Synchromysticism

" Synchromysticism:
The art of realizing meaningful coincidence in the seemingly mundane with mystical or esoteric significance."

- Jake Kotze

December 25, 2013

A Synchy Evening with Steve Kilbey

I had a great night out at Lefty's thanks to my Oklahoma friend  
Andrew West Griffin for alerting me to this gig of Steve Kilbey's.
Without Andrew mentioning this gig I would not have known until it was too late, so cheers to you Andrew for the heads up on the event.
Oh, and by the way, Andrew is a relative of the man who designed the layout of Australia's capital Canberrawhere Steve grew up and formed his band The Church.
Walter Burley Griffin (1912)
Steve Kilbey on stage at Lefty's
Music-hal
l in Brisbane
Those zebra mats Steve is standing on kept reminding me of the patterns coming out of the TV screen of an opening to the Dr. Who TV show.
Another thing that struck me about Lefty's Music Hall was all the chandeliers all over the roof, which gave it a very Donnie Darko type feel to the evening, remembering that Steve wrote and sung a song which was used in that movie, Under the Milky Way Tonight
And who can forget the scene where the chandelier is seen rocking back and forth after the engine plunges through Donnie's roof in its bid to kill him?
Lefty's Music Hall with the
chandeliers on the roof
Weirdly, a day or two after Steve's show at Lefty's, the chandler on the roof of the Apollo Theatre in London would fall from the roof injuring a whole heap of theatre goers.
The Apollo Theatre in London
"On 19 December 2013, at about 20:15 GMT (8:15 pm), 10 square metres (110 sq ft) of the auditorium's ornate plasterwork ceiling collapsed around 40 minutes into a performance of  
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
It brought down a lighting rig and a section of balcony,thereby trapping 2 people and injuring around 88, including 7 seriously. 
There were 720 people in the audience at the time."
Apollo Theatre
8:15?
Lefty's had a very Twin Peaks feel to it as well, as there were deer heads and stuffed bears on the walls.
In fact, there were four deer heads right behind the stage area.
We're not going to talk about Judy Boone:
  
Christopher's mother
Steve also sung a cover of a Lou Reed song with the word "zebra" in the lyrics.
And Lefty's used to be 'The Velvet Cigar' strip club.
Signs from 'The Velvet Cigar' still hang
in the Men's room of
Lefty's.
There were also mirrors all over the place at Lefty's.
The massive mirror running down Lefty's sidewall
Another view of the big mirror at Lefty's Music Hall
A banana on The Church's DVD cover?
A banana on The Velvet Underground's album?
"I'll Be Your Mirror" is a song by The Velvet Underground
It appeared on their 1967 debut album The Velvet Underground & Nico
It also surfaced as a single a year earlier with 
"All Tomorrow's Parties" in 1966.
Lou Reed wrote the song for Nico, who provides lead vocals. 
Inspiration for the song apparently came about after Nico approached Reed after a show in 1965 saying,
"Oh Lou, I'll be your mirror."
The song is a favorite of Reed's and The Velvet Underground & Nico engineer, Norman Dolph."
I'll Be Your Mirror
On the subject of the Lou syncs, Steve made a remark about playing in an old strip club while Bon Jovi was literally playing to a packed stadium up the road from Lefty's Music Hall.
Oddly enough, the ring tone on the cell phone I took all the pictures above at Lefty's on the night has Bon Jovi singing Living on a Prayer
I placed it on there as my theme song, as I was working at IKEA at the time and felt everyday working there was like living on a prayer just to get by, pay off my mortgage and make ends meet.
The pay is peanuts at this place, not bananas;-)

