A 20 day music challenge

An old friend of mine has taken on this challenge whereas you nominate a song a day for 30 days running based on a different category each day. Not surprisingly it’s called the 30 Day Song Challenge. Now I haven’t got the time or the inclination to do this for 30 days running. There are also a number of categories that I couldn’t possibly fulfil- I mean, ‘a song that you often hear on the radio’? I don’t listen to music on the radio. ‘A song that you can dance to’??! I don’t know any song that I cannot dance to. Some of these categories are decidedly dull, so I will add a few of my own. Because I love music so much, I can’t resist the challenge, but I will complete them all over one day instead, and settle for 20 songs.




day 01 – your favorite song- I guess it is probably ‘Amelia’, Joni Mitchell, but because I have already mentioned this for an earlier blog, I will nominate Van Morrison ‘Astral Weeks’ instead, because it has the rawness of an early song (it is in fact the first song on Van’s first solo album), and it takes you into a completely different stratosphere, just like Holst’s ‘Planets’, if you close your eyes and allow it. Listen to the section near the end of the song where the singer repeats ‘I’ve got a home on high..’ as his voice soars and astral planes, if you like.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ech6pZoBJ4




day 02 – your least favorite song- I have tried to think of the worse song from a band or singer that I love (to legitimise this silly category a bit), and I have come up with ‘What Goes On?’ from The Beatles ‘Rubber Soul’ album, one which they mercilessly threw Ringo Starr’s way, to make it even worse. Yes this song is probably worse than ‘Revolution No.9’ (White Album) which at least has novelty value. I don’t like ‘Octopus’ Garden’ much either, for that matter.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgAa9Y8SIIY  




day 03 – a song that makes you happy- The Beatles again. This time ‘Rain’. I love the bass, the drums, the carefree words. And the fact that it is slightly obscure because it was only a ‘B side’ and didn’t appear on any albums. ‘Street Fighting Man’ by The Rolling Stones is also great fun.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPjDMZiuhbQ      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wKEzHXVPE4

                     


day 04 – a song that makes you sad- I’m not sure if I have heard anything much sadder than Johnny Cash singing ‘The Evening Train’, especially if I link it fancifully with his beloved June Carter Cash who died sometime around the time the song was released? …..include lyrics…It’s not just the lyrics- the arrangement and his voice is so sad, sad, old and sad.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8s83x9OU5Zk





day 05 – a song that reminds you of someone- the first time I ever heard ‘Sexual Healing’, and possibly Marvin Gaye himself, was a revelation. It was outside my parents’ house in Reservoir nearing dusk on a warm summer night. I was in love with the beautiful dark-haired Irish/ Indian girl next to me. She had this new wonderful contraption called a ‘Walkman.’ It actually enabled you to listen to music in a completely portable fashion as you walked along the street. The novelty of the contraption, the beautiful melody in the song itself, and having C standing next to me, was an experience that was just about too much.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVpzSaNpErY

              



day 06 – a favourite song about an apocalypse- this is hands down ‘The End’ from The Doors first album- that rawness of something new and fresh again. This is a song that was worked out properly during live sessions in 1966, and one night in LA apparently, Jim Morrison threw in the Oedipal section for the first time that mesmerized the rest of the band, and probably the club’s patrons. It’s the words, the percussion, the eerie guitar, and the beautiful clear vocals.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDN9y2vTdUs






day 07 – a song that you enjoy singing to the children as you hope they will fall asleep- for some reason Simon and Garfunkel’s ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’ always tumbles out of my mouth on this regular occasion. The lyric beginning ‘Sail on Silvergirl, sail on by, your time has come to shine, all your dreams are on their way, see how they shine…’ is a wonderfully optimistic thing to sing to a child. And it is such a great song to sing anyway. Simon & Garfunkel must have a funny effect on me- if the kids falling asleep becomes a slow, painful experience, then ‘The Boxer’ tumbles out as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_a46WJ1viA           http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdKjEHfHINQ

