The Lore of Synchronicity?

I stumbled on a great little podcast yesterday from a site named 'Lore' and the latest podcast was -
EPISODE 55: A WAY INSIDE
I found this site when it was recommended on a blog-post of Scarlet Ravenswood's.

Everything is Connected on The Web
Scarlet named 'Lore' as one of her six favourite podcasts.
And after listening to the above episode, and a few more recent ones afterwards, I can hear why Scarlet rates the show highly.
But there is synchronicity tied into this latest episode 'A WAY INSIDE', because I had just visited the Bee Gees WAY for the second time last Saturday afternoon (there will be a post on that coming soon) after first attending a talk and buying a book from the author about the Bee Gees titled 'Tragedy: The Sad Ballad of the Gibb Brothers'.

The free local council magazine where I
 found out about the Bee Gees talk

Jeff used to be the editor of the Australian 'Rolling Stone' magazine.
I had also written a post about visiting a Taoist temple and the Bee Gees Way in this post -
Something Strange Happened to Me on THE WAY out of a Taoist Temple

Jeff's book obviously takes its title from the Bee Gees' song of the same name, and Jeff told in the talk that while Barry had read the book, he wasn't real happy about the title.

I've never been a real big Bee Gees fan, but I have a weekend pass to this year's Byron Bay Bluesfest and was looking forward to seeing the last living Bee Gees member doing a show on Easter Monday, but Barry cancelled this show and his Australian tour.
Things were looking grim at Bluesfest for 2017, because Neil Young had only cancelled a short time before Barry, and Neil was someone I was really looking forward to seeing and hearing.

It was only after Barry had cancelled the Bluesfest gig that I decided that I should pay a visit to Redcliffe and check out the walkway the Redcliffe council had built to honour Redcliffe's favourite sons.
I've lived in Brisbane all my life ... well just outside it, but I couldn't remember the last time I ventured over the bridge to Redcliffe, it must have been a good 25 years, or more, so I thought I would make a day of it by taking in the Taoist temple on the way to Redcliffe.
The pun there being that the Tao is also known as 'The Way'.

The bridge that connects Redcliffe to Brisbane ...
but it's not the only WAY:-)

After I visited the Bee Gees Way I became very curious to the history of the Bee Gees, as I was fairly ignorant of their story, not being a real fan of their music, but hearing it while growing up on local Brisbane radio and TV.

Looking out the library window waiting for Jeff's 'Tragedy' talk to begin 

And as luck would have it, I just happened to read some junk mail (which I rarely do) that was in my letter box, which mentioned the author of a book about the Bee Gees was going to do a free talk at my local library, a library I had never set foot in before, since it had been built.
So, I planned to go to the talk, buy the book and then head out to Redcliffe again, have a meal at the 'Yabbey Road' fish & chip shop (because I'm a huge Beatles fan) and then see the light show when the sun set on the Bee Gees Way, as I didn't see it last time I was there.

The light show on Bee Gees Way last Saturday
 night (Fever?-) in Redcliffe

I have to say that the night show is nothing spectacular, but more about the light show in another future post soon.

There was a dead bird in the gutter outside
 the window, not a good sign maybe? 

How Many Birds?
I got to the library about half an hour early on Saturday and decided to grab a copy of Jeff's book before the talk began, so I had something to read while waiting, and lucky I did because it turned out they only had two copies of that book for sale on the day because of a supply mix up. 

Now here are where the synchronicities come into play between the podcast I listened to yesterday and the Bee Gees history that I've been reading up on.
The podcast is about tragic creepy stories from the city of Boston, Massachusetts and the word "Tragedy" is used quite a bit throughout the podcast.

And notice the word "way" in that pod-cast title?-)
EPISODE 55: A WAY INSIDE

""Massachusetts" is a song by the Bee Gees, released in 1967.

Written by Barry, Robin & Maurice Gibb.
Robin Gibb sang lead vocals on this song and it would become one of his staple songs to perform during concerts on both Bee Gees and his solo concerts. 
It later appeared on their 1968 album, Horizontal.

The song became the first of the group's five No. 1 hits in the UK, reached No. 1 in twelve other countries, peaked at No. 11 on the Billboard Hot 100 and eventually became one of the best-selling singles of all time, selling over five million copies worldwide.

When the brothers wrote the song, they had never been to Massachusetts.

