it's like being in love
ordering up big at the Press Club
and doing a runner

it's like when your car breaks down
and it's stinking hot
and your shoes are melting into the road
and there's a clear lake nearby
and it distracts you
it calls to you
and you abandon your car
and you walk into the water fully clothed
and there are fish swimming through your legs
and you never remember that your car broke down
or where you left it 

it's like that famous joke
why did the chicken cross the road?
and you begin to think it was never to get to the other side
it was to get to the middle
it's like getting to the middle
and realising it's good enough

it's like that reoccurring dream i had when i was young
owning an expensive car
and just leaving parked in the middle of peak hour traffic
and walking away

it's like that Carlton Draught competition
where you drop a car out of a moving plane
and if you hit the target you win $100,000
but at the last minute
something tells you
that throwing the band out of the plane
would be more appropriate

it's like when you get to the end of tomato season
and your plants are all shriveled and dead  
and you chop your plants up
and mix them back into the earth
cause those dead tomatoes
are going to help something else grow up big and strong
probably the broad beans

to be honest
i don't know why it's the last show
it's like you have to grow up and leave home eventually
and this band has always been like a family to me
a family that just argued over the dinner table most nights
the food we served up was top notch
but we still enjoyed throwing it at each other

winter comes
you can't hold it back
you can't keep wearing your shorts and singlet through winter
or you get pneumonia
and you die

it's like that Powerful Owl
living in the Flagstaff Gardens at the moment
standing 80cm tall
with his eyes the colour of corn yellow
and silently ripping the heads off possums
in the dead of night
the lucky possums never really fully understanding
where their brothers got to  

in the coming months
in the coming years
martin martini and the bone palace orchestra
will be like those possums
taken in the dead of night
by a Powerful Owl
and dropped off in Band Heaven
where we will be waiting for you all to join us once more

you have our records
dance in your kitchens
open your ovens up in wintertime
and dance 
when we are gone

i don't think it's sad
it's nature
we are all temporary
every little thing
we've all taken our numbers
we are all laughing
we took time in our pockets and spent it well 
see you at the funeral 

    
 









 

1 - When your manager is broke and has decided he's going to dress up as the Easter Bunny for 20 dollars an hour and walk around shopping centres - you accidentally overhear a phone conversation with him arguing with some booking agent about whether or not the Easter Bunny can speak - For the record our manager believes the Easter Bunny don't speak

2 - When an audience member decides it's ok to grab a microphone off the stage during your set and give the band feedback on their dress sense(this happened to the Bison at Joe's Waterhole in Eumandi on the weekend -the lady said that the way the Bison dressed was disgusting - the later part was caught on camera - here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KK9UYBeFbro ) later followed by a band meeting in the van on whether the band is ugly or not -conclusion - we are an ugly band

3 - When you spend more money than you have - When you spend more money than you make - When you realise you could have bought a house by now but you are an ugly band -the re-occurring image - an old man with one arm in the middle of the woods it's snowing and he's chopping down a 200 year old oak with a blunt axe -and Jules Pascoe comments from the back of the van -can you imagine how strong his arm will be when he is done -

martin martini

I’ve never been a great runner
I’ve never been good at running
When I was young my parents thought there was something wrong with me because of the way I ran
When I was eight or nine I remember running at school sports and my parents would say
Martin you don’t look comfortable when you run
Martin you run differently from all the other children
Martin you look uncoordinated
This was highlighted by my earliest running memory
I was running a 1500meter race at a school sports day
My cousin Nick Pistikakis a spectator and much older than me
for some reason I find him running along side of me yelling out absurdities such as
Run you bloody idiot
Run like Nick
You’re weak
Run like your fucking cousin Nick
Do you want to be tough like Nick or do you want to be a girl?
Back then I guess I wanted to be tough like Nick
I managed to go from last to third last in the last 500meters of the race only to find out that I had been disqualified at the finishline because of my cousin Nick Pistikakis running along side of me throwing off the other competitors

