Chapter 21: Summertime

The Last Stand

December, 1983

That evening, just after dinner, there was a knock on the front door.

“Will Morris? I’m Frank Bubalo, Uncle Phillip sent me,” he said.

“How’s the old guy doing?” I replied.

“He’s pretty good, considering everything,” was his response.

Having passed the test, as it were, I shook his hand.

“Paul Ramos recommended you,” I said.

I ushered him inside, and told him I was looking for a reasonable security system for the house and garage. He made notes as we walked around; drawing a rough sketch plan showing doors, windows and rooms. I showed him the utility room, and the mini-pabx we had.

“Is there a spare extension that can be used on that?” he asked. “Does it handle tone dialling, or just pulse?”

“It can do both; normally, to get an outside line, you dial zero, then the number.” I said. “I can set it up so that from the outside, if you dial the main number, then once the pabx ‘answers’, you can then dial the two digit extension you want, it will connect you.”

He asked about some of the features I might want; tying in smoke detectors, motion activated floodlights for the yard, what he called ‘duress’ buttons inside the house, which would send an alert signal to the alarm monitoring company.

“When the system detects any sort of problem – fire, intrusion, a duress alarm – the monitoring people call the number here. Whoever answers the call has to respond with a code number, otherwise the police or other emergency services are called,” Frank said.

He showed me some brochures; one model was a modular unit – what appeared to be a microcomputer based S-100 bus system, it had a 10MB disk drive to record events, and an interface to a VHS VCR to record the video stream from the monitoring cameras. It would need a small 19 inch rack system, and there was a rack mount battery UPS to filter the power and keep the system operational should the mains power fail. It all looked pretty good; I told him to give me a quote for the supply, installation and a year’s monitoring.

“You’ll get the family discount, too,” he said. “Paul told me to look after you.”

In all the excitement surrounding the trial, the announcement from the Federal Government regarding the floating of the Australian dollar almost passed without notice in the house. Of course, the news was greeted by the expected protests and predictions of doom from the opposition, but the financial markets greeted the announcement very positively. Just as Cathy had predicted, when the markets opened on Monday morning, the value of the Australian dollar against the US dollar had climbed, as many traders were wanting to buy the dollar and get into a new avenue of trading. Cathy called me that night, to see how I was after the trial.

“Will, I read about it in the paper, I guess you’re relieved it’s all over, and he’s going to jail?” she asked.

“I’m glad it’s over, but sad he’s going to jail; I keep thinking if only he had come to me last year, when he started having problems, we might have helped him adapt to University.”

“And what was behind the judge making comments on threats to some of the witnesses? Did that include you?” she asked.

I gave her a brief rundown of the events that happened outside of the courtroom, Tom Domican’s threats against me and others, and how the Crown Solicitor’s office was looking into it all.

“God, Will, you manage to find yourself in some situations. Just take care, look after yourself, he’s a nasty, dangerous man. Now, I assume you followed my advice and picked up some US dollars?”

I told her that I did, and she said that over the next few weeks, to see if I could get more, the Aussie dollar should continue to rise between now and the New Year.

“Just be prepared to hold on to the US money for about six months,” she said. “It’s the honeymoon period at the moment, all of the forex traders want to get into this new currency, but after a few months, the shine will wear off.”

After she hung up, I thought I should give Georgina a call, since she worked in foreign money trading, maybe I could set up an account with the Commonwealth Bank through her.

“Hey, George, how’s it going?” I asked her, when she answered her phone.

“Will! Great to hear from you,” she said. “It’s been crazy ever since the government announced the float of the dollar. It means heaps more work for us; every time we process a settlement, we need to check the current exchange rates between the dollar and whatever foreign currency the deal is in. Plus, every man and his dog wants to get into the Aussie dollar, I’ve now got responsibilities for managing a stack of foreign investment accounts. I’ve got a pay rise, plus I get a commission bonus on top of that.”

“That’s great, now maybe I can give you some more work,” I said. “What do I need to do to open a foreign investment account? I’m thinking of buying another ten grand’s worth of US Dollars, and put in another ten grand I have already.”

