her knowledge from the corporate sector and a master’s degree in marketing to the small business world by providing entrepreneurs with marketing training and advice.Building a maverick brandAfter identifying a market need and an audience, Franziska set about building the Basic Bananas brand. ‘I wanted a quirky brand that stands out from the crowd,’ she says. ‘Back then I had a really smart business woman as a mentor. When I told her I’d decided on Basic Bananas as the name of my business she grimaced.’‘No! You’ve got to change it,’ her mentor insisted. She wanted Franziska to choose something more normal, less out there.‘No way!’ Franziska replied emphatically. ‘I can’t do that. I may not know how to run a business just yet but the one thing I do know is branding and I know Basic Bananas is the right name. It will take a little longer to take off, but it will go really far and create a loyal following. I am going to build a tattoo-wort
A lucky change of mind brought us back to the Narrabeen channel and a perfectly aligned sun for the best seascape shoot we have had for a while. We start in the Narrabeen car park on Sydney’s Northern beaches looking at bleak morning darkness. Stuart and Logan recorded this episode on 21 September 2019. We can be found at lostphotographers.com with links to all our podcasts and Instagram pages with images from this shoot. Logan Instagram https://www.instagram.com/logan_dibble123/ Website https://www.lostphotographers.com An image from this shoot is on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/p/B2tXavvH_EE/ --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/lost-photographers/message
Rodney and Shane ride around in Narrabeen. Topics include: Narrabeen origins, pseudo science, angry customers, Narrabeen Sands, Chippy, Beach names, Gavin Mitchel and a friendly Narrabeen local. www.spokeyblokeys.com www.facebook.com/spokeyblokeys www.instagram.com/spokeybokeys
Iva Davies is one of Australia's most accomplished musicians and composers with a career spanning over 30 years with his band Icehouse, and as a composer for film and theatre. I produced this feature music show with him in 2014.The number one song on the Australian pop music charts in 1980 was The Buggles 'Video Killed The Radio Star', accompanied through the year by such gems as Michael Jackson 'Don't Stop Til You Get Enough', The Village People 'You Can't Stop The Music', Split Enz 'I Got You', The Vapours 'Turning Japanese' and Queen 'Crazy Little Thing Called Love'.In May 1980, Australian radio stations started playing a song by Sydney band, Flowers. 'Can't Help Myself' made it into the Australian Top 10 and was the first song from their debut album, 'Icehouse'. I think I was first in line at my local record store to by the single and was enormously envious of my older brothers who would regularly see Flowers playing at the local pub. IVA DAVIES: We came from quite a distinct stream of music which generated by the punk movement out of Britain, but then it morphed into a strange hybrid because of technology. There was an explosion of technology, especially synthesiser technology, at that period, so we were a kind of punk band with synthesisers which was a bit odd. But clearly, these other people were not, including Michael Jackson! There were all sorts of strange things going on, strange fashions; it was a very interesting time."The first song we put out was called 'Can't Help Myself' and we'd been playing all these classic punk venues for about three years before we put out that first record. I remember being told it had become a disco hit in Melbourne and I was semi-horrified. I was very pleased it was a hit, of course, but a disco hit - we weren't a disco band!By the time we got to 1980 we'd been playing quite a few of our own songs but still had lacings of the odd cover version of things not even particularly fashionable at the time, things like T-Rex songs, but by then we'd really turned into an original band and signed with a small independent label in Sydney called Regular Records and we'd recorded our first album, and although they constitute really the first 10 songs I ever wrote, they did have a certain flavour about them that I guess was, again, a hybrid of punk with synthesizers.CAROL DUNCAN: Iva, you mustn't have been very long out of the Conservatorium by this stage?IVA DAVIES: I dropped out of the (Sydney) Conservatorium when I was about 21, so I was about 23 or 24 by this point.CAROL DUNCAN: So how did you decide to steer your songwriting and music releases in that environment at that time?IVA DAVIES: It's a terrible admission to make considering that 'Can't Help Myself' made it into the Top 10, that I was probably fairly unaware of radio except for 2JJ. That's a terrible admission for somebody who's trying to break into getting airplay on radio!CAROL DUNCAN: Something like The Vapors 'Turning Japanese' would have been all over 2SM (in Sydney) at the time. 2SM would have been the number one commercial pop music station in the late 1970s.IVA DAVIES: Indeed, and I missed a great deal of that. I think we were pretty well buried in our own world and our own world had been dominated by what I'd listened to as I grew up, quite a lot of classics, psychedelic and heavy rock bands including Pink Floyd and so on. And then when Johnny Rotten (the Sex Pistols) arrived, the world was turned upside-down quite literally.He put all of those big bands out of business overnight and London was the place to be. I remember very clearly when Keith (Welsh) and I, our bass player and co-founder of Flowers, we'd been playing almost every night of the week, sometimes nine shows a week. There were clubs all over Sydney, there were clubs all over Melbourne, there were really great bands everywhere and on any given night down the road there'd be Midnight Oil and INXS and any number of bands.When we arrived in London for our very first international tour, we looked at each other and said, 'Let's get a copy of New Musical Express (NME) and go and see a band 'cause this is where it's all coming from!' And there was nothing on!I was absolutely gobsmacked that Sydney was a hundred times more active than London on a club scene. It absolutely mystified me. All the pubs shut early, there was nowhere to go!CAROL DUNCAN: Who did you admire at the time?IVA DAVIES: I didn't buy albums of anybody, I didn't consume music. I was very curious about music but most of what I listened to was via 2JJ. 2JJ was a very progressive station; I think it's been forgotten to some degree. 2JJ were playing things that had been bought on import - they hadn't even been released in Australia yet - and so it was fascinating.We were hearing things we thought before anybody else in the world had heard them, things like Elvis Costello, XTC, mainly British bands but the odd thing coming out of America. There was a real movement of punk and new wave.CAROL DUNCAN: So you and Keith have taken off to London, you're going to see all the bands, but there's no-one home?IVA DAVIES: There's no-one home! I remember thinking at the time, 'Well where did The Cure come from and where did The Clash and The Damned and The Jam come from? Where are they all'?I had imagined that London was heaving with little clubs with all those names playing in them every night but it was really something created through the tyranny of distance, I guess. We had amplified that whole thing that had started with Carnaby Street, The Beatles, and Rolling Stones; and in my mind, and I'm sure in the minds of many other Australians, this was the mecca that we were going to visit. But it turned out it was really as much a product of BBC1 and radio and record companies than it was of an active pub music scene which was exactly what we had in Australia.CAROL DUNCAN: So, what did you do, turn around and come home?IVA DAVIES: We went off touring. We went off touring with Simple Minds who were just starting to break through in Europe. They'd a quite successful album, and we did a reciprocal deal with them where we said, 'OK, if we are your support band in Europe, that will help us, and you come to Australia and be our support band there because nobody knows you. In fact, to this day, and I'm sure Jim Kerr from Simple Minds would take credit in saying that tour we did with them really broke Simple Minds in Australia - it was off the back of that tour that they started achieving success here. Of course, many many albums and many many successes later I still catch up with Jim Kerr quite frequently.CAROL DUNCAN: I remember seeing the two bands at the Manly Vale Hotel.IVA DAVIES: Very possible! That was one of many hotels in that northern beaches area, and I ended up living on the northern beaches by accident. It was quite tribal. There was a very big pub at Narrabeen called the Royal Antler and it was our first proper gig, I guess, and almost residency. At one point we and Midnight Oil were alternating weekends. We never met them, but there was this kind of unspoken rivalry for the same audience of mad, drunken surfies.CAROL DUNCAN: It was one of Sydney's great beer barns.IVA DAVIES: It was and they were mad, of course, mad drunken surfies and probably a few other substances, as well. But they were great nights. It was a big place; I think it held something like 1500 people. And you're right, we probably did attract slightly different audiences, and certainly we also had the other side of us which was playing the inner city hotels which, of course, were very driven by the punk movement, so we'd look out on a place like the Civic Hotel and there'd been a sea of black and safety pins.CAROL DUNCAN: Why did the name change come about? Was it as simple as swapping the band name and album title?IVA DAVIES: It was, but we actually had no choice. What we hadn't realised was that while we were happily going along as Flowers in Australia and New Zealand, as soon as we signed to an international record company and they said, 'We're going to release this around the rest of the world, we need to do a little check on the name. It hadn't even occurred to me that a band name is like a company trading name and, unfortunately, there were at least three other acts around the world trading on the name 'Flowers'. One of them being the very, very famous session bass player, Herbie Flowers, who you probably know best for being the creator of that wonderful bass line that introduces Lou Reed's 'Walk On The Wild Side'.So there were objections and we simply had no choice, we had to come up with another name. This has happened to a number of Australian bands. It happened to Sherbet who became Highway, and The Angels who became Angel City. Our logic was fairly simple - people here in Australia and New Zealand only know us by two things, that is the name of the band 'Flowers' or the name of the album 'Icehouse'. So, we became Icehouse.A band name becomes its identity in a far bigger way that just a set of letters. I've had this discussion with my 17-year old son who has got a collection of friends in a band and they haven't been able to think of anything. I keep asking what the band is called and they're called something different every day. I said 'you better get it right because it will end up owning you'.CAROL DUNCAN: Your son has actually played with you?IVA DAVIES: Yes, oh you know about this! I had a fairly mad idea last year, although the idea had been around since 1983. I remember we were touring in Europe and we had a number one song in Europe so there was a lot of pressure on me. I was doing millions of interviews and we were playing very big festivals of 30,000 people.We were playing on one and I was standing on the side of the stage next to my band and Peter Tosh's band was playing - Peter Tosh was the co-founder of Bob Marley's Wailers - and it was a big band, 9 or 10 people on stage, backing singers and whatnot, and I said to my bass player, "See the guy at the back going chukka, chukka, chukka