There’s a recording I have from Sydney but there is one on YT from Melbourne – same tour, around 10 days apart. To me, when I listen to both these recordings, Jim sounds thoroughly exhausted – especially on both recordings of Hunter And The Hunted – and they both are placed early in the set.
The thing I love most about these versions of HATH is that towards the end as Jim is singing those “only with you life moves so fast” lines, he sings one of them with emphasis (for Oz audiences only, it seems, as I am pretty certain he doesn’t emphasise the words like this at any other time – same as he does with King Is White And In The Crowd – again, for Oz only, more accurately Sydney…he knows us Aussie c*nts too well. Lol) and sings “with you life moves so FUCKING fast”. That always gives me an extra buzz, and extra ripple of delight. Call me shallow!
These days he doesn’t even sing the line at all, but that doesn’t mean HATH is any less appealing and wow – the visual display it had at the gigs this year with those wild horses cantering through the Badlands? MAGIC!
If the auto skip embed hasn’t worked – Hunter And The Hunted starts at 11:35
So…my Facebook feed tonight threw this one up at me. A piece of poetry I wrote.
It was based on going out for a meal in Sydney’s northern suburbs with my sister to a place called Sambal.
There we are outside it. One of my favourite dishes is laksa and this place were doing a vegetarian laksa. I HAD to try it. It was bloody delicious!
Anyway. I found out about this place in the most unusual way. Jim had posted on the SM Facebook page about being a “domestic god” lol, and his like for sambal. I’d never heard of it! Looked it up on Google and it showed me this restaurant in Sydney among the search results. I replied to his post with all this – and this happened…
Obviously some time later I must have been reminded of the poem as several months later, I made this…and used the last line of the poem as part of the piece.
I thought of it all. Remembered it all just from seeing the poem in my “memories” earlier.
All these little insignificant things are all lovely little tokens for me. They’re all lovely little mementos of a special time.
Being home with mum. Feeling an affinity to Jim. Having a fun time with my sis. The art burgeoning and being special.
I guess it is one of my more “sycophancy Nancy” pieces. I had it printed years ago, and it’s still up on my wall now. I think it’s another of Sheila Rock’s. She always seemed to get him with his tits out. Lol
And the poetry? Well, it was all early days of my fandom. Been around barely a year. Had only just started to get snippets of interaction with Jim at that stage. Had only been to TWO Simple Minds gigs and was still another 18 months off meeting him.
Currently at Sydney Airport. Shortly about to board a United Airlines flight to San Francisco. About 30 plus hours of travel ahead with connections included.
It’s now 4 years since this happened and I know Jim will be utterly bloody bored with it, so I’ll just keep the memory here on the blog.
This anniversary I find myself back in Oz, so this year feels just a little more special, yet painfully sad.
Kyoto might well still be in snow, but most of the Eastern seaboard of Australia, as well as parts of Adelaide and Perth, have been aflame this summer.
Again for most of the outer suburbs of Sydney, up to Newcastle, and down to the south coast, past Wollongong (where regional coastal towns are on high alert as fires threaten to ravage the area again, having only just gone through the devastation just 72 hours ago) and into country areas of New South Wales, temps are set to be a minimum of 40 degrees Celsius – with the average being 44 tomorrrow.
After Saturday’s extremes, the temp. drops away and falls by 20+ degrees for a high of 25 in Sydney on Sunday and 22 on Monday.
Four years ago, the weather was unusually cool for the time of year – 21 degrees and drizzle. A rare overcast and rainy day.
Well the days I’ve had here I’ve hardly seen the sun but for vastly different reasons.
Also this time four years ago, I was spending – what I feared would turn out to be – my final months with mum.
And so I say it time and again, my Hunter And The Hunted piece will forever be the most special thing to me. I don’t know how much I can express all that is wrapped up in it.
The significance of the song… it really is just about the finest thing Simple Minds ever produced – and as a consequence how enamoured I am with Jim. He is just beautiful… the lyrics to the song and just him… body and mind. Intelligence. Beauty.
And I still feel that my piece on it compliments the beauty of the song.
And there’s mum and those precious final months with her. I never wanted those months to be the final ones😔💔
I knew time was running out.
This silly mind is still waiting for us to travel to Busby to go and see her… wondering why we haven’t been yet. Pulling into Liverpool Station on the train and not getting off the train there feels really wrong.
The anniversary will be more special every year.
Jim, thank you. I will love you always for this. 💕😚
Okay. I know it’s Christmas and Sir has got to have his family time. And I know the tour needs to be pushed. But!!