“Can you come in tomorrow morning, and see me in my office? We can do all the paperwork, get you set up. I’m now on the fifth floor of the Commonwealth Commercial Bank building, in Martin Place – it’s not the ‘money box’ building, but the other one, between Castlereagh and Elizabeth Streets. There’s a reception desk just when you get out of the elevators on the fifth floor, ask there for me.”

“Sounds great, I’ll see you then, George.”

I could easily spare an extra ten thousand dollars to put aside for a few months; my last royalty check, with the payment for the October gigs at the Entertainment Centre, was rather substantial.

The next morning, I headed into the city; I had the stack of US bills that I had purchased over the previous weeks in my brief case. I found her desk; she had a cubicle in one corner of a large open-plan office space; her desk was covered with forms and papers, off to one side of the area were some computer terminals. She moved a pile of computer printouts from a chair, and indicated I should sit, after giving me a soft kiss on the lips.

“Great to see you, Will,” she said. “Now, let’s make a start, before the morning’s chaos starts!”

She handed me an account application for to complete, showing me what I needed to fill out. When I signed the bottom of the form, she added her signature, and a stamp – her official registration stamp, she explained.

“Now, you can call in, twenty-four hours a day, to our trading desk, there will be someone to help you,” she said. “All you will need to do is give your account number, which is here, and we need to set up a password, so they know it’s you. Just a word, that’s all, something that you can remember easily, but secure enough that no one else might guess what it is.”

“How about ‘callipygous’?” I suggested. “Whenever I think of you, I can’t forget your beautiful buttocks.”

“Don’t!” she said, blushing, but giggling. “You’ll get me all embarrassed, thinking about things like that!”

“I like thinking about your buttocks, and the things you and I did...”

“God, stop that, Will! I’m going to get all...”

“All moist and turned on?”

“Yes! And I don’t want to be like that when I’m here at work, and not able to do anything about it!”

“Anyway, on a different topic, would you and Ross like to come to the gig we are doing with Chisel this Thursday, the night after tomorrow?” I asked her. “I have a couple of comp tickets, if you want.”

“That would be great; I’ll call Ross a bit later. What time should we get to the venue?”

“Oh, six, six-thirty, something like that,” I said.

“Thanks, Will, that’s really kind of you. Maybe I can offer you my ‘beautiful buttocks’ as a means of thanking you? That time in my apartment, our ‘greek date’ ... I would love to do that again.”

“Georgina, you know my rules...”

“I know; and I suspected you would say that to me. But ... I had to ask, I would love to have just one more time with you. I would make sure it was the time of your life.”

“I’m sure it would be; the times we were together were very enjoyable, but, that’s not the point, I’m not going to do anything that might hurt Ross.”

“Yeah, I guess so; I don’t want to lose him or hurt him, either.”

“Anyway, thanks for setting that trading account up, Georgina; I need to get back home and check all of my equipment for Thursday night. But I will see you at the gig, I’m looking forward to that.”

I gave her a quick hug, and kissed her cheek.

“I want you to kiss me all over,” she whispered in my ear. “I need to feel your lips and tongue on my pussy, while you finger me and make me come.”

“Georgina...” I said.

“I know, I know. Take care, Will,” she said, as she kissed me softly on the lips. “I’ll see you Thursday. Give my love to Lisa.”

I kissed her again, and she hugged me, and I felt her soft breasts pressing against my chest. Before things got even more out of hand, I let her go, and headed back home. I checked our gig schedule that Mary Beth had put up on the main whiteboard in the studio. She had mentioned that we were pretty much playing every night until Christmas; this week we were playing at Chequers every night, except for Thursday when we would be at the Ent Cent. Next week we had three nights at Selina’s; Friday night we were having a big Christmas / Birthday party in the back yard. Christmas Eve we were at the Antler, along with four nights at the Antler. New Year’s Eve we had a combined gig with the Angels and the Divynils at Victoria Park. And that didn’t include the touring in January; my equipment (and me!) would be getting a pretty solid workout over the next two months. Still, if we wanted the album and the single from it to sell well, we had to get out and promote them. Besides, the money from all of this would be good.

