At 12 years old – I took up guitar and never looked back.  Thank you Led Zep – and happy 40th birthday to you – IV Led Zeppelin.  Any memories to share as well?

Being completely in awe of this poem, that states nothing about “money” in his words about success, I was disappointed to discover that Ralph Waldo Emerson did not write this actual poem.  It turns out that the real authorship is a Bessie Stanley, who in 1865, entered a competition in the local newspaper, Lincoln Tribune to answer the question, What is success.    It turns out that Bessie, a housewife, had entered and won the poetry competition, however, history had acclaimed Ralph as the author.

Last year I heard another poem, “Return to Love” by an American author, Marianne Williamson, and it turns out many people believed that Nelson Mandela had it as his inaugural speech, in fact this is not true at all.

A few weeks ago I was discussing these mysteries of authorship with a business colleague and he was talking to me about another inspirational poem that I had not heard, “Desiderata”.  He went on to discuss the poem being discovered buried at an old church in Baltimore, Maryland in the late 1600’s.  I read the poem and was impressed with its wisdom.  After some research I discovered that it was not an old masterpiece poem, however, written in 1927 by Max Erhmann of Indiana, USA.

So what to make of all this confused authorship.  There is also much speculation around the authorship of the works of Shakespeare.  Apparently it could be Henry Neville - or even Sir Francis Bacon.  I think that there is a list of possible authors, or a combination of a few?.  Look at the date of the William Shakespeare’s birth and death ~ (baptised 26 April 1564; died 23 April 1616).  Now look at this list of who was around at the time of Shakespeare.

Sir Walter Raleigh (c. 1552 – 29 October 1618) was an English aristocrat, writer, poet, soldier, courtier, spy, and explorer. He is also well known for popularising tobacco in England.

John Dee (13 July 1527 – 1608 or 1609) was a noted English mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, occultist, navigator, imperialist,[4] and consultant to Queen Elizabeth I

Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount Saint Alban,[1] KC (22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626) was an English philosopher, statesman, scientist, lawyer, jurist and author.

Sir Henry Neville (c. 1562 – July 10, 1615) was an English politician, diplomat, courtier and distant relative of William Shakespeare

Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (12 April 1550 – 24 June 1604) was an Elizabethan courtier, playwright, lyric poet, sportsman and patron of the arts,

Christopher Marlowe,(baptised 26 February 1564–30 May 1593) was an English dramatist, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era.

Benjamin Jonson (c. 11 June 1572 – 6 August 1637) was an English Renaissance dramatist, poet and actor.

Thomas Middleton (18 April 1580 – 1627) was an English Jacobean playwright and poet.

Mary Herbert, Countess of Pembroke née Mary Sidney (27 October 1561 – 25 September 1621), was one of the first English women to achieve a major reputation for her literary works, poetry, poetic translations and literary patronage.

I will leave you to ponder this authorship – as we will never truly know the answer.   The only question it does raise also is this….

Why were most of the plays set in Greek times?  And what connection does WILL- I AM SHAKESPEARE have as to the Greek mythological goddess, Athena, the goddess of Wisdom and the Arts – who’s statue is of a SPEAR SHAKER who shakes her spear in face of the ignorance of humanity.

More info here re this question

Ben Jonson info here

Edward De Vere info here

Even if it comes to naught, isn’t it just great fun to question everything before ever believing it?

Rave interviewed this older version of the Artful Dodger, to reflect on what it was like in 1991. Enjoy the read. – Greg

Artful Dodger interview RAVE ISSUE 1000 – PAGE 29

RAVE ISSUE 1000 COVER PAGE

Take a moment to read them and ponder on them – love to hear your thoughts too – Greg

The Five Agreements:

1. BE IMPECCABLE WITH YOUR WORD
   Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.
2. DON’T TAKE ANYTHING PERSONALLY
   Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won’t be the victim of needless suffering.
3. DON’T MAKE ASSUMPTIONS
   Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings, sadness, and drama. With just this one agreement, you can completely transform your life.
4. ALWAYS DO YOUR BEST
   Your best is going to change from moment to moment; it will be different when you are tired as opposed to well rested. Under any circumstance, simply do your best, and you will avoid self-judgment, self-abuse, and regret.
5. BE SKEPTICAL, BUT LEARN TO LISTEN
   Don’t believe yourself or anybody else. Use the power of doubt to question everything you hear: Is it really the truth? Listen to the intent behind the words, and you will understand the real message.

A Creed To Live By

Don’t undermine your worth
by comparing yourself with others.
It is because we are different
…that each of us is special.

