It sounds clichéd but the booze led us straight to harder things and we were soon chasing any drugs we could get our hands on, just like the big guys we looked up to. The older guys became noticeably more dangerous as harder drugs came into the picture. And so did we.
All my mates started out as potheads, happy to smoke weed and sit around and laugh at each other, but that didn’t work for me. I was watching the older guys taking cheap speed and acid and I noticed some of them doing smack.
I wasn’t a fan of weed as it made me too laidback and a bit more introverted, which was the last thing I needed in Elizabeth, so I started swallowing handfuls of cheap speed tablets, washing them down with beer or spirits.
I found that I could drink all day and night if I took these pills and as drinking was our main pastime this suited me down to the ground. Instead of getting drunk and sloppy, I would get drunk and aggressive, which was a dangerous thing for anybody who messed with me. We all started doing this, which led to us getting into fights with any strangers who walked near the shopping centre.
* * *
The gang would grab girls and some booze and head up to Uley Road Cemetery, an old place up in the hills above Elizabeth Downs. Now, Uley Road had a few benefits. It was out of the way of anything or anyone, and it was a bit scary so it was a good place to take girls because they wouldn’t leave your side. We would sit up there and take drugs and drink and tell stories and make out with chicks.
A lot of the guys used to tell the girls to put out or walk home but I thought this was all wrong. I didn’t want the blokes to think I was soft so I would pretend to do the same but let the girl know what was going on. We seemed to get away with it. I never really liked going up there for that reason and I thought that it was fucked up to have parties on people’s graves, but I quite often ended up there. It was one of the few places we could go without being hassled or having to fight anyone. Sometimes we ended up fighting each other but not often and only when we were very drunk.
I don’t think that any of us were that comfortable there, but in a group we were all much braver. Occasionally one of us would walk through the cemetery with one of the girls. It’s funny how brave we were when girls were involved.
Uley Road had one road in, and one road out. I liked a place that was well lit and easy to get away from. I wouldn’t go anywhere without an escape plan. Even at clubs or parties you would always find me with my back to the wall and in clear view of an exit. No one was going to sneak up on me.
I progressed from speed to acid, LSD. A lot of my friends were spending thirty dollars on a bag of weed. I thought that was a waste of time and money, so I would buy six tabs of acid and take them over the course of the next four or five days. Half a tablet on the Thursday, a whole one on the Friday, a couple on the Saturday and anything I had left on the Sunday. Then more of my mates started doing the same and things changed. Most people I had heard of who took hard drugs like this sat and listened to music and contemplated the universe, but not us, we wanted a challenge – and doing anything on acid was a challenge.
There were guys who hung around the gang who could do incredible things while they were wasted. One friend of ours played first division football for Elizabeth City and he used to take acid and play the games. So we would all take acid too and go and watch him play. We would all be amazed at how he did it, but he not only did it, he played really well. Meanwhile we were having trouble sitting in the car drinking beer, just watching him.
He was amazing. He was the team captain and the main striker, so it was not like he could avoid the play. He was right in the middle of it. He told me later it was like the whole game was in slow motion, and he had so much time to make his decisions and get himself into the right position. I don’t know if I could have done it but, in saying that, many years later I used to take acid and go on stage with Cold Chisel and not tell them. They never noticed but I know it was incredibly hard to concentrate.
We would still get into fights, even on acid. We did other stupid things too. Here’s the sort of smart thing we would do: we used to wait until the drugs kicked in, and we were hallucinating, then walk over to the local police station and ask directions to places that didn’t exist. Just to see if they noticed that we were tripping.
‘What can I do for you . . . Hey, you . . . Over here. What can I do for you? Over here, mate.’
‘Sorry, er. Yeah, I’m looking for a place to watch er . . . movies.’
‘You mean a theatre. Is that what you want? Look at me when you’re talking to me, son.’
‘Er, yeah a theatre. I want to see a movie.’
‘There isn’t a movie theatre here, son. This is a police station in case you didn’t notice. How old are you? I think I’ve seen you before, haven’t I? Just stay there while I come around from behind the counter and see if I can help you. Have you been drinking or something?’
‘Er . . . No. Er . . . Bye, sorry mate, I’d better go.’
‘Take it easy, son. I want to talk to you a minute so just hold on there.’
‘Bye, got to go, thanks mate.’
Out the door I went, running as fast as I could out of the car park and back to the safety of the shops.
