The world adores matt hayward

Gertrude St, being the funky artery between Brunswick St and the skank of Smith St has a few hidden jewels like the Ume Bar and Ladros. But fuck me dead, I had no idea that I only had to walk to the end of the street to have great fish instead of going to Barclay St’s Claypots.

Yes the same crew have a far bigger restaurant in Collingwood, with an even better selection of fish (including Coral Rainbow Trout) and tapas. Although your’e more distanced from the kitchen and can’t drool over your meal being prepared, it’s a lot less congested and relaxed than Barclay St.

For entree we had Balmain Bugs. Interesting flavours and not as messy as it sounds. Don’t ask me what a Balmain Bug actually is. But it looks like a huge beetle or something and has fleshy meat like a prawn but with richer flavour.

One cute thing they do is bring out a massive paella cooking tray full of tapas dishes, so you can pick and choose, instead of reading them from the menu. This time we wen’t the Cajun Flathead and god damn was it succulent and with just the right hint of spice. In fact the first bite was so tender it was almost like a chicken breast.

In short if you love your fish and uncrammed restaurants, this really hits the spot!

** an open letter emailed to Kim Beazley and Simon Crean 21/02/05 3:54pm **

Mr Beazley and Mr Crean,

Jim Lloyd’s imminent changes to the importation laws regarding 15 year old vehicles are big-business biased, anti consumer and small business.

Importers of such vehicles ensure the strictest of compliance with these vehicles and ensure Australians have the best possible vehicles on offer. That and the fact that a fifteen year old foreign vehicle is by and large far safer than an equivalent domestically delivered vehicle. Especially given that the crux of cars being imported are more prestige German and Japanese vehicles.

Without alternatives to domestic vehicles, big business can continue to dish out whatever product they see fit for the market, knowing the average consumer has little alternative. Look at your Holden Statesman or BA Ford Falcon to see how much local product has had to improve since smaller importers started offering excellent, international spec vehicles entered the market at similar prices in the past 5 years. The big 3 Australian auto manufacturers must be scared to admit that a 15 year old Japanese import can be of similar standard to current domestic Australian sold vehicles.

I for one don’t want to see the quality and safety of our vehicles regress any further just to increase the profit of auto manufacturers. Look at our neighbours such as Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore and see just how stagnant, and low standard, their new car market is. There’s very little affordable middle ground between say Proton and BMW. I’d rather not see this happen here considering we’re not the most populous market for auto manufacturers.

Diversity in the market place is the only way to keep the manufacturers honest and industry profitable. Allowing importation of so called grey imports was a big wake up call to the industry, but the economy has benefited. According to NineMSN Carpoint, Wheels and Motor magazines (copied in on this mail), last year was one of the most successful years in new car sales in Australia on record. So how can Mr Lloyd argue these small-time private importers have had anything but a positive impact on the local motoring industry? Whose pocket is the Liberal party in to change these laws? It’s not as if you can salary package or novate lease a 15 year old vehicle like you can a new car, so what’s the impact on the big manufacturers? That [novated leasing] is under current tax laws the only real viable way for many white collar workers to afford a new vehicle.

I beseech of you to maintain the 15yo import laws, set to end March 1 2005. Like many car enthusiasts, I fear any more change to these laws will lead to further stumbling blocks to grey import laws for the consumer and more watered down domestic product. They are the only way to keep the big manufacturers honest, making sure that Australian drivers get affordable vehicles of internationally high standards and demand that domestic products matches them. Not to mention keep in business thousands of Australians (such as Prestige Motorsport and J-Spec, blind carbon copied on this email) lawfully providing these vehicles who have worked hard to establish their niche.

END

Links to Local Grey Importers:
Prestige Motorsport, Perth
J-Spec, Melbourne

Brands are an ever pervasive means these days of polishing a turd into something more palatable. Basically you want a car within your means, but you still have desires. You want to express something about yourself in your lethargic 5 door econohatch. So if you’re the manufacturer, why make a better car when you can make a better badge? Enter Chevrolet UK, and it’s not what you’d expect.

