Last week we brought you part one of The Duke Spirit’s Australian tour diary which followed the genial four-piece’s adventures across our fair land. Part two finds the Brits embracing beach culture in Byron Bay and getting acquainted with our (not so friendly) local wildlife.
So a few days of cooking up some fuzzy, “tight as Mick Jagger’s pant’s”* rock shows (East Brunswick Club, Melbourne) and then we got to relax and reap the benefits of beating ourselves up with a lot of touring . Here are some snaps from an evening out with Josie, our Melbourne goddess…She took us down her favourite childhood path to the beach just in time for sunset.
Calm evening sea, Dave Benge and I went for it and took a swim just as the sun dipped and extinguished the colours of the landscape…leaving us slipping around in an abyss of water that looked like oil, sleep or pain relief.
Then we slurped our way through some local Brut and Coopers, and snuggled up with the dog. Well not all of us together obviously. Not cool.
Then it was up and out and onto another plane. That’s Benge our TM right there in the middle – you can tell from the way he holds his luggage why check-in desk ladies always let us off a few penalty fares with the overweight baggage. He just has a knack with it.
And there you go.
I am now writing from the Hinterland near Byron…we OBVIOUSLY had to make a a little stop off there to flirt with surf and alternative living. I have seen some dolphins today so that might make it official. Not sure if I’ll catch Luke Olly Marc or Toby in flipflops though. Mind you, a little more coaxing and it might bring the Huckleberry Finn look out of them. Lets hope not though. Paint it black I reckon.
As it happens Dan Auerbach is playing the Great Northern tonight so we’ll go and watch him and leave the surfing to the athletic types.
Pretty soon we’ll be heading back down to Sydney so I’ll write some more along the way and find some pictures from our Sydney Oxford Arts gig which was superfine.
See you at the Beach House show…
PS that Jagger Pants quote (*) is real! Some journalist penned that the other day. That’s fucking great. I’ll have that one for sure.
PPS I just remembered some awesome tropical shit that happened yesterday.
1 = I nearly stepped on a local venomous snake. Yep. Just missed it. Very invigorating.
2 = Waded in the river by Minyon Falls. Got home to find leech attached to my goddamn toe. Duke Toby, the survival expert, burnt it off. I don’t eat or harm animals at any other time, but figured this little fucker was essentially trying to kill me slowly with blood sucking antics. SO all was fair, I think.
Leila Moss
Photos Provided by The Duke Spirit