The Andy Dick Show – 

10-16-13

Doesn't Steve have a poetry
book called
Fruit Machine?
Most of these song titles could refer
 to the IKEA monkey, I think.
Steve also remarked that his twin daughters were playing in stadiums in Norway and Sweden while he was now playing in small venues like Lefty's.
Their band's name is Say Lou Lou (Lou Reed?).
Say Lou Lou on stage
Steve's daughter's band Say Lou Lou
"Say Lou Lou are a twin sister musical duo hailing from both Australia and Sweden.
Considered Dream pop or Dream Wave, they released their first single in 2012 before forming their own record label, à Deux, in 2013."
Say Lou Lou On Debut Album, Scoring a Breakout Hit with a B-Side
"Whether you're in Stockholm or Sydney (or Brisbane;-),
"Fool of Me," which features Australian vocalist Chet Faker, is one of the more quietly devastating songs released so far this year. 
Released earlier this month as a b-side on the vinyl release to
Say Lou Lou's single "Julian," "Fool of Me" has garnered 123,000 Soundcloud plays in two weeks, and has been highlighted on Pitchfork, Idolator and MTV Buzzworthy as a potential breakout song for the duo.
"We're overwhelmed," says Kilbey of the response to the song. 
"For us, it was always an amazing track and it felt very intimate, but in our view it was something to complement 'Julian.' 
We didn't plan for it, and we didn't even hope for it, to have that kind of reception.""
https://soundcloud.com/sayloulou/fool-of-me-feat-chet-faker
"Fool of Me" has garnered 123,000 Soundcloud plays in
two weeks, and has been highlighted on Pitchfork, Idolator
and MTV Buzzworthy as a potential breakout
song for 'Say Lou Lou'.
Fool of Me?
Steve on stage with new Church guitarist Ian Haug
"The Church frontman Steve Kilbey has taken to his  
official Facebook page to announce that his band have begun 
recording a new album as The Church, and to announce the addition of former Powderfinger guitarist Ian Haug to the band, replacing the unavailable Marty Willson-Piper.
“This has been hard to broach,” opens Kilbey
“This is the simple truth. Marty was/is unavailable. After having secured the funds to make a new Church record, Marty was not available…
So I asked Ian Haug from Powderfinger if he would like to play on this record and do the subsequent tour.”"
The Church Announce Addition of Powderfinger Guitarist For New Album
420 pages?
42?
Steve reading from his book Uncollected.
"Once upon a time Steve Kilbey lived in Mansfield St, Rozelle (Sydney Australia) in an old terrace house. 
It was 1986, he would sit around in his kitchen banging out poetry. 
He wanted a poetry book because that's what pop-stars did that had done everything else, they released a poetry book or two. 
Dylan, Bolan, Lennon... if it was good enough for them then it was good enough for him. 
Steve Kilbey - Musician, painter, writer, poet, sage, dispenser of arcane wisdom, and much loved national treasure. 
A songwriter of many musical tongues, from the sprawling guitar thunderstorms of his band 'The Church', to the opiated dronescapes and psychedelic vision of his solo recordings and paintings. 
Kilbey can only be referred to as a polymath; a modern-day renaissance man, a consummate musician and hitmaker. 
His fans have been treated to an unrivalled catalogue of material for over 33 years.'
The Time Being' brings you 'Uncollected' by Steve Kilbey. 
A deluxe edition of his books - Earthed, The Ephemeron, Nineveh, Fruit Machine and other selected works, all in one neat and tidy volume."  
‘Uncollected’ poetry book 
Bit of a personal sync for me in the above paragraph with Steve living at Mansfield Street, as my high school was Mansfield State High.

Songs From The Real World – Kilbey/Kennedy.

Written and recorded by Steve Kilbey and Martin Kennedy. Additional instrumentation on ‘More of the Same’ by David Spall. Album artwork by Steve R Dodd. Many thanks to all our commissioners. Special thanks to Steve R Dodd and Kay Smith
Tracklist
1. For All We Lack
2. Naomi And Maya
3. A Short Song About Eternity
4. Tomoko
5. A Song For Kris
6. Emerald Lake
7. Lucy
8. Holly
9. Transformation
10. Life’s Sweet Decay
11. Anastasia And Jens
12.Michou
13. Elly
14. My One
15. More Of The Same
Here's another personal sync for me involving "Lack".
When I was working at IKEA (at the old Springwood store) 
Bernard Fanning, the lead singer of  
Powderfinger came into the store with his then 
girlfriend/partner and bought a "Lack" bookcase for his home.
Some of the guys working with me asked him to sign a few IKEA catalogues, so they could give them to their friends and family.
Another sync for me was the song Anastasia And Jens, as my grandmother's brother was a World War II hero and his first name was Jens, but he dropped his first name and went under his second name Frank.
My grandmother had his medals in a draw and sometimes as a kid I would take them out and look at them like the kid in the movie The Wall does.
Frank was still alive at the time I was a kid, but he shunned anything to do with the war when he returned and gave his medals to my grandmother to keep for some reason.
When he died in 1991 grandma returned his medals to his sons to keep.
He was a big hero in Italy, but hardly recognized in his own country Australia.
Although I'm told there is something down in the
Australian War Memorial in Canberra about him.
Well for me "An Evening with Steve Kilbey" was money and time well spent, and oddly enough, my next big day out is to the Woodford Folkfest to see a number of my favourite musos,
http://woodfordia.realviewtechnologies.com/?xml=Woodfordia_Folk_FestivalV3&iid=82660#folio=108
but guess who is headlining the day
Julian Marley.
I'll be doing a photo blog on that day too, if everything goes to plan.
Stay tuned.