on the guitar, the laziest job in the world? I want his job. I had a conversation last year with somebody about this moment and they said, 'Why don't you do it?'Our manager thought I was mad, a number of promoters thought I was mad, too, but what we did was completely re-invent Icehouse as an eight-piece reggae band. We added some extra guys from Melbourne to give us a brass section and we re-arranged every one of the hits that we'd been playing in the classic repertoire as reggae songs.We put two shows on - one in Melbourne, one in Sydney - as a kind of Christmas party because my feeling was that the reason we were doing it is because reggae makes you want to dance and smile and laugh, and we had the best possible time, it was just fantastic. We've just released the recording of the Sydney show and re-named the band DubHOUSE - the album is DubHOUSE Live.I wanted to get my children to come. My daughter is OK because she's 20 but my son was under age, under the drinking age, and the only way I could get him in was to put him in the band. So I said to him, 'Look Evan ...' he's17 and a very good guitarist, 'I'm sorry, you're not going to get a rehearsal, you're not going to get a sound check. Here's a recording of a rehearsal of Street Cafe done in this style, you've got the guitar solo, go home and learn it and I'll see you on stage."And so the poor guy was thrown on stage with absolutely no preparation whatsoever, but fortunately, he had done his homework and had a great night.CAROL DUNCAN: How do the kids see your career, Iva?IVA DAVIES: Well the strange truth is that they didn't. I finished the last tour that we did back in the day, as it were, when my daughter was six weeks old. Effectively, we didn't play again and my children grew up.In 2009, our long-time tour manager, Larry, who works for a very big audio production company - he'd been working for with us since 1984 - came up with the idea for Sound Relief (concerts held in Sydney & Melbourne for 2009 bushfire relief) and actually volunteered us, so we were the first band on the bill for Sound Relief.By that time in 2009, my daughter would have been 14 or 13, and my son 12 or 13, and that was the first concert they ever saw me play. So they'd grown up all those years not knowing anything about it, or relatively little.CAROL DUNCAN: Did they think Icehouse was cool or were you 'just Dad' and therefore couldn't possibly be cool?IVA DAVIES: Strangely enough, I seem to have breached the cool barrier into the cool area. A very strange thing happened, before that Sound Relief show and before my daughter really got to appreciate my association with it. She came home from school one afternoon, waltzed in the door and announced, 'I LOVE THE EIGHTIES! I love EVERYTHING about the eighties!'Strangely enough, the eighties are going through a whole new generation of cool at the moment. Except for the hair, and a lot of the clothes.CAROL DUNCAN: When you look at that part of your career, the pop/rock part of your career, what do you see, Iva?IVA DAVIES: I'm proud that we worked very hard, I believe, to maintain a kind of class and a quality. That went through everything, even the recordings themselves. I went through the graduation from vinyl to CD, which was a massive turnaround, and it happened incredibly quickly.I remember having a talk to a record company about it and they said, 'Last year we manufactured 80% out of vinyl and 20% out of CD, this year we're manufacturing 80% out of CD and 20% out of vinyl, and the following year we're not making any vinyl at all. That's how fast it turned around. But 'Measure for Measure', our fourth album is one of the first three fully digital recordings ever made in the world, which was a real milestone, so it's the first completely noiseless recording that was made for the new format of CD. It's moments like that that I reflect on and think, well, that's because we really put a lot of care and attention into these things.CAROL DUNCAN: Iva, you're also seen as one of the pioneers in Australia of bringing in synthesizers, computers, the Fairlight and so on. You mentioned an interesting word there, 'noiseless', and that's perhaps where the feud happens between the vinyl purists and people who are very happy to purchase their music in a digital form whether on CD or via digital download. How do you see the vinyl vs CD war when it comes to audio quality?IVA DAVIES: I noted with some amusement touched with horror a program that Linda Mottram did on 702 in Sydney where there was this discussion about vinyl, and she spoke with a so-called expert who was out of a university, and with due respect to that professor I desperately wanted to call in and say, "Can I just tell you about what actually happens when you're making pieces of vinyl and why they sound the way they do, and how it is absolutely possible to make CDs sound exactly like vinyl IF that were the endgame that you wanted to have in mind.I won't go into it now but the fact of the matter is it's all about a process called mastering. The way that tapes, mixes, were mastered for vinyl had to be very particular because of the intolerance of vinyl - vinyl can't carry very much big bass. I found that out with the Flowers album when I insisted to the co-producer that we put lots of bottom end into it and then realised a bit later on when the mastering engineer said to me, "I can't cut this to vinyl, it's got too much bass in it." They're the sorts of mistakes that you make when you're young.I'm a firm believer in anything that doesn't have moving parts and that is digital. I'm afraid I've moved on from anything old-school quite happily.CAROL DUNCAN: Did you call in?IVA DAVIES: No, I didn't, I just thought it's probably too difficult a conversation to have in detail over the radio but it does infuriate me because I'm sure if you got any mastering engineer on to the radio they'd say to you it's mainly because people don't understand how these things are made.CAROL DUNCAN: What gave you the confidence to leap into these new technologies?IVA DAVIES: Perhaps it was more out of ignorance than anything, I certainly didn't see any risk involved, but the main driver for me was that these were new toys. Every time something new was invented, my eyes would light up and I'd think, 'Imagine the possibilities!'I remember expressly that conversation I had with our management where, out of sheer co-incidence they'd moved offices from where they were in Bondi Junction to the top storey of a two-storey building in Rushcutters Bay and the ground storey was where they made Fairlights, believe it or not. Management were oblivious to this, they had no idea what was going on down there. But I did and I came to the managers one day and said, 'I desperately want to get one of these machines, they are amazing.'Of course, I was proven correct because they revolutionised music forever. I think apart from the technology of recording, the sampler - which is what a Fairlight was - was the single most influential piece of technology ever created. I said this to my management, that I was desperate, that I'd really like one, but the catch was they were $32,000. That was in 1981 or 1982 so you can imagine how much money that was then - it was half a small house.But I got one, and interestingly enough my management were quite philosophical about it. They said, 'Well, it's a lot of money, but according to our calculations you'll pay for this with the first two projects you use it on.' And they were right. The first project I used it on was my very first film score for Russell Mulcahy's 'Razorback', which is about 95% Fairlight.The great irony of that was that I kept producing bits of music, because Russell Mulcahy was out in the desert filming scenes and he kept dragging up Peter Gabriel's fourth album, the one with Shock The Monkey on it, and they were out in the desert with this blasting away on a ghetto blaster and I got it into my head that this was what Russell likes. So I kept producing Gabriel-esque soundscapes and so on, and the producers of the movie kept coming back to me and saying, 'No, no no - that's not what we want, we don't want this.' In the end I was getting various clues from them but didn't really know, but I had another go along the lines of Stravinsky's 'Rite of Spring' - a fairly mad piece of classical music. I constructed all this with the Fairlight, it was a quasi-orchestral thing. I took it back to them and they said, 'Yes! That's exactly it!' and I said, 'Well, if you wanted that sort of thing why didn't you go and get a classical composer.'In its day, 'Rite of Spring' was a controversial piece of music, and Iva Davies shares a birthday with Stravinsky.Considering that it was 1913 when that piece first hit the stage for Diaghilev's ballet company. It wasn't just the music; it was actually the subject matter of the ballet that I think was fairly upsetting to a lot of people. It's all about primal sexualism, basically, so you can imagine that to an audience of 1913 that sort of idea was fairly horrifying.CAROL DUNCAN: In 1984, you've got Razorback, also 'Sidewalk' - the third album from Icehouse, at this point did you consider that you didn't actually have to be a pop star?IVA DAVIES: No, I had a very strange life prior to that because I had a completely Jekyll and Hyde existence. I took up the guitar when I was 13, and taught myself, and it was probably also the year that I started taking oboe lessons. I had these two parallel lives and completely separate lives. I had a set of classical people - when I was in high school I played in a wind quintet and we used to rehearse every Saturday morning. We all had our first cars at that point. They were my friends and we went off and won the City of Sydney Eisteddfod and so on. They never, ever met the guys that I was in the acoustic band with. Ever! Because I just had these two lives. So my course was fairly accidental all the way through, it was probably always going to be accidental.To this day, I keep remembering things that I did. I remembered that I was in the orchestra that was primarily made up of members of the Sydney Symphony and the senior Conservatorium orchestra, of which I was a member, for the staging of the two first Australian ballets in the Opera House. I would have been about 19 and, of course, that's a fairly big moment for the Opera House to have a night featuring Australian opera in that building, and I'd completely forgotten about it. There are things from both lives that I've forgotten about.CAROL DUNCAN: 1985, your double life really starts to change as you start working with the Sydney Dance Company.IVA DAVIES: I have to give credit to our managers to some degree who recognised - Ray Hearn was managing us from the beginning. I think he considered himself to be a very erudite individual, he was very widely read, he'd seen every movie possible, and he had a huge record collection. He wasn't a musician but I think he spotted in me the potential that if I kept on that very two-dimension wheel of 'write an album, record an album, tour an album, write an album, record an album, tour an album ...', that I would burn out, that I needed something else to do. So it was he who went and pursued the soundtrack idea with Russell Mulcahy, and it was he who introduced me to the Sydney Dance Company who were a very dangerous company at that point. People forget that they did ballets entirely naked and this was quite revolutionary stuff in its day. They had a very young, hip audience. So it was a very smart move. But it was also a move that was good for the dance company. I had also forgotten until reminded about a month ago that in the Opera House's entire history this has never been repeated, but they did a very dangerous thing. They put two shows on a Friday and a Saturday night, one at a conventional hour and then a whole other audience would turn up at 10.30 at night and we'd do it all again. The