CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | Contact
Betoota sound tech, Pete Bartholomew (42) has this week been forced to make the most difficult decision of his fringe millennial life.
The ageing scenester has just found out that British indie rock icons ‘The Kooks’ are touring Australia, and this puts him in a difficult position
Does he honour his court-ordered commitment to redirect a certain percent of his salary towards his former Sass And Bide model ex-girlfriend and the two children they conceived together, or does he skip this month’s child payment and immerse himself in the last truly authentic youth subculture to ever take hold in Australia.
As a former Indie Sleaze posterchild, Pete’s late teens and early twenties were spent smoking rollie cigarettes and sitting on upside down milk crates in the industrial beer gardens of Betoota’s Flight Path District.
It was nothing for him to hit the town in a beanie and business shirt with a thin tie. He used to wear laceless white canvas loafers. He was old enough to enjoy the fruits of bikie-operated garage pill presses, and the early days of YouTube.
While some say that the Australian iteration of Indie Sleaze was nothing more than young suburban kids running as fast as they could away from the heavily localised pub rock era, Pete believes that it wasn’t just a British cultural import. It was the real deal, mate.
And if he misses the Kooks 15th anniversary tour, then it was all for nothing.
While he may not have the same motor he had in the mid-2000s, and probably cannot pull of the elegant multi-day benders that he used to revel in, Pete says The Kooks tour is his equivalent to the boomers flocking to the winery amphitheatres for Bruce Springsteen
Only this is real music, that Australians can actually relate to.
With his ex-girlfriend now juggling the life of a single mum on top of her sporadic work as a stylist, Pete knows that buying these tickets will make him the subject of her over-sharing on Facebook.
But this band is the reason he still spells the word Naive with a ‘ï‘ – and it’s the reason he spent five of so years speaking with a vague Brighton accent.
“It’s a no-brainer innit” says Pete, as he once again begins channelling that particular chapter of pre-Instagram Australian anglophillia.
He won’t be made to feel guilty about the cost of revisiting his side of the sofa.
He’s handled his charm with time and slight of hand.
He’s breaking out the Tsubi jeans and the bowler hat.