Don’t set your goals by what
other people deem important.
Only you know what is best for you.

Don’t take for granted the things closest to your heart.
Cling to them as you would your life,
for without them life is meaningless.

Don’t let your life slip through your fingers
by living in the past or for the future,
By living your life one day at a time.

Don’t give up when you still have something to give
nothing is really over until the moment you stop trying.

Don’t be afraid to admit that you are less then perfect.
It is a fragile thread that binds each of us to each other.

Don’t be afraid to encounter risks.
It is by taking chances that we learn how to be brave.

Don’t shut love out of your life by saying it impossible to find.
The quickest way to receive love is to give love;
The fastest way to lose love is to hold it too tightly;
And the best way to keep love is to give it wings.

Don’t dismiss your dreams.
To be without dreams is to be without hope;
to be without hope is to be without purpose.

Don’t run through life so fast
that you forget not only where you have been
but also where you are going.
Life is not a race,
but a journey to be savored each step of the way.

{Nancye Sims}

Steve Jobs, co creator of Apple reflects in 2005.  Powerful words of wisdom and great to ponder.

“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

This is a shortened version prepared text of the Commencement address delivered by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, on June 12, 2005.

The full version is here ~

http://news.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html

So as 1990 rolled over we had established a music store in the heart of Fortitude Valley, much to the disgust of our music store neighbor, Mick Privitera at The Musicians Pro Shop.  To make his point, he would turn up at one of our BBQ events at the store and stand in the doorway of our store to try to intimidate our customers (some of them he knew and others smirked at the intimidating bulk blocking the doorway).

The MIAQ was planning to develop a small book for young musicians to give them better information about forming a band and how to give it a better chance of survival.   This idea had been inspired by a Victorian organisation, The Push, who had also published a Melbourne centric version.  Tony Allison (or TA as we called him) became the link between the local Brisbane City Council, headed by Lord Mayoress, Sallyanne Atkinson and the MIAQ Executive.  The expertise within the book was to come from Solicitor, John Kenny, Agents, Recording Studios (QRA), Production specialists, Ray MacGuire and a host of industry people from in and around Brisbane.   Barry Bull owned and ran Toombul Music and had previously worked at CBS (before it came Sony) and we discussed vigorously about only printing a small run of 1000 books, however, Barry Bull, John Morris and Mick Privitera convinced us all that we should print 10,000 copies and sell at our annual Brisbane music show in late 1990.  The Brisbane City Council had funded the research (TA) for the book, but not the funds to print it.  At $2.50 a copy – this was a $25,000 investment that the MIAQ did not have at the time.

The book was titled – “IN TUNE ~ a young musicians guide to the music industry” and for a small booklet, it packed a lot of punch with the information about making a CD, playing gigs, marketing, business and putting on a great show.

We also decided that at the MIAQ Music Show event we would have some keynote speakers in a music speakers forum.  John Kenny invited Ritchie Yorke, who had been travelling in Canada and US with Led Zeppelin and John Lennon for the past 20 years, returning to work with the Courier Mail and some local street media.   Other speakers included Warner Chappell boss, John Bromell, Sebastion Chase, John Kenny and a host of other local music identities.

In 1990 there was a real buzz about the local independent music scene.  There were a few new bands starting to pull together some very unique sounds and the original scene was starting to rise above the underground and play in some more open spaces.  Bands like Love Child, Neighbourhood Unit, Bulldozer, Earwigs were all on the up and up.  A major driver was also the annual, Queensland Rock Awards, put on by Kev Wilmot and his team at the Australian Academy of Music.

So we ran the MIAQ show in 1990 and we had 16,000 people attend over three days.  It was an amazing feat for a Queensland music initiative.  No where in Australia were they pulling crowds of that magnitude to a music show.

Disaster did strike in  late 199o, when after the show, John Morris, Barry Bull and Mick Privitera all resigned from the MIAQ (Music Industry Association of Qld).   They had realised that the show did not raise the much needed funds for the booklet published, In Tune, and hence left before Xmas 1990, leaving the MIAQ in enormous debt (it was around $15,000 in the red).

In 1990 there was a band called Paris Texas, with frontman, Steve Kinney (now James) and a great band of musicians.  They had a young manager, Frank Montervede, who was hustling them to Friday’s (a night club) and other venues.  I had also met a drummer, Darren Clark, from a three piece band called, Russia Blue.   Darren and I got into a rave about the bad music agents in the city and introduced Darren to Frank.  Greg Shaw was running Shawthing Agencies and he wanted out to pursue management with Keith Urban.  As I had played in a band with Greg in the late ’70′s I introduced Darren and Frank to Greg and soon after they were the new Directors of a new agency in town, Shawthing Agency operating above Time Off building in Berwick Street, Fortitude Valley (also shared with Jacinta Brodgeest from Ausmusic).

