Hi,
I was very sad to read this morning , that Steve Prestwich, drummer for Cold Chisel ( iconic Aussie Rock Band 70's/80's)
has passed away aged 56. Died 2 weeks after being diagnosed with a brain tumour.

Sadder, when it's someone you've actually met.

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/musi...0117-19t4h.html

Our thoughts and prayers go out to his family and friends

Damn damn damn...

Cold Chisel were one of Australia's greatest bands. Here is their video of "Forever Now".



What a sad loss to Aussie music. And on top of that I saw also that Harvey James died. He was one of Australia's greatest rock guitarists. His playing was sheer magic. Here he is playing the guitar on the 70s hit by Sherbet.

I am too familiar with Australian talent that has passed on. I used to play bass and synthesizer in a Melbourne based band called The Flatheads with our singer Guy McDonough. We played and recorded the first version of "Downhearted" which later became a hit for Australian Crawl.



Guy reworked another of our songs from The Flatheads and turned it into "Errol" which he sang with Australian Crawl. Guy was always a very dear friend and I will always miss him.



Here is another song I wrote and recorded with Guy and Colin Haye from Men At Work with his brother Bill McDonough on Guy's post humous album "My Place".
http://synthzone.com/songs/nigel/TooManyPeople.mp3

You can read the background history on Guy in Australian Crawl and The Flatheads at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Crawl
Oh yeah I even get a mention lol

Hi Nigel

thank you for the links. Really takes one back .
( James Reyne was a real cutie haahaa)

Sort of makes you wonder, what they're doing now.

When I was very young James and David Reyne grew up just a few houses up the street. I remember them both riding their tricycles up and down the street when they were little kids lol

Yeah I am going to do a special Prestwich tribute at my next show..I will bracket Flame Trees, Forever Now, and When the War is Over..
Dunno if I can do it but I will try and do a medley of them.

He wrote some good songs, along with the man himself Don Walker!!

I also saw that Harvey James (guitarist for Sherbert) also lost his battle with cancer....

It goes in threes, I wonder who's next??

Dennis

I wouldn't wanna even predict that. It's not so long ago we lost Thorpie.


And even though it has been a long time now I will always miss Matt Mofitt too

Yeah I know Nigel, and I don't want to either, but these things always seem to happen in threes..

Thorpie was a huge loss to the biz for sure...

Too many greats are not getting to enjoy what should have been great years for them after the many years of enjoyment they gave the rest of us.

Dennis

Hi Nigel,
was that in Brighton? or there abouts?

Little did you know they'd be famous one day . haahaa

No we all grew up in Rutland Ave in Mt. Eliza on the Mornington Peninsula. Guy McDonough lived just down the road.
Guy was magic and was the major song writer. Guy and James were a great combo.


Note the red 60s Fender Jazzmaster Guy is playing in this video. I earlier played in a band with the previous owner Peter Van Der Sluys who is also dead now from cancer. Now Guy is dead. Maybe that guitar is jinxed .... darn cos it is such a great guitar. It is now owned by Guy's brother Bill McDonough who was the drummer in Australian Crawl but no-one plays it now. Maybe that is best.

Hi Dennis,
that sounds really nice, doing a tribute.

I actually got to meet him back in 91/92, I think it was, round about the time the Korg O1W was around..

I used to do a bit of casual work for a music store. On the odd occasion if someone wanted a hand with working out the functions on a particular keyboard or workstation they used to get me to come in for an hour or so and go thru it with them. ( walking , talking , startup manual)
Fortunately they didn't pre warn me who the client was, or I would have chickened out. Nerves would have gotton to me . haahaa
The usual 1 hour sort of extended to 3. Really nice guy , so unpretensious.

Hope you're wrong about the 3, though it does appear to happen quite often.

So young.....He's now in that great Rock band in heaven.

Thanks for Sharing Rikki and my condolences....

p.s. Rikki, you weren't caught up on those Aussie Floods, were you? I pray not!

Hi Nigel,
lovely place Mt Eliza. Used to be somewhere you'd go for vacation, now it's a quick trip down the freeway ( tollway actually, they charge you haahaa)
Went there a while back, it's grown.

Hi Al,
thank you.

No, not caught up in the floods. They're about 500 miles north ( Queensland), & 500mls south of us ( Victoria). We're in the middle in NSW.
It's been really horrible for these poor people. Miracle not more have died. Can't beleive a capital city like Brisbane can just flood like that within a matter of hours. They've just had so much rain up north, and currently , it's mid summer.

Synthzone's being a great distraction at the moment, one just feels so helpless when there's nothing one can really do to help.

Thank you for asking.

And here is Harvey James playing very tasty guitar with the Richard Clapton band. RIP Harvey. The band I played in back then opened for this band dozens of times so I got to talk with Harvey quite a lot.

gr8 tune Nigel, I had forgotten that one. Didn't know Harvey James had played on it. I seemed to remember this vid on Countdown, would that be correct?

Dennis

Yep you are right Dennis. It's just a pity Harvey is behind the door in most of the video. But awesome guitar playing. Richard Clapton with Harvey James .... wow what a powerful combination of talent. That band was always magic. Such a shame they didn't release their music internationally.

Hi Nigel,
amazing, Richard hasn't changed that much since that clip.

Still had that dark hair .

Used to quite often see him in the shopping centre in Turramurra & in the music store.
Guessing he may have lived in the area.
Never got to meet him though.
Some customers were off limits. haahaa

Amazing clip.