Presentation Night with photos by Tony Proudfoot of freetoeknee PHOTOGRAPHY

Presentation Night #2

with Tim Rogers, Matthew Richardson & Francis Leach @ Corner Hotel, 15 August 2013

© freetoeknee PHOTOGRAPHY (see the whole set here)

Photographed for Tone Deaf

Sport and music bounce off each other to their mutual benefit. The big crowd were right into it and got involved. Tim responds to a helpful suggestion from the back. 

Fantastic bit of set dressing, with a genuine VFL single bed sheet.

Just after the half time break Francis held up the Bones McGhie shirt I donated for the Casey Tutungi raffle. He said "this was made by Nick Rees, are you here Nick?" (In case blog readers don't know, my name is Chris).

Vincent and I were sitting right in front of him in the same shirts. Might have had the light in his eyes I guess.

Both lads brought a sports bag onto the stage with them and pulled out an old touchstone of theirs. Richo went with "The Map" from his brief Tasmania representative career.

Tim wrapped up the night with a delicate acoustic reading of "Berlin Chair" on his tiny guitar.

Presentation Night teaser

I haven’t written anything about Presentation Night yet - travel weariness and a need to get into waiting work are my main excuses.

But there is a fantastic review here by Dugald Jellie, a proper writer. He has caught the warmth of the occasion and the character of the main protagonists beautifully.

Also some great pics by Tony Proudfoot can be seen here on the ToneDeaf records site. Vincent and I can be seen looking up the stars’ noses in pics 36/37.

I do wish I had hung around afterwards to meet some of the people I have been corresponding with recently such as Dugald - but a lifetime habit of slipping away unobtrusively is hard to break.

Tigerland

I just had a great few days in Melbourne with plenty of downtime to just roam. I spent a few hours around Punt Rd and the back streets of Richmond. 

While I was taking a picture of Jack Dyer's statue, an old bloke came up and said "He really did have a massive head y'know." It was Chopper Read. I said "How are you, Chopper?" He said "Oh yeah, OK, apart from the cancer". 

Went to Richmond v Carlton yesterday - Tigers put the cue in the rack at quarter time, 36 points up and still lost. Frustrating. But great to see Alex, Michael and John and spend some blokey time yelling and drinking.

Photo: Sebastian Costanzo, The Age

Photo: Sebastian Costanzo, The Age

Back from Canberra

We all missed Marcus when he was away for 5 days on a school trip, even Michael. I thought this was very sweet: Marcus is heavily into sport, Michael has no interest in sport but is intimately familiar with the TV schedule. At breakfast Michael had something exciting to tell Marcus but he had to wait for someone else to finish talking. Then he blurted out "Marcus - tonight is the Third Ashes Test Day 2 - DOUBLE EPISODES!!!!"

Presentation Night

I am off to the mainland for the first time this year, to attend a football/music mashup called Presentation Night. It consists of one beloved footballer (and music fanatic), one national music legend (and footy tragic), compered by a man with impeccable cred in both discplines, Francis Leach. The organiser is music A&R man Andy Kelly. The stars this time are Matthew 'Richo' Richardson and Tim 'Tim Rogers' Rogers.

Our buddy Vincent attended Presentation Night #1, and reported that he was not the only one there wearing a 70s Footy Enigmas shirt. I got in touch with Andy and said how much I wanted to attend #2, thinking it would be an annual thing. Lo and behold, he announced #2 about five minutes later.

So I am off over to Melbourne for a few days to attend this function and also see my Tigers take on the old enemy Carlton. Carlton are msifiring dreadfully at the moment, will be missing about a dozen first choice players, and have next to no chance. Richmond are in their best form in a decade and are warming up for their first finals series since 2001. It promises to be a fine old bloodbath. I am going along with three Melbourne-based pals who all go for the Blues, and they are as buoyant at the prospect as if we were going to a school recorder recital.

Andy asked me to write a spiel about the footy shirts for his Presentation Night blog, and you can read it here. Another online friend is The Holy Boot, and he also asked me to give him some wordage for his blog, which is over here.