In a UK television special on ITV in December 2011, it was voted third (behind "How Deep Is Your Love" and "You Win Again") in "The Nation's Favourite Bee Gees Song"."

"The song was written in the Regis Hotel, New York City during a tour of the United States. 
The song was intended as an antithesis to flower power anthems of the time such as "Let's Go to San Francisco" and "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)" in that the protagonist had been to San Francisco to join the hippies but was now homesick. 

The idea of the lights having gone out in Massachusetts was to suggest that everyone had gone to San Francisco."

Lyrics from the song 'Massachusetts'.
There's no place like home?

Ironically, reading the above passage from Wikipedia about the song 'Massachusetts', Byron Bay would be Australia's equivalent to San Francisco Hippie wise and Redcliffe would be an area like Australia's equivalent to Boston, as far as first settlements and conservatism goes, in a way.

Crow/Raven?

The Crow: Examining the Dark Side of Life
"Folklore is more than just a collection of stories; it’s the soul of a culture or location.

Without them, our world has less texture and beauty. 

But like the stories themselves, some places have spirits that creep in and take up residence."

"Lore: The learning and transmission of a cultural heritage."
What I like about the word "lore" is that it is a word very dear to my indigenous Australian friends.
"Law: Also known as Lore. Handed down by the Creation Ancestors and upheld by Aboriginal communities for thousands of generations, Law includes the accepted and traditionally patterned ways of behaving and shared understandings relating to land, language, ways of living, kinship, relationships and identity."

"The song was originally intended for The Seekers. 
Upon arriving in London from Australia (following in the path of the Seekers who had arrived several years earlier) the Bee Gees had been unsuccessful in getting the song to the group, so they recorded it themselves. 
During a chance meeting in London between the Seekers' lead singer Judith Durham and Maurice Gibb, Durham learned that "Massachusetts" was originally intended for her group and in 2003 the Seekers recorded the song as a tribute to Maurice following his death earlier that year. The Bee Gees had never actually been to Massachusetts when they recorded this; they just liked the sound of the name."
That was a personal WTF(?) moment for me reading that above passage from Wikipedia, as my mother insisted on a Seekers song (I'll Never Find Another You) for my father's funeral last year.
And weirdly my father passed away on September 13th last year and Redcliffe was founded on ... you guessed it ... September 13th, 1824.

Redcliffe's postcode is 4020 by the way;-)

Now here is something that I didn't know until after listening Aaron Mahnke's podcast, a podcast that opens with a story about Boston's subway railway line.
"We have never been there (Massachusetts)but we loved the word and there is always something magic about American place names. 

It only works with British names if you do it as a folk song.

Roger Whittaker did that with Durham Town." 

[Robin Gibb also recalled to The Mail on Sunday on 1 November 2009]: 

"This was a bittersweet victory. 

The day it went to number one it was Bonfire Night and I was in the Hither Green rail crash in Lewisham. 

Forty-nine people died and it was one of Britain's worst rail disasters.
"On 5 November 1967, a busy Sunday evening train service from Hastings to London Charing Cross derailed near the Hither Green maintenance depot in London, between Hither Green and Grove Park railway stations.
Of the twelve coaches, many full of standing passengers, eleven were derailed and four turned onto their sides, resulting in 49 fatalities and 78 people injured."

Luckily I didn't get injured. 

I remember sitting at the side of the carriage, watching the rain pour down, fireworks go off and blue lights of the ambulances whirring.

It was like something out of a Spielberg film.

I thought, at least there is one consolation, we have our first UK number one."

Now, I have a heap of blogposts that can branch off of this one like latticework connecting each one of them, as far as synchronicity goes and I'll write a few to show what I mean in upcoming posts, but I have to say now that prawns/shrimps have become a potent symbol in a lot of them.

See the "Prawn Day" ad next to Jeff in the magazine that promoted his "Tragedy" book/talk?

Prawn/Shrimp?

Roll Over Beethoven Chuck Berry has Died

Life is way stranger than fiction, I think.

Did Paul Hogan say shrimp in that You Tube above?-)

Share a plate of ... shrimp?-)

69, 2(0)17? Coincidence, or Just a Plate of Shrimp?

And on the subject of plates of shrimp, imagine a plate of shrimp that has been sitting in the sun for a few days and then watch the movie above (whatever you do try not to pay to watch it) and you'll find that they both really stink.

Coincidence?