Two Years

But the real reason behind all of this is to have a reason. Have something to look forward to. Have something that makes the shittiness of life a bit more bearable. It doesn't exactly get rid of your pain but it makes it feel worthwhile. It's the kind of shit that makes you write songs and rehearse and put real effort in because you know it's for something. It's the kind of shit that makes you show up to school even when you feel absolutely shitfaced because it's an opportunity to jam out. It's the kind of shit that makes you stay even when you're living with pain. Pain that may not go away.

In my parents' culture, you don't have ownership over yourself. What you do is basically dictated by what those considered higher up in your family want you to do. It's engrained in their culture. The teachers and admin at school don't give a fuck about you even though they try and give that wishwash shit at assemblies. All they care about is getting you to conform and do what they want you to do. A lot of them go a step further and fucking egotrip because they feel powerless in their own lives.

Right now, I'm trying to build a solid foundation for my life. Because there's two types of chaos. There's the good kind where you can fuck around and go crazy but at the end of the day you still have people who make you feel at home and help keep things in check and are there for you for when you need someone to just be there; to prevent shit from going real bad. Then there's the other kind where it's kinda high risk high return. Where your future is kinda predicated on the risks you make and you don't know where it is going but where you are doing it anyway because it's your only shot right now. A chance to ascend above the ashes.

Noel Gallagher was going to quit Oasis after playing a gig where the band was out of their minds and where it didn't go as spectacular as he thought. He was going to quit the band but before doing so just went to San Francisco unannounced and stayed with a girl he met at a previous gig where he got his mind sorted and realised that he was on the cusp of something big. Then there's the case of people like Richard Ashcroft of The Verve where he was really talented but couldn't handle the pressure and cracked under it.

Really, it's hard times that build you up to become someone greater. You don't conquer your fears by avoiding them. You conquer them by being exposed to them and proving your old self wrong. Now, if I were to just be flat out, how I felt after the first gig I held was pretty unstable. In the leadup to the gig I was just manically at work and trying to get stuff perfect that I got too caught up in extraneous factors and bullshit and it just did meet what I wanted it to meet but in a different way. I read the biography of Oasis and in their early days they kept thinking that a gig or a certain connection or appearance would be their big moment and from there it would be an easy ride but it isn't. It's kinda like a set of stairs. You move up a bit and then sometimes have to face more challenges and then you move up a bit more; it's not really a linear increase.

I thought that with the gig it would earn me a lot of friends and I'd be shot to being the biggest person in the scene and that the feeling of proving everyone who questioned me wrong would be absolutely supersonic and that I'd go from feeling like an empty shell of my former self to having people to hangout with every weekend and just being able to chill and ride it out.

The reality was a bit different and shaped by lingering insecurities I had. Yeah, I did get more exposure and got to know more people and go from just some rando in people's eyes to being the guy who put on a gig and did some cool shit; which is what everyone who's young tries to do; they really just try and prove that they're cooler than others and everyone does it. But it wasn't where I got people mass DM'ing me or old contacts suddenly calling me and shit being all sunshine and rainbows. It just gave people in the scene more of an idea of me and just changed the narrative among some people though it was still the same mix of people saying this and people saying that just about different stuff.

At school it was a different story. I'd say this is where it really mattered and really fucking worked. I became a legend. I did something big and people wanted to be a part of it. They saw how I was part of 'the scene'. I saw how they were talented people. It just fell into place.

I have to say that in general I have three general 'goals' which are based on deeper emotional needs. I just say em like this because trying to explain emotional needs and shit is just psychoblabber and it's just better said in simple language. All I want really is to be able to be creative and also just find enjoyment in creating stuff; that includes work/assignments; and to have my efforts and work recognised and appreciated and to be able to do it well and to a standard I'm happy with. Basically, it's to be good professionally/creatively.

The second thing I want is kinda symbiotic with the first one. It's to just have friends. Have people who understand me and are just my people and who are there for me and empathise with me. Basically a friend group and people to have a fun time with who I can basically fill up my weekends with and where I don't feel like the guy walking on the grass when the others are on the sidewalk but as the fucking main character and not a sidepiece/person who does shit/gives free shit to other people.

The third thing is pretty fucking blunt. To be in a relationship. To just have that kind of very intense deep connection that is really the pinnacle of what it means to love. To just… I dunno. You just know it when you're in one. I've kinda had connections that basically met it but not where it just hit the spot 100% and where I know I've made it. I think it'll just happen when I first love myself and get my shit sorted out and it'll just be. I basically know what's needed but at the same time because I haven't really properly experienced it in a way nor really reached a state where things just feel normal and where it just feels like it's time and not out of trying to fill a hole but out of already being enough and being able to have that exchange where it takes you to the next level I don't really know.

I'd say that I've had each one at different times but not really all three at once. Well, there were times where it felt like all three at once but not where it was a regular thing; it was just like a specific moment in time where it just clicked but was like a flash of what could be; like a higher version of myself but not where it lasts but where I need to do shit to get there and figure shit out.

Two years ago, at my first gig I attended two years ago, I'd say that the first two needs were met. I realised that I was enough. I was able to live out my passion. I also got to experience the actual people that make up the 'community' that is the scene and I really felt like I was part of something bigger.