staff at the Opera House thought this was going to be an absolute disaster, 'Nobody's going to go to the Opera House at 10.30pm to see a show', but they did and they were all my audience and they were coming to see what all the fuss was about. It was the most successful season the dance company has ever had.CAROL DUNCAN: Were you worried about your pop/rock audience coming over to see what you were doing and being disappointed?IVA DAVIES: I've always utterly failed to understand what the problem is between the various tribes of music. I started of as a bagpipe player when I was six, and although I went through that very, very particular stream of classical musicians, and they are, and they are a very exclusive lot - a lot of them, and they are a very intolerant lot - a lot of them, I think things have improved. But at that time they very much looked down their nose at 'popular music' and rock and roll, but by the same token it was equally prejudiced the other way around. I've never understood why. I don't get that you have to be one or the other but not all of them. In my head, there was absolutely no problem with my audience turning up to the ballet.CAROL DUNCAN: What gave you the confidence to follow both streams?IVA DAVIES: Only because I can kind of speak both languages. I had a discussion with somebody the other night about music and it is another language. It's certainly a language when you read and write it and I learned how to do that. But my dialogue with rock and roll musicians has to be completely different because most of the people I played with all these years don't read and write music. But rock and roll musicians communicate in a different kind of way. So because I'm comfortable in both of those languages, I can happily flick between the two of them, at whim almost.CAROL DUNCAN: Which is why I don't' let my kids drop out of their violin lessons - I want them to have that other language.IVA DAVIES: From my point of view, by miles, the single biggest advantage I've had in my work and succeeding in the broad framework of popular music is the fact that I was highly trained. That is the most sure, certain way to cut every corner you can - to actually know what you're doing.CAROL DUNCAN: December 31, 1999, and Icehouse is performing at the Millennium New Years Eve concert outside the Sydney Opera House and there is a moment on your face where it's just occurred to you how very special that moment is.IVA DAVIES: The penny really didn't drop, I mean, there was such a lot of pressure involved in that. The transmission, the TV director, Greg Beness, had synchronised a whole lot of footage to be running in parallel with shooting the performance. We had backups of backups because, of course, everybody thought that every computer in the world was going to blow up at midnight being the Y2K bug and so on. It was going out to about four billion people. It's not as if you can get to the end of it and go, 'Oh, we mucked that up, can we have another go?', 'Oh, they've already counted down; we're in a new millennium'. So I was incredibly aware of all of that and actually I've watched back some of the footage and it takes me a fair old while to settle down, it's (The Ghost Of Time) a 25-minute piece and it took me a number of minutes before I was, 'OK, we're up and running, everything seems to be working, everybody knows where they are, I can hear everything ....'I got to the end of it and stepped off the stage, Frank Sartor the Lord Mayor of Sydney gave me a glass of champagne, Richard Wilkins counted down from 10 and the fireworks went off directly over my head and I went, 'Wow!'CAROL DUNCAN: From this point, your other career really takes off and you head off to work on Master and Commander.IVA DAVIES: Yes, I've said to other young bands over the years, 'Just be aware - you never know who will be listening,' and so it was with thus that one person who was listening to The Ghost of Time on the millennium eve as it was going out, one of those four billion people, was one Peter Weir - an iconic Australian film director.This is how bizarre the next few years ended up being for me in terms of things just popping out of seemingly nowhere. I was sitting in my studio one day up on the northern beaches and the phone rang. A voice said, "Iva, this is Peter Weir. I'm filming Master and Commander on location in Baja, Mexico. I've fallen in love with The Ghost of Time. I want you to reassemble your team and give me a score like that."The whole experience was incredible, to go to Hollywood. I remember I had a colleague of mine, my music editor, had worked quite a bit in Hollywood on 'Moulin Rouge' and other things. He took me to the Fox lot and was very well recognised, but the thing that became immediately apparent was how incredibly well-respected Peter Weir is in Hollywood. Even though you don't necessarily associate him with massive blockbuster success time and time again, he's respected by directors and quality people in Hollywood and that's the difference.CAROL DUNCAN: Is it difficult to do this sort of work, to create something to someone else's demands?IVA DAVIES: I was very fortunate because Peter Weir has immense respect for music. He said to me not once, but twice, 'Music is the fountainhead of the arts,' that's how important it is to him. But having said that, he uses it very sparingly and in a very subtle way. So I had the great luxury to have three months to work on what equated to, in the end, not much more than 35 minutes worth of music. If you go and see a movie like 'Lord of the Rings', the composers had to write music from end to end of the film, so we're talking two and a half hours of music. Three months to produce that amount of music meant that it could be done with care but at a fairly unstressed pace, as it were. And that was fantastic. I have no doubt that Peter Weir quite deliberately planned the whole thing that way, so that it would be NOT a stressful operation. He's a consummate film-maker and he knows exactly what he's doing, so he schedules and plans things very well.Having said that, I always knew that the brief of a score writer is to write what the director wants to hear, not what the score writer wants to hear, so that was very apparent and so be it. Very often these films are the vision of a director and music is just one component of that. It should feed into their vision.CAROL DUNCAN: What are the professional moments that you hold dearest to your heart?IVA DAVIES: In terms of recording, I had a quite surreal moment. I was very influenced by one Brian Eno who was an absolute pioneer of synthesizers and electronic music, and in fact probably invented the term 'ambient music'. Of course, he was a founding member of Roxy Music but went on later to become incredibly successful in his own right and especially as a producer, he produced almost all of the U2 albums - massive albums. But I'd been following him since he was an early member of Roxy Music and especially been guided by his approach to synthesizers, which was very esoteric and completely at odds with a lot of the nasty noises that were being produced in the 1980s, for example. And I thank him for that because it probably stopped me from making a lot of bad sonic mistakes.The producer I was using at the time was a friend of his and I found myself having a conversation with the producer about the song we were working on at the time - a song called Cross the Border - I had in mind Brian Eno's backing vocal style. I knew that the producer, Rhett Davies, had worked with Brian Eno. I turned up to Air Studios, another very famous studio in London, to do the vocal session and in came Brian Eno. So there was a moment where I was standing in the studio, standing next to Brian Eno who was singing my lyrics and my backing vocal line. That was a real moment for me because he was a real hero of mine.CAROL DUNCAN: At what point did you realise that you had been successful enough to truly pursue anything that you wanted to do?IVA DAVIES: I spent most of my career not quite believing that things would work. In fact, I remember very clearly - we'd been working for years and years, working around these pubs, the first album came out, and I remember the first royalty cheque turned up. The accountant for the management company asked me into the office and said, 'Well, here's the cheque for the Flowers album for you,' and I looked at it and I'd been broke for years. My parents had to keep paying the odd rent payment for me and so on. We weren't earning any money at all, the album had only just come out, and I saw this cheque and it was for $15,000.I looked at Gino, who I had lunch with today - same accountant, and I said, 'Gino. This is amazing. This is incredible. I know I'm just going to fritter this away. I know I'll never get any more money out of this business. What's the deposit on the cheapest, cheapest, cheapest house in Sydney? Well, I bought the cheapest house in Sydney with that deposit, but of course, it wasn't the last cent that I made out of the music business.But for many years, for a long time, I really didn't consider that it was going to last, that I was going to make any money out of it. It's that classic thing where, luckily my parents didn't call me on the phone and say, 'When are you going to get a proper job?' they were very supportive. I think I was the one secretly calling myself and saying, 'When are you going to get a proper job?'CAROL DUNCAN: What are you still learning?IVA DAVIES: I'm still learning technology because unfortunately, it won't sit still! The industry standard for recording is a system called Pro-Tools, you very possibly use it in the studio there and it's certainly in every recording studio in the world. I've been working with Pro-Tools for a very long time but, of course, like any other software, there's a new release of it every five minutes. So I'm actually getting to the stage when I really am going to have to run to catch up! So unfortunately at my age, I'm still having to learn technology because it's the basic tool of my trade and that's never going to stop.CAROL DUNCAN: Are you still as excited by it as you were in the mid-1970s when you and Keith Welsh started 'Flowers' and when you went and harassed your management to allow you to buy that first Fairlight for $32,000?IVA DAVIES: I think I take it a bit more for granted these days because things have exploded in the way that they have. You can imagine the climate in which a piece of technology like the Fairlight came out; it was just mind-numbing. It was unlike anything anybody could ever imagine, whereas I suppose every time there's a new release of Pro-Tools, it's got a couple of lovely new features but it is a development of something which has been around for much more than a decade now.However, having said that, there seems to be a whole new generation of software writers who are incredibly interested in music and incredibly interested in playing with sound, and these are the people who are coming up with all the new noise generating bits - soft synthesisers and all that sort of stuff. That's kind of where the interesting new area is.CAROL DUNCAN: And Keith Welsh has been on this whole journey with you?IVA DAVIES: Indeed. In the music industry the whole time. He and I have been working closely over the past three years and we've started playing again and we re-released the entire catalogue. We put out a compilation called 'White Heat' which is about to go platinum.CAROL DUNCAN: What would you want the young Iva Davies to know?IVA DAVIES: That's a good question! I think I probably did seize most opportunities that came my way so I wouldn't necessarily say, 'just go as fast as you can with every opportunity that you can', I probably would have said, 'Put more attention to the money and where the money is going and who's getting it!' As a forensic accountant, I'm a kind of 'overview guy' as opposed to a 'detail guy'.