We assembled a new executive committee for the MIAQ, with Geoffrey Schukraft as the new President and myself as Vice President.   Geoffrey had been in the US with Little River Band and the Nelson’s.  We struggled with getting the MIAQ back out of debt and had many meetings with government trying to keep it alive.

The business, Music Worx, was firing along nicely in the Valley and we had workshops and clinics every other week from visiting national and international musicians.  The scene was really in full swing, however, I am still surprised that Wickety Wak pulled two full nights at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre – and they had never written a song.  They were a band left over from the showbands that toured up and down the coast of Australia.   At this time, they had ten crew on the road and two semi trailers.  It was also the last show from them for a long while.

There was a new original  freshness in the air – and new bands were popping up all over the place.  Grunge had fired in Seattle in the late 80′s and now Brisbane was also grabbing hold of the new sound. The latest band to get signed to  major new label was Tainted Violets – and a new name change was in the wind.

More about their roller coaster ride in part six…  enjoy the journey.

In the shadows of all these national activities was the new emerging  national music body, AUSMUSIC.  We caught the attention of the CEO, Pete Steedman, who addressed an audience of over 400 musician and industry people in the Fortitude Valley pub, Dooley’s in 1989.  AUSMUSIC wanted to develop formal qualifications for sound technicians, artist managers, performers, artists and road crew.  As it stood in 1988 – 89, the “modern popular music industry” had minimal formal training opportunities for entrants and the information and “the business of music” was known by so few in Australia.  Those that had built their careers weren’t developing the next generation with good business skills (many were skilled in street smart skills only).

Australia, at that time in the late ’80′s, had some amazing exports in contemporary music: INXS, (with a USA number#1) AC/DC, Men at Work (USA number#1), Little River Band (LRB – many #1′s), Air Supply, Midnight Oil, and so many more, however, there was no proper infrastructure building and transferring the skills, knowledge and competencies as in other creative industries such as film, dance, design and classical music.

In Australia we invest billions annually in Sports development – but zero in “Popular Music” development.  The national government had invested in AUSMUSIC to fulfill this role at a cost of only $2million a year.   The Victoria State Government also set up a state music body, Vic Rock, in 1989, and invested $1mill a year.  It sounds big numbers.  But consider this was twenty one years ago – and the two million dollars nationally to assist producing more serious exports in Intellectual Property that can be reinvested back into the development grassroots communities (like in sports).

Almost every state government ran an orchestra, which costs tax payers approximately $6 – 10 million a year to fund (per state).  Orchestras create NO Intellectual Property – only the retention of employment for the retention of a cultural “European” heritage – a glorified cover band really.  It is about fair ‘equity” – and this has been out of balance for along time – and still remains a quandary.

So, to quickly recap the local Brisbane music industry landscape in September 1989 through my eyes ;

1. A new industry body was formed  – MIAQ – predominately music product retailers and recording studios.
2. Ausmusic had set up a local office – manned and run by Jacinta Brondgeest (local musician)
3. Music Worx (my new business) launched as a new innovative music store in Barry Parade, Fortitude Valley (two doors up from Mick Privitera’s ~ The Musicians Pro Shop)
4. A major public music show was about to be run ny the MIAQ at the RNA showgrounds in October 1989.
5. Robert Brock created an Industry Training Advisory Board (ITAB) for Q’ld Tafe (now called Southbank Institute of Technology) to assess the needs of the music industry.   The collection of people came from Musicians Union, Recording Studios, agents and the newly formed MIAQ. I was honoured to have a guernsey to be on that advisory board.
6. Triple J was being born as a national youth FM radio station
7. Triple Zed Fm Alternative Radio had been locked out of their studios at Uni Q and had related temporarily to Toowong.
8. Indecent Obsession were the keynote speakers at the new MIAQ Music show at the RNA showgrounds
9. December 1989 saw Wayne Goss (Labor Party) win the election from the corrupt National Government, who had held power in Q’ld since 1957 (Joh Bjelke-Peterson was Premier from 1968 – 1987 – forced to resign under investigation from the Fitzgerald Inquiry).
10. The old derelict Target building in the Fortitude Valley Chinese Mall, became a regular cost effective rehearsal space for Brisbane bands.
11. Livid was a new small music festival starting at the grounds of Garden’s Point, QUT in January 1989 – featuring Go-Betweens, Chris Bailey, Ups and Downs, Died Pretty and Great Caesar’s Ghost.

