ADAM PAVITT

The words to ‘No Arms’ came to me through a quite strange encounter. I was catching a train between Coffs Harbour and Sydney and it was the middle of the night when a new passenger joined the train. The smell of alcohol was strong on his breath and he started to mumble as he sat down in the seat right in front of me. As he went into his rant, for some reason , i took up a pen and started writing down what he was saying. Writing in the half-light i saw the strangest words appear on the page. “It’s contaminating the atmosphere, poison in the sky. So excuse me for breathing, accidents happen. Just when you thing something good in the world is going to go on, there’s no need to argue. You know i’ve got no arms”. It was a strange moment and within a minute the man had drifted off to sleep. I kept the words in my song book and waited for a melody to arrive for a few years.
In later years as i learned of Australia’s greedy sale of large quantities of uranium throughout the world and began to hear terms like ‘preemptive strike’used in the public arena, the song evolved into being about the insanity of war.
The words “no arms” to me speak about the possibility of a world without weapons and war. A Utopian vision of a peaceful world. The words “no arms” also references the waste and destruction of war in regards to amputees. You see the victims in every war-torn country, young and old they lose their limbs in the senseless violence that plagues our planet.
Us humans are a strange species. Brought up with action figures and toy guns. Coaxed into joining the army to get some discipline, a trade and see the world, we are not told about the gun that is going to be pointed at the back of your head when you don’t want to fight in the heat of a battle. Time and time again war has brought out the very worst in human nature. Mass murder, genocide, rape, torture, environmental destruction and cultural decimation all go hand in hand with war! No longer do the leaders of countries lead their troops into battle. No the puppeteers play with the lives of many in the cowardly comfort of the senate. The war is waged from afar and we the public are offered sanitised images via satellite. until we are desensitised enough to play the latest video reenactment of a conflict scenario.
The biggest losers in terms of lives lost are often everyday people. Since the invasion of Iraq in 2003 there have been over 100,000 civilian casualties! All this on the premise of Iraq possessing weapons of mass destruction. No weapons have been found and now a country is in chaos because some people think ‘war is the answer’. The oil flows from the wells and the money flows out of the country. A shallow democracy is imposed and the streets are safer. Try telling that to the people of Iraq who have lost loved ones, family and friends to the horrors of this war.
For me ‘No Arms’ stepped into it’s own when Cameron spike-Porter added the final acoustic guitar riffs. The chorus run is a bit like a riff from ‘The Police’ and the solo wind downs are so tasty. I have listened to the song alot, as Stefan Ehrenfeld and i put together a film-clip over a couple of months. This involved playing the audio over and over. It is always a pleasure to work with Stefan, as he loves the music and is always open to creative exploration.The eventual fusion of music and images i think captures the vibe of the song well. The song is meant to be hard-hitting and opinionated. It is meant to be bleak and hopeful simultaneously. I hope this song gets to as many people as possible . I also hold hope that one day the horrors of war and conflict will cease to exist…..
Adz

It’s just the cause

‘Just Because’ has a country feel to it because it is about this country. It is a country folk song that talks about what is happening to this land. Australia is a land of constant drought. We are often on water restrictions and the great brown land with the red rock as it’s center is a harsh one. We cling to the coastal fringes and hug her mountain ranges where the rain falls more frequently.
It is water that sustains us. We can go many weeks without food. Without water….. only a matter of days. This precious life force is not given the respect it deserves! Now with global warming being recognised as a real phenomenon the panic is setting in. What happens if all the water drys up? How did it all come about? Cars, factories, land clearing and big houses are all big contributors. Can we adapt to a changing environment and take on alternative energy en masse to avert disaster? People have been warning us for years about our finite resources including water, oil and arable land. Will it be a case of the scientists saying “i told you so”, or will we change our destiny.

