ASR – StopPress 105

Madder
Lake’s Andy Burns brings up another new track
A
session with Madder Lake
12.5.12 – For a host of reasons it’s not
every day you get asked to put some harp onto a couple of Madder
Lake tracks. For one Madder Lake hasn’t been that prolific of
late – unless you count the Aztec Music re-issues it’s been
decades since the last Madder Lake album was released. So, last
Wednesday night I trucked on down to Ashburton to be met by
the Lakes’ Brenden, Kerry and Andy, (pic) and a miniature
pomeranian (I think) whom I was told was the producer.
Anyway, I manfully huffed and puffed and eventually came up
with some stuff from which they assured me they could extract
something useful. Afterwards they played me some of the other
tracks – bloody crackers they were too!

Party,
party..


1) Wazz
orders some platters at the Plaka 2)
Birthday boy Steve and his sexy entourage


3) Chris
dances with Teri at Steven’s 60th 4)
Steve blows out the candles on his cake
Two
birthday parties in a row has repercussions
7.5.12 – I was looking forward to Friday night. I’d
been invited to help celebrate Dr Marg Sellers’ birthday (pic
1) at the Plaka (Greek) restaurant in East Ivanhoe. I’d
brought along one of the Heathcote Gold bottles of shiraz that
Jeremy very kindly left me after his sojourn at my place and
this, combined with the stubby of Greek beer, may well have
been my undoing. I felt alright when I got home, but when I
went to bed I realised that my heart was just a little too excited
to let me sleep. The knowledge that I had a big day ahead probably
just added to my apprehension and the next morning I arose with
perhaps a couple of hours of fitful dozing behind me.
I rolled up at the Box Hill Golf Club and loaded in the PA and
other paraphernalia, grateful for the help of Vermont Street’s
Eric Yap. It was Chris’ fellow Vermont St resident Steven’s
60th and I’d been booked to play (solo) as part of the elaborate
birthday celebrations. Actually it was a gift gig – I’ve not
been pro-active in pushing myself as a solo act and so it was
an opportunity to bone up on the Rudd repertoire, which is different
again to the other combos’, and push through the nerve barrier
to an essentially uncritical audience.
And that’s the way it worked. Everybody had a good time – Steve
made a dramatic stage-managed entrance flanked by Teri’s glamorous
daughters (pic 2) and there was lots of karaoke (a
Vermont St specialty) and Chris eventually danced with Teri,
(pic 3) (the Vermont St supervisor) after declining
to join in for most of the day.
I should really do this sort of thing more often.