Rob Hirst - The Sun Becomes The Sea album release feature 2014First published ABC Radio Australia18 November, 2014 12:07PM AEDTRob Hirst - a new solo album and the Midnight Oil 'anti-plan'By Carol DuncanRob Hirst has a new solo album out - released under his own name instead of one of the innumerable musical units that he's part of. The Midnight Oil drummer and songwriter celebrates his new songs with an unexpected collaboration with his artist daughter, Gabriella Hirst.10Rob Hirst oozes 'proud dad' as he talks about the achievements of the offspring of some of his bandmates."We've all got very talented sons and daughters now, all very grown up, and my daughter Gabriella is now in Berlin after finishing her courses at COFA in Sydney and the National Art School. She did very well, got a travelling scholarship and went to Berlin."Gabriella Hirst's art is, indeed, striking and beautiful. And perhaps unsurprisingly, her work seems to share her father's social and environmental concerns."She was looking out over a wasteland where she was in north-west Berlin, went for a walk in the afternoon and asked one of the locals why it was so deserted. He told her that until recently there had been a poplar forest full of birds but that despite the protests of locals the little forest that had acted as a buffer between quite an industrial area and the local residences had been levelled to put in a department store or factory.""But he also told Ella that he'd gone for a walk on the day they cut the trees down and found 24 birds' nests. He sent them to Ella and she painted them as part of her Berlin projects in watercolours on silk flags, which the man then attached to bamboo poles and put back where the forest once was as a symbolic gesture to remind people of what was lost. Being ephemeral artworks, she expected them to be souvenired, which they quickly were, but they fly now from the balconies of neighbouring apartments overlooking this area."Rob's album, 'The Sun Becomes The Sea', features 24 of his daughter's bird artworks in the hardcover booklet version of the album, which he had made to protect Gabriella's artwork but there are a few of them online."I was just finishing a bunch of songs that I'd been doing over a couple of years down at Jim's (Moginie) studio and I thought for the first time that I'd put it out under my own name rather than under the Ghostwriters or whatever. It's just one of those lovely synchronicities where she was finishing her artwork at the same time and agreed that I could use these beautiful watercolour birds for the sleeve of the book and for the new website which finally links the Oils, the Backsliders, The Break, Angry Tradesmen, Hirst and Greene, Willies Bar and Grill, etc."Unusually, Rob made the decision to make all of the songs on the album available online for free."I just thought it would be a nice gesture and I had such fun making these songs."I point out that a similar 'nice gesture' recently backfired somewhat for U2."I would never be so presumptuous as to upload these 11 songs on people's iTunes!" Rob laughs, "It's available for those that seek it out and like it and there's the option for people to go to a few of those old-fashioned record stores that still exist, and which we really want to support, and get the hardcover booklet with all of Gabriella's birds and other information on it."The exhibition of Midnight Oil's incredible place in the Australian music industry was a huge success at the Sydney exhibition hosted by the Manly Art Gallery and Museum and will be hosted by Newcastle Museum early 2015. How does Rob Hirst feel about his life's work being treated as a museum piece?"We had so many people come through and they were pleasantly surprised. I think they thought, 'Oh Rob's dug out a few old posters and stuck them on the wall with blu-tack' or something. In fact, we spent about two years working on it; this is me, curator Ross Heathcote, Virginia Buckingham, Wendy Osmond who did the art direction on it.""We've got a special film which runs an hour and fifteen minutes made by Rob Hambling about the making of '10 to 1' with Nick Launay producing back in London all those years ago, and we've sourced all this film from 1984 of the band backstage in South Australia at Memorial Drive, and at Main Beach on the Gold Coast. There's a lot of home movie footage, the Exxon banner from New York City, a full stage set-up of the band with the exact drums, guitars, amps, backdrop, lights and even the PA to be authentic from 1987 to 1989 which we toured on the back of the Diesel and Dust album.""There lots of little early recordings that have never been heard, a song we've never released before, and the piece de resistance is a replication in a box which has sticky carpet, three screens when you walk in and a curtain you pull behind you. It has footage of the band playing at the Tanelorn Festival in 1981 and there's two sets of headphones you can choose from - one is loud, the other is really loud - and you can stick to the carpet. There's elbows that come out from the side of the box so that you can be elbowed in the ribs. What I was trying to do was replicate what it was like coming to see Midnight Oil back then at the Mawson Hotel, the 16 Footers or the Ambassador or whatever."I enquire as to whether the box also has the special scent that some of our more notorious venues had. Rob Hirst assures me it does."I've poured so much Tooheys New into that carpet, you've got no idea, and I've ground some lemon chicken and sweet and sour rat or whatever into it. Remember in NSW in those days the liquor laws stated that the pubs had to pretend to provide a meal if they were serving liquor late. No-one would ever touch those meals but they'd be knocked off the bar and into the carpet. So after three months in Manly it's getting quite fruity in there!""It's funny, one of the last surviving venues down here (Sydney), The Annandale, has just ripped up there carpet. The carpet was legendary. It was despicable. They could have scraped it for a new form of penicillin! But they shouldn't have thrown it out. I'd have taken a square metre of it and put it in what became known as 'Rob's Folly', but is now known as 'The Royal Antler Room' which is the Narrabeen pub that Midnight Oil first started playing all those years ago.""The curator, Ross Heathcote, named it 'Rob's Folly' because he was bemused by the idea. He didn't think I'd ever build it, but over six months with a couple of hard-working, underpaid friends we actually made it. It looks like a giant road case but it's big enough for two or three people to cram in and get blasted by Midnight Oil at the Tanelorn Festival."Rob describes the opening of the Midnight Oil exhibition at the Manly gallery with great affection and it's obvious that he still finds great joy in every tiny connection that his career has afforded him - from those with names to the 'unknown' members of road crews. Indeed for just a moment he sounds a bit misty when reminiscing about the night of the opening and the loyalty of the huge crowds who were not only Midnight Oil fans but turned out in droves to see the exhibition. I gently accuse him of getting mellow and soft in his dotage as he describes this 'gathering of the tribes'. This quickly turns his thoughts to Newcastle."Newcastle will be the same. After all, Newcastle meant so much to the band. We went time and time again until we finally did a huge gig on Redhead Beach. We expected to find maybe a couple of thousand people, but there must have been 25,000 or 30,000 people on the beach. That kind of paid us back for all the hard work. We'd spoken to The Angels and (Cold) Chisel who'd just preceded us a little bit, and they said, 'If you get places like Newcastle you'll get the most loyal audiences on earth', and that's what happened. And of course a few years later was the earthquake benefit and we were lucky enough to be on that bill as well, and that gig goes down as one of the great shows we've ever played."Midnight Oil, of course, achieved success with not just a lot of hard work, but what Rob Hirst describes as an 'anti-plan'."We'd heard all these terrible stories of bands that we'd loved that ended much too early, before their time, through no fault of their own. They were brilliant musicians, songwriters, performers, but through management or lousy agency deals or record company stuff-ups they hadn't fulfilled their potential. So we looked at them and because Pete and I had done law - Pete finished law, I didn't - but we knew our way around a contract a little bit. So when we signed with an independent label, even though we were being chased by the majors at the time - that made us too anxious, so we signed with an independent label which we called 'Powderworks' after the first song on the first album and gradually eased ourselves in.""I think that stood us in good stead because we were able to build this very loyal live crowd - initially in Sydney, Newcastle and Wollongong and then interstate. But because we took it softly, softly, I don't think we made the horrendous mistakes that some of the other great Australian bands had done."I point out the obvious that Midnight Oil weren't trying to seduce an audience with songs of sex and drugs and rock & roll like every other band, but were insisting we have a look at contemporary Australian issues.Again, Rob is amused, "Yeah, we were decidedly unsexy and we didn't take anywhere near enough drugs although I was on ascorbic acid (vitamin C) for about 15 years.""Probably two of the most maligned rock managers of the time were Gary Morris who looked after us, and Chris Murphy who looked after INXS, although Gary also looked after INXS initially but then just us once he realised we were more than a handful.""Those managers were much feared and not very liked in the industry, but they were fiercely loyal to their bands and Gary not only was a real strong-arm, Rottweiler kind of manager which you need to protect a young band that has big ideas but no money in the bank, but he also threw all these crazy ideas at us all the time. One in every 100 of his crazy ideas was brilliant and we'd actually do it.""The best bands seemed to have been the most unlikely bunch of people - and I include their management in that - all thrown together and all providing different talents to an end that make the sum much stronger than the individual.""With Midnight Oil and Cold Chisel, for example, the songwriters weren't the singer. In the case of Chisel it was Don Walker writing for Jimmy (Barnes), and with the Oils it was Jim (Moginie) and myself writing for Pete (Garrett). There were others in the band that were great performers - Pete was this extraordinarily charismatic singer, Jim was a whiz in the studio, Martin (Rotsey) was great with arrangements ... and everyone kind of had their place.""Back in those days you actually sold albums, they weren't all pirated or downloaded for free so we could quickly pay back that poor bank manager in Chatswood and get going and make our own career even thought we didn't play Countdown and we didn't play the industry game."They most certainly didn't. And I suggest that to a then-young and female Australian music-goer, Midnight Oil could appear a bit intimidating. A bit cranky."We were a bloody-minded bunch of bastards back then and, yeah, we were cranky all the time. If you look at photos from that time we look really cranky. A lot of bands want to look cranky but we were actually cranky because we were tired and probably hungry and pissed off about something."Yes, I detect Rob Hirst pulling my leg a bit, but only a bit. He admits that if you were anywhere near the front of the stage during a Midnight Oil gig, or The Angels, or Rose Tattoo, Cold Chisel, whatever, you were a member of a fairly tough breed. I assure him I was happy at the back of the room but I suspect the safest place may have been behind the drum kit.False rumours have just done the rounds that Robert Plant had knocked back $500-$800 million to reform Led Zeppelin. Big numbers. What would it take for Midnight Oil to perform together again?"Robert Plant. I really admire the man, he keeps reinventing himself. It's long not been about the money for people like that. But it's one thing cruising around the pubs and just playing a medley of your greatest hits and a lot of bands fall for that trap. But I think Midnight Oil is among that bunch of bands that would be much too musically curious to have ever done that.""If we were ever to get back together, it would almost certainly be with new material and we'd have to feel we were contributing something rather than just some nostalgic act in sparkly jackets doing the clubs. Whether that will happen I have no idea."Rob Hirst's new album, 'The Sun Becomes The Sea', is a beautiful personal work recorded in memory of his later mother, Robin, who ended her life a few years ago after decades of living with depression. In a recent interview Rob pointed out that it's important we talk about depression, that we acknowledge the importance of mental health in order to help people."It's not just my mum, there are other members of the family who have suffered from it and it is as strong as any other inherited disease. And possibly more lethal because we don't talk about it and don't address it."Rob and his daughters sang 'Someone Scared' at his late mother's funeral and he suggests that this song was the catalyst for the full album.It's a terrible thing to admit, but as a high school work experience kid I spent a week at Powderworks when Midnight Oil's 'Bird Noises' EP was being pressed on to gooey black vinyl. I simply wanted to know how music worked.I wish I hadn't been such a good kid and actually nicked one.And frankly, I'd have pinched one of Gabriella Hirst's beautiful silk birds from the poplar forest, too.