The song was pretty matter of fact in it’s arrival in my song book. It came to me in two sittings. I wrote the verses and chorus in the first session and then came back to the song after a few days and wrote the bridge. It is probably one of the easiest songs that i have ever written and yet speaks of some of the most pressing concerns facing humankind.
Naomi Jones and Joanna Flemming do a beautiful job on the harmonies through the bridge section of ‘Just Because’. The ‘oooohs’ to me seem really powerful and add a nice lift to this section of the song. Naomi and i met through Jo’s band (The Joelenes). The Joelenes are a groovin’ country band with hints of folk, funk and all out twang! They are always inviting friends up on stage to jam out and that is where Naomi, Jo and i first shared some music. Both talented singers and instrumentalists, it was amazing for them to help me out for free on the backing vocals. There was some real magic during the practice sessions , as we experimented with the melodies to reach the eventual harmony lines. I also invited a good friend and talented songwriter Jim Green to do harmonies on the song originally. Unfortunately Jim had a cold on the day and we didn’t end up using any of the vocals that he laid down. Jim has had a big influence on my songwriting and we have sat down quite a few times over the years and swapped new song ideas that we have been working on. Jim’s debut album ‘ Come Aboard’ is a classic and had daily high rotation in my CD player for three months when it was first released.

Another part of this song that i love is Liz Frencham’s double bass. Liz is busting out solos and solid as a rock on the groove. Liz is quite busy at times with her band ‘Dev’lish Mary’, who have a country blue grass thing going on , so again it was easy for her to tap into vibe of ‘Just Because’.
I was talking to someone the other day about the song, and it was suggested that The Greens would possibly be interested in a song like ‘Just Because’. I had a chuckle, but then again, i have done a Greens benefit gig and Bob Brown auctioned off one of my paintings once in strange circumstances….so at least we have a history…if they were to come knocking. If ‘Just Because’ was to influence, someone, anyone to think about the environment and alter their actions even slightly to bring about positive change, then my work is done. The last line of the song states “It’s just the cause”. The environment is the most ‘just’ cause that i know of. We must respect the environment…because we only get have one earth to live on. Just one.
Adz

“sweating on the inside of too many clothes to wear”….”world divided, no-one really knows, if we care”…….”if we can”

Glistening is a short sharp song that is about the excesses of the modern world. It talks about a world divided. A world where we are the privileged few and the majority of the world’s population is poor. It’s a crazy life living in the first world. There is so much to give and yet we take, take, take. Third world sweatshops still make our clothes and their forests are cleared for our farms. We are put on the treadmill by driving up the price of land and having to earn a wage forever to own a quarter acre block. Who has the time to change the world working 9-5? Knock off, drink away the stress and then back to work the next day. The people starve and meanwhile our tables overflow with food. I don’t want to get caught in the trap of apathy.
Progress proceeds and before you know it one cubic metre is worth one million dollars in downtown Tokyo. Meanwhile kids sift through rubbish for food in bare feet. How is that relative?Do we care? Or are we sweating under too many clothes to wear? are we too busy snapping up the next consumer product put in front of us?
We all give to charities, and a while back i decided to make a choice to buy all my clothes at the second hand stores to make sure that money was going to help people, animals and the various charities that run the those clothes shops. It is a great way to avoid sweatshop labor and i’ve been pretty committed since 1995….buying all my clothes there(except socks and undies). I know it’s only a small contribution, it feels good though, and there are so many clothing gems to be found. As a painter, i know that if i spill some paint on my clothes, it’s no great loss..just grab a bunch more for a few dollars. The clothes are worn-in and often one-offs can be found.
Glistening has a nice bouncy drum feel to it which i like.This is probably due to the bass and drums being captured live.I even dropped in a bit of cowbell during the bridge for more rhythm intensity. Steve Vella (Dog and Bear Studio) was right into this hilarious youtube video with Christopher Walken, all about a song needing “more cowbell”, so it was fun to overdub that. My guiro experiments didnt make the edit though and were a good laugh at the time. I find the backward guitar in the second half of the song quite interesting with it’s violin sound. It was Cameron Spike-Porter’s favorite track off the album, and so he agonised over what to add guitar-wise. The sharp finish of the song is a highlight for me too.
Adz

You need to surround yourself with the people that can help you to fly

Alone again explores a vulnerable side of my writing that i am not too sure how to explain. Some songs are hard to sing through emotional attachment or lack of technique. I have always tried to keep my songs on the emotional pulse and not hold back despite my inherent vocal limitations. In this song the emotions got the better of me. My voice cracks revealing a passion that i want to feel and yet it hurts to feel. The vocals first talk about feeling out of place and the claustrophobia having no time, no space and no extra space. This can be seen as being overworked, underpaid, being lost in a consumerist culture and being out of touch. Sometimes the world gets you down. And so sometimes cannot help it. It happens to all of us and you go inside yourself to be alone. There seems to be so many with some power and privilege who just don’t seem care for others who struggle. Those that have the house of gold can often have the heart of stone. It may be true in many cases, yet there are also so many people fighting for justice, peace, equality and our environment. These movements are global and gaining momentum. W e should not give up hope. We are relying on the people to sand up, the corporations to be more humanitarian and the governments to deliver on promises made to the people. To be hopeless is to be powerless!

