Airship Over Occussi
Songs from 1983
Songs recorded “live” on a cheap cassette recorder at various locations in Fremantle, Western Australia during 1983 (or was it 1984?). The recording quality in all cases is extremely poor, but the spirit remains audible. These recordings marked the end of my creative musical life; not long after I gave it away, deciding deliberately and consciously that I had nothing to say.
Whilst all the compositions below are original creations, I feel that all creation is a synthesis of past and present experience. For an individual to take credit for any creation is a silly notion, notwithstanding copyright notices! Whilst my compositions may be unique, they nevertheless represent syntheses of my experiences and interactions with a particular set of people, circumstances and social environments at a particular time and place. I have long maintained – and I continue to maintain – that there is nothing truly new under our sun.
Some of the background noise (‘influences’) that contributed to this collection of music, in no particular order, include: Charlie Parker, Wolfgang A. Mozart, Bruce Henderson, Joseph Haydn, Kim Salmon, 1968, Led Zeppelin, Mar Bucknell, Jesse Dean, Bryce Moore, CPA, Sir Charles Court, Bootleg, Bu Wilson, Social Security, Gough Whitlam, The End of Prehistory, Fremantle Agriculture, Vietnam, Bob Hawke, Emma Dodderall, Hungerford’s Diseases of Livestock, Karl Marx, WA Child Welfare Dept, Freedom Collective, Janette Weaver, Jo Stevens, Glenn Miller, America’s Cup, Dave Bowers, Jethro Tull, and the JFSH Music Room.
Most songs feature me alone on acoustic guitar and voice, without percussion or any other accompaniment whatsoever. Two tracks have a bass line played (extremely badly!) on an electric stylophone. The only electronic effects devices used were a chorus box, and a touch of reverb on a Peavy PA system. They were all recorded on a cheap AU$100 cassette recorder using the built-in condenser microphone. I transferred the songs to digital format using a $10 walkman-type cassette player that I bought at a market in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Minor digital cleanups were attempted to reduce the amount of hiss and noise, using software such as Sound Forge and Dartpro.
The photo above was taken by Bu Wilson in Occussi-Ambeno in August 2000, not long after a militia rampage had depopulated the entire enclave. The airship seen coming in to land is a Zeppelin NT LZ N07 with a capacity for 12 passengers and two crew.
Airship over Occussi
Solo Acoustic Guitar and Voice.
Composed and Performed by Gary Dean.Armless
Solo Acoustic Guitar and Voice.
Composed and Performed by Gary Dean. Words by Mar Don’t-Call-Me-Maurice Bucknell.Show Words.
Armless
Words by Mar Bucknell, 4 July 1982
Hi soldier, I see you’re home
I’m glad you’re home, where’ve you been?
You’ve been gone from here so very long
You think that we’ll be proud of you
Well sorry brother, we’re not proud of death
We’ve got a different point of view
Now tell us, what you saw
Tell me who, did you kill
You’ll never know the things I’ve seen
The mud the cold the heat the blood and pain and fear
My best friend blown up by my side
And then they tell you kill some more and more and more
And standing in the firing line
Never knowing when your time will come
No I don’t know what happens now
The country’s fit for heroes now the government said
Well no I haven’t got a job
But now we’re safe from communists the general said
Well soldier that is very fine
But tell me where you left your arm behind
Grounded
Solo Acoustic Guitar, Voice and Stylophone.
Composed and Performed by Gary Dean. Words by Bryce Moore.Show Words.
<small>
<h6>Grounded</h6>
<cite>Words by Bryce Moore, 21 February 1983</cite>
<p>Well I've been there, done that, they say to me<br>
And I've climbed up the mountain and swum in the sea.<br>
There's nothing much more you can say to me<br>
So just feed my stupour or go home to tea.</p>
<p><i>Ref.</i><br>
If I hide my thoughts in a torrent of sound<br>
It won't alter the fact that you're still on the ground</p>
<p>Don't sing any songs about alienation<br>
Just trite little ditties about infatuation.<br>
We've all been well taught, and we all know our station<br>
We don't give a stuff about social relations.</p>
<p><i>Ref.</i></p>
<p>This is you'd agree a conventional song<br>
But you don't know the words, so you can't sing along.<br>
Don't bother to listen, just light up a bong<br>
Being there and doing that has not made you strong.</p>
<p><i>Ref.</i></p>
</small>
</details>
<hr>Gunter’s Periwinkle
Solo Acoustic Guitar.
Composed and Performed by Gary Dean.Not Art
Solo Acoustic Guitar and Voice.
Composed and Performed by Gary Dean; Words by Gary Dean.Industrial-Military Hell
Solo Acoustic Guitar, Voice and Stylophone.
Composed and Performed by Gary Dean. Words by Gary Dean.Show Words.
<small>
<h6>Industrial-Military Hell</h6>
<cite>Words by Gary Dean</cite>
<p>1. Whatever happened to the anarchist dream?<br>
(Ask the fascists and the bolsheviks)<br>
Where's the world that Marx proclaimed?<br>
(The marxists put him up against the wall)<br>
Where is Trotsky's International?<br>
(The corpse is cold, decomposition advanced)<br>
Where is Lenin now that Stalin's gone?<br>
(He's alive and well inside the Kremlin halls x4)</p>
<p><i>Ch.</i> <br>
Dragged up from the Dark Ages<br>
Thrown into a technocratic lions den<br>
Taken from the feudal fields<br>
Thrown into an industrial and military hell</p>
<p>2. Whatever happened to the Aquarian Age?<br>
(The Nimbin freaks are wearing suits and ties)<br>
Why has student revolution decayed?<br>
(Don't bother me, I've got to theorise)<br>
Who are the champions of liberty?<br>
(They're drowning their sorrows down the Drunken Crow)<br>
Where are the dreams of New Society?<br>
(The drought is over, we can all get stoned x4)</p>
<p><i>Ch.</i></p>
<p><i>Ref.</i><br>
Betrayed by parasites of social change, reformation games<br>
Their bureaucratic strangulation of mass initiative<br>
They work inside the system for the mutual benefit<br>
Their treachery is so pitiful, metaphysical, parasitical ...</p>
<p>3. Who will stand up for the ALP?<br>
(They change the system from the inside out)<br>
Who will defend present society?<br>
(The politicians and the pious devout)<br>
Who will break out and demand their right?<br>
(The individual, who puts up a fight)<br>
Who will believe that there are better ways?<br>
(The prophets of liberty, disciples of day x4)</p>
<p><i>Ch.</i></p>
<p><i>Ref.</i></p>
</small>
</details>
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