We already had our set lists worked out; we really wanted to plug tracks off the new album. I wanted to work on some songs where Tracy would be taking the lead vocals; she wanted to work on her stage presence and vocals prior to the recording of her new TV series, ‘Sweet and Sour’. While there were several songs that she and I would sing together, and on the latest album Tracy sang the lead on several tracks. But she wanted something powerful, but sad, poignant; a song that would really push her vocal abilities to the limit. I was pretty sure there was at least one song that Megan and I had performed together that would fit the bill; I started looking through the index card system that Mary Beth maintained. It took less than a minute to find the song title that I was looking for, we did a cover of the Eagle’s ‘Desperado’, just me on the piano, and Megan singing. The index card included a reference to the cassette with a recording. I put that on the tape player; it was just what Tracy was looking for.

“Is Tracy there?” I asked when Merry answered the intercom in the family room.

“I think she’s getting here after lunch with Stewie,” she replied.

“No, not Trace, Tracy. Tracy Mann!” The trouble with having two people with the same name.

“Yeah, do you want her up in the studio?”

Tracy arrived soon after, and I re-cued the tape.

“Tell me what you think of this,” I said, as I hit the play button.

She sat in silence, listening. When Megan had finished singing, her eyes appeared damp.

“You don’t seriously think I could do that, do you?” she said softly. “There’s no way I can sing anywhere near as good as Megan, her voice ... that was pure magic. I have no idea how to get all of those emotions into what she’s singing, and that final note ... no way!”

“I can transpose it down a few tones, that’s not a problem,” I said. “And we can work on the emotional side of it; I mean, you should have no problems with that, not how I’ve seen you put your emotions in acting. Come on, let’s give it a try.”

I started to play the introduction, Tracy missed the timing, so I restarted, counting her in. She was right, in one sense, the song as I played it was pitched a little too high for her to reach some of the notes comfortably. I would have to spend some time transposing the music for her. It made me wish I had one of those new Yamaha digital pianos, they had a built in transposing feature.

We tried it again, this time transposed down two tones; she found the higher notes more comfortable. All that was needed was some practice, working on her breathing and our overall timing. We took a break after playing it a few times, Tracy sat next to me on one of the couches, and I put my arm around her.

“You’re better at it than you first thought,” I said. “We should have that ready for performance in a few days.”

“I’m nowhere near as good as Megan was on that tape, though,” she said. “When I heard her singing, I almost burst into tears.”

“That was done not all that long after you left her,” I said. “I’m sure she pulled all of her feelings about you leaving her into that song.”

“Oh,” she said, her voice expressionless. “Oh. I guess I understand.”

She wiped the back of her hand across her eyes, and swallowed.

“I guess I never really thought how my leaving would have upset her ... but hearing that, now I think I understand. Was she ... was she really upset?”

“She was, but she channelled all of her heartbreak into that song; I had the suggestions when I heard Linda Ronstadt singing it, just by herself, with the piano, and I felt Megan could do that. That recording was of the second take we did, one afternoon in the studio at Erskineville. We had played it through once, and before we could do it a second time, Mary Beth wanted to get it down on tape.”

“I want to be able to sing it with you just as good as she did,” she said. “It’s going to take some work, but ... Now I know why Megan said she would get so turned on every time she performed on stage with you; singing like this, just you and me, there’s so much emotion flowing from you to me; it almost overwhelms me. I can see how you affect others singing with you, too, like when you perform with Chrissy. I love sharing that with you, Will.”

I turned my face, and kissed her on her cheek.

“I love performing with you too, Tracy. Feel like trying it one more time?”

“Sure, just give me a minute, to get myself centred and in the right frame of mind.”

She put her head down in her hands, her eyes were closed, and she looked to be deep in thought. After a minute, she sighed deeply.

“Okay, let’s do it, Will.”

Just before we started, some of the others – Mary Beth, Merry, Ange, Lisa – had come up to the studio. I looked at Tracy, she smiled and gave me a nod. I played the opening broken chords on the Rhodes, and waited for Tracy to start singing. I played chords, filling in behind her. This time, her voice was clear, pure, she held each note perfectly; with it pitched down to a range that was better suited to her voice, she didn’t have to strain to reach the higher notes. When she finished, the others were stunned; I just looked at her and slowly clapped.