You need to surround yourself with the people that can help you to fly. Make your ideas and ideals a reality while standing up for what you believe in. Support worthy causes and while helping others you will no longer be alone. There is so much work to be done and inside yourself is the strength to be part of this. I have always felt that no matter how bad we feel, we can still lift ourselves up and do something,anything to let us know that we are part of an amazing world of like-minded people. Music can educate, inform and entertain all in the one instance. It is inspiring to look around and see bands like John Butler Trio and Blue King Brown proving that every day.
This song has a funky feel to it. I have always felt a connection to funk music, and from my late teens to this day it is probably my favorite music to dance to. It is this uplifting vibe that helps keep the song positive despite the heavy subject matter. I try to remember when i am low to keep grooving along and look for the beauty in this world. My cousin eldest Sam Bennett has always been in a funk band of some description and some of the dance sessions with my cousins and siblings over the years have definitely influenced my musical tastes. That along with seeing James Brown at Byron Bay Blues Festival not long before his passing. And a long list of funky blues from my parents collection like Steelly Dan and Robert Cray.
Cameron Spike-Porter has been a close family friend since he was a young tacker. He is probably the most versatile guitarist i know. I was so happy with the contribution with Cam brought to this song and the entire album over all. His electric tracks were written and recorded in Lismore N.S.W, where Cam is studying Jazz. The layering of guitar tracks with, slide, jazz influenced chops and funky stabs adds great effect. Cam is gonna want me to hold this info back, but was once known as ‘Jazz Cat’prefering now to be calle d’The Panther’. Playing in a few bands such as motown specialists Lisa Hunt Band and fusion funk band Suji Toko cam is probably gonna end up as a New York local on the circuit one of these days. He was the shredder lead guitarist in a Sydney band called Porcelain Grace, and before that as a youngster got to jam with Phil Emmanuel.It is a strange coincidence that my first concert after turning eighteen year old was with a buddy and my Dad out t see Phil and Tommy Emmanuel. Phil’s music used to echo down the small valley in Sawtell N.S.W and i would crank my electric in the bath room, responding to the chunky rock riffs and hope that he could hear my twenty five watt amp. So it’s cool to think that Cam and i had similar influences, especially with our parents musical tastes and our own choices. We actually worked out that i may have shown Cameron some of his first chords and even though his playing has surpassed mine by eons, i can still ask him to play on my album. He did it all for free! Spending many hours arranging, recording and sitting by the computer waiting for big files to send.
We spent some good times busking ‘Alone again’ while busking around the place and doing a few gigs as well.
Cameron really shows his tasty production smarts in the middle of the song when he backs everything off in the most powerful thematic peak. He lets the words stand alone and in my opinion shows the great second sense that Cam has for adding in the right places and holding back for dramatic effect. The backwards guitar swells still blow me away every time that i hear them. Cam uses the technique in three songs on the album. In the other tracks he gets a nice violin riff and then a synthesizer sustained sound. His experimentation with backwards riffs over the years have been along side home recordings of surf soundtracks, blues bend ups, ambient sound collage and the list goes on. Without raving too much about Cameron spike-Porter, i will just say that his name is one that people will be hearing about in the next few years.
I am really happy with how ‘Alone Again’ turned out. I got a blast out of singing the outro with my vocal overdubs. Steve Vella and i were digging in and busting out the falsetto in the control room and really enjoying the process of putting the song together. I was ever so slightly aiming for a popsters Hall and Oates feel while referencing Blind Boys of Alabama for the deeper register.