As Bob Dylan sang many years earlier, “The order is rapidly fadin’/ And the first one now/ Will later be last/ For the times they are a-changin’”.

For me and many others, 1989, was a very good year.  It was also the formation of Australia’s hottest new Brisbane  band, Powderfinger (although playing covers, they were far from being together enough to be on anyones radar yet).      Brisbane as a city had just finished the World Expo 88 hangover and was getting down to business.   A new government, the police force was being cleaned up and the Valley, predominately run by “mafia types”, was on the reform.

The MIAQ ran its first music show at the RNA Showgrounds and we managed to attract over 12,000 people.  There was a united buzz in the air.  We launched Music Worx and we set up a string of other tenanted businesses in the same building at 188 Barry Parade.   Road Worx – owned by Bruce Fogarty (building road cases and renting out band rooms for rehearsals), Rock Worx – owned by John Wiseman, Guitar teaching studio and later in 1990, Drum Worx – owned by Colin Barnes.   As a collaborative team we created the impression  that we were one larger entity.

AS 1990 kicked in a new decade (and the last for the century) – we shouted loud and proud on our stone washed t-shirts ~ 1990 THE YEAR OF THE WORX.

We had big plans and we were keen to roll them out to put Brisbane on the map.  Stay tuned for PART FIVE for how these plans rolled out.

So in late 1988, against the backdrop of the conclusion of Brisbane hosting the World Expo 88, and in the thick of the Fitzgerald Inquiry (looking into a corrupt Police Service and Government), we had our first meeting in Brisbane’s City Hall to a group of locally based (skeptical) music product retailers.  The Australian Music Trade Association (AMTA) had sent up their President, who was also the Director of Yamaha, Mr Philip Burn.

To a small audience of about 30 – 40  interested parties, Johnny Morris Senior, Philip Burn and myself, spoke about unifying and creating a voice for music retailers to help improve the “music world” for all parties to work together on joint activities and promote the benefits of people to play music – and hence this would help “grow a larger pie” for all concerned.  In hindsight, it was not broadly  inclusive of many other areas of the industry and hence by 1991 this model of “just music retailers” was just too narrow a view.  I am getting ahead of myself, so I will continue on.

In the audience were local retailers, John Masson (Masson’s Music), Stan, Paul and Fred Ellaway (Ellaways Music), Barry Bull (Toombul Music), Mick Privitera, Gary Barr (Musicians Pro Shop/Australian Concert Productions), and a host of  other local store owners, interested wholesale and music related people.  I was still managing the Music Junction and not a store owner at this time,  so I was seen as a junior by the older members standards (I was only 30 years of age and many of my peers were decades older and had been dominating the city for many years).

From this meeting, we met regularly over the next few months to plan and set up the MIAQ inc (Music Industry Association of Q’ld Incorporated).  The Executive Committee was formed, which saw Johnny Morris (President), Mick Privitera (Treasurer), Barry Bull (Secretary) and myself (Workshop Co-ordinater).  Our first major project, we decided, was to run a large public music show at the RNA (Ekka showgrounds) and it was booked and secured for late September 1989.  Not only was I seeing a great opportunity to start my own dream business, but by early 1988 saw Brash’s (who had taken Palings over the year prior) they were losing ground and the local music businesses, by pulling together, wanted to leave this southern owned national company out of any of their plans for growing the industry.  Maybe this was a parochial thing to do – but new management at Brash’s were not interested in the local Queensland market.

I had a dream.  It was about having my own music store.   I was 31 and was married nine years, had two kids, a mortgage, couldn’t seem to get ahead and we had another child on the way.  I had no money to speak of, as most of us know when raising a family, and in 1989, interest rates on home loans had risen to 18+%.  There was negative talk in the media about a thing called a “Recession” – it was at this time in 1989 I chose to never read a newspaper, watch news on TV (or little TV for that matter) and turn off the news on radio.  This has been something I have never regretted to this day, as it enabled for me to focus positive thoughts on how to solve problems and think creatively rather than be bombarded by negative news that really have little to do with me or my family.