“Wow, Tracy, that was amazing!” Lisa said. “So beautiful, are you going to add that to our regular list?”

“That’s just as good as how Megan did it,” Mary Beth said. “Do you feel you’re up to doing it again, I really need to get that on tape? Lisa, can you grab a blank cassette?”

Lisa and Mary Beth had the tape recorder set up, meanwhile Tracy sat next to me, and held my hands.

“Do you think I sounded any good?” she asked. “I know I’m not as good as Megan was.”

“That was absolutely stunning, Tracy,” I said to her. “You really pulled out all the stops, it sounded beautiful.”

“You’re just saying that,” she said.

“No, I’m deadly serious, you really nailed that. I don’t know what you thought about when you were preparing yourself, but it really worked.”

“I thought back to when you took me up to Kim’s, and we spent those few days in that beachfront resort, talking about our future. A future that will never happen, I know, but...”

“Are you two ready to do that again?” Mary Beth asked.

“Give me about thirty seconds,” Tracy said, bowed her head and closed her eyes. “Okay, you lead in, Will.”

I looked over to Mary Beth, she nodded, and started the tape. I played the intro, and Tracy sang, ever better this time. When we finished, I pulled her over to me, and kissed her deeply, right on her lips. She responded, our tongues pushed together.

“Wow! That was amazing, hearing you two do that,” Merry said. “I’ve got goose bumps after listening, that was stunning!”

“I need to take a break after that,” Tracy said. “Before I have to get ready for tonight’s gig, anyway. When are we loading the trailer?”

“We will start in about fifteen minutes,” I said. “We’ve got enough hands, if you need to take a break.”

We had the trailer loaded; then headed into the city. It didn’t take us all that long to get set up on the stage at Chequers; we had played there plenty of times before, and knew just where things needed to go, where cables had to be run, and the right positions for each person so that the lights were already correct. We used the sound check to review the set lists for the evening; these gigs before Christmas were pretty much promoting the new album.

“Once we get ‘Desperado’ sounding better, maybe we can slip that in somewhere,” Tracy suggested. “Maybe instead of the Zeppelin cover?”

“I think you and I have some serious practicing ahead of us,” I said. “But I like that suggestion. Maybe we can try it Thursday night, at the Ent Cent?”

We had a quick meal for dinner, and at 7:00 p.m. we started the show. We opened the first set with ‘Old Time Rock and Roll’, and mixed in all of the songs off the album with some of our older favourites. ‘Nutbush’ and ‘Bobby McGee’, of course; and closed out the final set with ‘Mean Woman Blues’. We played ‘Kiss my Funky Penguin’ and ‘Promised Land’ as the encore; it was our first time incorporating the ‘Penguin Dance’ that Lisa and Trace had come up with; even though we had practiced it in the studio back at Banksia Lodge, this was a first ‘live performance’. From where I was sitting it didn’t looked too bad; at least not for a first attempt.

The next day was almost a repeat of Tuesday; Tracy and I did some more practicing of ‘Desperado’, meanwhile Paul and Chris’s guys were around, putting in the new garden edging and replacing the path from the garage to the house. At least that would be done by the time we had our big Christmas party on the 23rd. We had decided that since the engagement party that we had put on last year was such a huge success, we’re do something similar this year; but it would be to thank all of our family, friends, and people at Alberts for helping us (as a group) have such a successful year. Mary Beth and Lisa were doing most of the organizing, we had worked out there would be around one hundred and fifty guests, give or take. We would use the same caterers as we had last year, Stewie’s mate would be there with his portable bar to provide the drinks, and we would set up a temporary stage between the garage and the house where we would play music.

Bill Coleman had printed up some pretty spiffy looking invitations, they had all gone out late last month, and Mary Beth was keeping track of the RSVP’s. All five of my thesis students from the university would be coming, along with Claude and his wife, David, Michelle, and a number of other staff members. It should be a rather fun evening; some of our other musician friends would be there; AC/DC, Don Walker and Ian Moss from Chisel, Chrissy and Mark from the Divinyls. George and Harry would be there as well, so there the chance of a big jam session was pretty much on the cards.