Rob Hirst - The Sun Becomes The Sea album release feature 2014First published ABC Radio Australia18 November, 2014 12:07PM AEDTRob Hirst - a new solo album and the Midnight Oil 'anti-plan'By Carol DuncanRob Hirst has a new solo album out - released under his own name instead of one of the innumerable musical units that he's part of. The Midnight Oil drummer and songwriter celebrates his new songs with an unexpected collaboration with his artist daughter, Gabriella Hirst.10Rob Hirst oozes 'proud dad' as he talks about the achievements of the offspring of some of his bandmates."We've all got very talented sons and daughters now, all very grown up, and my daughter Gabriella is now in Berlin after finishing her courses at COFA in Sydney and the National Art School. She did very well, got a travelling scholarship and went to Berlin."Gabriella Hirst's art is, indeed, striking and beautiful. And perhaps unsurprisingly, her work seems to share her father's social and environmental concerns."She was looking out over a wasteland where she was in north-west Berlin, went for a walk in the afternoon and asked one of the locals why it was so deserted. He told her that until recently there had been a poplar forest full of birds but that despite the protests of locals the little forest that had acted as a buffer between quite an industrial area and the local residences had been levelled to put in a department store or factory.""But he also told Ella that he'd gone for a walk on the day they cut the trees down and found 24 birds' nests. He sent them to Ella and she painted them as part of her Berlin projects in watercolours on silk flags, which the man then attached to bamboo poles and put back where the forest once was as a symbolic gesture to remind people of what was lost. Being ephemeral artworks, she expected them to be souvenired, which they quickly were, but they fly now from the balconies of neighbouring apartments overlooking this area."Rob's album, 'The Sun Becomes The Sea', features 24 of his daughter's bird artworks in the hardcover booklet version of the album, which he had made to protect Gabriella's artwork but there are a few of them online."I was just finishing a bunch of songs that I'd been doing over a couple of years down at Jim's (Moginie) studio and I thought for the first time that I'd put it out under my own name rather than under the Ghostwriters or whatever. It's just one of those lovely synchronicities where she was finishing her artwork at the same time and agreed that I could use these beautiful watercolour birds for the sleeve of the book and for the new website which finally links the Oils, the Backsliders, The Break, Angry Tradesmen, Hirst and Greene, Willies Bar and Grill, etc."Unusually, Rob made the decision to make all of the songs on the album available online for free."I just thought it would be a nice gesture and I had such fun making these songs."I point out that a similar 'nice gesture' recently backfired somewhat for U2."I would never be so presumptuous as to upload these 11 songs on people's iTunes!" Rob laughs, "It's available for those that seek it out and like it and there's the option for people to go to a few of those old-fashioned record stores that still exist, and which we really want to support, and get the hardcover booklet with all of Gabriella's birds and other information on it."The exhibition of Midnight Oil's incredible place in the Australian music industry was a huge success at the Sydney exhibition hosted by the Manly Art Gallery and Museum and will be hosted by Newcastle Museum early 2015. How does Rob Hirst feel about his life's work being treated as a museum piece?"We had so many people come through and they were pleasantly surprised. I think they thought, 'Oh Rob's dug out a few old posters and stuck them on the wall with blu-tack' or something. In fact, we spent about two years working on it; this is me, curator Ross Heathcote, Virginia Buckingham, Wendy Osmond who did the art direction on it.""We've got a special film which runs an hour and fifteen minutes made by Rob Hambling about the making of '10 to 1' with Nick Launay producing back in London all those years ago, and we've sourced all this film from 1984 of the band backstage in South Australia at Memorial Drive, and at Main Beach on the Gold Coast. There's a lot of home movie footage, the Exxon banner from New York City, a full stage set-up of the band with the exact drums, guitars, amps, backdrop, lights and even the PA to be authentic from 1987 to 1989 which we toured on the back of the Diesel and Dust album.""There lots of little early recordings that have never been heard, a song we've never released before, and the piece de resistance is a replication in a box which has sticky carpet, three screens when you walk in and a curtain you pull behind you. It has footage of the band playing at the Tanelorn Festival in 1981 and there's two sets of headphones you can choose from - one is loud, the other is really loud - and you can stick to the carpet. There's elbows that come out from the side of the box so that you can be elbowed in the ribs. What I was trying to do was replicate what it was like coming to see Midnight Oil back then at the Mawson Hotel, the 16 Footers or the Ambassador or whatever."I enquire as to whether the box also has the special scent that some of our more notorious venues had. Rob Hirst assures me it does."I've poured so much Tooheys New into that carpet, you've got no idea, and I've ground some lemon chicken and sweet and sour rat or whatever into it. Remember in NSW in those days the liquor laws stated that the pubs had to pretend to provide a meal if they were serving liquor late. No-one would ever touch those meals but they'd be knocked off the bar and into the carpet. So after three months in Manly it's getting quite fruity in there!""It's funny, one of the last surviving venues down here (Sydney), The Annandale, has just ripped up there carpet. The carpet was legendary. It was despicable. They could have scraped it for a new form of penicillin! But they shouldn't have thrown it out. I'd have taken a square metre of it and put it in what became known as 'Rob's Folly', but is now known as 'The Royal Antler Room' which is the Narrabeen pub that Midnight Oil first started playing all those years ago.""The curator, Ross Heathcote, named it 'Rob's Folly' because he was bemused by the idea. He didn't think I'd ever build it, but over six months with a couple of hard-working, underpaid friends we actually made it. It looks like a giant road case but it's big enough for two or three people to cram in and get blasted by Midnight Oil at the Tanelorn Festival."Rob describes the opening of the Midnight Oil exhibition at the Manly gallery with great affection and it's obvious that he still finds great joy in every tiny connection that his career has afforded him - from those with names to the 'unknown' members of road crews. Indeed for just a moment he sounds a bit misty when reminiscing about the night of the opening and the loyalty of the huge crowds who were not only Midnight Oil fans but turned out in droves to see the exhibition. I gently accuse him of getting mellow and soft in his dotage as he describes this 'gathering of the tribes'. This quickly turns his thoughts to Newcastle."Newcastle will be the same. After all, Newcastle meant so much to the band. We went time and time again until we finally did a huge gig on Redhead Beach. We expected to find maybe a couple of thousand people, but there must have been 25,000 or 30,000 people on the beach. That kind of paid us back for all the hard work. We'd spoken to The Angels and (Cold) Chisel who'd just preceded us a little bit, and they said, 'If you get places like Newcastle you'll get the most loyal audiences on earth', and that's what happened. And of course a few years later was the earthquake benefit and we were lucky enough to be on that bill as well, and that gig goes down as one of the great shows we've ever played."Midnight Oil, of course, achieved success with not just a lot of hard work, but what Rob Hirst describes as an 'anti-plan'."We'd heard all these terrible stories of bands that we'd loved that ended much too early, before their time, through no fault of their own. They were brilliant musicians, songwriters, performers, but through management or lousy agency deals or record company stuff-ups they hadn't fulfilled their potential. So we looked at them and because Pete and I had done law - Pete finished law, I didn't - but we knew our way around a contract a little bit. So when we signed with an independent label, even though we were being chased by the majors at the time - that made us too anxious, so we signed with an independent label which we called 'Powderworks' after the first song on the first album and gradually eased ourselves in.""I think that stood us in good stead because we were able to build this very loyal live crowd - initially in Sydney, Newcastle and Wollongong and then interstate. But because we took it softly, softly, I don't think we made the horrendous mistakes that some of the other great Australian bands had done."I point out the obvious that Midnight Oil weren't trying to seduce an audience with songs of sex and drugs and rock & roll like every other band, but were insisting we have a look at contemporary Australian issues.Again, Rob is amused, "Yeah, we were decidedly unsexy and we didn't take anywhere near enough drugs although I was on ascorbic acid (vitamin C) for about 15 years.""Probably two of the most maligned rock managers of the time were Gary Morris who looked after us, and Chris Murphy who looked after INXS, although Gary also looked after INXS initially but then just us once he realised we were more than a handful.""Those managers were much feared and not very liked in the industry, but they were fiercely loyal to their bands and Gary not only was a real strong-arm, Rottweiler kind of manager which you need to protect a young band that has big ideas but no money in the bank, but he also threw all these crazy ideas at us all the time. One in every 100 of his crazy ideas was brilliant and we'd actually do it.""The best bands seemed to have been the most unlikely bunch of people - and I include their management in that - all thrown together and all providing different talents to an end that make the sum much stronger than the individual.""With Midnight Oil and Cold Chisel, for example, the songwriters weren't the singer. In the case of Chisel it was Don Walker writing for Jimmy (Barnes), and with the Oils it was Jim (Moginie) and myself writing for Pete (Garrett). There were others in the band that were great performers - Pete was this extraordinarily charismatic singer, Jim was a whiz in the studio, Martin (Rotsey) was great with arrangements ... and everyone kind of had their place.""Back in those days you actually sold albums, they weren't all pirated or downloaded for free so we could quickly pay back that poor bank manager in Chatswood and get going and make our own career even thought we didn't play Countdown and we didn't play the industry game."They most certainly didn't. And I suggest that to a then-young and female Australian music-goer, Midnight Oil could appear a bit intimidating. A bit cranky."We were a bloody-minded bunch of bastards back then and, yeah, we were cranky all the time. If you look at photos from that time we look really cranky. A lot of bands want to look cranky but we were actually cranky because we were tired and probably hungry and pissed off about something."Yes, I detect Rob Hirst pulling my leg a bit, but only a bit. He admits that if you were anywhere near the front of the stage during a Midnight Oil gig, or The Angels, or Rose Tattoo, Cold Chisel, whatever, you were a member of a fairly tough breed. I assure him I was happy at the back of the room but I suspect the safest place may have been behind the drum kit.False rumours have just done the rounds that Robert Plant had knocked back $500-$800 million to reform Led Zeppelin. Big numbers. What would it take for Midnight Oil to perform together again?"Robert Plant. I really admire the man, he keeps reinventing himself. It's long not been about the money for people like that. But it's one thing cruising around the pubs and just playing a medley of your greatest hits and a lot of bands fall for that trap. But I think Midnight Oil is among that bunch of bands that would be much too musically curious to have ever done that.""If we were ever to get back together, it would almost certainly be with new material and we'd have to feel we were contributing something rather than just some nostalgic act in sparkly jackets doing the clubs. Whether that will happen I have no idea."Rob Hirst's new album, 'The Sun Becomes The Sea', is a beautiful personal work recorded in memory of his later mother, Robin, who ended her life a few years ago after decades of living with depression. In a recent interview Rob pointed out that it's important we talk about depression, that we acknowledge the importance of mental health in order to help people."It's not just my mum, there are other members of the family who have suffered from it and it is as strong as any other inherited disease. And possibly more lethal because we don't talk about it and don't address it."Rob and his daughters sang 'Someone Scared' at his late mother's funeral and he suggests that this song was the catalyst for the full album.It's a terrible thing to admit, but as a high school work experience kid I spent a week at Powderworks when Midnight Oil's 'Bird Noises' EP was being pressed on to gooey black vinyl. I simply wanted to know how music worked.I wish I hadn't been such a good kid and actually nicked one.And frankly, I'd have pinched one of Gabriella Hirst's beautiful silk birds from the poplar forest, too.
