Alone With You

Droppin' In, Droppin' Out & Getting Lost In Music

Standing up near the front of the stage joyously yelling “I’m A Dropout” along with the Beasts of Bourbon and a pulsating, electrified crowd on Friday night made me think about how powerful the lyrics of a song can be in the most subversive ways. When I abandoned my schooling shortly after completing my Year 10 exams, I would sing the Beasts anthem to myself with a strange sense of pride often. I liked the lyrics of the song being true for me, even though they were referring to society rather than school. Decades later, the band and their catalogue of songs were as brilliant as ever and I bumped into my friend Meg who I started going out to see bands with at the age of twelve and it was like no time at all had passed. I loved when she told me that a boyfriend had once suggested she take time for herself and go and get her nails done when she was in need of some self care and she had to explain that her form of self care was to go out by herself and see a band. Preferably an ear-wincingly loud one. I feel the same. I woke up still smiling after witnessing the Beasts in action, feeling cleansed and ready to greet the world, like I’d done a yoga class and sipped green juice.

I’ve always loved to go to gigs alone. You can arrive and leave when you like. You’re inside the experience rather than just observing. Talking and communicating just breaks the spell. Without pesky conversations being attempted, you can just give yourself over to the music and wander through the crowd til you find the sweet spot to absorb it all. I want rock’n’roll to eat me alive and take me to the other side.

Going to a truly great gig is like stepping through a portal into another world, where the songs are the life force, or the structures that hold everything up. The walls you live within. The bed you lie in. You can roll in their dirt and then bathe in them and they will cleanse you. You step inside a rainbow and the rules of gravity and nature just don’t apply anymore.

Listening to music loud at home alone can take you somewhere transcendent too. It’s different to the shared experience or to enjoying music you love with people you love. I always have to close my eyes when I listen alone. It becomes a kind of catharsis.

Years ago I was in a film* where my character was distressed and trying to lose herself inside a bottle and blasting music. The director asked me if there was any particular band or song that I thought would be right, something intense and powerful, and I immediately suggested the Beasts of Bourbon song ‘Fake’. I think it worked. I also think they’re one of the greatest bands in the world, in any of their formations. I’m beyond grateful and amazed that I got to witness them as a very young person and to see them again as the very mature, wise and sophisticated person I am now (hey it’s my story, I can be whoever I want to be). Not to mention myriad times in between. Every single time was bewitching, exultant and sometimes terrifying in the best of ways. I recently uncovered an incredible whole concert I filmed (rather wobbly-ly) in France and will share with the world as soon as I get my act together. Stay tuned!

There’s something Janis Joplin said about performing that I believe is just as true for the deep listener: “Playing isn’t just about feeling. Playing isn’t necessarily about misery. Playing isn’t necessarily about happiness. But its just about letting yourself feel all those things that you have already on the inside of you, but you’re all the time trying to push them aside because they don’t make for polite conversation or something…”

Who makes you feel all the feelings? Takes you all the places you want to go? Gives you a place to hide and a place to let loose?

Who needs polite conversation? Get it, friends, you know you want to x

Thank you to Janine Bubb for the snippet of Beasts ‘Dropout’ footage from The Factory, Marrickville 11th Aug 2023

*Footage from ‘Tom White’, director Alkinos Tsilimidos, available to rent or buy here.