               


day 08 – a favourite song that is about the death of the singer’s father- ‘New Horizons’ by Justin Hayward is the second song on ‘The Moody Blues’ ‘Seventh Sojourn’ album. The singer’s father isn’t mentioned by name, but it makes sense when you discover who it is about: ‘Well I’ve got dreams enough for one/ And I’ve got love enough for three/ I’ve got my hopes to comfort me/ I have my new horizons out to sea/But I’m never gonna lose your precious gift/ It will always be this way/ and I know I’m gonna find my own peace of mind/ Someday, some way…’ it is a lovely tribute throughout.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iF2__-K8qFo





day 09 – a song that is about the birth of a new child- Tragically, not long before he was murdered, John Lennon wrote ‘Beautiful Boy’ about his son, Sean Lennon, which contained the ill-fated lyric ‘I can hardly wait/ To see you come of age/ But I guess we’ll just both have to be patient.’ It is not a song that Lennon could have written in his time in The Beatles. The maturity of the ideas demands an older, wiser man, in this case about forty. He whispers to his son at the end of the song, ‘see you in the morning’…. Oh.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5BBEOjUKrI





day 10 – a song about travel, balloon riding in particular- It isn’t Jimmy Webb’s best song (try ‘Galveston’ or ‘By The Time I Get To Phoenix’), but it is great fun, especially the version by The Fifth Dimension.’ The song is ‘Up, Up and Away.’ Wonderfully life-affirming, great melodies, fun lyrics: ‘We can sing the song and sail along the silver skies..’
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HC9yD8YqXYI





day 11 – a song in which a new version is better than the original- For me, this doesn’t occur very often. The new version of someone else’s song has to be quite different and original in its own way for me to like it. Two examples immediately jump out. The first is ‘Fire And Rain’, a very sad song about loss, that James Taylor wrote and sang well. But the version by Marcia Hines is much better. Much more passion and soul- even though she didn’t know the tragic ‘Susanne’ in the song. The second example is probably a better one. Once again it is Ringo Starr, and that tuneless, bland version of ‘With A Little Help From My Friends.’ Joe Cocker made it more dramatic and mesmerising several years later.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbQMMapTB40               http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijsogLJvBB4&feature=fvsr

         



day 12 – a song that is a guilty pleasure- There are many guilty pleasures- guilty probably because people I know would squirm or turn their nose up, in a snobby sort of way. I love ‘Tunnel Of Love’ by Dire Straits- it names some innocuous towns along the Northumberland coast in the UK, and charts the great time Mark Knopfler had visiting them in his youth. I have no idea what ‘Jet’ by Paul McCartney and Wings is about, but I love singing it. ‘You Make Loving Fun’ by Fleetwood Mac is great to run to- is that a guilty pleasure? Perhaps the best example I can think of is the one hit wonder by Benny Mardones? called ‘Into The Night’ for its passionate vocals. It came out during that terrible time for popular music in the 1980’s.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bpOBAwrFVw

  

day 13 – a song that no one would expect you to love- maybe people would be surprised that I like ‘Release Me’ by Ingelbert Humperdinck and ‘The Green, Green Grass of Home’ by Tom Jones? I don’t know.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCZO9xeYA8g   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5IABqwVO2U

      


day 14 – a favourite song that is sung and written by someone that is in the twilight of their career- ‘Not Dark Yet’ on Bob Dylan’s album ‘Time Out Of Mind’ is wonderful and moving. His voice is cracking and worn, but much like Johnny Cash near the end, it suits the song perfectly and adds to the pathos of the lyrics…… Surely one of the best songs of recent memory.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZgBhyU4IvQ&ob=av2e




day 15 – a song that you wish you heard on the radio- It would be lovely to hear some Melanie (Safka) on the radio. I know it’s unlikely, except for perhaps one of her worst songs, ‘Brand New Key’. If I could I would choose ‘Little Bit Of Me’, ‘Don’t Think Twice, It’s Alright’ or ‘Stop! I Don’t Want To Hear It Anymore’, which I sometimes watch on youtube.com to give me courage before the students walk into the room. Such beautiful singing!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwlbHhq-5lQ  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJbXDX5z80g&feature=related          http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqSqWHOtIew

                             



day 16 – a song that you want to play at your wedding- Well, I am already married, and I didn’t have a song, I had a book reading. But if, alas, it happened all over again I couldn’t go past ‘Unchained Melody’ (clichéd choice) or ‘Hymns To The Silence’ by Van Morrison (bit less obvious).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGbVzqnbZIw    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-idDbIfGvw

            


day 17 – a song that you want to play at your funeral- ‘Hejira’, by Joni Mitchell, with its theme of mortality would be a suitable choice, and it has the best lyrics that I know of any song. Somehow I think Neil Young’s ‘After The Goldrush’ or ‘Helpless’ might be good too. …………………
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnLLQmRehYo  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1e3m_T-NMOs&feature=related                 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BREYCGWOouw

