I don’t think I should do any more overnight bus journeys. It was completely full and far too warm for my delicate disposition. Sleep was achieved in 20-minute increments, and I reckon I would have been lucky to have gotten an hour in total. It wasn’t the most ideal ticket to get, but it was the only ticket. Arriving at 6am required three hours of lurking in the Adelaide dawn, which had the good decency to arrive later than I. The hotel opened at 9am, and I latched onto the first human in uniform. Local decency was extended as their room was immediately available. I slunk in, dumped my stuff, and slid under the covers to sleep.

Downtime followed. Days of slow mooching around the city looking in bookshops, tending to admin, writing, laundry, and being busy resting. Exploring didn’t take me far. I was impressed with the curation of the Adelaide Art Gallery, a fascinating juxtaposition of indigenous, classic, and modern art works and forms. I couldn’t help feeling a little paranoid as the security guard who seemed to follow me throughout the gallery, across rooms and floors, but it didn’t deter from my enjoyment. Maybe he was the paranoid one, who can say, maybe he was just bored.

The quiet week is welcomed. I’m into the fifth week of touring, and the exertion of effort is really starting to make itself known. The body expresses aches. I thought I was developing a cold on Monday night, but the symptoms dissolved somewhere in the night. The orange case hovers around 23kg, and despite a particular road fitness developing, the weight distribution of the box is unfairly distributed across shoulders, knees and elbows. Careful consideration of movement is a useful skillset to develop to avoid injury as weight is hoisted up and down stairs, and along uneven terrain.

The first event for the week is at the beautiful Hymn Bar. At first I thought it was a tiny church, but the owner says it was built over 100 years ago as a bible school. There will be none of that business here this evening. The first act is Plain Services, a duo of instrumental guitars, whose original compositions often felt curiously cut short. A soundworld was established and then most often swiftly terminated — more like glimpses of landscapes from a train’s window than the contemplations from a bench somewhere. It actually had a refreshing aspect to it. My set followed and was perhaps more akin to a train’s rolling somersault down a hillside somewhere. Alongside this tumult though, I have recently been exploring establishing a section in the set aiming to keep playing to the quietest volume physically possible. I really like the sense of sitting up there, making the softest sounds I can, and sensing the room listening intently.

The third act was a film screening hosted by Moviejuice; they projected the film Wavelength by the Canadian, and apparently quite notable, filmmaker Michael Snow. It was a long, slow, increasingly tense and claustrophobic film set in a single location — a room overlooking a road somewhere, sometime in the ’60s, with the focus becoming ever tighter on an image of the far wall. The local curators had obtained a version on 16mm.

— — —

Thursday’s show is at the Grace Emily Hotel.

First up is Les Voltiguers, a maximalist four-piece rock band. Unrelenting hints of grindcore, Boredoms, Nomeansno — hefty riffs and heavy toms — but also some unexpected sonic deviations into quieter (but not quiet) passages when conventional instruments are sidelined for gongs, electric mbira, and darbouka. Following this was Minimax, a duo of guitar, laptop, and saxophone. A long-form piece that seemed part composition, part improvisation. There were prerecorded elements, alongside some processing which I couldn’t quite figure out. A cinematic set. I play third.

—

Two candle holders, made in India, found their way to Newcastle. Across the seas and time they have traveled, to illuminate family rituals and to relieve the frightened from blackouts. Somehow, they became abandoned to the purgatory of a secondhand shop’s shelf. I bought them for the difference in tones between the two brass bells.

I put my contact mic on the base to amplify the resonance, but somewhere along the line, I abused the mic to the point of destruction. There is more static than bell. Regretfully this time, I abandon the candle holders to some future event.

Kick the switch, and four channels, all sound, eject in volume for the P.A. I accompany, torrential, with maximum metal and skin. I have a handmade Wuhan China cymbal at hand. If I time it right, in the tumbling of drums, I can grab it by the collar and slam it into the skin of the floor tom. Upon impact, while raising the cymbal into the air, I simultaneously silence the synth. With the electronics silenced, the metallic acoustic resonance hangs above the audience. Repeat.

Attention has been gathered. I change direction and reduce the ruckus to a single line of bass tones, gated by the voltage of the venue’s only living plant. The quality of the signal determines when and what we hear. I try to match pattern for pattern, always playing catch-up with nature.

The plant was almost denied inclusion into the trio — the bartender declined my request to include the plant in my set, saying that he didn’t know me, or what I would do with it, and that it had taken some substantial effort to keep it as healthy and alive as it was. I had to respect that position, though I must admit I was a bit frustrated. I went in search of a plan B. Twenty minutes later, he made his way around to the stage. Through some process, he had changed his mind, saying the plant could participate if no other option arrived. My mind had changed in that time as well. I shifted from irritation to respect once I realized that what he was doing was being the plant’s protector, caring for its wellbeing in this unexpected moment of uncertainty.

No other option arrived, and the precious plant took the stage.

Typically, though, plants in pubs don’t tend to be the healthiest of specimens. Many bars have none at all, or maybe provide the theatre of greenery by installing plastic doppelgangers into the intoxicated gardens of the mind. Even more rare, I assume, are serious conversations about the health of those sun-starved tenants in the pubs environment.

I wonder, sometimes, if the inclusion of plants and fungi in a performance such as mine shifts the perspective a little. Their live-ness is audible. Their presence is made known. The silence is broken. Interaction is observable. They are alive.

— — —

I like Adelaide. It’s a city that seems to lack pretension. It feels like a city centre that is for living in, rather than modelled around looking good for Instagram posts. The diverse cross-section of Adelaide life, and population, always seems ever-present. There’s a good number of places serving up delicious Indonesian cuisine. And I love the numerous and ever-unfolding alleyways that weave throughout the inner city. I’d come back here.