So after chatting about the dream of starting a music store with no money with Don Morrison, a local sales rep from a wholesale music company, Electric Factory, he suggested I be introduced to a fellow bass player, store owner, Nigel Line, who had purchased “Smithy’s Secondhand PA and Sound Gear” a few years ago off Neil Smith.  I put a basic plan together of my ideas and had some chats to a few (only five) music distributors.  My simple logic at the time was that I had left Palings in early 1987 to Music Junction.  In a little over the twelve months I had managed the store, we had increased the turnover (sales) significantly (by 80%).  I had discussed with the Music Junction owner, Palmi, about possibly getting some % of profits and he, rightly so, declined.  So – I believed that if  we started a music retail store with only a few distributors then we could at least do $800,000 sales in the first year (sounds a lot – but I will explain breakdowns later).  I met Nigel, we clicked, he loved the idea, as he was not into selling new products, only secondhand and some small hiring of PA’s.  Nigel also agreed with the supplier list (Fender, Yamaha, Electric Factory, Pro Music and Australian Monitor), focusing only on guitars, bass, amplification, PA and sound gear.

So in August 1989, Nigel and I set up Music Worx Pty Ltd and I had my $1000 holiday pay invested (my only savings) and $3500 borrowed reluctantly from my “in-laws”.  (I was sacked on the spot by Palmi – which caused my wife enormous grief with a bay due in several months, as I told her then about my dream to improve our lot in life – so she hung in for the ride).

With our combined capital invested of $9000, we went looking for a store front.   Nigel had his store, Smithy’s, in a backstreet in Gotha Street, Fortitude Valley and a vacant spot was available at the front on Barry Parade.  We kept it very quiet about our idea and I had not mentioned a word to Mick Privitera (Musicians Pro Shop) who was, at that time, playing car pool with me after meetings with the MIAQ.  His business was well established, however, he had done some strange deal with the Electro-Voice sound gear at World Expo in 1988, and he had run up a large debt with Yamaha Music as well.  Yamaha were keen to deal with us and Mick only found out it all when, accidentally, a Yellow Pages advert confirmation letter to Music Worx for 188 Barry Parade had ended up at 222 Barry Parade, Mick’s business address.  Needless to say, Mick had  made some demands to us that we ignored (and laughed about) and within a few months Mick had sold Musicians Pro Shop fully to Gary Barr and Nigel Dwyer (the legendary bass player from The Smokin’ Crawdads).

So, prior to all this going down, we had built a strong connection across the active music businesses in Brisbane and charged them all up about the public music show.  A letter had arrived at a meeting  and was presented by the President of the Queensland Recording Association (QRA), Murry Werne, from a lawyer, John Kenny, who had arrived from Sydney and wanted to know how he could assist the QRA and the new MIAQ.  His specialty was Intellectual Property (IP) and he had a loyal friendship with music industry heavy weight, Sebastion Chase, who had not only previously managed Dragon, Cold Chisel and Rose Tattoo, he had also come out of a nasty bust up with INXS’ Manager, Chris Murphy, over an indie record label in Sydney called – rooArt.

The city was heating up, a new music body, MIAQ, (dominated by music product retailers and aligned with QRA), a huge music show, a new music store (Music Worx) and a lawyer who had southern contacts.  I had mentioned briefly about Robert Brock in part two.  Rob was well on the way with his “rock school” concept with government, connecting the dots with the Dean of Southern Cross University (then the University of New England), Lismore – Professor Clive Pascoe.  Prof. Pascoe had the vision to develop a University to upskill contemporary musicians.  He broke away from the Sydney Conservatorium (Jazz Course) and set up with the help of former players from a well known Sydney band, Crossfire.   Clive also recruited a strong industry support network that included the likes of John Farnham, John Brommell, Glenn Wheatley, Rob Hirst (Midnight Oil), Jimmy Barnes and a host of many of Australia’s icons.

This was a very interesting time in Brisbane’s music history.  In 1987, Molly Meldrum had signed a young Brisbane band, Indecent Obsession, who were very rarely spoken about in local circles, as they were a teen pop band.  John Kenny had represented them and had asked them up to take questions at our new music show.   They had a hit song nationally in the top ten, so they were the only Brisbane act, at this time, we collectively knew who could help lift the lid on the truth about being in the music industry.

It was at this time, whilst still working at the Music Junction, I met for the first time, Ian Haug, who bought a new amp from me, as he was forming a new band, doing Zeppelin and Neil Young covers.  They called the band, Powderfinger, named after a song written and recorded by Neil Young, and they were part of  a new movement of single minded young bands, a new breed, about to change history as we all knew it – a wind of change was coming and no-one on the outside could see it come together until another seven years later.

But we could all feel it….somehow we all knew a serious change was about to come.  It affected each of us differently, but the change we could all smell in the air……………and it had a good new fresh smell.

To be continued in Part FOUR.