Album Notes

This album represents many years across my lifetime from the age of 17 to 41.
Track 3 ‘Birthday Girl’ is the earliest song, written in a lonely backyard caravan on the eve of my 17th birthday.
The next in chronological order is track 6 ‘Tokanui’- I composed music for the words written by a very old ex about this time in residence at Tokanui (a now defunct Mental Health facility in New Zealand). ‘Tokanui’ is one of my favourites on the album, I particularly enjoyed creating the harmonies and singing with myself.
Shortly after that, I wrote track 5 ‘Christmas Eve’ for my father, as I had no money to buy him a gift for Christmas ’83 - which was the following day.
Track 2 ‘I need a refill’ and track 4 ‘Love song’ were written around the same time, in a flat in East St Kilda and were both directed at the eventual father of my children – perhaps I should have predicted our ultimate break-up!
‘Circles & Cycles’ is track 1, and probably my favourite- written in 1998, although I added the counter melody in 2007.
The last songs written were tracks 7 and 9 ‘Neptune’s Ghost’, composed at the request of my brother-in-law to words he had written to be read at his funeral- he died shortly after in May 2007, the day after my birthday.
The only song not written by me is track 8 ‘Country Daydream’, which was composed and accompanied by Joanne Mitchelson.
Apart from ‘Country Daydream’ the instrumentals for each track were created using a combination of computer programs (Sibelius, Reason and Pro-tools), and the whole album was mixed and mastered by Gerard Brumby.