Hi all
Monday June 8, 2017 was our 51st lunch/meeting at Varsity Lakes Tavern on the Gold Coast and has set an ARROWS record.
Everybody who said they were coming actually turned up, leaving no unclaimed name tags on the table. Wow! In fact
eight un-announced members and virgins
arrived to make the
total of 60 on the day. This included four virgins -
Peter Brown, John ‘Bluey’ Watson (Aztecs),
Woody Finlayson, and
Rod Little (UK Rocker).
The eight unexpected people who surprised us included -
Ian Franklin, Patty Brittain, Kaye Purser and 5 - I’ll repeat FIVE Drag Queens. That’s right -
Simone and Monique stars (but with no Carlotta) of
Les Girls in Sydney’s Kings Cross and even before that at
Lee Gordon’s Club ‘The Jewell Box’ along with 3 dancers from that era.
Lisa, Jackie and Tanya.
Mr. Franklin told me on arrival he’d forgotten to bring his name tag so he wore one he’d written himself. ‘FRANK DILLIGAF’
was on the tag and when I asked him what the hell that meant, he explained it was an anagram for ‘Do I Look Like I Give A F..K’ –
"Nice touch Frank…….".
Happy to see Bluey Watson original AZTECS who is still as ‘mad as a meat axe’ and a few stories were told about who was the most nutty, he or John Bogey, as they both were proponents of the ‘Dance of the
Fames’ routine often performed back at the hotel after a show. Bluey can also lay claim to being a Zarsoff Brother with his moniker ‘Bluey Zarsoff’…..eh?
Quick Story - We were all (namely O’Keefe, Rebby’ Joye, Devlin, Digby and the Delltones and their relevant bands) in Melbourne this night after a
Lee Gordon Big Show ‘The Battle of the Big Beat, July 1959’, and back at our hotel
Johnny Devlin had invited a number of Air Hostess’s to his hotel room, with the door ajar.
Down the hall was Bogey AND Dave Bridge busy rolling a paper to squeeze between Bogey’s bum cheeks. Bogey was clothed in a
white singlet only ready and to run down the hall to burst into Devlin’s room. Dave set the paper alight and Bogey took off in the direction of the target door with the paper well alight, while we all stood around to watch the
show…..Just as Bogey crashed through the door, his singlet caught fire and amid his screams and the frantic squeals of the air hostesses trying to escape this madness, we all jumped on Bogey with towels putting out his fire.
It was great to see all our Kiwi brothers attending and we always love to have these talented N.Z. lads in our midst and to always see them seated at their own special table talking and
laughing together…. Great vibes fellas, it brings a welcome buzz to the room
Ken Bennett had a mild stroke a few weeks before our luncheon that they called a ‘TIA’ (?) He was in good spirits on the day.
After lunch it was time for the Biz part of the day and it began with my welcome to all for the 60th birthday year in Rock and Roll in OZ. and 10 years celebration for ARROWS. (we started in 2007)
I mentioned our up-coming big show to commemorate the 60 years to be held on October 7th at the ARENA CLUB in Yagoona.
Ronnie Kitchin then took the mike and introduced our Virgins and welomed the drag queens to ARROWS.
Ron then invited ex N.Z. radio personality John Kerr to speak. We later witnessed two good mates from the early days of Sydney Radio having a good old ‘natter’. I’m talking about
John Kerr and Graeme Webb, who were reminising about their burgeoning radio careers. John during his talk on the mike mentioned that just recently he had a meeting with the original ‘King of Talkback Radio’ John Laws,
who indicated he’d like to attend
an ARROWS lunch. (I’ll follow that up)
After John’s speech I welcomed all present to attend the Side Splitters lunch on the following day at the Surfers Paradise RSL.
Lynn Rogers was our last speaker and she delighted us with some of her stories in the business and remarking it was thrilling to see lots of musos in the room whom she’d had the pleasure of
working with over her exceptional career.
I closed the meeting by announcing our next Gold Coast ‘knees-up’ on November 13th (same Venue) and invited all to participate in a group picture to be taken by our always happy and obliging, Sandra Erdman (our official
photographer and widdow of the late Martin Erdman.)
Meeting closed at 2.30pm
Special thanks go out to Ronnie Kitchin Co-Compare, Sandra Erdman Photographer, Geoff Groth numbering the group photo and Noel Clarke Web-Master.
John
From Sue Kirby
Hi John and Lynne. Thank you both for the amazing endless effort organizing Arrows. Looking forward to the next one in November, I have some maybe suspects.
Love and Hugs.
Sue
From Colin Lock
Great day again at the ARROWS. Thanks again for all your effort John
Colin
From Billy Foster
Once again a Great luncheon thank you John, some snap happy pic's from the day cheers
Billy
John Charter
Office: 02 9822 4414
Mobile: 0414 849 966
Website: www.chartermusic.com.au