Gary Steel
I had a night to kill in Northland and the motel clock radio seemed to be permanently jammed on the local radio station ‘Magic Music’. There is a recording studio I was told in Kamo, and yes it is spelt with a K and not a C. Hell, I couldn’t even remember where Kamo is. Apparently nowadays it is a little Whangarei suburb on the edge of town abandoned as the highway pushed north.
Well thanks to Kamo and ‘Magic Music’ I rediscovered Country and Western music.
You know I thought that was the stuff we used as background music to vacuum the house by but I had never stopped to really listen to it before. So this is confession time. I really love it. If I stop trying to be clever then what is there to hate really? It is the poetry of the common man and pitched right to the soft spots with no pretence of being subtle. With lines like ‘love letters right from the heart’ and ‘ I never intended to fall in love with you again’ the message is quite clear really.
I don’t know anybody who lives is Kamo but by the next morning they were real people to me. I wanted to pop over for a chat with Chuck Norris, as he would help with ‘all my real estate needs’. Hey Chuck I thought, when I am ready for the simple life I will give you a call and we will find a veranda I can sit on to sip single malt and chew on an empty corn cob pipe. I will be at home and confident that when the Corolla breaks down then Jack at K.P Automotive in Main Street will fix it and true to his promise allow ‘those on fixed income to make easy weekly repayments’. Hell I could make a country boy yet, now where did I leave those slippers and the old fiddle? JOHN GROOM