        



day 18 – a song from your childhood- As a child I seemed to be hooked on Abba, and I still remember ‘Fernando’ when it was No 1 for such a long time, and ‘SOS’ and ‘Mamma Mia’ and ‘Dancing Queen’, and it’s amazing how these songs have never gone out of fashion.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ohr4P8E_io





day 19- favourite songs written by someone for other artists to perform- Jimmy Webb is good for this, but I love many Burt Bacharach songs sung by people like Dusty Springfield and Dionne Warwick, and The Carpenters- ‘Anyone Who Had A Heart’, ‘The Look Of Love’, ‘Close To You’, ‘This Guy’s In Love (With You)’, etc.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhHfcLwEzp0   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyWeWNAr-4Q



Day 20- a song about an important social issue- almost anything from Marvin Gaye’s ‘What’s Going On’ album, but in particular ‘The Ecology’ ….and ‘Inner City Blues (Makes Me Wanna Holler’).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9KC7uhMY9s  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tOpwgrqshU

Randy Newman and the MSO

YESTERDAY the weather was beautiful in Melbourne. An easy breeze, dull sunshine and t-shirts, cardigans, jumpers all on display, which is exactly the way I like it. People wearing clothes they are comfortable in, rather than being dictated to by cold or hot weather. And in certain sections of the city the streets were crowded. A rally of some sort outside the State Library. A mass of people crossing the lights at Flinders Street outside the station. People wandering aimlessly in and out of shopfronts on Bourke Street Mall, and a boy of about twelve rap dancing (if that's still a term people use) encircled by a rug that collected spare change and hordes of people.

And yet, the two places we went to were strangely quiet. I'm not complaining. It made bowling at the QV Centre great fun. It was the children's first time. Then by the Yarra, past Federation Square, we visited the Ferris Wheel. A few people on it, but no queue at all. After a weekend of queuing incessantly- at the Eye and Ear Hospital for eight hours, for example- this was luxury. The girls and I yelled out constantly with our loudest voices- 'we're at the top!'. My wife sat far below, shaking her head, thinking we were yelling 'I want to get off!'

A relaxing time at the Arts Centre, State Theatre as well the other night to see Randy Newman with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. I don't know if he's always like this, but Randy Newman had a great time with lots of jokes, mostly self-deprecating ones abut getting older, about marriage, about US foreign policy, etc, etc. A lot of banter between songs and lots of charm. The set started with a track from 'Good Old Boys' called 'Birmingham.' A great start for me because I only know two Randy Newman albums, and this is one of them. The concert featured two other tracks from this album which are really beautiful, which he played with sensitivity and passion. 'Louisiana 1927' is about the great floods in Louisiana at this time:

'What has happened down here is the wind have changed
Clouds roll in from the north and it started to rain
Rained real hard and rained for a real long time
Six feet of water in the streets of Evangeline

The river rose all day
The river rose all night
Some people got lost in the flood
Some people got away alright
The river have busted through cleard down to Plaquemines
Six feet of water in the streets of Evangeline.'

This song reverberates well with what happened with Hurricane Katrina. Evidently it became a sort of anthem for the new floods and the new struggle for people in this area. The disdain Newman feels in regards to President Coolidge in this song can be transposed to the 90's, and the apathetic response by George Bush. There is a heartfelt clip on youtube.com of this song being played by Newman in New Orleans at this time.

'Marie' is a touching and sincere love song about Newman's first wife. There are strings on the original album, and these two songs were gtreat examples of the way in which the MSO beautifully enhanced these recordings:

'You looked like a princess the night we met
With your hair piled up high
I will never forget
I'm drunk right now baby
But I've got to be
Or I never could tell you
What you meant to me
I loved you the first time I saw you
And I always will love you Marie
I loved you the first time I saw you

And I always will love you Marie.'

'You Can Leave Your Hat On' and 'Short People' (in hindsight a very amusing song) understandably garnered a lot of applause. The middle sections of the concert afforded Newman a break (of sorts) as he conducted some instrumental orchestral suites from films like 'Toy Story', 'The Maverick' and 'The Natural.'

There was a lot of typically wry humour in songs towards the end of the night like 'Political Science', 'Better Off Dead', and "It's Money That I Love.'