The boys would be waiting, glassy-eyed and laughing. ‘That’s so cool. What did you say?’
‘What? Er . . . I don’t know but it was funny. Your turn.’
That progressed to some of the guys actually trying to get arrested to see how they coped being locked up while they were tripping. That still wasn’t enough though; we kept pushing it further. A couple of our friends who were particularly crazy decided that they would not only get arrested but see how long it would take for them to escape.
The local police had a lot to deal with, as you can imagine, and they were known for their heavy-handed tactics. Looking back I can see why they had to be that way. A lot of the boys would fight with the cops at any chance they were given and this led to our next game. The idea was to take the acid and wait until you were peaking, hallucinating so much you hardly knew where you were, then you had to get yourself arrested. Now as I said, the police were a tad violent, so they were easily provoked. What you had to do, once they locked you in the cell, was scream and yell at them until they decided to shut you up.
They had a system whereby if someone was a difficult detainee they would take them out the back of the cells and beat them. At this point our guys would turn on them and smash them to bits. You’ve got to remember that these mates of ours were very hard guys and they were on very heavy drugs, so they had incredible strength and no fear. After they belted the cops they would jump the back wall of the station and run back to the shops where we were waiting. Of course, we were timing them and it became a competition to see who could do this the quickest.
The police would turn up minutes later looking for them but they would be gone, off with some girl or hidden in the boot of the car, anywhere the cops couldn’t find them. This kept us amused on the odd night but more often we would go out to start trouble somewhere else, where the cops didn’t know us.
I started hanging out with a guy called Mick. As we both knew loads of girls, we spent most nights getting drunk or fucked up and chatting up chicks.
Both Mick and myself were different from the other guys around the area. We were smarter. We didn’t want to fight and get chased by the cops all night; we preferred to cruise around getting wasted and listening to music, singing along to the radio and pretending we were singers in bands. We both fancied the idea of getting into a band but it was Mick who was most likely to do it. He had better clothes than me and he knew more songs than me and he was more outgoing than me. He had the front to chat up the girls and win them over, but he was pushy, where I was just easygoing. He made it clear to girls what he wanted where I was just out for some fun. So a lot of the time I ended up with the girls, which suited me fine and drove Mick mad.
* * *
Night after night Mick and I would drive around looking for chicks. Talking shit and getting smashed.
‘Come on, sing along. This is great.’
‘I don’t want to sing along with that.’
‘But it’s huge, Jim. This band has sold a shitload of records. It’s one of the biggest selling records in history I reckon.’
‘Yeah I know, but it’s hippie shit. I don’t mind listening to it when I’m out of it but I don’t want to sing along with it.’
‘Why not? It’s cool.’
‘If I wanted to be in a band like that I’d smoke pot.’
‘You do smoke pot.’
‘Just drive the car and shut up.’
‘You love pot.’
‘You smoke pot. I just have to drive around in the fucking car with you while you do it.’
‘I hear Led Zeppelin smoke pot.’
‘Just fucking look at the state of them. Hey, watch the road, would you.’
‘What? I’m watching the road. Now that sounds cool.’
‘No it doesn’t. I like music to fucking smash you in the face. I don’t want to go see a band and sit around and watch the light show. Fuck that. I want music you can fight to. Like The Who or Jerry Lee Lewis. Not Pink Floyd.’
‘You like Pink Floyd.’
‘I know I do, but that’s not the point.’
‘Hang on, man, try to look cool. And act like you’re enjoying yourself for a minute.’
‘Yeah, yeah.’
‘Hey girls, what’s happening? Are you looking for a party to go to? We got one going in the car here. Why don’t you jump in?’
‘Nice car. Maybe we will. Hey, cool music.’
‘Shit.’
* * *
It seemed that everyone our age in and around the north of Adelaide had nothing better to do than fight. Not only in the north – there were stabbings and even shootings at the clubs and pubs around Adelaide – but it always seemed to be traced back to Elizabeth. Whether it was gangs like us from the north heading to town to start trouble or motorbike gangs based in the north fighting in the clubs, the police ended up looking for culprits in Elizabeth and most of the time they were right.
