Prestige: Those who have it, know it

After the first EP being, for myself at least, such a sensational and gratifying experience, it made absolute sense to me that we should record another one. I was spurred on by listening to the first five songs and how damn good they sounded.  Plus, the songs were receiving 4ZZZ airplay which was also a great motivator at the time.  The funk band continued to sound really tight and professional, and we were at our busiest in terms of gigs during 2016 and 2017.  We picked up a Friday night residency at Lock and Load, a venue in Brisbane’s West End district.  We weren’t making great money at those gigs and didn’t care – oh the crowded dance floors, the wild party atmosphere and the love and appreciation the audiences showed for us! At the end of our three sets, finishing at 1:00am, we were often met with roaring applause and even at times conga lines and standing ovations. The sheer pleasure of playing those songs with those people in that band cannot be overstated – another dream come true!

My workplace had stablised quite significantly by 2016.  I was seen to be working hard, which I had been, and I was deeply engaged in the administration and operations of the undergraduate engineering course provided by the University.  So far, I’ve portrayed my experiences there as being difficult and challenging.  And many were.  But there were definitely also people who were fantastic to work with and for, and who I still love and appreciate to this day.  My boss at the time, Phillip Bryans, was an exceptional boss and wonderful human all round.  The six of us on his team who reported to him loved and appreciated him universally.  Phillip was a psychology graduate who’d studied honours in organisational psychology before starting his career as a university administrator.  To say that his background in organisational psychology gave him deep insight and empathy into my own predicament at work is a huge understatement.  Phillip was so understanding, of me and all his staff, that I was inspired to write and record a couple of songs in his distinguished honour! More on that in later chapters.

Prestige

Tight black jeans

Brain freeze

Rotating vinyl for a little while

Super queen

Daydreams

Contemplating your salacious smile

Leather belt

Face melt

Blowing gently like a summer breeze

Libertine

Vespertine

Your mercury is 120 degrees

Aorta, the soul, the heart

Your awesome has torn me apart

Shattering like broken glass

Transcending wealth and social class

Tell me diva where you been?

Skill and creativity

Move along nothing to see

What does the goddamn world expect from the likes of me?

Hot I bet

Your silhouette

Carves a subtle image and you’re keen

Never doubt

What it’s all about

You’ve given all of that and more to me

I know it’s real

How you make me feel

Dreams like this must be the real deal

Velvet pants

Take a chance

Checking all the bases I must steal

Aorta, the soul, the heart

Your awesome has torn me apart

Shattering like broken glass

Transcending wealth and social class

Tell me diva where you been?

Skill and creativity

Move along nothing to see

What does the goddamn world expect from the likes of me?

So there was the medication thing and the dysfunction discussed already.  But at the same time I did still had drive, and while I was far from being a rockstar, the funk band and the recordings were generating interest among our many musician contacts, friends and family, and to a limited extent, the public via 4ZZZ airplay. A man will channel that energy into his songs!  At work at times female colleagues would come and say g’day, be flirtatious and show romantic intent, which I loved but never acted upon.  It was a strange dichotomy – “the mind is willing, but the flesh is weak!” At some point everyone must cede to fate and opportunity, and I did on very rare occasions.  It’s certainly been years now and opportunity all but alludes me nowadays.  But in 2016, buoyed by the funk band’s live party vibes, the thrill of having some kick arse recordings, and the relief of having gained some respect and respite at work culminated in the raunchy fantasy that is Prestige.

I called the song Prestige to express the concept of those people we all know and meet sometimes throughout our lives who have it.  Who are it.  Everyone knows it, and everyone wants them. And I, like most, am an ABSOLUTE SUCKER for those privileged few who own and exhibit those qualities of prestige!  Over the decades, I’ve had long time crushes turn romance, turn break up, turn estrangement, turn years without contact.  And somehow I still burn a candle!  It’s most annoying.  I’ve reached out to old flames years and years after any possibility of further romance was long dead and again expressed unrequited love.  For a long time I wondered – is that harassment? To not only maintain, but express, desires towards people who have long, long moved on and possibly even forgotten all about you?  In some instances, there haven’t really been many, that may have been the case. But it occurred to me that for the prestigious it’s just as likely to make for a funny story, another example of yet another tragic soul entranced by their prestigious magic.  I can see that too. Never having had prestige myself, I can only ever speculate.

Tis a raunchy bass groove, Prestige.  D minor pentatonic.  Toby rocked the drum kit syncopation that day in the studio. Damn he’s a fine player!  And it was as though Nate was born to blaze the Prestige licks and solo – so funky, bluesy and groovy!  We didn’t rehearse often with the funk band.  We didn’t need to.  We played a gig at least once a fortnight and we knew our setlists backwards, upside down, every which way but Sunday.  We’d only rehearse to bring new covers songs up to speed for integration into our live performances.  At one such jam after recording the second SWO EP, Lauren hinted at the possibility of including some of the funkier SWO songs into the Alphabet Street live repertoire.  I was excited by the idea but didn’t make a big deal of it.  Nathan had his own original recording project underway at that time also, and as leader of the funk band, he abruptly kyboshed the idea.  I wasn’t upset by that to be honest.  He’d actually put forward the idea of Alphabet Street writing and workshopping original material as well as covers quite some months earlier to which both Lauren and Toby said ‘no’.  And that was fine too.  We were a damn good covers outfit and funk review.  It made perfect sense us to stick within the brief.