The gig at Chequers that evening went fairly well, the ‘funky Penguin’ dance seemed even better that the first attempt. We had to pack our equipment up, since tomorrow night we would be at the Ent Cent; supporting Cold Chisel for the final night of their ‘Last Stand’ break-up gig.

We arrived at the Entertainment Centre just after lunchtime; Chisel’s gear had already been moved to the sides of the stage, and we set things up. Time for a quick check of the sound levels, and for Mary Beth, Chris and Lisa to make sure the lighting and sound systems were right. We had slightly rearranged the set, so Tracy and I could fit ‘Desperado’ in before we closed out our set with ‘Promised Land’. Once we had finished, it was time to check with the other guys to make sure there were no changes to the final combined encore set. They were suggesting we really draw that final set out, rather than just doing three songs, they wanted to make it last almost an hour.

“You guys are fine with that?” Don asked.

We thought it all sounded good, and we went over what we could put in there. They wanted some of their more popular songs, ‘Khe Sanh’, ‘Rising Sun’, ‘Choir Girl’, ‘Cheap Wine’; we suggested that we add ‘Mean Woman Blues’, and have Jimmy and I sing that together.

“I saw you guys do that with AC/DC, back when Bon was still singing with them,” Jimmy said. “That’s a real ball-tearer; I’d love to do that with you guys!”

We worked out the list; and ran through things once. Mary Beth, Lisa and Chris were on top of things up in the control booth; we felt it would sound pretty good.

“I think we can all give you guys a really good send off,” Phil said. “It sucks that you’re breaking up though.”

“Yeah, well, we’ve had a pretty good run,” Don said. “Ten years, we can’t complain about that. That’s about as long as you guys have been together, isn’t it?”

“Well, not counting the group Paul, Andrew my brother and I had before that,” Phil said.

“We probably made a mistake trying to tour overseas, to Europe and the US,” Ian said. “They are incredibly draining; and money-wise, really not worth the effort. Far too much stress. You guys have made the right decision just to base yourself here in Sydney.”

“Yeah, we’ve done some interstate tours, Melbourne, Brissy, but they do take it out of you,” I said. “Of course, since all of us have full time careers or are studying, it’s not all that possible to take extended overseas or interstate tours. Mind you, we are hitting the north coast next month, so...”

“Playing the Hoey Moey at Coffs?” Jimmy asked. “That’s always a great place to play in summer, so much energy in the audience.”

We spent the rest of the afternoon just kicking back, talking about various venues, good places and not so good places to play, various musical topics, and plans for the future. I reminded Don and Ian that any time they wanted to play with us, we would love to have them join us; there were always welcome at our rehearsal sessions, or to play at any of our gigs.

“Well, we’ll be there at your party tomorrow week,” Don said.

Time to get ready for the evening’s performance; a light meal, shower and into the stage clothes. When we got up onto the stage, and took our positions, I looked out into the audience; I was amazed at just how many people were in the arena. Phil made a brief announcement, and then it was into the opening track ‘Old Time Rock and Roll’. The lighting seemed particularly impressive; and the sound system ... That was one advantage in playing the larger venues, the sound systems were always very impressive. Combined with the energy of the huge crowd, it made playing places like this a real experience.

We continued on through our set; when it was time for Tracy and I to play ‘Desperado’, all of the stage lights were dimmed way down, there was just a spot on me sitting at the Rhodes, and as I played the introduction, the spot on Tracy slowly came up. Her voice was particularly poignant, I could detect a sense of heartbreak, of loss in what she was singing. Whether it was about the falling apart of her relationship with Megan, or wishing for a future with me that would never happen, I wasn’t sure; they were two of the series of thoughts she would use to get herself ‘emotionally ready’ for the song. Whatever she had done this evening worked, she gave a terrific rendition of the song; probably better than Megan had done. When she finished, there was silence in the auditorium for a few seconds, then the whole crowd erupted into cheers. I looked across at her, her eyes were moist, there were tears trickling down her cheeks.

“That was beautiful, simply stunning,” I said to her.

She looked at me, and smiled; blinked her eyes to clear the tears away. There wasn’t time to reflect on her performance, we had one last song before handing the stage over to Chisel. ‘Promised Land’ was the closing track of our set; I gave it everything I had; and we left the stage as the crowd were cheering and applauding. The stage crew moved our equipment to the back of the stage, and pulled Chisel’s equipment in from the sides.