Iva Davies is one of Australia's most accomplished musicians and composers with a career spanning over 30 years with his band Icehouse, and as a composer for film and theatre. I produced this feature music show with him in 2014.The number one song on the Australian pop music charts in 1980 was The Buggles 'Video Killed The Radio Star', accompanied through the year by such gems as Michael Jackson 'Don't Stop Til You Get Enough', The Village People 'You Can't Stop The Music', Split Enz 'I Got You', The Vapours 'Turning Japanese' and Queen 'Crazy Little Thing Called Love'.In May 1980, Australian radio stations started playing a song by Sydney band, Flowers. 'Can't Help Myself' made it into the Australian Top 10 and was the first song from their debut album, 'Icehouse'. I think I was first in line at my local record store to by the single and was enormously envious of my older brothers who would regularly see Flowers playing at the local pub. IVA DAVIES: We came from quite a distinct stream of music which generated by the punk movement out of Britain, but then it morphed into a strange hybrid because of technology. There was an explosion of technology, especially synthesiser technology, at that period, so we were a kind of punk band with synthesisers which was a bit odd. But clearly, these other people were not, including Michael Jackson! There were all sorts of strange things going on, strange fashions; it was a very interesting time."The first song we put out was called 'Can't Help Myself' and we'd been playing all these classic punk venues for about three years before we put out that first record. I remember being told it had become a disco hit in Melbourne and I was semi-horrified. I was very pleased it was a hit, of course, but a disco hit - we weren't a disco band!By the time we got to 1980 we'd been playing quite a few of our own songs but still had lacings of the odd cover version of things not even particularly fashionable at the time, things like T-Rex songs, but by then we'd really turned into an original band and signed with a small independent label in Sydney called Regular Records and we'd recorded our first album, and although they constitute really the first 10 songs I ever wrote, they did have a certain flavour about them that I guess was, again, a hybrid of punk with synthesizers.CAROL DUNCAN: Iva, you mustn't have been very long out of the Conservatorium by this stage?IVA DAVIES: I dropped out of the (Sydney) Conservatorium when I was about 21, so I was about 23 or 24 by this point.CAROL DUNCAN: So how did you decide to steer your songwriting and music releases in that environment at that time?IVA DAVIES: It's a terrible admission to make considering that 'Can't Help Myself' made it into the Top 10, that I was probably fairly unaware of radio except for 2JJ. That's a terrible admission for somebody who's trying to break into getting airplay on radio!CAROL DUNCAN: Something like The Vapors 'Turning Japanese' would have been all over 2SM (in Sydney) at the time. 2SM would have been the number one commercial pop music station in the late 1970s.IVA DAVIES: Indeed, and I missed a great deal of that. I think we were pretty well buried in our own world and our own world had been dominated by what I'd listened to as I grew up, quite a lot of classics, psychedelic and heavy rock bands including Pink Floyd and so on. And then when Johnny Rotten (the Sex Pistols) arrived, the world was turned upside-down quite literally.He put all of those big bands out of business overnight and London was the place to be. I remember very clearly when Keith (Welsh) and I, our bass player and co-founder of Flowers, we'd been playing almost every night of the week, sometimes nine shows a week. There were clubs all over Sydney, there were clubs all over Melbourne, there were really great bands everywhere and on any given night down the road there'd be Midnight Oil and INXS and any number of bands.When we arrived in London for our very first international tour, we looked at each other and said, 'Let's get a copy of New Musical Express (NME) and go and see a band 'cause this is where it's all coming from!' And there was nothing on!I was absolutely gobsmacked that Sydney was a hundred times more active than London on a club scene. It absolutely mystified me. All the pubs shut early, there was nowhere to go!CAROL DUNCAN: Who did you admire at the time?IVA DAVIES: I didn't buy albums of anybody, I didn't consume music. I was very curious about music but most of what I listened to was via 2JJ. 2JJ was a very progressive station; I think it's been forgotten to some degree. 2JJ were playing things that had been bought on import - they hadn't even been released in Australia yet - and so it was fascinating.We were hearing things we thought before anybody else in the world had heard them, things like Elvis Costello, XTC, mainly British bands but the odd thing coming out of America. There was a real movement of punk and new wave.CAROL DUNCAN: So you and Keith have taken off to London, you're going to see all the bands, but there's no-one home?IVA DAVIES: There's no-one home! I remember thinking at the time, 'Well where did The Cure come from and where did The Clash and The Damned and The Jam come from? Where are they all'?I had imagined that London was heaving with little clubs with all those names playing in them every night but it was really something created through the tyranny of distance, I guess. We had amplified that whole thing that had started with Carnaby Street, The Beatles, and Rolling Stones; and in my mind, and I'm sure in the minds of many other Australians, this was the mecca that we were going to visit. But it turned out it was really as much a product of BBC1 and radio and record companies than it was of an active pub music scene which was exactly what we had in Australia.CAROL DUNCAN: So, what did you do, turn around and come home?IVA DAVIES: We went off touring. We went off touring with Simple Minds who were just starting to break through in Europe. They'd a quite successful album, and we did a reciprocal deal with them where we said, 'OK, if we are your support band in Europe, that will help us, and you come to Australia and be our support band there because nobody knows you. In fact, to this day, and I'm sure Jim Kerr from Simple Minds would take credit in saying that tour we did with them really broke Simple Minds in Australia - it was off the back of that tour that they started achieving success here. Of course, many many albums and many many successes later I still catch up with Jim Kerr quite frequently.CAROL DUNCAN: I remember seeing the two bands at the Manly Vale Hotel.IVA DAVIES: Very possible! That was one of many hotels in that northern beaches area, and I ended up living on the northern beaches by accident. It was quite tribal. There was a very big pub at Narrabeen called the Royal Antler and it was our first proper gig, I guess, and almost residency. At one point we and Midnight Oil were alternating weekends. We never met them, but there was this kind of unspoken rivalry for the same audience of mad, drunken surfies.CAROL DUNCAN: It was one of Sydney's great beer barns.IVA DAVIES: It was and they were mad, of course, mad drunken surfies and probably a few other substances, as well. But they were great nights. It was a big place; I think it held something like 1500 people. And you're right, we probably did attract slightly different audiences, and certainly we also had the other side of us which was playing the inner city hotels which, of course, were very driven by the punk movement, so we'd look out on a place like the Civic Hotel and there'd been a sea of black and safety pins.CAROL DUNCAN: Why did the name change come about? Was it as simple as swapping the band name and album title?IVA DAVIES: It was, but we actually had no choice. What we hadn't realised was that while we were happily going along as Flowers in Australia and New Zealand, as soon as we signed to an international record company and they said, 'We're going to release this around the rest of the world, we need to do a little check on the name. It hadn't even occurred to me that a band name is like a company trading name and, unfortunately, there were at least three other acts around the world trading on the name 'Flowers'. One of them being the very, very famous session bass player, Herbie Flowers, who you probably know best for being the creator of that wonderful bass line that introduces Lou Reed's 'Walk On The Wild Side'.So there were objections and we simply had no choice, we had to come up with another name. This has happened to a number of Australian bands. It happened to Sherbet who became Highway, and The Angels who became Angel City. Our logic was fairly simple - people here in Australia and New Zealand only know us by two things, that is the name of the band 'Flowers' or the name of the album 'Icehouse'. So, we became Icehouse.A band name becomes its identity in a far bigger way that just a set of letters. I've had this discussion with my 17-year old son who has got a collection of friends in a band and they haven't been able to think of anything. I keep asking what the band is called and they're called something different every day. I said 'you better get it right because it will end up owning you'.CAROL DUNCAN: Your son has actually played with you?IVA DAVIES: Yes, oh you know about this! I had a fairly mad idea last year, although the idea had been around since 1983. I remember we were touring in Europe and we had a number one song in Europe so there was a lot of pressure on me. I was doing millions of interviews and we were playing very big festivals of 30,000 people.We were playing on one and I was standing on the side of the stage next to my band and Peter Tosh's band was playing - Peter Tosh was the co-founder of Bob Marley's Wailers - and it was a big band, 9 or 10 people on stage, backing singers and whatnot, and I said to my bass player, "See the guy at the back going chukka, chukka, chukka on the guitar, the laziest job in the world? I want his job. I had a conversation last year with somebody about this moment and they said, 'Why don't you do it?'Our manager thought I was mad, a number of promoters thought I was mad, too, but what we did was completely re-invent Icehouse as an eight-piece reggae band. We added some extra guys from Melbourne to give us a brass section and we re-arranged every one of the hits that we'd been playing in the classic repertoire as reggae songs.We put two shows on - one in Melbourne, one in Sydney - as a kind of Christmas party because my feeling was that the reason we were doing it is because reggae makes you want to dance and smile and laugh, and we had the best possible time, it was just fantastic. We've just released the recording of the Sydney show and re-named the band DubHOUSE - the album is DubHOUSE Live.I wanted to get my children to come. My daughter is OK because she's 20 but my son was under age, under the drinking age, and the only way I could get him in was to put him in the band. So I said to him, 'Look Evan ...' he's17 and a very good guitarist, 'I'm sorry, you're not going to get a rehearsal, you're not going to get a sound check. Here's a recording of a rehearsal of Street Cafe done in this style, you've got the guitar solo, go home and learn it and I'll see you on stage."And so the poor guy was thrown on stage with absolutely no preparation whatsoever, but fortunately, he had done his homework and had a great night.CAROL DUNCAN: How do the kids see your career, Iva?IVA DAVIES: Well the strange truth is that they didn't. I finished the last tour that we did back in the day, as it were, when my daughter was six weeks old. Effectively, we didn't play again and