Footy and music, “routine and ritual” – a happy marriage in the southern states of Australia and the impetus for a night of talking about two great loves in a treasured venue in inner city Melbourne.
Francis Leach hosted the inaugural Presentation Night featuring the unparalleled Paul Kelly and AFL footballer, the Western Bulldogs Bob Murphy. It was a night of chatting that drew in a crowd consisting of Tex Perkins, Tim Rogers, Paul Dempsey and even the Mayor of Yarra, Jackie Fristacky.
Three stools and a couple of tables graced the stage where a mostly seated audience witnessed and at times joined in to the conversation that followed. Topics centred naturally around the guests’ backgrounds, loves and influences in footy and music and themes such as Kit Bags, The Grand Vinyl, Cue Jumpers, Trophies, Mavericks and Scary Monsters punctuated the night.
Francis Leach was the perfect host as his passion for both music and footy cannot be denied. The long suffering St. Kilda supporter drew out the football pasts and influences from both guests with the audience learning that Bob was a Richmond supporter in his youth and still has a huge regard for Matthew ‘Richo’ Richardson to this day, saying watching him was “an event”.
The “warrior, dreamer and diamond dog”, also an Age columnist, revealed his respect for the eccentric writings of Maverick Brent Crosswell and the benefits of having a bloke like Barry Hall on the same team, “like having the biggest kid in the playground playing with the preps”. Bob’s kit bag held special memories such as a footy he kept from a final against the Sydney Swans.
The footy is a reminder of how close the Doggies got to the Holy Grail and the absolute euphoria they felt when the Premiership was in sight, the closest he has ever been. He is appreciative of his footy career recognising the privileged life of experiencing the “full ride” and is happy to let the other guys have a shot at the “mountain”. His heroes in footy include the Tiger Dale Weightman and more recently the Cats Steve Johnson. Musically Murphy works out to the Stones’ Exile in Main Street through to Lady Gaga and winds down to Tex Perkins eliciting a comment from Leach that he is an “old soul”.
Paul Kelly’s South Australian upbringing had him barracking for Norwood as a kid and betting with his brother that he would either play with them or in an Australian test team.
Sadly for him but lucky for us his focus became song writing but footy always held his interest. He was a rover at school but it was music that became his love. He played trumpet at high school until he realised the allure of the guitar and the bands synonymous with the Adelaide scene: Fraternity, Cold Chisel and the like. They were his influences along with Bob Dylan.
He revealed that writing songs is his biggest thrill gracing us with one he wrote that day inspired by Charlie Perkins and an incident at the Moree swimming pool in 1965, when indigenous kid weren’t allowed to swim there. A Bastard Like Me lulled the audience and made us think of issues bigger than footy, bigger than music and all too familiar in the recent history of this nation. Kelly talked about reaching that point in your art, whether it be playing music or footy that enables that “great oceanic feeling” to surface, the mesmerising level that makes a song take over him and he just goes along with it.
Kelly’s choice of vinyl was Died Pretty’s Complaining Days borrowed from his mate Damo as he has never owned a record player. He reminisces about seeing them at the Trade Union Club in Sydney admitting that they could be “majestic one day, awful the next.” His time in Sydney also featured the absence of news about AFL and how he would look forward to copies of The Age with articles from the incomparable Martin Flanagan – another footy devotee that kept Kelly in the loop and enabled him to connect to the ‘religion’ that dominates south of the border.
The conversation flowed and there was a lot of humour and a few digs (Renee Geyer and a young pup draftee at the Bulldogs weren’t spared) but the consensus was pretty clear – Presentation Night works and certainly should become a staple in the depths of a cold Melbourne winter.