Chev’s UK range (as of Feb ‘O5) are rebadged Daewoos, that have been selling in the UK for some time now. They’ve sold in moderate volumes in the land of the rising Turnip, but not well enough to keep Daewoo afloat. Given that ‘The General’ had invested so many green backs into the Korean being a global success, it had to do something. Being American, naturally making a quality product didn’t appeal to them (Ask an American about their normal cars, you’ll find out what I mean). So maybe giving it a more aspiration brand instead would work? Dang! The General’s done it again!

In North America, Chevy means 2 1/2 tonne powerful, luxurious SUVs like the Tahoe and the Suburban. Vehicles that are so ridiculously only viable in the US and wouldn’t sell in volumes anywhere else in the world. With trucks like that, Chevy is about nothing more than overt, conspicuous consumption and that all important power. In the UK, Chevy now means tarted up Daewoo compacts with a cute bow tie on the front.

Is Chevy, like many corporations, becoming too audacious? Andy Carroll, Chevrolet UK’s Managing Director beckons “We are proud to be introducing a global brand with such heritage and strength to the UK market. We have been encouraged by the awareness that people in the UK already have of Chevrolet”. Introducing?! INTRODUCING?! What have they been watching Coronation Street on repeat for 50 years? I think we all know the Chevy brand from every US TV show and movie that’s entered the zeitgeist. Remember the war? A lot of American steel has been hitting Europe since then, but none of them compact little rebadged Korean hatches. At least amongst us blokes, Chevy is a household name for big, heavy stuff. So in my humble opinion they’re going to dilute their brand not sell more compacts.

Chevy only have to look in their own backyard to know that it’s an embarrasment to drive a non-SUV, ‘domestic’ car in the states. Looking at the US Chev web site, their lot’s improving, but only after decades of embarrasment forcing seppos into Carmys and Accords. So when our English chums notice the distinct lack of these compact Chevs on all those chart topping cop shows (CSI and all that crap), aren’t they going to smell a rat? GM had the intelligence not to do the same here and Daewoo all but disappeared for the now.

Now what about compact 4WDs? There’s even more dirt to dig on Chev’s parent company General Motors. If you’ve been reading a car mag in Australia in the past 12 months, you’d know about GM’s Saabaru venture. Perhaps the most wretched hybrid of WRX moxy and Saab designer shoe sense to ever slap you in the face. As WRX owner and precision driver Kevin Flynn attests, “the Subaru is a well built, but noisy vehicle. Even brand new, compared to my old Audi it was rattly and noisy.”

So what does the General do? Put Saab sheet metal on it and try and pass it off as the perfect boulevard-to-chalet cruiser. Basically, take all the sensibility and comfort out of the Saab that appeals to all those Apple Macintosh user types and make them whine as their Evian shakes in the cup holder and their Radiohead CD won’t cover up the engine note. Two niche brands coming together doesn’t make a right. Have a look at the picture of the Saab 92-x judge for yourself. Another branding ‘truimph’ to balance the books. I think it’s probably done nothing but boost Subaru WRX sales stateside.

Less tragically, the Subaru Forrester has been marketed in India and Asia as the Chevrolet Forrester.

On the flip side, it’s amazing to see how an enduring brand can be adopted on a totally unsuspecting populous. A visit to www.holden.co.jp (site in Japanese) shows an independent operation where the Japanese are buying HSV Maloo and SS utes to Tokyo. Perhaps they’re more realistic than corporate America. See American cars do sell in Japan. But no one is offering a sporty, rear wheel drive pick up - well ute. Enter the Holden.

When I asked my Japanese mate Tetsuji Yamamoto about the site, he said “that’s pick up track with sporty body. that’s not in Japanese sense. very interesting car”.

Surely it’s better to introduce a brand with an offering of something fresh and unique than serving the same shit in a different wrapper. But the fact remains, you can’t fool all the people all the time. And the English don’t like collectively taking the piss. Here’s hoping their faces fall flat in their apple pie with Chevy UK. Maybe one day people will wake up to global branding and corporations will have to think about the consequences to their core ‘brand values’ before emptying their bowels on yet another suspecting market.

** Powderfinger live at Festival Hall, Melbourne 28/01/05. **

How much can a band suck? Well my son this is highly dependent on the ticket price. For give or take $70, in the sweat box ‘festy hall’ NOT Melbourne’s most avant garde venue, the ‘Finger are already pushing my buttons.