FUCKING HELL – I MISS HIM! I miss how Simple Minds Official was.
What’s happened? Why has he stepped away from it so much? I thought it was because of his Da – and that I (obviously) understood. But I’m starting to think it wasn’t so much about his Da at all.
I dunno.
It’s a sad indictment on me if I miss him this much, I guess. Considering I just lost my mum and I’m worried about bloody Jim flipping Kerr!
Shit… says a lot about me, doesn’t it?
It feels like both ends of that beautiful tie is gone.
Four years ago when I was in Oz, I felt like I had both mum AND Jim. My time with mum was precious and Jim made it more special.
And now… both feel gone 😔😔😔
Well… mum is absolutely gone. And I can’t shake this feeling while being here of “When are we going to see mum? It’s been great staying at Gwenda’s, but can we go and stay with mum now? Aren’t we going to visit her?”
There was an open coffin at the funeral. I saw her there… laying in state! My mind refuses to accept it. There is a void. I miss her. So much! But I have hardly shed a tear. There’s a detachment from not being here in the final days before she passed. And so I am missing her and can’t grieve properly. It’s kind of awful.
A strange limbo…
Jim is linked to my final memories of mum… and I miss him.
I just miss how SMO used to be. Not so much corporate whoring. A human touch. And Jim very much at the centre of it.
I miss you so much, Jim, because I miss my mum.
Anyway… we better get our tour tickets. Well, I have 11 now. That’s more than enough.
I arrived in Sydney nearly 24 hours ago. The smoke haze on the approach stretched on for miles. It started long before the plane’s descent.
Of course I arrived on a scorching hot day. I got some rest on the plane. I had my first (and what will probably be my only) experience as a business class traveller.
I flew out with Lufthansa under a Star Alliance co-airline flight. Glasgow to Frankfurt – Frankfurt to Hong Kong – Hong Kong to Sydney.
At Frankfurt there was announcement at the departure gate that some business class seats were available for ecomonmy/economy plus travellers to buy at a discounted rate. I thought… well, I can just enquire and see. If it’s stupid money, I won’t. So… I upgraded. Wow! The seats actually FULLY recline prostrate! It was amazing. The leg room. Wow. A MENU of food. I slept properly for about 4-5 hours. Even laid on my stomach at one point. I mean… when do you get to do THAT on a plane!?
Back to economy for the final leg, which was with Cathay Pacific. It was my first experience with Cathay Pacific and I have to say their economy class is VERY good.
We landed almost an hour ahead of schedule. Sydney was humid but cool when I arrived. I took my time. Alighted the plane last. Tidied myself up in the first toilet I saw. Took a seat and filled out the immigration form.
The e-passport thing blows my mind. All electronic. No 20 questions of why I’m the country, etc, etc. Scan and go.
My poor suitcase had hardly any friends left when I got to baggage reclaim.
Going through customs was fun. Some of us weary travellers were guinea pigs for trainee sniffer dogs, so it took a little time to get through there.
Out in arrivals I got myself a coffee and a bite to eat. I got a local SIM for my phone and then went to the train station and got myself to Central to get a connecting train to Liverpool – which still leaves from trusty old platform 19.
On the way through we passed Lidcombe Station. Lidcombe is where my mum grew up – not too far from the station itself. Two stops down is a tiny station – mostly it served workers for the big rail depot there. The station is called Clyde. And… all the time I lived in Sydney, the link never really occurred to me! I know! Silly. But how it hit me yesterday. My mum starting out in Lidcombe, just a short stop away from Clyde… and here I was, home to say goodbye to her. Never being able to say “Oh, mum, guess what? I live near Clyde too now.”
We say goodbye later today. To have been able to talk to her one last time… I wish.
Today I booked a Lufthansa flight home. From newest home to first home…
Glasgow to Frankfurt
Frankfurt to Hong Kong
Hong Kong to Sydney
A total of around 28 hours travel time with 22 and a half hours of flying time.
I leave on December 8th – which is now cancelling my trip to Germany and my two Stranglers gigs. It also means what should be my first Christmas in Glasgow will be spent roasting away in hell.
And I want to go back NEXT YEAR just to see a few Simple Minds gigs? I must have fucking rocks in my head!
And so while I try to deal with both a house move AND a flight to the other side of the world in the space of three weeks… I’ll be needing the music of this amazing band and the beauty of this beautiful, beautiful man (sorry, Jim…you’ll just have to deal with the endless adoration, buddy!) to keep me calm, (relatively) sane and tranquil.
I owe him so much from last time. I’ll need him again…
