Hey hey it's Australia day.

Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury i put it to you that "Great Southern Land" is the best song about Australia. Ever.

Around a thousand years ago - in the early 80's - Iva Davies (singer/songwriter, record producer, guitar/bass/keyboard player) and Icehouse were THE sound of of synthesizer pop in Australia. Davis took pub rock and and changed it into something that could mix it with the best of the rest of the world.

"Great Southern Land" embodies everything about that sound. And it's everything about Australia.

"Standing at the limit of an endless ocean,
stranded like a runaway, lost at sea.
City on a rainy day down in the harbour,
watching as the grey clouds shadow the bay.
Looking everywhere 'cause I had to find you,
this is not the way that i remember it here.
Anyone will tell you its a prisoner island,
hidden in the summer for a million years."

Can someone give me a good reason why that's not the first verse of the national anthem? Actually, can anyone give me a reason it's not the national anthem full stop?

Sun is shining, there's not a cloud in the sky, it's Australia day and you should be outside playing this song very loud at a BBQ not inside reading a quite ridiculous blog post.

Play it loud.

davey.

Crazy in the coconut.

Tomorrow is Australia Day, it would be a rubbish effort on my part if i didn't play a couple of my favourite bits of Australiana.

The Avalanches are - or were depending on who you ask - a loose collective of musicians and DJ's from Melbourne. They gained international recognition in 2000 when they released their only album to date "Since I Don't Have You".

In 2001, they put out "Frontier Psychiatrist" as a single and made the most crazy ape bonkers video to go with it. For that i thank them.

If you've not seen it for a while it's worth another look, it still makes me smile, but if all this is news to you and you've never seen it, ohhh you don't know what you've been missing.

I still love the track, but for me it's about the video, i mean, faced with the challenge of making a video for a track that is made up almost entirely of samples, would you have done this? I wish i could have been there at the pre-production meeting "So how many times do you think the monkey should chase the giant dove around the stage before they stop and have a dance then"?

brilliant.

davey