I don't know when I stopped running
It was probably around the age of 14 when it stopped being compulsory at school to do sport
Since then I have done my fair share of smoking and drinking and what not and when times arise in my life when I have had to run (for the bus or the train) two things happen
One my body hurts and my lungs don’t work very well
and secondly I am transported back in time to that day on the oval with Nick Pistikakis

I am turning 30 this year and over the summer I was drawn to reading Haruki Murakami’s novel/memoir What I talk about when I talk about running
Sam Dunscombe describes Murakami as the Tarantino of literature
and in case you were wondering this is not a compliment
Surprisingly I enjoyed reading his book alot
I found it very meditative

Murakami sold his famous jazz bar in Japan to become a writer
All his friends thought he was crazy
He had never written before and the club was making serious money
In his book he talks about how he loves the loneliness of long distance running and how he finds it is important to be physically fit in order to be mentally fit in order to be fit enough to write novels and not rely on or fall back on natural talent

He runs most days of the week and at least one marathon a year which is like 40 something kms without stopping
After finishing his book I came to the conclusion that I am not a fit writer or a fit runner
I start to think immediately of Nick Cave’s 9am – 5pm writing regime
And I say out loud to myself whilst alone
I am a lazy writer and
I am lazy runner

So at age 29 I go out and buy my first pair of professional running shoes
And I decide to take up running before it’s all too late

My first week of attempts
which I think is the best way to describe them
as attempts
were not exactly gold
I made it to the corner shop where i had to rest before I turned around and went back home
The turn around trip ended up being about 1500meters which was what I ran at aged 14 back at school and it still hurt like I remembered it

As the weeks went on I increased the distance I was running and the time I was running started to decrease
I found out the importance of breathing in through the nose and out through the mouth
You can tell a new runner by the way he breathes or the lack of his or her breathing
I was running better than I have ever run in my life
I was running past other runners and I had enough lung power to say hello to them whilst I was still running
I was running 6 days on 1 day off
Everything was fantastic
I was a runner
Uncoordinated said my mother
But I was still runner

On top of this I would get insults and horn toots by passing drivers
Cause my running get up was a little strange
I haven’t owned a pair of shorts for along time – so I stole a pair of dads white 70’s short shorts and I found myself a great sun cap with a propeller coming out of the top –
this made me feel like a human helicopter and in my head it made me run faster

So I hit my first brick wall when I met this crazy Phd student who just knocked me out
I just couldn’t get out of bed and I didn’t want sleep
She was like – Honey why do you run?
And I was like - Men have been running since the dawn time
And she’s like - Women have been running from men since the dawn of time until man invented high heels and that was that
Anyway to cut along story short she was the 2nd woman to break my heart and she stopped me running for a week or two somewhere in the middle of it all

But then dad told me about Cliff Young
And if you don’t know about Cliff Young
You don’t know what it’s like to run
Cliff Young was a 61 year old potato farmer who owned a sheep ranch with a head of 2000 sheep on 2000 acres
Now Cliff couldn't afford horses or 4wd’s so he use play sheep dog and round up his sheep on foot alone and he had no teeth
This would sometimes take him 2 days and 2 nights without sleep
And he would just do it in his overalls and gumboots
No one told him he was crazy
He just went these are my fucking sheep and I am going to round them up
Cliff Young literally opens the toilet seat and puts Forest Gump deep in the bowl as far as I’m concerned
Now in 1983 Cliff Young turns up to compete in the Sydney to Melbourne Marathon which mind you is 875km long
It’s actually the closest definition to madness that I have come across
Let get some men together and run 875 fucking kilometres
Now World Class Athletes mostly under 30 years old come from all over the world to compete in this race each year with their coaches and their expensive shoes and their clothing
brands and the prize money
So when they see 61 year old Cliff Young in his gumboots they all think its some kind of joke until they see Cliff at the starting line and everyone is like who does this guy think he is with his gumboots and no teeth
He’s gonna die running this race
This is madness
But cliff just wanted to run
In the same way that people like you and me just want to sleep

