Lurching out to Mildura through a surprisingly green Victoria the van was starting to demonstrate signs of being unwell. The occasional shudder and cough boded ill but the prospect of some genuine coalface action helped to ignore it.
The Sandbar at Mildura was a good show, the hotel was sumptuous – well, better than a swag. We got away early and made for Pinnaroo, just over the South Australian border. By the time we got there an unsettling whine had set in somewhere deep in the bowels of the engine.
The show that night was way out in the drought-afflicted badlands and freezing cold, but made up for by Margaritas and scantily clad barmaids – it was a fancy dress party.
On the way home the van demonstrated that it either had some crossover strain of mutant mechano-equine flu or was in drastic trouble. It got us back to our beds in the Roadhouse, courtesy of Lewis, our properly spoken English host who woke up at 6 to cook us breakfast despite his prodigious consumption of beer, margaritas and black label bourbon at the shindig.
By now we had serious problems. The van was gulping oil feverishly and beginning to fart LPG – though it runs on dual fuel, we were only using the petrol. A smoking ban was swiftly ordered.
We struggled across Victoria for the next day, made it back to HQ in the late evening exhausted, strained. But we’d made it. NRMA and insurance would get us home and a new engine for the van, and we could finish this run. It’s tough at the coalface.
Next week, if we make it back, we play the Lismore show on the 18th and 19th. Stay tuned.

At the Tote - pics by Tim Chuma

By Wanda de Verelle at the Gold Coast Rodeo

Mick with guiding light, mentor, record company boss and beer guzzler Mick Thomas

A flawed grand design, The Leyland P-76 was emblematic of Seventies excess. Imagining Shakespeare’s tragic cuckold Othello hooning the main street of Everytown in this dodgy chariot put Re-Mains songwriter, Mick Daley, in mind of the monochromatic vision of John Howard.

“If you’re alive you’re political,” says Daley. “And what Howard’s doing to the soul of this country needs at least a few songs to hit back – my part in the war on error.”

‘Othello’s P-76’ is the first track of The Re-Mains forthcoming album, ‘Vregedonomy’ currently recording in the band’s home hills of far northern NSW, between Nimbin and Byron Bay.

Christian Pyle, the brains behind ACRE, the Brisbane band that had several charting songs in the early Oughties, is producer for this, The Re-Mains fourth album.

He’s taking a different tack to the band’s traditional full-tilt country rock and roll, investing more time and technology in creating a shorter, more concise and considered album that’s culled a potential 30 tunes down to 12 finely honed tracks.

“Christian’s an expert at paring my epic Dylanesque sagas down to tight, explosive songs that have all the power of country rock and roll in a leaner format,” says Daley.

“There’s more keys – Phil, our banjo-slinger plays a mean Hammond organ, and with a different line-up to our last records a racy sound that’s a few miles down the road from our last, live album.”

That record, the live ‘Love’s Last Stand’ was recorded in a mud-brick hall on the North Coast of NSW. Rolling Stone magazine awarded it four stars and it received universal acclaim from musical peers, blues legend Chris Wilson declaring it to be ‘the best live album produced in Australia - ever.’

Though the line-up has changed, the band’s reputation has only been enhanced by cracking shows at top venues in Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, Tamworth and Byron Bay.
In July 2007 they embarked on a 6-week national tour that was rudely interrupted by a collision with a cow near Tennant Creek, NT. Drummer Grant Bedford and guitarist Dave Ramsey both suffered serious injury and the touring van was a write-off but four weeks later the band, calling on a reliable pool of replacements, was playing shows at popular Sydney and Hunter Valley venues.

Recording the rest of ‘Vregedonomy’ has been postponed till Ramsey and Bedford are back on their feet, but meanwhile, with a new van the full band is touring to Melbourne and rural Victoria in October.

Benefit gigs in Byron Bay, Melbourne, Tamworth, Canberra and Sydney have been put together by a distinguished cast including Mick Thomas, Tex Perkins, Chris Wilson, Acre, Sara Tindley, The Detonators, Sarah Carroll and Suzannah Espie and Jimmy Willing.

They raised enough cash to pay the injured band members prodigious medical bills and get the band back on the road and back into the studio.

‘Vregedonomy’ is expected to be completed by 2008. Meanwhile ‘Othello’s P-76’ is a taste of the battered but unbowed Re-mains, post-prang.

We’re finally (officially) back on the road this week. Got a new van, almost identical to the cow-capitulator, courtesy all our remarkable pals who put in and earned a motza for us at the respective Melbourne, Canberra and Byron Bay benefit shows.
Dave Ramsey won’t be joining us, he’s still convalescing up in the Mountains – and his gal Bec is having their baby any day now. Good luck kids.
Grunter however, played with us last Thursday in Brisbane, supporting Johnny Casino and The Secrets and despite hobbling up the venue’s stairs at the speed of a Chillingham cucaracha he ripped it up - you’d never know his left leg was made of lego.
First show’s at The Tote on Thursday 4th with old mates Tonchi and Spargo – haven’t played here since early days. Johnny Kendall is planning to invade the pitch with his fiddle. North to the Sand Bar at Mildura on the 5th, then out to Pinnaroo in SA, and back down to Koroit on the 7th.
A busy week in Melbs – 3CR on the morning of the 10th, playing The Rainbow that night. Hank Denfield, aka Den Hanrahan is joining us this week with his usual reckless steel assault and a coupla solo spots.
Thursday 11th we’re on at the Greyhound, plus a PBS spot in the arvo. The Pub at Bendigo on the 12th, St Andrews Pub on the 13th, and Transport at Federation Square on the 14th.
After that we make our ways home to play the Lismore Show on the 18th and 19th.
On the 25th I’m doing a show at the Rails in Byron entitled – Mick Daley and Friends – basically the usual suspects roped in to play along with a few pissed locals.
Then the 26th we’re back at the Nimbin Hotel – always an interesting experience.
Our foray into Canada has proved to be a bloody good idea. We’ve pretty much sorted a really sound tour over there for two months from June next year. Country rock and roll goes global – at last.