Monsterpants

Just been to KMart. They seem to be panicking about the obesity epidemic: there were racks and racks of unsold 2XL -> 7XL underpants. I was after plain L for my robust but apparently sub-normal arse. Had to shift literally wheelbarrowloads of monsterpants to find one pair Ls.

A stirring tale in pictures by Michael Rees (9)

This has got the feel of the Bayeaux Tapestry about it, but Michael tells me that his inspiration was actually the Royal Standard of Ur.

Snow

These were taken here at our place a week ago. It was pretty crisp.

Cousins

My sisters and I have four first cousins. Our parents each had one sibling who married and had a boy and a girl. But like most of our parents, our Mum and Dad had cousins galore. Dad’s dad was the last of eleven.

Dad grew up in Launceston, and after his father Didds died (when I was a baby), our whole family would drive there two-and-a-half hours each way, in our small Fiat. This was about once a month - or so it seemed. Maybe it was more often, maybe less. We would visit Ibey and Dad would mow the lawn and collect the fruit from the trees, and generally be the handyman. Ibey didn't trust tradesmen so Dad was required to develop skills in many different disciplines.

One day recently I was asking Dad about the family tree, and he said off-handedly that Uncle Norm lived at Nº 9 such-and-such street Invermay - not very far from Ibey. I was flabbergsted - why had we never gone to visit when we were in town? Dad’s answer was there were just so many uncles, aunts and cousins its was simpler to visit none than to visit all.

Dad and Mum just set off for a few weeks visiting friends and family around NSW. Dad popped in just before they left to return my wheelbarrow and give me the latest printout of the definitive family tree, which he was sent by the official family genealogist John Cannon, the bushwalking columnist in the Mercury - a distant cousin of Dad’s.

Dad's parting words were that he was surprised to look through and see how many of his cousins have died. Dad is 77 this year.

Even though I only have 4 cousins and it is easier than it has ever been to keep in touch, I haven’t seen or spoken to any for at least ten years. And I suppose one day they and I and my sisters will also be part of an update to the family tree.

Exciting sideburns news

My 1970s footballer shirts got a write-up in big-city newspaper The Age the other day! I was working from home, noodling through some project or other, and I kept getting email alerts that shirts had sold online. By the end of the day I had sold about 20 (previously I had been selling maybe 1 or 2 per week). It was very hard to concentrate.

In the evening someone commented on my Rees Design Retail facebook page that they'd seen an article in the Herald Sun - cue a fruitless (and gooseless) wild goose chase, then I found it here in the Age Online. The next day I tracked down a printed copy, and it was even better as it reproduced one of my shirt designs, of Geoff Blethyn from Essendon.

The writer Peter Hanlon contacted Geoff, who was quite pleased to be remembered and gave his blessing to the design. Since then I have spoken to him and sent him a shirt - he's a very nice guy, humble about his achievements and interested in what I do. He also ran a company called Major Pants for 15 years, you’ve got to love that. Peter mentioned that I had done other designs, and it seems people have googled "1970s footy enigmas" and found my RedBubble shop that way.

The sales spike is fading now but it has lasted for a week, and given me a hell of a boost.

Winning stuff in the school hall

On Friday the school hosted an inter-school chess tournament. Chess Kids do a really great job - they bring the whole circus with them except desks and chairs. I got there at 8 to set up for 100 kids and about 20 parents and teachers.The tables were out but they were pretty yucky so I swabbed 25 tables which was a good warm-up for putting out 120 chairs.

It all went very well. I took the opportunity of nominating about twice the usual number of kids, since we didn't have to worry about transport or supervision (well, I supervised all day so it wasn't putting anyone else out at least). This meant we had plenty of first-timers but they all seemed to have fun and find their level OK.

Marcus was in the mix towards the end. After winning, then losing, he won the next 5 straight and ended up equal first (although he admitted to me later he would have been 3rd if they had done a countback). He got another medal to add to his massive clanking collection which always reminds me of Idi Amin. The school finished 4th which was enough for us to earn 5 spots at the State championships in November. This caught me by surprise and I clapped and let out a little "Wooh!!" in an otherwise tiredly silent hall. Marcus was somewhat embarrassed, so that all went very well.