Continuing the moan fest, these tix were bought about Octoberish last year. That’s a long time in advance. Most of my mates laughed and said “i’ve paid a lot less than that to see Powderfinger!” and I know they’re right. It was part out of my girlfriend’s moan that an Aussie band wasn’t ‘worth it’ that I forked out the cash. Sucks to be me? You betchya.

By this stage good old Bernard was asking a lot and I felt well bent over. Well they were on at 9.15 and off by 11.15. A two hour set, so not too bad, but I thought it was only England that had gigs that finished before Cinderella turns back into a pauper hag. Apparently Bernard Fanning turns back into a Brisbane dole bludger by midnight as well because come quarter past, the house lights were on, NO ENCORE and the ‘Finger had fucked off like Trump’s wife as soon as his boxers came off.

So i’m feeling bloody rheamed with my pants on holding my bloody girlfriends hand and I am trying desperately to be impressed. Bernard was laconic. The two guitarists were doing their best Joe Perry impersonations with solid, stable US stadium rock. They had some screen behind them at times with the lyrics like i’d paid $70 to drink warm beer and watch Fanning sing karaoke.

Some people would’ve said they did a solid two hours, and they belted out all the radio hits. I would say I saw a rigid set, played by frigid musos too scared to improvise their way out of the set list now they’re played on commerical radio. The brilliant backup singers probably stopped the need for Bernie to sing with an autotune and have the pitch and fullness of the studio albums. How bloody lovely. How abouts a bit of spontinaeity or even bloody serendipidy?

Thanks for a set that started somewhere and took me nowhere. I thought I could be persuaded but what a soft on of a gig. Back to Tim Rogers and the Temperance Union I go.

Sadly, everyone knows of the Ramones through liberal use of their mock CIA band logo on every piece of fashion imaginable. If you’re lucky, you know ‘em through a mix tape a mate gave you in your teens and rocked out to ‘Now I wanna sniff some glue’ and ‘beat on the brat’. But what you probably don’t know is just how messed up these guys are.

This doco has interview footage with anyone that ever got close to them, including neighborhood friends, early punk journos, brothers, mothers, roadies you name it. You will find out little known facts that on the first UK tour the Bronx boys did, Johnny Rotten ‘wanted to meet them backstage, but was scared of getting beaten up’. Even more scary that The Ramones had an art director virtually since inception and when they were all broke, they crashed in his loft. It’s interesting to see just how much the guys relied on conceptual styling to get noticed.

What amazed me was just how these guys managed to hold it together for so long whilst absolutely hating each other. There’s anecdotes and early concert footage at CGBGs where they’re even arguing on stage about what song to play next! In fact the early band footage is absolutely hilarious. At one point Joey Ramone almost knocks himself out with his own mic stand, mid performance.

As with any Rockumentary, there’s the token a la Yoko Ono, band breaking bitch semiotic. I can’t remember the full SP, but Johnny Stole Joey’s chick and married her and the song ‘The KKK took my baby away’ was written out of spite for Johnny. According to CJ Ramone, Joey and Johnny didn’t speak for years.

In short this movie is absolutely hilarious, poignant and insightful. Dee Dee is an absolute blithering idiot, Johnny the Saergaent that holds it all together (no matter what), Joey the obsessive compulsive hobbit that lives to be on stage, Tommy the ‘normal’ one.

There’s an absolutely hilarious bit where Dee Dee describes Tommy: “You know . . . Tommy was the kind of guy in his twenties that would buy some bread and hamburgers. . . . and cook. . . . hamburgers . . .”. One example of so many Spinal Tap-esque one liners that are just so funny.

Perhaps what makes it so poignant is months before Joey and Dee Dee’s death, Rob Zombie says “The Ramones were just always there. I guess you end up taking it for granted they’ll always be there”. There was no shortage of stars that make a quick cameo to say their bit, but Rob said it best. The boys were a classic comedy of errors and epitomised true Rock and Roll, spreading the gospel to millions and an inspiration to all hardcore, punk and metal bands the world over.

Considering this movie was director Michael Gramaglia’s first doco and on the shelf for a few years, this doco is absolutely tops. I don’t think i’ve ever laughed so hard, yet been so inspired to keep sticking it up the mainstream. You must see this movie.