The gang would change from night to night. Some nights there were thirty or more, mostly young guys who had nothing better to do. They couldn’t or didn’t want to stay home. We all went out looking for something we couldn’t find anywhere else, especially at home – ourselves. Sometimes it was easier to find yourself in the eyes of someone else. A young girl who saw you the way you really wanted to be. Soft, caring and even, God forbid, sensitive. Or sometimes you saw yourself in the eyes of one of your mates. Cold, angry and rebellious, ready to smash anyone that came within swinging distance. There were a few of us who were always there. We were the ones who never stayed home. We had nothing to stay home for.
Jeff was about six foot two and English and as hard as nails. But the same guy could tell if you felt alone or worried and would reach out and say things to you like, ‘Jim, you don’t look like the same old you tonight. Is something wrong?’
‘Yeah, mate, I’m in trouble. Things aren’t going well at home and I don’t know what I’m doing with my life. It’s all going down the drain.’
‘No, mate, you’re fine. You just need to shake it off.’
‘But I can’t, Jeff. I’ve got myself into huge trouble and I can’t see any way out of it.’
‘Well, I’m here if you want to talk about it.’
‘Thanks, mate.’
‘If you don’t want to talk about it we could always go over to the shops and bash someone’s head in. That’ll cheer you up.’
Mick, on the other hand, was more like me in a lot of ways. He liked music and didn’t want to fight all the time like the other guys. But he was so wounded he was even more alone. He needed no one. He could be warm one minute, then selfish and cold the next.
‘Hey Jim, I thought we’d go out tonight and find a few chicks and have a good time.’
‘That’d be great. Where did you want to go?’
‘I don’t care. How much money have you got for petrol?’
‘I’m broke, but I’ll get some tomorrow and slip you a bit for gas.’
‘Na, fuck it, Billy’s got money, I’m going to see him instead. Maybe I’ll see you tomorrow.’
‘Thanks, mate, that’s nice of you.’
‘Fuck it. I’m not running a taxi service here.’
‘Yeah, fuck you too.’
It seemed the more of us that got together the more trouble we got ourselves into. The size of the gathering fed the need to be violent – with each other and anyone else. One or two of us could have a laugh or see a movie but any more than one or two and we would only want to drink and fight. Young blokes, driven by fear and testosterone with no morals and no sense of decency. It was frightening how quickly things could change. From laughing to leering; from friends to fighting. It all turned on its arse in a matter of seconds.
I have been sitting in a car laughing while everyone smoked pot and drank beer one minute and the next someone they didn’t know or didn’t like walked by and it became a near-death experience for one of them.
Most of the guys didn’t seem to care if they really hurt someone or not. We all wore R.M. Williams riding boots with Cuban heels. I wore them because I thought they looked cool but my mates wore them because they did more damage when you jumped up and down on people’s heads. Pounding them into the ground and smashing them into the gutter on the end of their boots. Leaving people bleeding and gasping for air while they laughed out loud and shouted for one another to come and join in. It was frightening.
These fights were not just about knocking people down, they were about hurting people as much as you could. Somehow that was meant to make you feel good about yourself, but it didn’t make sense to me.
I don’t know how people weren’t killed in these fights. Maybe they were. I’m sure some of them must have been left with permanent damage but I tried not to think about this. I went along with it all, trying to get through without killing someone or being killed myself.
Eventually the gang ran out of people to fight around Elizabeth, so they would pile into cars and go into town and find people to fight there. There were always more people just like us, wanting to belt things to get rid of their frustrations, and it wouldn’t take us long to find them.
Fighting wasn’t the only thing we did but it did seem to take up most of our time – either fighting or bragging about our fights. In Elizabeth there were two types of people, fighters and victims, and I wasn’t going to become a victim for anything or anybody.
The gang were like a pack of wolves, looking for weakness – if you looked weak, even for a second, one of them would turn on you. But most nights I was ready and struck out at one of them first. Whoever I would hit, I had to hit really hard. This normally made them all back off in fear they might be next.
There is one night I remember very clearly, when things didn’t go as easily as I thought they would. I was in the coffee shop and there was a new guy hanging around the pack. He was very big and I think my mates, if I could really call them that, wanted to find out how dangerous he was. These guys were your friends while they were scared of you or needed you. If they didn’t need you, you were a target. Anyway, one of them told me the guy had been talking shit about me. We’d all been drinking so it didn’t take a lot for the rest of them to get themselves whipped into a frenzy.
‘This fucking guy has been telling people you’re scared of him. He lives near your house and he says you avoid walking near him,’ one of them said, baiting me to see if I would react.