So the race started and all the young competitors did what the hare did
In the famous story they raced ahead of the old man and he was left behind and forgotten in their dust
But Cliff didn’t care he just shuffled along
He had a very unconventional style of running more like a shuffle than a proper run
Now the race normally took around 7 or 8 days
And the runners would sleep for a few hours every night to save their energy and to get much needed rest
But Cliff was use to rounding up his 2000 sheep in storms without sleeping
So Cliff didn't actually sleep at all for the first 2 days
And by the end of the race he over took all the young hares and the tortoise
Cliff Young won the race and broke the record by a day or two all he really thought about was sheep
He won 10 grand and gave the money to the other competitors claiming he wasn’t in it for the money
Anyway you get the picture Cliff Young was responsible for getting me out of bed for a week or two there also
So before I realised It i was back on the bitumen running like a pro

The next brick wall was that series of 40 degree days just before the fires broke out and took the people with them
I only left the house once and that was to see Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler

I am sure you have all tried to run at some point in your life
The most recent event that has stopped me from running is this fat woman who has started to turn up on my daily runs
She’s always there on the same corner everyday and she’s big
Really big
But it’s like someone has actually put her there for me
And she’s there with this old ice cream container in her hands
And every time I pass she stops me
And she’s says – SNACK BREAK – and I look into her icecream tub
Like I am looking deep into my own reflection in the bottom of a river
And there in the bottom of the blue ice cream container are fresh organic cherry tomatoes
And she gives me a handful
And she says – They’re for you and they’re from my garden -
and I thank her and run off
and this happens most days
And as I run off I think of that happy fat woman with her tomatoes who doesn’t run
And I wonder what all this running is really about
What is this world really about
I miss that girls legs
I miss that girls lips
I miss that girls laugh
It’s so funny running

I’ve been trying to grow tomatoes this summer and they don’t look anything like that fat ladies tomatoes
They look nothing like I imagined they would
And my body looks nothing like I imagined it would after all this running
This running away or running towards death

martin martini

for some reason we are sitting around with an american girl in london having breakfast

she wont stop talking

no breaks

here is some of what is coming out


i love making bacon muffins

i hate ham

bacon is so much better

the next time i brush my teeth will you play the ukelele for me?

did you see the new ipods

they are like super crazy

they will choose music for you

like sad songs on saturdays

i dont know what i listen to on saturdays



there is silence here

i hear a rubbish truck out on the street

a bird flys into the window and falls to the ground

i wonder for a moment if this american is a bird killer?


shes talking again now

do you wax your moustache

you should try it with wax

some people use gel which is dumb

i had a moustache party a month ago

i consider all things indi

cause it makes things less difficult

what do you australians listen to?

besides digeridoos?


bison responds: mainly american music


i tell really boring stories

which is really bad if you guys need to concentrate



oh and one other thing about my ipod is

its so old it doesnt turn off any more

which is really funny

computer off!

 

mm

a small bed time scene between Martin Martini and Jules Pascoe

the setting ( it is late at night at the piccadilly backpackers)

JULES - i guess its thats time, better go shine up the sharpies

MARTIN - fuck that man - Coltrane wouldn't clean his teeth after a gig

JULES - yeah fuck that - Monk wouldn't clean his teeth after a gig

( jules falls back into his shitty single bunk bed colgate free - )

we arrived in london/soho two days ago

bison arrived with one set of clothes and 3 socks - note not 3 pairs but 3 socks

jules has also run out of socks

natasha rose has a new nick name - 'bug fingers' - 5 am yesturday morning she woke up and got rushed to hospital after being attacked by killer bed bugs - she is in a stable condition but cant stop scratching

bug fingers cause her fingers are covered in bug bites - also because when the bugs come you cant stop the bugs - reference to the way she moves her fingers across the frets - like bugs

bison befriends homeless man - shares his whisky

homeless man quote - you don't need a B.M.W to ride a pussy

also found out where the saying- To Freeze to Death comes from -
old world europe - popular suicide method - take a bottle of whisky and blanket into the mountains of snow - drink til you fall asleep/pass out - and freeze to death - a beautiful way to kill yourself i would think