A bit over 24 hours later, back in the same hall with the same tables and chairs, Elf and I found ourselves at the annual fundraising Quiz Night. I have commented on this before, and once again we had been treated to our tickets by our friend The Fewst who wished to have our brains on her side.

Now - just to jettison false modesty once and for all, it was pretty much about having ME on her side. It is now considered proven fact that I am a Quiz Freak and you do no not want one of them outside the tent as they say. So I was in the tent and furthermore given the job of team scribe which was a relief. In other years I have had to plead with the scribe to write down what I know with 200% certainty is right, while they are looking at me sidelong and saying "Yeah well I'm PRETTY SURE there are 52 states". This year I wrote down whatever I liked, pretty much. And no, I wasn't always right (isn't it weird how Tiger Woods' voice sounds like Lance Armstrong's?) but I was right enough that we WON.

And took home one bottle of wine and a really ugly wine cooler thing each. Oh well. It was a good cause etc. I can't think of a particular "wow" answer that I knew that no-one else did, but I was solid.

Boys v Girls in the middle of Tasmania

It was a perfect day up at Campbell Town today. Marcus and the Central u11s played the State Girls u13s and sneaked home 4-2 in the end. It was a huge field and an 80 minute match (the boys are used to 50) so they did well. Look at the size difference when Marcus was marking his "man".

Meanwhile on the sidelines

Michael is always terrific at soccer events. He mildly wishes Marcus well, and will sometimes politely ask the score, or “who won?”. While the game goes on, he finds things to do. Often this has involved mud, puddles, sticks, bits of scavenged metal and a lot of quiet muttering. I am sure some of the other parents think he's been raised by wolves.

Up in Devonport, he spent a lot of his time sitting on a soccer ball, drawing and calculating on a pad. He spent most of day 1 drawing an intricate map of a made-up continent. Judging by the arrows one country was invading another one. I used to do the very same thing - I have NOT taught him how to do this but he does read a lot of the same books I did as a kid - 1950s and 60s geography textbooks that my dad once taught from. They are full of pincer-movements on the Western Front and waves of Norsemen assailing the coasts of Britain, etc.

For day 2, he covered a few pages with numbers, attempting work out what a completely impossible fraction-of-a-fraction-of-a-fraction (that he made up) would equal as a decimal. This is NOT something I would have ever done as a kid, but he will regularly do this, while whistling, singing or just beatboxing. I think he enjoys the feeling of having his brain fully engaged in something. People going past admired and said "Wow, he's a bit of a genius isn't he?" One said "Goodness, is he .. doing homework???"

Leaving aside the fact that our other son, the strapping right-fullback, is also a mental wunderkind, the fact is Michael's numbers actually made no real sense, but he was as happy as a trout. For us the big thing is we can take him off to something like the soccer carnival, and he keeps himself occupied one way or another, despite his zero interest in soccer.

There has been a bit of a sportfest at home lately with footy and soccer on TV every other day. While Marcus and I are absorbed in that stuff, Michael is on the floor between us and the TV, with anything from 3 to 10 books open all over the place. Library books and my books, his books, old books that i can't remember where they come from. And he takes a bit from here and a bit from there and makes something new. These below all come from a 4-5 day period, except the map of France at the end. That was a sustained effort over about 4 days, drawn on an x-ray envelope.

Soccer names

I passed a lazy half hour this morning (a public holiday) slurping tea and looking over the program for the weekend's soccer carnival, primarily at the kids' names. I am of course not wanting to make fun of names which are part of other cultures. Just names from the stranger aspects of my own culture.

I see these names as a desperate stab at creativity by some parent or parents who possibly have very limited outlets for their poetic hearts. I imagine these are people who put a high premium on things that are NEW and DIFFERENT and UNIQUE. How about naming your daughter Angel? Wait. POWER MOVE. How about going one better and naming her Aingel? Really get the Ain in there so people don't think of Angle.

One girls team has a very tempestuous backline Imagine the drama and recriminations when Storm is picking the ball out of the net and pointing the finger at Skye and Angel (without an i).

