don't need no cocaine to feel dem blues

on the shady side

how to describe shady pines saloon without losing the waxed rhetoric plot?

the object of personal paradoxes: a wonderful underground hole in the wall steeped in shadows & brooding lynchian mid west design. the good ol' fashioned longhorn bar replete with bric-a-brac detail: a production designer's wet dream & a taxidermy fetishist's paradise with faux tobacco-stained walls caressed by music to caustically vibrate the soul. music that counts. like townes van zandt. no pre-fabricated paint-by-numbers easy listening sounds here.

this is a bar for stylish sadists. where a well-trained palate & eye can soak up the well turned cocktails which seduce from the bleeding burnt umbre hues like a beguiling victorian ankle, exposed just so, then ambushes with the gravelly rash only william burroughs & his ilk could provide. just ask the skilled staff to make you a cocktail: provide a preferred ingredient and the trade is a win win. especially if it's whiskey based.

if oscar wilde was a cowboy, he would drink here. this is a place a literary barfly could call home. and so it was.


[thanks daniel]


shady pines
alley off crown st
[beneath american apparel]
darlinghurst 2010
daily til midnight

at one with the beach ball

like silence she stands, like laughter she falls

from her castle of sand, like a memory she calls

and the mockingbird grieves, cos he can't make her cry

but they'll soon start to believe, that the lady has died.

what it all goes to show, it aint my job to say

for who am i to know, why she's acting this way

once again turn away if you're sure that it's done

tell your prophets to pray, tell your bandits to run

take your islands of stone, they won't do you no harm

take your cross made of bones, take your fly paper arms

and when everything's placed, and your coffin of gold

throw a scarf round your face, cos the subway gets cold

pack up your sunflower smile, and your bandanna blues

take your worthless denials, they're all you got left to lose

take your tinkerbell lies, and your weary desires

take the tears in your eyes, take your cupful of fire

give your lover a call, if your legs start to fail

let them come break your fall, with a pitful of nails.

no need to glance back again, there aint nothing to see

just this drunken old man, and this woman and me

and you've made it quite plain, that we're just wasting time

and you say it seems strange, that i'm staying behind

don't you worry about me, i can make it alone

i got no place to be, and i aint far from home.

- "why she's acting this way" townes van zandt

the importance of being mojo

mojo... not exactly a definable quality but definitely something none of us want to lose. as popularised by austin powers last decade to a generation of the then uninitated. but long preceded by ancient hoodoo practicing shamans as they conjured magic through the mysterious burning of substances, rhythmic dancing used in the practice of healing, necromancy & summoning of supernatural powers, other world entities even. like jimi hendrix... cut to now.

nestled in the subterranean matmos of york st, sydney lies mojo music. champions of the twisted ravaged soul of stuff that fell off the vinyl B side to ear-candied vintage rarities of old school garage, rockabilly through to impossible-to-find back catalogues of country, jazz, blues and psychedelia...

walking into this visually eclectic original sleeve/postered wall-to-wall coated space is a virtual rock n roll time-warp. and oh how i warped.

why did the rolling stones never sound so good in my pre-adolescence as my mother relentlessly force-fed them in large unappetising dollops from full to bursting mission speakers? not until frank pumped up the bass in the checkered tungsten cavern beneath the streets & busted out those dirty tunes which promised perfection did enlightenment come, as neville, caterpillarlike on lewis carroll's magic mushroom, smiled over the counter knowingly. maybe it was the mojo bubble, or the beer, but alice went ahead & swallowed the red pill...

with a beer in hand, i soaked up the regular wknd instore this time featuring little known but big in style & savvy sound, the nevada strange who partially mirror an early velvety nick cave sound fused with light post-punk guitar rifts fronted by a really cute swaggering lead singer swathed in 70s hip jumble shop couture [loved the striped beige jacket] with all the right mic moves. the narrow shouldered boho drummer looked like he'd be more comfortable behind a bass but then he started smashing that kit & everything worked in a way that fresh-faced acting students wax rhetoric about not playing but being.

the time warp complete after casually schmoozing the room, addled with beer & intoxicating conversation i left that place with a copy of "live at the old quarter, houston, texas" by townes van zandt who i ashamedly did not know existed prior to the day but listen to now whilst tapping keyboard keys theoretically in sync to his quietly tumultous texan guitar folk warbles. it makes me want to play what basic blues rifts i once knew, howl at the moon & drink women on wine [in that order]... all on a verandah. "i wanna trace her with my body, i wanna track her with my mind..."

the red pill lives on. my mojo partially revitalised until next visit when rabbit hunting will take my running-on-empty soul back onto york st through the looking glass right under the nose of the imperious queen of hearts.