One year ago, I had quit the scene and was dissociated from music in general. I got really good grades which tickled my ego and provided a sense of self-fulfilment, and school wasn't an issue. I was also in the closest thing to a relationship I've experienced. It was really a weird 'situationship' if you could call it that but it taught me to just let go. To be spontaneous and find people that ground you and prevent you from flying too high.

Right now, I'd say that if I were to be really honest with myself, the first two are definitely met. It's met through the band which I'm 1/5th of and through the friend group I'm a part of at school. At the same time, there's this dissonance because the way I feel is so new to me.

I've gotten used to instability and it's sort of become part of my identity. What I'm doing is letting go of old beliefs such as that I'm a loner, misunderstood or a failure or basically just not enough because it doesn't match up with the reality anymore. I've got people who really understand and have been through what I've been through and with whom when I jam with them we can just feel it that the music is the reason we keep going on. I've gone further than I could've imagined. Went from having no clue what I was gonna do and feeling pity for myself to being quite a figure among the people I know.

At the same time I have people who just aren't my people who try and insult me and bring me down to their level. I have 'authority figures' who just don't fucking understand who try and put me in a box and stroke their egos. I have people who had a really important role in my life who just aren't in my life anymore. To be honest, some of them I've split with on acrimonious terms but all of those are for the better. What really hurts though are the people who yes we've wronged each other over but with whom with each other we reconciled but just because of lifestyle changes or poor choices or just shit in general have slided away from my life.

Right now I've basically got the gig sorted. Contacted the place and got the slot confirmed; just waiting for them to send the invoice. For the lineup I'm pretty about it. It feels like what it's supposed to be. A celebration of how far I've come but not of the sobby type like Nirvana on MTV but like Oasis Live 25 where new history is being made.

Where it has echoes of the past but where it's made with the people who are there with me right here, right now. We've got a band called Corkscrew from the Sunshine Coast, influenced by metal and punk like our band but they do it their own way. Their bassist Isla went to the gig I put on and thought it was really cool, and wanted to play something like that. She messaged me and just really got what I was on about. There's just people like that. And I just knew it, they were the people, and a fitting opening band.

Next band is Perpanic who really hone in on the hardcore feeling. They've played with bands who have been in the game even longer than them and they've really perfected the craft of getting a crowd wild. They have the credentials. I just knew that they were THE band to really take this to the next level.

Next band is Lightning Fuze. We have a rivalry with them. The rivalry that drives us to do what we do bigger and better. They're playing a warmup gig on the 16th. Crazy. They're really the band that makes this not just a gig but really a movement. A battle.

Next band is our band Dork Diaries. We started off being pretty basic playing 'dumb stuff' that just happened to sound like Sunami. Now we've really got in those fucking operatic vocals and ridiculous drum fills and Gothenburg style guitar parts. We're hardcore to the core but we've also not afraid to experiment and go beyond the doors of perception. That's what makes us what people call post-hardcore.

To quote an Oasis song, all we know is that we don't know how it's gonna be.

What I do know though is that I'm on the cusp of something big and I gotta get my shit together. I've been meaning to do that for a long time but what is it actually like? Well, I don't really know but it's about just doing stuff and trying new stuff and not being afraid to try and go further and also about focusing on the stuff that matters and really having that foundation, that group of people who make you feel at home at the end of the day. Who stay even when you want to hide away. Who take the pain away from life's game.

I know I talk about Findaway a lot and reference them a bunch but it's because they literally are the band. Me and my mates at school would not be doing what we're doing if it wasn't for them. Honestly, it's a chain of influence. Silverchair were inspired by Nirvana; they saw that they did and about how it gave youth in general the permission to do what they love. Silverchair just brought it to Australia and gave Australian youth the permission to do the same by proving that it was possible for Australian bands to make it big. Findaway saw what Silverchair did and have proven that it's possible for Brisbane bands in the social media age to still live out their dreams. We saw what they did and we want to more or less prove that you don't have to be some person who has an in-house studio and has connections with some community orgs and has somewhat supportive family to do so. What we're doing is proving that all you need is a love of music and a group of friends to make it big.

Findaway's songs really resonate with everyone in the scene. Songs about losing friends. About feeling lonely. About being in the moment at a gig. About what it's like to be a young person in the scene.

I honestly wanted bands like Findaway, Heavy Liquid, Piss Off etc to play at the new gig. Turns out, all of them are busy. Findaway are working on a new album and are obviously planning something big. Heavy Liquid is playing a gig on the same day. Piss Off has a member with uni commitments on the day. It felt kinda bad to not be able to have the people I wanted to play to play considering how they're big influences on us and also just have that tried and true power. But what Arran from Piss Off told me really struck a chord. He said that there's probably bands out there who put on just as good a show who deserve the slot even more.

He's right. What we're seeing in the scene at the moment is a movement of bands who are tired of the lack of any shit going on in the scene and so have decided to put shit into their own hands and make it happen. It's not even just Dork Diaries and Lightning Fuze. Bands like Rupture, Ember, No Clue, Maniakal, Mandala, Liasis. They've gone beyond having to rely on some café 'clubhouse' in Redcliffe and said fuck it and have creating their own tribes.

This new wave of bands was what the scene needed a long time ago. Because as good as they are and as much as they want to keep going at full speed, the old bands and old organisers have had shit happen in their lives or are working on other stuff or have sold out. This injection of new blood is what we need and really what all of our bands need is just people showing up. Being there.