One team has two Zoes and a Zara. Zzzzzzzzz!! One team has two Raphaelas and a Gabriella but they are all beyond reproach judging by the surnames. There are Pipers and Ethans absolutely everywhere. It's times like this that I appreciate my ignorance of the old testament - it must be quite unsettling to have grandchildren named Noah and Caleb and Aaron and Zachariah when those names create vivid images in your mind of first-borns being slain and calves being fatted etc.

Did Brumby Smalley and Luke Klug's parents ever say those names out loud? I'm sure they are great kids by the way and I wish all of them, the Chloes and Zoes and Kades and Jades and my favourite - plain old Erin Fudge - all the best with their soccer careers.

Central Region win on the road again

We just spent the weekend with Marcus up north for the Devonport Soccer Carnival. His team Central Region (representing the main metro area of Hobart) won their four games and took out the tournament again. Last year they won Devonport and Launceston and lost at home in Hobart (to Northern Tasmania). Again this year they have lost in Hobart (to Northern Tasmania) and won in Devonport - we travel to Launceston in about 5 weeks. We have just heard there is going to be a fourth tournament, in Burnie in September.

The first game on Saturday against Eastern (representing the eastern shore of Hobart) was a tight tussle. Central were 3-0 up early in the 2nd half when they started to get complacent. Some snoozy defending let Eastern in for an excellent goal, and then it looked like a matter of time before they scored again as panic set in.Central's travelling supporters started praying for the whistle and the ref obliged, final score 3-1.

In the afternoon was the game we all were hanging on, against the main threat, Northern Tasmania (who represent the whole North and North East but are generally just called "Launceston"). They were very unlucky to have a probable goal ignored by the ref, who thought it didn't cross the line. Our keeper Ethan scooped it out, and play continued. It was extremely tense for the whole first half, which finished 0-0. After the break Central scored from a goalmouth scramble. Again there was debate whether it had gone over the line but the referee was very decisive and firm in all four games. I was still worrying that we had been very lucky to be 1-0 when a 2nd went in. The Launceston boys dropped their heads then and it became a rout, finishing 5-0. Our boys were terrific in their behaviour - no over-the-top goal celebrations. Although they knew they had made a huge step towards winning the comp, they were respectful of their opponents and didn't go crazy at the end.

The next morning we played one of the traditionally weaker teams, WSSA based in Burnie. They gave us a very tough match - WSSA scored after only a minute. Again there was some dozy boys in the backline, WSSA won a corner which popped out to one of their midfielders who crashed it in just under the crossbar. Within 3 minutes Central equalised then added another. WSSA were moving the ball around really nicely while Central were rushing everything, but it was still 2-1 at half time. Central settled in the 2nd half and got out to a comfortable 4-1 lead. WSSA pulled a well-deserved goal back before the end. Coach Atef addressed the boys at the end, (in gentle-chiding mode rather than hairdryer mode) and said that apart from Marcus who was man-of-the-match, everyone else forgot to do the jobs assigned to them.

Our last game was against the hosts, Devonport. The word was out that our boys needed only to draw to take first place, but Devonport had also looked like an improved team. They took it right up to Central, and had us under a lot of pressure at times. Our defence in this match was a lot better, and our forwards made the most of their chances. Central won 5-1 although on the balance of play the teams seemed much closer.

The team has changed a bit from last year. Sam, Antonio and Gus have left either for AFL or to play exclusively for Ken Morton's soccer school. Sam was our best defender but I think Marcus has taken that mantle now. He always gives 100% and I get the impression the coaches really trust him. He is happy playing at right fullback where his primary job is marking. But he plays more like a centre-back, and I think with his height there is a good chance he'll be given that responsibility sooner or later.

New website n stuff

I have got my own domain name now, www.reesdesign.com.au. This is part of a major push to garner more work, since my only dependable cash-cow client has just cut me back to irregular projects rather than a weekly day in the studio.

There is a just a place holder on the site for now but coming soon will be this;

Of course if you have any work in the field of graphic design, interactive design (Flash etc), animation, illustration, typography and the like - please get in touch!