It’s strange the way that that your influences start coming out in every song without your knowledge at first. For example the verses riff had a slight Red Hot Chilli Peppers feel to it while in the studio. The outro was also going into Stevie Wonder for a while there and Steve Vella even decided to pop in and try to lay down some snare and hats to capture the bounce. despite the beats not making the final edit, it was heaps of fun jamming out the song with Steve on
percussion during recording or mixing sessions.Influence territory is something you have to deal with when you add a recording to the public domain.I guess you never know what is going to come out until you hear it back maybe hearing the hints at styles riffs from our formative years. It will be interesting to see if the public hears the same ones that i do. ‘Alone Again’ perplexes me with all its interwoven elements alongside it’s basic simplicity and that makes it my favorite track on the album.
Adz

Writing in the tunnels

The first day i started busking it took a courage that had not anticipated. I was dropped off in the main street of Byron Bay and chose a spot outside a Thai restaurant. It seemed like a pretty straight forward plan…Set up a guitar case and play a few songs.
As i sat preparing to play my first song, my vocal chords froze up. ‘Perhaps my guitar is out of tune’ i thought. So i tuned my guitar again and a fear came over me. What would these strangers think of my songs? I was about to reveal my inner most workings….. I tuned my guitar for a full twenty minutes and finally mustered up the courage to sing. I had played in bands at parties and for friends and family constantly. Yet this seemed like such a big deal. It felt like no-one was listening or maybe everyone was listening!
The first person to approach me was an elderly lady. It felt so good when she gave me a hand-full of coins and said “that’s very nice dear”. The second interaction was with a small child who danced up smiling and then threw the money down and danced back to their parent’s side. Then the hoons turned up…. a car sped by and some guy hung out the window and threw a five cent coin at me and said “that’s all you’re worth”. I was shattered for a few seconds and about to give up on the busking idea, when suddenly i shook my head and logic set in. That guy did not even hear the music and everyone else so far seemed to ‘kinda dig it’, i thought. I have since discovered that even when people look away from buskers and try to ignore them, it is a little known fact the some of them walk in perfect time to the music.
After moving to Melbourne i began going out busking about four nights a week often in the tunnels of the train stations. People would always be generous in varied ways, dropping money, food, drinks, alcohol, drugs, yearly met tickets, phone numbers, flyers, cigarettes, skateboard wheels, flowers, and other miscellaneous donations into the guitar case. It was always a surprise to look through the case at the end of the night to see what strangeness had turned up. I jammed with everyone from homeless crew to classically trained travelers. I sang with drunk business men and stoned junkies. I was never robbed or bashed. Once i was urinated next to, and i cracked it! I threw all the money in my case was all over the ground just before i put my guitar away and stormed off in disgust. The guy was having a rowdy race day and i was not having anything to do with those coins after that!
There were definite stand out nights while busking that helped shape who i am as a songwriter. One Valentine’s day comes to mind…..As i stood wearing a suit with a rose in the pocket and singing love songs, a Spanish flamenco guitarist approached wearing a suit with a rose i the pocket. He asked if we could jam, going song for song and improvising guitar solos over the top of each other’s compositions. We agreed to give it a try and split the money. It was going quite well until a very large group of tourists appeared in the tunnel. As they passed our guitar cases, each and every person lent down and either placed a gold coin or a rose into the collection. We were so overwhelmed at the gesture that words could not express how we were feeling.

The song ‘Silver Gold Bronze’ was born out of moments like that. Those lovely people could have dropped silver, gold or bronze into the case and it would not have mattered. I just knew that i was really happy sharing my music with strangers. Even if they got ‘thirty seconds of happiness’ or connection from a busker, i felt it was a precious thing in this life.
A great thing about this song is that i got Liz Frencham to play on it (an ace double bass player and vocalist). Liz and one of her bands Jigzag, have a song all about their experiences busking called ‘ Thirty Seconds Of Happiness’. I was exceptionally lucky to catch Liz between some of her numerous tours, gigs, recording sessions and festival appearances, as she is a true working musician! Liz got to hear the demo’s and write up some charts in the back of the tour van and then we hit Dog and Bear studio with her devoted partner Steve Vella . Steve is a musician also and has the most relaxed vibe around. He was so encouraging, inspiring and helpful with putting the album together. On the day of recording we had my old band mate Jangala Birrenjur (formerly known as Geraint Seren) to play kit and percussion. Jangala is a great player and gifted psychic who holds a steady beat. This was proved by the fact that the track is actually two tracks fused together. Both versions were recorded live and were somehow able to get glued together…Go Steve! The cymbal work by Jangala adds a dreamy element to the bridge sections. The winding outro was fun to play and the laughter at the end of the track shows this. It was an energetic vibe in the studio that day, with daggy jokes a plenty and herbal tea brewing.
It’s nice to have a bouncy track as second track to get the album into gear early on. The track builds and builds which i am pretty happy about. I feel there is a sincerity to the song and yet carefree elements as well. It harks back to busking, when you are singing your heart out, but you can pull the pin and go home whenever you want. You can slog it out on the one phrase about the Iraq War to make a point over and over for ten minutes if you want. Or you can explore your high range in the extended improvised middle section of a love song freely. Busking is no pressure once you get over that first song. You are keen to get some coins dropping, but really even a smile or a positive comment could change your entire day. Music is certainly a beautiful thing that we all share.