more later

m.m

i'm not mentioning names
cause i value my life
and yes it's true i am more attracted to woman who are good at shouting as opposed to shopping
but a stalker is a different beast
a stalker is like a weed
or those crawlers
they can grow without dirt or sunlight
they come up from the pavement
out of the cracks of bricks
hell i've got one coming out of my wooden kitchen bench top

you see you have two options with the stalker
1)ignore the stalker
2)love the stalker
if you ignore the stalker you're pretty much dead
i mean you can't ignore someone who see's your show in every state
you can't ignore someone who becomes the show more than the show itself
you can't focus on eating when your stalker wants to eat with you
as nick cave once put it 'if you gonna dine with them cannibals, sooner or later you're gonna get eaten'
either way you're going to get knifed on stage at some point -
the securit's just not that good
you just gotta hope that one of the horn players see's her running
or loves you enough to stop her running
i figure i aint got a chance there

so option 2 - Love the stalker is the safer option
bring her into your home
give her your number
give her the bootlegs
give her the pictures
but along with this put up with the 3am phone calls
the 'i came all the way from the otherside of the planet-you should feel so special' and the threatening to kill themselves if you don't visit them while they are in town
cause obviously you actually have nothing better to do

so it's best to love your stalker
and you hope she will keep a good head on her sholders
not your head
and you hope she'll discover 'Little Red'or Josh Pyke really soon -
and you hope that she'll die of some disease that's very quick
some disease that comes in the night like a lame ghost
a disease that you can't see coming
a......
actually thats really wrong
i am wrong here
option 2 is fucked
it's not going swimmingly
so lets go with option 1
option 1 is the best

or pray that her husband stops letting her come to gigs
or locks her in the basement
or start to build one


martin martini

2 things happened in tasmania

we discovered that the bison can't look after his money
you see on tour we get 30 dollars each a day
to buy things like coffee and sandwiches
but the bison spends his money on c.d's and then doesn't eat for two days
he scabs beer and cigarettes from the audience at shows
but generally speaking he isn't eating well and the band is a little concerned

you see when he's on stage we don't actually know if he is actually there
i mean we see him
but sometimes we look over and we don't see him
his body is just bones
and weird skin
he turns side on and he's gone
i don't know where the notes come from
he's been reading far to much henry miller
and we are all scared he is going to die
so we decided

that Mr Arron Light on the drums is now in control of the bisons funds
the bison will have to ask the light for his money
Q: arron can i buy this c.d
A: no you need breakfast
A: here is 4dollars for breakfast
and so the bison will only be able to eat
and only eat with his 30 dollars
but ladies he is a machine
a walking intestine that will smell you out
and he will soon grow to be a man

the other thing about tasmania
there is a man there with a tattoo on his cock
i know this cause i met him
he came up to me in the second set and presented his penis to me
it was hard to remember the lyrics to my songs when this happened
it was hard to focus on anything but the cock in hand
i was the only one that seemed to notice this
so i questioned me sanity til after the show

when he corners me and tells me his story
now this guy is big and you get the feeling he might take a swing at you if you don't laugh at his story - so i laugh in the appropriate pauses

it turns out he met Chantelle
married her
tattooed her name up his cock
for it was true love
then he left her cause she was a bad root
which i think means she left him cause he use to beat her up
anyway he says proudly i turned all the letters into 8's
now i have ten 8'S up my cock
i did it myself with a gun
and i couldn't piss for 4 weeks -

i realised later that chantelle is a 9 letter name
so he must have added an eight
or he can't count

a friend of mine this morning - Mr Eddie Perfect pointed out you can't fuck a Susan with Chantelle cock - which i think is very true
imagine how Susan would feel with Chantelle in there

so let that be a lesson to you all

ladies and gentlemen i give you tasmania

martin martini

Nash Lee doesn't like flying
its the planes it makes him nervous
so if you want to see Nash Lee play the guitar
i heavily suggest you fly
sell your house
sell your kids if you have to
get to melbourne
it's something that everyone should do at least twice before they die
so he didn't make it on tour
Tash Rose stepped into his shoes
i will say this
she's 18
she cut Eyeball Sam's hair off before the Vanguard show on Sunday
and we all love her
she is tax free dynamite

on tour i have been reading 'Finding God through sex'
the band is suspicious
a beautiful Melbourne woman gave me the book to read
and you really can't say no to a woman who does kungfu twice a week
she nearly cut me in two at the piano last night
so i am reading it
if i find God i'm going to
cook him PIG JOWL