My impression then is that Randy Newman is a charming  performer, a talented musician, and the writer of a good number of impressive songs. He is growing old gracefully. It struck me as being fortunate for him that, although being born in the early to mid 40's with contempoararies like Van Morrison, Mick Jagger and Tom Jones, Randy Newman can shimmer and shine softly as he is just one man behind a piano who doesn't have to belt out songs with gusto and perform bodily tricks on the stage.

Song choice: Amelia

I have set the following task for my students:

Choose a song that you like primarily for its LYRICS. Show a www.youtube.com clip and discuss the words with the class. Place your discussion on your BLOG.

So i thought that I would have a go at as well.

Amelia: Joni Mitchell

I was driving across the burning desert

When I spotted six jet planes

Leaving six white vapour trails across the bleak terrain

It was the hexagram of the heavens

it was the strings of my guitar

Amelia, it was just a false alarm

The drone of flying engines

Is a song so wild and blue

It scrambles time and seasons if it gets thru to you

Then your life becomes a travelogue

Of picture-post-card-charms

Amelia, it was just a false alarm

People will tell you where they've gone

They'll tell you where to go

But till you get there yourself you never really know

Where some have found their paradise

Other's just come to harm

Oh Amelia, it was just a false alarm

I wish that he was here tonight

It's so hard to obey

His sad request of me to kindly stay away

So this is how I hide the hurt

As the road leads cursed and charmed

I tell Amelia, it was just a false alarm

A ghost of aviation

She was swallowed by the sky

Or by the sea, like me she had a dream to fly

Like Icarus ascending

On beautiful foolish arms

Amelia, it was just a false alarm


Maybe I've never really loved

I guess that is the truth

I've spent my whole life in clouds at icy altitude

And looking down on everything

I crashed into his arms

Amelia, it was just a false alarm


I pulled into the Cactus Tree Motel

To shower off the dust

And I slept on the strange pillows of my wanderlust

I dreamed of 747s

Over geometric farms

Dreams, Amelia, dreams and false alarms


This song is about the famous aviator, AND the writer- she seems to be trying to make connections between her experiences and those of Amelia Earhart. Therefore, the ‘six jet planes’ and the ‘six white vapour trails’ becomes connected to her experience- the guitar strings (being a musician). This is also apparent in the way the ‘drone’ of the engines becomes ‘a song so wild and blue’, and she really identifies with the aviator when she says ‘like me she had a dream to fly.’ The ‘clouds at icy altitude’ of Amelia Earhart (literal) becomes a metaphor for the singer- her difficulty in finding love or making proper connections. When she wrote this song, she was on the road driving across America, trying to forget her drummer, who she was in love with but who she had just broken off with. Finally, in her dreams she connects with Amelia Earhart as she dreams of ‘747’s over geometric farms.’



My favourite lines are:

I wish that he was here tonight

It's so hard to obey

His sad request of me to kindly stay away

So this is how I hide the hurt

As the road leads cursed and charmed

I tell Amelia, it was just a false alarm.



I can sense the pain of how difficult breaking up is for her- it doesn’t feel right for her, but she must do what he has told her. The pain is represented well by the sad, choking of the alliteration in ‘how I hide the hurt.’

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzjxIIhHYRA 

A Tribute To Paul Cox

BESIDES being a great film director, Paul Cox is also a great, humanitarian man. The first time I met him was ten years ago at the premiere of his tribute to Norman Kaye: ‘The Remarkable Mr Kaye.’ He was dressed in his usual attire- casual, dark non-descript clothing (not one for worrying about fashion). I was standing five feet away and wanting to make contact, but nervous as anything. Then I see film reviewer David Stratton- also famous but not one to send chills down my spine- so I asked David to introduce me. I didn’t know what to say- so all I did was get his address (in Albert Park) and told him I wanted to write to him. Which I did. Two weeks later.


The next time was at another premiere- the much weaker, it has to be said, ‘Salvation’- about two years ago. Again, I shook his hand and didn’t know what to say. I thanked him for the tapes of his film ‘Vincent’ and ‘The Diaries Of Vaslav Nijinsky’ he so kindly posted me, and left it at that.