It is not just me who feels the busking buzz. It thrives the world over. It keeps the streets alive, vibrant and keeps us all human. Alot of people still have a coin or a smile for a busker, and that is what keeps me coming back.
“You give me silver, give me gold, even bronze you know, will be just fine”.
Adz

Seasonal Pass

Seasonal Pass is the first song on my debut album ‘Seasons Will Pass’. The song is based on memories and often called the “summertime song” by friends and relatives.
I was lucky enough to be put on a surfboard one summer at around five years old. The old single fin was dragged out through the breakers. As my dad pushed me into my first wave and i stood up, I turned and tried looking away from the shore to show dad that i done it….He yelled to me “look at the beach! Look at the beach!”. As i turned back towards the shore and rode the wave towards my Mum waiting on the shore, I knew i was a surfer for life!
Growing up around the beaches of Northern N.S.W allowed me to interact with some wild and wonderful characters….There was Bill who everyone knew as ‘Big Red’ due to his carpet cleaning business. I used to help him out with as a teenager. His greatest passions were surfing and surfboard collecting. He had over seventy classic boards from different eras that he would lend out to anyone willing to experiment. I took a quad fin board of his surfing once that was like “trying to take your front veranda for a surf” (as my Dad would say). Bill was so encouraging and the next surf i persevered while trying out a malibu, and had a ball.
Then there was Matto, still a great friend, who would sprint his entire paper round and then ride his pushbike at break-neck speed to get to the water at first-light. The enthusiasm did not waver at all after he jumped of the rocks and into the first wedge at Southies either. Matto was and is perpetually stoked.
Ofcourse then there was whane, who after taking up surfing in his late thirties, was seen at the beach practically every day for the next few years. His hair progressively got longer and blonder. His van became rustier by the day, and although his family didn’t seem understand his new fanaticism. In later years when his back started playing up and kept him out of the water, people would admit it was those few years in the surf that he seemed most content.
My Dad also lost his share of the waves eventually. His spine also gave out and kept him off the surfboard and away from the ocean. He still tells me he “still misses her every day”. It sure doesn’t stop him taking anyone to the beach for a lesson with some old boards from under the house and a bunch of patched up wetsuits from under the seats of his Kombi. He is still living the dream through the smiles of surfers around him. Dad also has about a hundred great stories about his days surfing all those waves.
So we drift up and down the coast. Friends and associates come and go. The distances between the capital cities make us a transient tribe. Families live and work apart, friends move away. We get a postcard or a birthday card from afar…to remind us. To help us think back to the beach…. We sat squinting as the glare bounced off the water. We sat “on the sunny side of a winter’s day”, because we were happy. Chasing the waves, casting our cares and fears aside for the thrill of the next ridden wave. If the waves took us to our final rest, so be it. We thought we would die smiling. It sounds ridiculous, yet, i still quote statistics about more people “being crushed to death by snack and beverage vending machines every year than are eaten by sharks” to try to prove the my point. I must admit i am unsure of the validity of those stated statistics anymore. Yet don’t mind repeating it every so often.
Eventually Bill was coming in from a surf at his favorite local break and passed away on the sand from a heart attack. Despite the tragedy of his passing at around the age of fifty, people took comfort knowing that he had just surfed at The Island. We knew that he probably would not have had it any other way.
Matto still chases the Autumn swells around the world. He still also rides a pushbike at a hurried pace too when he knows that a surf is on. Instead of delivering papers now he is planting trees.
I still have a vintage surfboard in my small collection of boards and also two mals that are perfect for people to learn on. I also love sitting on the beach playing songs or floating in the swells while surfing humming a tune. The winds, the temperature, the places and the people change, and yet we still have the memories to draw us back to those summer and winter’s days spent on the sunny side. ‘Seasonal Pass’ is all about those memories…… Adz