JOK (Johnny O’Keefe) I’m a wanderer too

 JOK (Johnny O’Keefe)

I’m a wanderer too

 

 

JOK (Johnny O’Keefe)

I’m a wanderer too.

 

“If you’re a performer,

That’s the level you’ve gotta give”

-Rob Hirst (Midnight Oil Drummer-Vocalist) on Johnny O’Keefe.

 

I never saw JOK perform, but I’ve felt him tap me on the shoulder, when on stage, surrounded, as an 18 year old, by old man hecklers & rough boy c87nts.

Me, who as a boy soprano soloist from a 1000 boy Boys’ Grammar School with compulsory Military Training and udder thuggery had the fortune (mis? Fortune!!!!!) to be born with a 12 year old’s boy-angel’s voice and walked with a target on my back til I faked an injury & became a French Horn player (still pitch perfect bitch!).

 

Anyway, my adult singing voice was never as good as my child’s voice.

Lacked the strength and integrity.

But you know us Australians can’t reconcile the masculine with beauty.

 

Ah well,

What’s done is done.

 

Anyway,

Later I sung.

18.

& then onwards Engerland when I was 35.

 

I felt Johnny O’Keefe tap me on the shoulder

In the Murder Capital –

The Kindest place in the Country.

 

They say he embarrassed every overseas act (as ‘soft’).

 

Roy Orbison.

Little Richard.

Cliff Richard.

 

And THAT’s the real reason

Elvis never flew.

 

They say

 

Those I’ve known who saw him twice

That HE was THE MAN!

 

A performer.

 

A REAL PERFORMER.

 

You have to be a Colonial to perform.

Else you’re Apollonian.

 

Nietzsche’s ONE GOOD book.

(‘Birth of Tragedy’)

 

WE’RE the bastards.

 

The boys for the job.

 

Insults —

 

We learned

In our mother’s womb —

 

A kick to the guts.

 

Maybe a Rwanadan child

Born of soldier rape

Can relate

 

But no one will give them the tape.

 

So,

Until then

I’m your albino Bredren.

 

That’s how HARD

WE ROCK!

(After Hopkins)

Praise Him.

 

©Malachi Doyle 2023.