The third and quite recent time was at The Avenue Bookshop in Albert Park, at the launch of his new book, ‘Tales From The Cancer Ward.’ You guessed it- I didn’t know what to say- except ‘I’m glad you are still with us’ and ‘you deserve more than the paltry twenty or thirty people that are here to have their book signed. ‘


It’s possible this will be the last time I will see him. He is about seventy, and really lucky to be alive because he received a new liver at the eleventh hour when apparently all seemed pretty much lost.


Paul Cox has directed a multitude of films- over twenty. I haven’t seen all of them, but most of the ones I have seen are incredibly truthful and touching, and rich, and are about real people and about real things, and I think that’s all you can ask from a film, unless it’s ‘ET’ you want to see, or James Bond or ‘Pirates of the Caribbean.’


Among the best are the ones about incredibly important and beautiful people like Van Gogh, Nijinsky and Father Damien of ‘Molokai.’ Or they are about simple people and they own -amazing stories- a blind man- Cactus’- an old lady slowly dying- ‘A Woman’s Tale’- a touching and pain-filled marriage- ‘My First Wife.’


Paul Cox must truly love his subjects, and his admiration and love for Vincent Van Gogh is all consuming. Vincent is mentioned innumerable times in the new book. Every moment of ‘Vincent’ is resonate of his love for the great painter. The paintings have been lovingly reproduced for the purposes of the film. There isn’t any pretentious, false Hollywood-style acting- instead, the camera is Vincent’s eyes as he travels across the plains of Holland and France.

The voice over is the magical letters- a truly beautiful, human document. Paul Cox it must have been who had the brilliant idea of having the letters spoken by a narrator as a voiceover- and the choice of person, with his raw and character-laden tone was John Hurt. The letters that were selected were inspired. Vincent’s battles with God, feeling forsaken before he found the path of his true vocation- the Christina Rossetti poem that Vincent loved about the difficult journey that begins ‘Does the road go uphill all the way? Yes to the very end.’ Nothing superficial or melodramatic, just the non-glamorised and unsentimental truth.


Paul Cox’s new book, then, is about enduring the time when you simply cannot say if you will make it. What are the chances of a transplant suddenly saving your life? How much longer do you actually have? What if you haven’t said all you need to say? In between times, Cox rails against Hollywood, capitalism and consumerism: ‘The celebration of the dollar makes people forget that they might just have other talents- apart from making money- that could be used creatively and help others less fortunate’- his deep gratitude and respect for the medical profession, his hatred of the Melbourne Grand Prix (such a short distance away), his appreciation of family and friends, more stark than ever at these times- his visits to his home country, the Netherlands- and all his weird and vivid dreams.


It has been a pleasure to have met a great man like Paul Cox- three times- except I have never known what to say to him...

Recent observations in The Age

Some politics- just a change- early May 2011.




I met somebody new over the weekend and had a look at his blog which was fairly political- with Wikileaks, that sort of thing. It got me thinking that politics is something I don’t touch on much, but I find it fascinating and it does take up a lot of my thinking time. I felt some political urges emerge after reading the paper on the way home on the bus last night, and in bed later.

Obviously the main news of the day was the apparent killing of Osama Bin Laden. It is almost ten years that his name became a household word after September 11, 2001. I was teaching in a crappy school in Mansfield UK near Nottingham, last lesson, when the twin towers were smashed into. This time, teaching again, just before last lesson when one of the students strolled into the room and let me know.



I had a vague feeling about it all afterwards. Neither jubilant or sad, or moved in any way, just vague and uncertain. The only strong reaction I did experience shortly afterwards was when I saw footage of the excited crowds, huge grins on their faces, pumping their arms, celebrating like America had won the World Cup, or it was suddenly discovered that Elvis was alive after all. For some reason the excessive cheering made me feel sick. Was it because the crowd feels suddenly safer now? Or was it because they were sucking in a feeling of revenge? Or was it just mob delirium? We all know how horrible a mob of any kind is.

Next I read an article by Robert Manne that offered an overview of the way Federal politics is going, and how much things have become worse over the last decade and a half, after the election for the first time of John Howard. Worse, in the sense that as a nation we are less generous, more suspicious of ‘outsiders.’ Initially we rejected the notion of ‘White Australia’ and the 1970’s was full of hope with new arrivals coming to Australia and helpfully bringing with them their own exotic culture. Some excerpts from his article:



“In the quarter century between the election of Gough Whitlam and the fall of Paul Keating, Australia experienced a genuine cultural revolution where profound questions about the nation were asked and apparently solid values overturned.