my children grew up.In 2009, our long-time tour manager, Larry, who works for a very big audio production company - he'd been working for with us since 1984 - came up with the idea for Sound Relief (concerts held in Sydney & Melbourne for 2009 bushfire relief) and actually volunteered us, so we were the first band on the bill for Sound Relief.By that time in 2009, my daughter would have been 14 or 13, and my son 12 or 13, and that was the first concert they ever saw me play. So they'd grown up all those years not knowing anything about it, or relatively little.CAROL DUNCAN: Did they think Icehouse was cool or were you 'just Dad' and therefore couldn't possibly be cool?IVA DAVIES: Strangely enough, I seem to have breached the cool barrier into the cool area. A very strange thing happened, before that Sound Relief show and before my daughter really got to appreciate my association with it. She came home from school one afternoon, waltzed in the door and announced, 'I LOVE THE EIGHTIES! I love EVERYTHING about the eighties!'Strangely enough, the eighties are going through a whole new generation of cool at the moment. Except for the hair, and a lot of the clothes.CAROL DUNCAN: When you look at that part of your career, the pop/rock part of your career, what do you see, Iva?IVA DAVIES: I'm proud that we worked very hard, I believe, to maintain a kind of class and a quality. That went through everything, even the recordings themselves. I went through the graduation from vinyl to CD, which was a massive turnaround, and it happened incredibly quickly.I remember having a talk to a record company about it and they said, 'Last year we manufactured 80% out of vinyl and 20% out of CD, this year we're manufacturing 80% out of CD and 20% out of vinyl, and the following year we're not making any vinyl at all. That's how fast it turned around. But 'Measure for Measure', our fourth album is one of the first three fully digital recordings ever made in the world, which was a real milestone, so it's the first completely noiseless recording that was made for the new format of CD. It's moments like that that I reflect on and think, well, that's because we really put a lot of care and attention into these things.CAROL DUNCAN: Iva, you're also seen as one of the pioneers in Australia of bringing in synthesizers, computers, the Fairlight and so on. You mentioned an interesting word there, 'noiseless', and that's perhaps where the feud happens between the vinyl purists and people who are very happy to purchase their music in a digital form whether on CD or via digital download. How do you see the vinyl vs CD war when it comes to audio quality?IVA DAVIES: I noted with some amusement touched with horror a program that Linda Mottram did on 702 in Sydney where there was this discussion about vinyl, and she spoke with a so-called expert who was out of a university, and with due respect to that professor I desperately wanted to call in and say, "Can I just tell you about what actually happens when you're making pieces of vinyl and why they sound the way they do, and how it is absolutely possible to make CDs sound exactly like vinyl IF that were the endgame that you wanted to have in mind.I won't go into it now but the fact of the matter is it's all about a process called mastering. The way that tapes, mixes, were mastered for vinyl had to be very particular because of the intolerance of vinyl - vinyl can't carry very much big bass. I found that out with the Flowers album when I insisted to the co-producer that we put lots of bottom end into it and then realised a bit later on when the mastering engineer said to me, "I can't cut this to vinyl, it's got too much bass in it." They're the sorts of mistakes that you make when you're young.I'm a firm believer in anything that doesn't have moving parts and that is digital. I'm afraid I've moved on from anything old-school quite happily.CAROL DUNCAN: Did you call in?IVA DAVIES: No, I didn't, I just thought it's probably too difficult a conversation to have in detail over the radio but it does infuriate me because I'm sure if you got any mastering engineer on to the radio they'd say to you it's mainly because people don't understand how these things are made.CAROL DUNCAN: What gave you the confidence to leap into these new technologies?IVA DAVIES: Perhaps it was more out of ignorance than anything, I certainly didn't see any risk involved, but the main driver for me was that these were new toys. Every time something new was invented, my eyes would light up and I'd think, 'Imagine the possibilities!'I remember expressly that conversation I had with our management where, out of sheer co-incidence they'd moved offices from where they were in Bondi Junction to the top storey of a two-storey building in Rushcutters Bay and the ground storey was where they made Fairlights, believe it or not. Management were oblivious to this, they had no idea what was going on down there. But I did and I came to the managers one day and said, 'I desperately want to get one of these machines, they are amazing.'Of course, I was proven correct because they revolutionised music forever. I think apart from the technology of recording, the sampler - which is what a Fairlight was - was the single most influential piece of technology ever created. I said this to my management, that I was desperate, that I'd really like one, but the catch was they were $32,000. That was in 1981 or 1982 so you can imagine how much money that was then - it was half a small house.But I got one, and interestingly enough my management were quite philosophical about it. They said, 'Well, it's a lot of money, but according to our calculations you'll pay for this with the first two projects you use it on.' And they were right. The first project I used it on was my very first film score for Russell Mulcahy's 'Razorback', which is about 95% Fairlight.The great irony of that was that I kept producing bits of music, because Russell Mulcahy was out in the desert filming scenes and he kept dragging up Peter Gabriel's fourth album, the one with Shock The Monkey on it, and they were out in the desert with this blasting away on a ghetto blaster and I got it into my head that this was what Russell likes. So I kept producing Gabriel-esque soundscapes and so on, and the producers of the movie kept coming back to me and saying, 'No, no no - that's not what we want, we don't want this.' In the end I was getting various clues from them but didn't really know, but I had another go along the lines of Stravinsky's 'Rite of Spring' - a fairly mad piece of classical music. I constructed all this with the Fairlight, it was a quasi-orchestral thing. I took it back to them and they said, 'Yes! That's exactly it!' and I said, 'Well, if you wanted that sort of thing why didn't you go and get a classical composer.'In its day, 'Rite of Spring' was a controversial piece of music, and Iva Davies shares a birthday with Stravinsky.Considering that it was 1913 when that piece first hit the stage for Diaghilev's ballet company. It wasn't just the music; it was actually the subject matter of the ballet that I think was fairly upsetting to a lot of people. It's all about primal sexualism, basically, so you can imagine that to an audience of 1913 that sort of idea was fairly horrifying.CAROL DUNCAN: In 1984, you've got Razorback, also 'Sidewalk' - the third album from Icehouse, at this point did you consider that you didn't actually have to be a pop star?IVA DAVIES: No, I had a very strange life prior to that because I had a completely Jekyll and Hyde existence. I took up the guitar when I was 13, and taught myself, and it was probably also the year that I started taking oboe lessons. I had these two parallel lives and completely separate lives. I had a set of classical people - when I was in high school I played in a wind quintet and we used to rehearse every Saturday morning. We all had our first cars at that point. They were my friends and we went off and won the City of Sydney Eisteddfod and so on. They never, ever met the guys that I was in the acoustic band with. Ever! Because I just had these two lives. So my course was fairly accidental all the way through, it was probably always going to be accidental.To this day, I keep remembering things that I did. I remembered that I was in the orchestra that was primarily made up of members of the Sydney Symphony and the senior Conservatorium orchestra, of which I was a member, for the staging of the two first Australian ballets in the Opera House. I would have been about 19 and, of course, that's a fairly big moment for the Opera House to have a night featuring Australian opera in that building, and I'd completely forgotten about it. There are things from both lives that I've forgotten about.CAROL DUNCAN: 1985, your double life really starts to change as you start working with the Sydney Dance Company.IVA DAVIES: I have to give credit to our managers to some degree who recognised - Ray Hearn was managing us from the beginning. I think he considered himself to be a very erudite individual, he was very widely read, he'd seen every movie possible, and he had a huge record collection. He wasn't a musician but I think he spotted in me the potential that if I kept on that very two-dimension wheel of 'write an album, record an album, tour an album, write an album, record an album, tour an album ...', that I would burn out, that I needed something else to do. So it was he who went and pursued the soundtrack idea with Russell Mulcahy, and it was he who introduced me to the Sydney Dance Company who were a very dangerous company at that point. People forget that they did ballets entirely naked and this was quite revolutionary stuff in its day. They had a very young, hip audience. So it was a very smart move. But it was also a move that was good for the dance company. I had also forgotten until reminded about a month ago that in the Opera House's entire history this has never been repeated, but they did a very dangerous thing. They put two shows on a Friday and a Saturday night, one at a conventional hour and then a whole other audience would turn up at 10.30 at night and we'd do it all again. The staff at the Opera House thought this was going to be an absolute disaster, 'Nobody's going to go to the Opera House at 10.30pm to see a show', but they did and they were all my audience and they were coming to see what all the fuss was about. It was the most successful season the dance company has ever had.CAROL DUNCAN: Were you worried about your pop/rock audience coming over to see what you were doing and being disappointed?IVA DAVIES: I've always utterly failed to understand what the problem is between the various tribes of music. I started of as a bagpipe player when I was six, and although I went through that very, very particular stream of classical musicians, and they are, and they are a very exclusive lot - a lot of them, and they are a very intolerant lot - a lot of them, I think things have improved. But at that time they very much looked down their nose at 'popular music' and rock and roll, but by the same token it was equally prejudiced the other way around. I've never understood why. I don't get that you have to be one or the other but not all of them. In my head, there was absolutely no problem with my audience turning up to the ballet.CAROL DUNCAN: What gave you the confidence to follow both streams?IVA DAVIES: Only because I can kind of speak both languages. I had a discussion with somebody the other night about music and it is another language. It's certainly a language when you read and write it and I learned how to do that. But my dialogue with rock and roll musicians has to be completely different because most of the people I