We played our second show at the Bald Faced Stag
last time we played there was around 6 months ago
the place is a dive
the same tap that was running last time is still running
i don't know what kind of business they're running but its not right
the show got filmed by some rednecks for some program on foxtel
these three guys were very high and very drunk on Scorpion Mezcal Tequila
they were running across the front of the stage filming only our feet
i can officially say we are not going back
the highlight of the show was some crazy man in the audience
who was a professional hand dancer
he just moved his hands alot
keep an eye out on the facebook for video of this man dancing with his crazy hands
we were also short of beds at the Bald faced Stag
so we made our new manager sleep outside in van

note
when hiring a tour van check its dimensions
you don't want to get stuck in an underground car park in Sydney

in Newcastle we played at the lass O'Gowrie Hotel
very similar to the Rainbow Hotel in Melbourne
except they had a cat living in the pub
like it was the cats house
and his hair was all over the joint
and if you read the last blog
you know how i get
so the balls were big and we are not going back there either

The Vanguard went well
Our new manager is fluent in Japanese
so we made him get up and sing 'Monkeys and Cheese' in Japanese
if you ever get to experience Bone Palace material sung in Japanese you wont be sorry
very fucking strange
actually i'd go as far as saying
better than finding God through Sex

i am in bed listening to Thelonious Monk
the band have just finished recording the new album
we have no title yet
actually we have many titles but none of them fit like a glove
the next door neighbours cat is always at my window when i play Monk
i never see him unless i am playing Monk
when it’s raining he can even hear Monk
so he sits on at the window and sings
he is never there when i play classical music or pirate ballads or sea chanteys
just monk
(the man who didn’t fit in) the misunderstood jazz pianist
the cat has taste
i like the cat
as long as he doesn’t touch me
or come near me
you see i am allergic to cats and dogs and horses
mainly cats
if i go into a room where a cat has been
my breath disappears and my testicals grow like that of an elephant
most of the time this is not a great thing
once in awhile it works in my favour
but most of the time i fall ill
and can’t get out of bed
so i don’t like cats
only cats that listen to Thelonious Monk
outside of my room and far away someplace else

we broke alot of equipment during the recording
nashua lee - at the end of drank all my money away set an old
1950’s movie speaker on fire - you can hear this at the end of the track
it sounds beautiful
the bison - was playing basketball in the studio and broke a very expensive vintage ribbon microphone - all of a sudden the recording is going to cost alot of money

we seem to have covered all song types
1 - man verses himself
2 - man verses woman
3 - man verses society
4 - man verses nature
5 - man verses machine
and my favourite
6 - man verses god

we had a little help from Tamil Rogeon from True Live on i caught jesus sleepin in
we ate burgers all week at Dannys
we felt like americans
we felt free
we only nearly killed eachother once
during money in the hole the light wasn’t happy with my timing

my timing isn’t good
i’ve never been a fan of timing
Captain Beefheart never had good timing

The Dog left the band a coouple of weeks before the recoding
so sadly you won’t hear his aboriginal sounds on this one
you can visit him down at the very clean
vey airconditioned Hydra Studios in Burwood though
if you want to find out why he no longer plays with the band?
we all miss the Dog
Jules Pascoe entered on Upright and Electric Bass
Jules is like the mother of the world
he makes you feel like a million stolen dollars
all shiny
even if you haven’t eaten and you smell like burgers

Eyeball Sam spent alot of time either on his back spitting water into his clarinet or high up on chairs balancing whilst playing the clarinet
he sounds amazing

the last album we recorded we had no idea what the songs sounded like
they were like like one-night stands
this album sounds like a really long drawn out relationship with a chain-saw

we put the final touches on it in a week or so
and you should have it in your hands sometime late July
if all goes to plan with another one on the way later this year/early next

martin martini