In part, this revolution was general. Throughout the West, millennial certainties concerning race and gender, authority and sexuality, crumbled. But in part the revolution was particular, coloured by the histories of each country where its impact was felt.


In Australia, the revolution focused especially on questions of ethnicity and race. For the first time, at least in large numbers, Australians grasped the unspeakable tragedy visited upon the original inhabitants of the continent; the ugly racism implicit in the white Australia policy; and the arrogance that required postwar European immigrants to abandon their cultures if they wished to be regarded as truly Australian. As a consequence of this revolution, Australia became involved in a process of trying to reinvent itself.


In place of what W. E. H. Stanner had called ''the great Australian silence'' on the question of the Aboriginal tragedy, all Australian governments in that quarter century sought a future based on reconciliation and indigenous self-determination. In place of the white Australia policy, they committed themselves to a policy of racially non-discriminatory immigration. In place of the idea of the migrant assimilation to the Australian cultural norm, they sought to refashion the relation between ''Australians'' and those of ''ethnic'' origin according to the ideas of multiculturalism.


What was interesting was that the era of probing self-criticism was associated not with pessimism and paralysis but with optimism and creativity. During this quarter century a distinctive Australian style emerged in the popular arts - exuberant, quirky, vibrant, and self-consciously innocent and naive.”


Then when Howard was elected, the mood for some of us turned sour and culturally we spiralled backwards:

“From the mid-1990s, the period of reinvention and self-criticism began to falter.


The deep hope for reconciliation was gradually abandoned. The always utopian ideal of Aboriginal self-determination was replaced in the public mind by the all too obvious dystopian reality of dysfunctional remote Aboriginal communities.


The critique of the racism implicit in the idea of white Australia was replaced by an increasing hysteria about the supposed threat to border security posed by the arrival of mainly Muslim refugees by boat from central Asia and the Middle East.


The belief that relations between the old Australian population and migrants should be governed by the ideal of multiculturalism was threatened by a growing conviction that one or other of the religious-ethnic groups - ''Asians'' first, then after Tampa and September 11, ''Muslims'' - posed a threat to national cohesion. Because of the influence of a crass new cohort of right-wing commentators - Andrew Bolt, Alan Jones, Miranda Devine, Janet Albrechtsen - the cultural struggle against old patterns of racism was reinterpreted as the arrogant attempt of self-appointed thought police to impose their elitist values on the commonsense virtues of ordinary people.


The greatest enemy of Australian self-criticism and reinvention was the man elected PM in 1996. John Howard was disdainful of what he called the perpetual symposium on national identity. During his prime ministership, self-criticism gradually became confused with un-Australian self-hatred.


Howard sought to reduce the shame of the indigenous dispossession to a blemish on the otherwise glorious pages of Australian history. Under his influence, Australians were encouraged to take pride in the success of the post war migration program but to resist the divisive ideology of multiculturalism. Under his influence, the national imagination was militarised, with Gallipoli increasingly unchallengeable as Australia's sacred soil.


Yet the political and cultural complacency that gradually overtook the nation was more insidious than this. Having demonstrated their political and moral superiority in their defeat of the totalitarian Soviet state, the United States and some of its closest anglophone allies, including Australia, managed to convince themselves that they could do no serious political and moral wrong.


The most striking instance of this conviction came in the case of the invasion of Iraq. Although Iraq was invaded against the will of the UN Security Council; although the invasion was justified on the basis of fraudulent intelligence and immediately plunged Iraq into years of astonishing chaos in which more than 100,000 civilians were killed and millions more forced to flee their homes - the three leaders who had mounted the invasion were handsomely voted back to power in the following elections. Howard increased his 2001 majority in the election of 2004. For his role in the illegal and humanly catastrophic invasion of Iraq, there was no price to pay."

Then came great new hope with the election of the Rudd government, and it was soon discovered that he took on far too much, all at once, making wild promises, but at the same time encouraging us to cling to this hope that things will be better, that the image of Australia, and the will to be better will improve much to the relief of us all.

"Despite the early hopes the arrival of the Rudd government excited and its one transcendental moment - the apology to the stolen generations - what was most instructive about its 2½ years of office was how little it was able to transform the spirit of the political culture of conservative populism it inherited. By early 2010 the Rudd government lost its way in hopeless policy confusion, in particular on issues that had assumed symbolic resonance during the Howard years, such as asylum seeker policy and climate change.


