RETRO BLOG: BINDI IRWIN SPECIAL

Bindi Irwin Apocalypse Jam

We are into the last two days of band recording and it’s time to try a new composition i’ve been working on entitled ‘ Bindi Irwin Undersea Apocalypse Jam’.
I’ve always been a fan of underwater theme songs and underwater tv shows. ‘The Man from Atlantis’ blew my mind as i’d sit in our hot tv room in Port Lincoln as a young lad.

That show was a long way from the desert of 1970′s  South Australia, even tho it was a fishing town i was in. That Port Lincoln house provided the earliest dreams i can remember, particularly this one where cows would climb in through my window, stand up on their hind legs. wrap their forelegs around me and squeeze  milk out of me. I would wake up screaming.
What does that mean? Is it Freudian? Any dream analysts feel free to write in.
But i digress…..
my favourite underwater song of all time is Jimi Hendrix’s “1983…a Merman i shall turn to be”. In this epic tune Jimi runs ‘away from a world that’s battered and torn’ to the sea where he lives out his days in safety. The imagery is just the right side of hippie coz 60′s or not, Jimi was a righteous motherfucker and funny too.
Octopus’s Garden by the Beatles is another significant underwater tune for me too. it’s hard to overstate how great Beatles records  are when your a kid . Even stuff like ‘Obli DI Obli Da’ is magical until you hit 12 or 13. Thats why music critics drive me up the wall in their endless Lennon vs Macartney wank.  It really doesn’t matter.

As our uncle Morrissey says …
‘A sad fact widely known
the most impassionate song
to a lonely soul
Is so easily outgrown
But don’t forget the songs that made you smile
and the songs that made you cry
When you lay in awe
On the bedroom floor
and said “oh, oh, smother me Mother…’

not that he was talking about Obli di Oh blah dah of course, i’m just trying to say that we weren’t all always indie hipsters.

but i digress….
I had this jam that i worked up with A ron Cupples a couple of years ago in Dalston that i was keen to turn into something. It had a kind of spacious Ibiza feel from the get go.

One day lapping away in the Fitzroy pool i somehow accidentally and horrifically composed a scenario where i would escape the coming apocalypse by following Jimi’s footsteps and heading underwater. Knowing my awful sense of direction i figured i would need a tour guide, and before i could stop the thought, Bindi Irwin was in the song.

I spent the next three months trying to write her out, but sometimes you just can’t run away from a particular lyric that has attached itself to the music, no matter how hard you try.
Fearing a Tabloid backlash i then set about trying to make the song not creepy in any way, a hard task considering she is underage and most of my songs have a somewhat risque edge to them. Eventually i realized that if i got her mother Terri to chaperone her through the verses, that would take some of the edge off of it. I also wrote in a middle 8
“It’s not appropriate to share our beds
even though human kind’s hanging by a thread
I will hang with the mermaids instead..”
Now  i needed some more companions to live out my days underwater, so feeling guilty about ripping off  their two great songs somewhat , i invited Jimi and Ringo star into the picture. And naturally we had to jam. And then the Bindi Irwin Apocalypse Jam was born.

We spend the rest of eternity, shielded from the UV rays by the cover of the Great Eastern Trash, a continent sized pile of plastic that is covering most of the north pacific.

A word on Bindi Irwin. Now of course the whole mega oz/americana child star franchise horror is unsettling. But as modern stars go, a young girl in Khaki who saves all the animals from extinction is a pretty  cool by me.
I told the band and they were slightly freaked, then i played them the instrumental demo and it just sounds like an underwater jam with Bindi. So off we went.
Even Burke went for it, and you would not find a guy who would run further from cute novelty music if you tried.
So it came to be that the iron sculptures watching over our little cottage in Yandoit came to resonate with undersea Irwin frequencies through the night……

THE FORCES OF COOL MAY SHOUT ME DOWN
BUT HERE IS SOME GOLD FROM YE OLDE BRAIN TOWN
I WAS  BUSTING SOME LAPS ACROSS THE POND
BENDING MY THOUGHTS TO A WORLD GONE WRONG
THINKING  i WILL RETIRE TO BE UNDER THE SEA
JUST RINGO AND TERRI
BINDI AND ME
AND JIMI’S THERE TOO
LAYING IT DOWN
BIG BUBBLES OF SOUND
SO WE ALL DON’T DROWN!

SINGING OO WEE OO WEE
BINDI AND ME BINDI AND ME
OO WEE OO WEE
APOCALYPSE JAM UNDER THE SEA

I’M NOT LOOKING FOR LOVE, JUST COMPANY
AND SHE CAN EXPLAIN THE WORLD TO ME
FROM THE LITTORAL ZONES TO THE DOCK OF THE BAY
WE CAN AVOID THE WOES OF THE DAY
I DO DESIRE TO BE UNDER THE SEA
RINGO AND TERRY, BINDI AND ME
I’M GONNA LET IT RING OUT
ON MY  CORAL KAZOO
IT’S AN UNDERSEA JAM
WHAT ELSE CAN I DO?

OO WEE OO WEE
BINDI AND ME BINDI AND ME
OO WEE OO WEE
APOCALYPSE JAM UNDER THE SEA

IT’S NOT APPROPRIATE TO SHARE OUR BEDS
ALTHOUGH HUMANKIND’S HANGIN BY A THREAD
I WILL HANG WITH THE MERMAIDS INSTEAD
AND TOGETHER WE WILL RIDE OUT THE CRASH
UNDER THE COVER OF THE EASTERN TRASH
DANCING ALL NIGHT BY THE COAST OF MAURITIOUS
UNDER THE LIGHTS OF THE DEEP SEA FISHES

UNDERWATER GUITAR SOLO

DIARY ENTRY 603
ANOTHER DULL DAY IN OUR CORAL SANCTUARY
RINGO’S MESSED UP ON JELLYFISH TEA
AND BINDI’S BAD Fashion  IS GETTING TO ME
ONCE i desireD to be under the sea
AND I WILL LET THAT BE A LESSON TO ME
I WILL SWIM TO THE SURFACE
CLIMB A DEAD TREE
AND LET  THE TORNADOS
TAKE CARE OF ME!

OO WEE OO WEE
BINDI AND ME BINDI AND ME
OO WEE OO WEE
APOCALYPSE JAM UNDER THE SEA
ETCETERA