Flood Relief Gig

The story goes that Bertie Blackman sent a text to Megan Washington, who sent an email to a bunch of other Melbourne based artist, and Thursday nights relief benefit was born. I got a text from Michelle about it, said yes, and our tickets were sorted - a gig which sold out in an hour, apparently!

So Michelle and I drove down to Melbourne after work, met up with Ruth and Danny for dinner along Victoria Street, before getting to The Corner in the middle of Clare Bowditch's set. Ending with the beautiful The Thing About Grief, after confessing to having Googled the lyrics after not playing it for so long, showed the depth of her talent, from her infectious smile to a serious and beautiful track like this.

Tim Rogers was next, with a solo set which included an awesome Berlin Chair.

Then Bertie Blackman opened with Valentine, and remained a backlit silhouette as she played a couple of new tracks. Byrds Of Prey and Heart then also showed that she is experimenting with some new sounds, whilst tinkering with the live versions of her album tracks. Following her set, a piece of Bertie's art was auctioned off by MC Julia Zemiro, for a whopping amount.

Megan Washington was next on the bill, and showed me why she has been getting so much attention in the past year - she was great live! How To Tame A Lion and Cement were stand outs. Tim Rogers joined her for her last song, being a cover of That Thing You Do, which was loads of fun.

The commanding presence of Dan Sultan filled the stage next, and enchanted the crowd with his voice, his stories - and keyboard playing, after explaining that he has injured his fingers and can't play guitar at the moment.

Another auction, of a guitar this time raising $2000, a blonde Missy Higgins finished off the night. Missy was great, with new tracks, bookended by known tracks ending with Peachy. She apologised in the end for being so excited to play that she had managed to create herself a bubble of musical experience - which only added to the joy of seeing her live again.

This fantastic night ended with most of the acts of the night coming together to play You've Got A Friend. This gathering had raised something like $30,000 at one point on the night, for the flood affected Queenslanders.