UPDATE: 29/12/2013
The Apollo theatre roof in London would collapse not too many moons after Lou passed away and he sung about the Apollo in his big hit. 
"Sugar plum fairy came and hit the streets
Lookin' for soul food and a place to eat
Went to the Apollo, you should've seen 'em go go go
They said, 'Hey sugar, take a walk on the wild side'
I said, 'Hey babe, take a walk on the wild side'
Alright, huh."

42 Minutes: Episode 116: Trish and Rob MacGregor


12.24.13 Episode 116: Trish and Rob MacGregor
 . . . Chapter 6 of The Sync Book Vol. 2
The Synchronicity Highway
Visit: SynchroSecrets.com/SynchroSecrets
Topics: Aliens in the Backyard, Mars, Christmas, Grays, "Skin Suits", Santa Claus, Joseph McMoneagle, Whitley Strieber, "Trickster Sync", Xperiencers & Scrooge.

Purchase Aliens in the Backyard - UFOs, Abductions, and Synchronicity 
Purchase The Synchronicity Highway 
500 Things You Have to Do Once in a Lifetime?
A Deck Full of Jokers???

December 17, 2013

Nothing is Impossible

Matthew Manning posted this image above on the 13th December 
(Black Friday) on his Facebook page
 https://www.facebook.com/pages/Matthew-Manning-UK-Healer/311782348866547
 then the next day (December 14th) Peter O'Toole passes away.
Peter also played Robinson Crusoe in the movie Man Friday.

December 11, 2013

Mt. Thompson: The Place Beyond the Pines?

Mt. Thompson Memorial Gardens
I was reading Chuck Palahniuk's book Fugitives and Refugees
and he wrote about spending a lot of time hanging around this place in Portland -
Wilhelm’s Portland Memorial
and writing his book Survivor.
So, I decided to head up to my local crematorium with my camera and take some photos of the grounds that I have spent many a sad day in, and no doubt will again soon ... hopefully not for my final visit though;-)
This place is kind of like Hollywood for the dead, with its long palm tree lined driveway up to where the final act is performed, if you happen to be the star of the show on the day.
Luckily it was a day of rest around here, being a Sunday, but for the permanent residents everyday must feel like a Sunday to them.
 There are two chapels in the grounds, but this is the one I've spent most of my time in farewelling ... mainly family members who have passed on.
The last one here was my father-in-law's funeral about three years ago.
I still remember those glass doors above slamming shut in dramatic style right at the end of my wife's grandfather's funeral when a storm developed coming from the direction of the hospital he had died in and ended exactly when his service ended.
As soon as we got outside there was no trace of the storm clouds in the sky.
It was a truly weird experience indeed.
The other chapel is the West Chapel.
The West Chapel does seem to have a more religious quality to it.
 And the roof pattern on the West Chapel roof is rather trippy with all of those octagons.
And this side piece to the West Chapel reminded me of all the lattice work on the 'Tommy' album cover.
British director Ken Russell attends the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) at the 35th Anniversary of the Who's "Tommy" on May 21, 2010, in Beverly Hills, California. 
The Oscar-nominated director died in his sleep at the age of 84.  
Ken Russell poses with Tommy album
A scene from the movie Tommy
As far as octagons go, they are everywhere around here.
... and gazebos
Octagons as gazebos?
I personally liked all the pinecones lying around, because to me pinecones represent the Pineal gland in the brain, which is linked to cosmic experiences between the body and the universe.
And there are plenty of places to sit down and reflect on life, before your brain is turned to ash and interned with all the other stars who had their day of fame here before becoming just one more brick in the wall.
It's a great place to explore on the weekend, when no funerals are taking place and you have the whole place to yourself ... and who knows Chuck, I might just write a more popular novel than Fight Club or Survivor from within these grounds ... and I will be very well aware of deadlines in this place, as well;-)

UPDATE: March 16th, 2017
My father was cremated here in September 2016.
The Poinciana tree at Mt. Thompson
The weird thing though when I read this post in hindsight is that the day I took all of the above photos I had parked my old car under a poinciana tree and my father's ashes were scattered under the poinciana tree in the family backyard at my mum's house, because the crematorium wanted something like $3000 to place his ashes there after already forking out over $5000 for the service.
My old car and the Poinciana tree at Mt. Thompson in 2013
'Australian Christmas Tree' by Frieda Hughes 
Frieda Hughes and the Shamanic Spirit of Art?
The Poinciana tree in my mother's backyard
 where
my father's ashes were placed
My father grew that tree from a seed pod he found at Cleveland on Brisbane's bay-side of town.