The knife-edge election of 2010 may eventually be seen to be one of Australia's more important. What it revealed was that in the immediate future at least there is simply no prospect of Labor returning to power without an overwhelming proportion of Greens preferences. What it also revealed was that as long as the Greens hold the balance of power in the Senate there is no prospect of Labor governing effectively without a legislative program making concessions on issues of greatest significance to the Greens.


This is an inherently unstable political situation. A battle for the future of Australia - on one side Labor and the Greens, the partners of a tense, forced marriage; on the other an increasingly strident populist conservative Coalition under the leadership of Tony Abbott - will be fought out over the next two years.


The issues of the battle will most likely include not only the management of the economy but also Muslims and multiculturalism, asylum seeker policy, the referendum to acknowledge indigenous Australians in the constitution and, above all else, climate change and the carbon tax."


His article concludes with the grimmest thought of all:

"Unless the mood of national complacency is successfully challenged, the victor in this battle seems certain to be Tony Abbott."

After reading Manne’s article and feeling somewhat cheered that I haven’t been alone with these thoughts, I found another article in the same edition that gladdened my heart further. Sally Tonkin writes about an organisation called St Kilda Gatehouse that we can all be thankful for. It recognises, unlike many people in society, that street sex workers are real people, with real needs and emotions, too.

"Think, if you will, of the simple joys. Holding someone you love. Being held. A safe place to call home. Space to think, to just exist calmly. A feeling that you matter, that you somehow count for something. Confidence that tomorrow will probably be a pleasure, too. Security.


So many of us have this. For most, it's the result of hard work and, maybe, some good luck. We're aware it is impermanent and under constant threat from malevolent fortune. So we protect it with a primal passion. We don't take it for granted.


Now, imagine a life bereft of such universal, precious things. Imagine a life of pain, of struggle, of abuse in all its forms, and where the smile of a stranger is as rare as an angel. And imagine having arrived at such a destination without having bought a ticket.


Some of the most marginalised people in our community are also some of our most misunderstood. Street sex workers are not standing on those corners because they want to be there. They are not weak - on the contrary. Yes, some have made mistakes. Many of us do. Many teeter on the edge, but have the support to pull back, to be given that second go.


The vast majority of women working on the street are there through misfortune, mongrel circumstance. They are people deserving some sympathy and much help. Yet so often they receive malice and worse.


''A lot of people maybe don't ask the questions behind why they are there on the street corner. But going by how we can see how some of them are treated, we can assume that they are viewed as, I guess, scum - that would be the word that comes to mind - of very low worth, on a low rung in our society. They are abused by both the people who buy their services and also by general society.


''People don't understand that they are wives and sisters and someone's friend. I guess people aren't seeing the human side of who these women are. They see the issue. Some people just see the outcome of street sex work - the nuisance, the noise, and the issues that go along with it.''


The St Kilda Gatehouse, then, is a safe haven for these women to go to when they need support and services. And the support needed is widespread and confronting as you can imagine- childhood sexual abuse, poverty, homelessness, a lack of care and support throughout childhood, addicted parents, shattered homes, the awful scourge of heroin:

''Addiction plays a huge role. Many of the women we see have some common paths that they follow into street sex work. Many came from abusive homes, didn't have the traditional social supports that a lot of us have - family, friends - and things just unravelled in their lives.


Gatehouse has volunteers and donors. ''The way that we build a relationship with the women is through being there for them in their needs, whether it's crisis care or just everyday things. So, food, clothes, jewellery, cosmetics. Being able to have those things means that they come in and they get to know us and we build up a relationship with them. All those items are donated. So, [if you are] cleaning out your wardrobe, half-used lipstick, whatever, we'll take it.''


There's a barbecue every Monday night, with food provided by SecondBite and FareShare. It often becomes a bit of a brainstorming session. One Monday night, the idea of a netball team emerged. A melange of sex workers and volunteers and friends and Gatehouse staff, the team is set for its third season in the local league.


''No one's introduced as a volunteer or a sex worker, we're just all one; you're a wing attack or a goal shooter. We're not this special netball team. We are actually playing in a legit competition. It was pretty scary to put it out there for all of us. We had no idea how this was going to go. But it's been wonderful.''

Isn’t it great that places like this exist? And I’m glad I came across in the back pages of The Age travelling home last week.