“You were fantastic, Tracy,” I said to her as we were off in the wings. “That’s the best I’ve heard that sung.”

“Thanks, Will. Before I started singing, I did your trick, getting a suitable image in my head,” she said. “I looked back at those few days we had together at Terrigal, and the talks we had about a possible future together; how things never worked out that way for us...”

We headed up to the control room to watch Chisel’s performance; as we got there, Jimmy started on the introduction.

“G’day, Sydney! This is our absolute last final, never to be repeated show!”

Cheers from the crowd, including a lot of people crying out ‘No. Don’t break up!”

“What a fantastic opening for the show; everyone put your hands together for the Roberttones; they have made it hard for us to top that. Don’t worry, they’ll be back for the final, combined set with us! Now ... let’s hit it!”

They started with ‘Shipping Steel’, then ‘You Got Nothing I Want’, ‘Bow River’, and slowed it down with ‘When the War is Over’ and ‘Breakfast at Sweethearts’. They continued their set with ‘Saturday Night’, ‘Janelle’, ‘Khe Sanh’, and ‘Rising Sun’, the last two really got the crowd fired up and moving. Ian Moss did his moving version of ‘Georgia’, and they did another two songs to wrap up the set. Time to get back down to the stage; the stage crew were moving things around so both groups would be on stage.

“Ready to blow this crowd away, Will?” Jimmy asked me. “The opening track, that’s going to be a blast!”

With the equipment set up for us, we ran on to the stage; the audience started cheering. I grabbed my guitar, checked that it was plugged into the radio pickup, made sure the levels were set, and stood with Jimmy at the main mike.

“Sydney! We’ve got our great friends, the Roberttones with us now, and to start the final set is the one and only Will Morris! Tell me Will, what happened to that mean old woman you were seeing a while ago?”

“I don’t think I know any mean women, Jimmy...”

That was my cue to start the intro to ‘Mean Woman Blues’; I had Phil and Mossy right behind me; picking up on my riffs. Jimmy had his arm over my shoulder, and together we belted out the song.

I moved back to my piano, the next song was ‘Rising Sun’, that was always a blast to play, we followed that up with ‘Khe Sanh’, ‘Rising Sun’, ‘Choir Girl’, and ‘Cheap Wine’.

“Our final song of the night is a classic Aussie rock song,” Jimmy said. “It really sums up what it’s been like for us over these last ten years, and this is dedicated to someone who was a great mate for all of us up here on stage. Bon Scott was a legend, he typified what a rock singer should be like. This one’s for you, Bon!”

Ian, Phil and I all hit the opening riff of ‘Long Way to the Top’ together; again, Jimmy and I were at the microphone together, singing. Instead of bagpipes for the solo, we had our horn section; and when we finished, Jimmy looked around at all of us.

“Again?” he asked, and we all nodded.

Somehow we worked an extra verse and chorus into the song; when we had finished, and the crowd was still roaring out for more, my voice felt worn out, I was covered in sweat, absolutely exhausted.

“Thank you, Sydney, you’ve been great,” Jimmy said. “Stay safe, go out and buy these guy’s latest album, it’s bloody fantastic! Thank you, everyone, good bye!”

“That was a fucking blast!” Jimmy said to us as we moved backstage to let the roadies pack up our equipment. “Abso-fucking-lutely brilliant!”

All of us sat around in a room backstage, we were still pumped up from the performance.

“Why the fuck didn’t we get you guys with us for all of our performances here in Sydney?” Don asked. “Damn, that was a great way to go out, though.”

Once things had been packed up, we drove back home; the adrenaline was still flowing as we got inside. Merry and Ange disappeared into their room, leaving Lisa, Tracy and myself alone; everyone else was sleeping up in the guest rooms behind the studio.

“God, I need someone to fuck me senseless!” Tracy said. “Anyone else interested?”

“I know I am,” Lisa said. “How about you, Will? Not too worn out?”

The two of them dragged me off to bed – not that I put up much resistance – and we made love until the early hours of the morning, I did my best to fuck both of them senseless.