played with all these years don't read and write music. But rock and roll musicians communicate in a different kind of way. So because I'm comfortable in both of those languages, I can happily flick between the two of them, at whim almost.CAROL DUNCAN: Which is why I don't' let my kids drop out of their violin lessons - I want them to have that other language.IVA DAVIES: From my point of view, by miles, the single biggest advantage I've had in my work and succeeding in the broad framework of popular music is the fact that I was highly trained. That is the most sure, certain way to cut every corner you can - to actually know what you're doing.CAROL DUNCAN: December 31, 1999, and Icehouse is performing at the Millennium New Years Eve concert outside the Sydney Opera House and there is a moment on your face where it's just occurred to you how very special that moment is.IVA DAVIES: The penny really didn't drop, I mean, there was such a lot of pressure involved in that. The transmission, the TV director, Greg Beness, had synchronised a whole lot of footage to be running in parallel with shooting the performance. We had backups of backups because, of course, everybody thought that every computer in the world was going to blow up at midnight being the Y2K bug and so on. It was going out to about four billion people. It's not as if you can get to the end of it and go, 'Oh, we mucked that up, can we have another go?', 'Oh, they've already counted down; we're in a new millennium'. So I was incredibly aware of all of that and actually I've watched back some of the footage and it takes me a fair old while to settle down, it's (The Ghost Of Time) a 25-minute piece and it took me a number of minutes before I was, 'OK, we're up and running, everything seems to be working, everybody knows where they are, I can hear everything ....'I got to the end of it and stepped off the stage, Frank Sartor the Lord Mayor of Sydney gave me a glass of champagne, Richard Wilkins counted down from 10 and the fireworks went off directly over my head and I went, 'Wow!'CAROL DUNCAN: From this point, your other career really takes off and you head off to work on Master and Commander.IVA DAVIES: Yes, I've said to other young bands over the years, 'Just be aware - you never know who will be listening,' and so it was with thus that one person who was listening to The Ghost of Time on the millennium eve as it was going out, one of those four billion people, was one Peter Weir - an iconic Australian film director.This is how bizarre the next few years ended up being for me in terms of things just popping out of seemingly nowhere. I was sitting in my studio one day up on the northern beaches and the phone rang. A voice said, "Iva, this is Peter Weir. I'm filming Master and Commander on location in Baja, Mexico. I've fallen in love with The Ghost of Time. I want you to reassemble your team and give me a score like that."The whole experience was incredible, to go to Hollywood. I remember I had a colleague of mine, my music editor, had worked quite a bit in Hollywood on 'Moulin Rouge' and other things. He took me to the Fox lot and was very well recognised, but the thing that became immediately apparent was how incredibly well-respected Peter Weir is in Hollywood. Even though you don't necessarily associate him with massive blockbuster success time and time again, he's respected by directors and quality people in Hollywood and that's the difference.CAROL DUNCAN: Is it difficult to do this sort of work, to create something to someone else's demands?IVA DAVIES: I was very fortunate because Peter Weir has immense respect for music. He said to me not once, but twice, 'Music is the fountainhead of the arts,' that's how important it is to him. But having said that, he uses it very sparingly and in a very subtle way. So I had the great luxury to have three months to work on what equated to, in the end, not much more than 35 minutes worth of music. If you go and see a movie like 'Lord of the Rings', the composers had to write music from end to end of the film, so we're talking two and a half hours of music. Three months to produce that amount of music meant that it could be done with care but at a fairly unstressed pace, as it were. And that was fantastic. I have no doubt that Peter Weir quite deliberately planned the whole thing that way, so that it would be NOT a stressful operation. He's a consummate film-maker and he knows exactly what he's doing, so he schedules and plans things very well.Having said that, I always knew that the brief of a score writer is to write what the director wants to hear, not what the score writer wants to hear, so that was very apparent and so be it. Very often these films are the vision of a director and music is just one component of that. It should feed into their vision.CAROL DUNCAN: What are the professional moments that you hold dearest to your heart?IVA DAVIES: In terms of recording, I had a quite surreal moment. I was very influenced by one Brian Eno who was an absolute pioneer of synthesizers and electronic music, and in fact probably invented the term 'ambient music'. Of course, he was a founding member of Roxy Music but went on later to become incredibly successful in his own right and especially as a producer, he produced almost all of the U2 albums - massive albums. But I'd been following him since he was an early member of Roxy Music and especially been guided by his approach to synthesizers, which was very esoteric and completely at odds with a lot of the nasty noises that were being produced in the 1980s, for example. And I thank him for that because it probably stopped me from making a lot of bad sonic mistakes.The producer I was using at the time was a friend of his and I found myself having a conversation with the producer about the song we were working on at the time - a song called Cross the Border - I had in mind Brian Eno's backing vocal style. I knew that the producer, Rhett Davies, had worked with Brian Eno. I turned up to Air Studios, another very famous studio in London, to do the vocal session and in came Brian Eno. So there was a moment where I was standing in the studio, standing next to Brian Eno who was singing my lyrics and my backing vocal line. That was a real moment for me because he was a real hero of mine.CAROL DUNCAN: At what point did you realise that you had been successful enough to truly pursue anything that you wanted to do?IVA DAVIES: I spent most of my career not quite believing that things would work. In fact, I remember very clearly - we'd been working for years and years, working around these pubs, the first album came out, and I remember the first royalty cheque turned up. The accountant for the management company asked me into the office and said, 'Well, here's the cheque for the Flowers album for you,' and I looked at it and I'd been broke for years. My parents had to keep paying the odd rent payment for me and so on. We weren't earning any money at all, the album had only just come out, and I saw this cheque and it was for $15,000.I looked at Gino, who I had lunch with today - same accountant, and I said, 'Gino. This is amazing. This is incredible. I know I'm just going to fritter this away. I know I'll never get any more money out of this business. What's the deposit on the cheapest, cheapest, cheapest house in Sydney? Well, I bought the cheapest house in Sydney with that deposit, but of course, it wasn't the last cent that I made out of the music business.But for many years, for a long time, I really didn't consider that it was going to last, that I was going to make any money out of it. It's that classic thing where, luckily my parents didn't call me on the phone and say, 'When are you going to get a proper job?' they were very supportive. I think I was the one secretly calling myself and saying, 'When are you going to get a proper job?'CAROL DUNCAN: What are you still learning?IVA DAVIES: I'm still learning technology because unfortunately, it won't sit still! The industry standard for recording is a system called Pro-Tools, you very possibly use it in the studio there and it's certainly in every recording studio in the world. I've been working with Pro-Tools for a very long time but, of course, like any other software, there's a new release of it every five minutes. So I'm actually getting to the stage when I really am going to have to run to catch up! So unfortunately at my age, I'm still having to learn technology because it's the basic tool of my trade and that's never going to stop.CAROL DUNCAN: Are you still as excited by it as you were in the mid-1970s when you and Keith Welsh started 'Flowers' and when you went and harassed your management to allow you to buy that first Fairlight for $32,000?IVA DAVIES: I think I take it a bit more for granted these days because things have exploded in the way that they have. You can imagine the climate in which a piece of technology like the Fairlight came out; it was just mind-numbing. It was unlike anything anybody could ever imagine, whereas I suppose every time there's a new release of Pro-Tools, it's got a couple of lovely new features but it is a development of something which has been around for much more than a decade now.However, having said that, there seems to be a whole new generation of software writers who are incredibly interested in music and incredibly interested in playing with sound, and these are the people who are coming up with all the new noise generating bits - soft synthesisers and all that sort of stuff. That's kind of where the interesting new area is.CAROL DUNCAN: And Keith Welsh has been on this whole journey with you?IVA DAVIES: Indeed. In the music industry the whole time. He and I have been working closely over the past three years and we've started playing again and we re-released the entire catalogue. We put out a compilation called 'White Heat' which is about to go platinum.CAROL DUNCAN: What would you want the young Iva Davies to know?IVA DAVIES: That's a good question! I think I probably did seize most opportunities that came my way so I wouldn't necessarily say, 'just go as fast as you can with every opportunity that you can', I probably would have said, 'Put more attention to the money and where the money is going and who's getting it!' As a forensic accountant, I'm a kind of 'overview guy' as opposed to a 'detail guy'.
Shannon and Fiona headed out to the Narrabeen headquarters of the Australian Rugby Sevens program to chat with gold medallists Shannon Parry and Alicia Quirk with head coach Tim Walsh. They found out about the values that have driven the team to success over the past three years, what they got up to in Rio and who’s the brains trust of the team. Shannon and Alicia told of how they first got into rugby and what it was like heading into that gold medal match and in the aftermath. Plus, they all try to figure out what the keys to Brisbane city will open for Shannon. Shannon Parry is the co-captain of the women’s sevens side. She has played for Australia in 15s and Sevens and was a member of the Wallaroos 2010 and 2014 Women's Rugby World Cup sides - captaining the side in 2014. She was named in World Rugby’s team of the season following the 2015-16 series. Alicia Quirk was a touch football Australian representative before being recruited to the rugby sevens program. She played every minute at the Rio Olympics and is listed as the fittest member of the Australia squad. Tim Walsh is a former rugby player who played with the Queensland Reds and in England and Italy. He took on the women’s sevens coaching role in 2013. Walsh has won 81 out of 96 World Series games over three seasons at a winning percentage of 84 per cent.
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