‘Yeah, get him. Go on, hit him.’
Their voices were getting higher pitched, louder and more desperate. They wanted someone to get hurt. I don’t know why. Maybe it was because they got hurt all their lives at home or maybe they were just animals.
‘I’ve hardly seen this guy. I wouldn’t know him if I fell over him.’
‘You’d know him. You can’t miss him. He’s fucking big. I reckon he’d knock you out,’ one of them sniggered.
‘What am I supposed to be, scared because he’s big? Is that it?’ I was a bit but I didn’t let on to them.
‘Yeah. I reckon you are, and I think you’re letting him talk about you because he could do you in.’
I could see their eyes turning to knives and suddenly they all looked like they were after my blood, not his. I had to protect myself. I had to fight or risk becoming a target whenever they got bored.
I walked over to him as he was standing outside the coffee shop. ‘What the fuck have you been saying about me? If you want to get yourself killed, I’m happy to do it.’
He looked me straight in the eye with the look of a man who wasn’t bullshitting and said, ‘I haven’t said anything about you. I don’t talk about people I don’t know.’
This seemed like the right response to me. What more could he say? So I walked away and back towards the guys. Suddenly I knew they could taste my blood.
‘Why didn’t you hit him? You are a fucking coward just like he says.’
I had always hated these stupid thug games. I’d seen them since I started school in Elizabeth and I knew if I wasn’t careful, I was next on the menu. I had to do something. It was either fight him or fight six of these animals – my so-called mates.
I turned and walked after him. By this time, he had moved away from the shops and was heading home. The rest of the boys were walking behind me, snapping at my heels like a pack of starving jackals.
I had just about caught up to him as he started walking over the bridge that led over the railway line to Elizabeth West.
I could feel the train racing under the bridge, rattling it as I approached him. The wind was blowing and it suddenly felt colder. My heart was jumping out of my chest.
I reached up with my hand and grabbed his shoulder, spun him around and swung. I caught him hard right on the chin. He swayed, clearly stunned, but he didn’t fall so I hit him again. This time even harder.
He shook his head and then turned on me. He smashed me to the ground and began to beat me senseless. This was the worst beating I had had for a long time. I couldn’t help but think to myself as I lay on the ground being kicked to death that I deserved everything I got. Probably worse.
Meanwhile the jackals scattered like scared dogs, disappearing from sight, their high-pitched whining voices fading into the distance. Leaving me lying alone on the ground as he sunk another boot into my ribs. He left me bleeding, dazed and stunned.
After a minute I felt a hand pulling me up. It was him. I expected to be hit again but instead he helped me to my feet and stood and looked at me.
‘I told you I didn’t want to fight you but you pushed me.’
I felt even dumber than I looked. I was an idiot and I knew it.
‘I live just down the road from you. I’m going home now. So do you want to walk with me?’
I’d never been belted then helped out by the person who beat the shit out of me before so this felt a bit weird.
‘Yeah, why not.’
We walked along saying very little to each other.
‘Sorry for starting you,’ I muttered quietly.
‘Didn’t hurt a bit.’ He laughed as he looked at me.
‘That makes me feel a lot better.’
I had learned a big lesson. I would make my own decisions and do what I thought was right from then on, no matter what the consequences were. I’d rather get beaten for doing the right thing than the wrong. It was as simple as that. I never picked another fight in my life.
There were so many nights I sat alone, no longer afraid of where I came from but of what I was becoming. I was becoming just like the people in my darkest memories from Scotland. The same dreams that haunted me as a child were becoming a reality as a young man, twisting me around so much I wanted to die.
There was nothing for me at home. There never really had been. Home was a place that no one wanted to be. Mum stayed because she had to. Our home had been shattered and put back together and was in the process of being shattered again. Mum was a human wrecking ball when she had lost interest in something or someone. She had held it together long enough for us to basically get through school and now she was ready to move on again. Life was crumbling around us again but this time she would not be picking up the pieces. We would have to do it ourselves.
She and Reg fought and there were other people around all the time. There was nothing for me to stay there for, so I wanted to leave. I hadn’t worked out where I was going or what I would do. All I knew was I felt better around a gang of young guys who drank too much and ran out of control than I did near my parents and home.
There were nights when I walked through the shopping centre and there were no crowds of guys or girls hanging around, just rain falling on the footpaths where I’d seen so much blood spilled, and the wind howling around the shopfront windows. I wondered how long this life would go on before I would be made to pay for everything I had done wrong. I felt I was constantly running, only just keeping one step in front of everything that had haunted me in my nightmares.
Most of the guys had families or jobs and spent most of the week away from the shops but I didn’t. They would stay at home with their mums or girlfriends and then on the weekend come out and turn into some sort of animal, but I felt like an animal all the time. I didn’t want to be at home and I had nowhere else to go. I would sit alone on the steps of the pool hall waiting for someone to turn up, anyone who could distract me from my own thoughts.
Some nights other guys, even worse than me, would walk through the shopping centre. Drunk and dazed, looking for someone to hurt, they would walk from the pool hall to the coffee shop until they found someone to let their pain out on. I would be sitting in the shadows, watching as the police dragged them into paddy wagons, beating them with truncheons. I couldn’t help but see that this was what they wanted, to pay for their fucked up lives in their own blood and misery.
I would pull back even further into the shadows, ashamed, not wanting them to see me and know that I saw their pain. Then I would walk over the bridge and down the street to our house and sneak in so no one noticed me or spoke to me. I had nothing to say to anyone.
Some mornings, walking home just before sun-up, I would see the milkman delivering milk to the houses on his route. As the sun came over the horizon and shone a little light on the dark road, I would wait until he had gone out of sight and nip in and grab myself a bottle and drink it on the way home. I knew it wasn’t the best thing to do but if you were broke and really thirsty, surely it couldn’t be such a sin to steal one bottle? I kept telling myself that I would go back to the same house on another night and give them a bottle back but I never seemed to get around to it.
It was early 1972 when I had to run away from home to go to the Sunbury Rock Festival. My folks were trying to be tough with me by stopping me going again but I was way beyond that. They had no control over me by then. I snuck out my bedroom window and headed to Melbourne with Linda and her mates. They had a full car but they squeezed me into the back of their station wagon along with all the camping gear. I lay across their stuff for eight hours or so, smoking joints and drinking beer with them, and by the time we arrived at Sunbury they were all shitfaced, as was I. We staggered out of the car park and towards the gate of the festival.
Now, the reason I wanted to go was to see Billy Thorpe. He was my hero. He played louder and faster than anyone else in the country. So I was really excited at the prospect of seeing him in such a great setting. I planned to watch a few bands that I liked over the weekend and generally have a good time until Thorpie came on stage on the Sunday. The best laid plans and all that . . .
We walked into the festival and found a place to set up camp and also a place to watch all the bands from. We were all organised. It was my first rock festival and I was ready to watch every band that was playing. Then one of Linda’s mates pulled out a handful of pills that I found out later were Mandrax, a very strong sleeping pill that was taken in those days for fun. When you mixed it with beer very strange things happened. But they were all taking a handful or so of these tablets and they gave me the same.
Then we decided to check out what was going on at the festival, so we went for a walk. The Sunbury Festival site had a lovely river running through it where people swam naked, as you do at rock festivals. So we were down by the river admiring the view when the pills started to take effect. I sort of remember the whole world slipping into slow motion and it felt like my tongue had swollen up and I couldn’t talk. ‘So far so good,’ I thought. Then things took another sharp turn sideways and the last thing I remember was slipping down the bank and into the river. A veil of blackness covered me and then nothing.
I woke up in a tent. I didn’t know where I was but as I looked around the tent I saw people strapped into beds next to me. It took a while but my head cleared and I realised I was in some sort of hospital tent. I looked around and saw a sign saying ‘Buoyancy Tent’. Now I had seen this tent when I arrived and knew it was a place where people who had taken too many drugs or were having a bum trip went to be looked after. I wasn’t having a bum trip; in fact, I’d had a great sleep and felt refreshed and ready to rock.
I got up out of bed while no one was watching and left the tent, dancing out so it looked like I had just danced into the wrong tent by accident. No one noticed, so off I went to find the gang. I walked back to where Linda and her friends were watching the show; they were all in various stages of falling apart, staring blankly at the stage. I don’t think that any of them could even see the stage. No one knew I was missing. No one cared anyway. I could have drowned and I doubt that Linda and her mates would have even remembered that they had brought me with them. But the good news was, just as I got there Thorpie walked on stage to start his set. It was a perfect night. I had a great sleep, got hammered and got to see my hero Billy Thorpe. It was a perfect weekend really. Then we drove home.