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Ladies and Gentlemen! As our friend and colleague, Mr Bryan Brown might bellow in one of his more civilized moments.... A BIT OF BLOODY HUSH!!.
There -- that's better. Now tonight in the Dayglo we are delighted to welcome to the revolving stage (come to think of it, I don't remember it revolving yesterday - either Mary-Jane the caterer has been tampering with the desserts again, or Piotr the Polish carpenter has been more than usually creative overnight) -- no, welcome to the stage please an old Two Paddocks pal, writer and journalist Sarah-Kate, she of the arresting color-co-ordo ensembles (where would Mad Men be without cues from SKL?) and the lovely books; a ridiculously funny person, and living proof of how the Irish Diaspora has vastly enriched the world. And left Ireland the poorer for it. But that's another story...
In her own inimitable words...
Sarah-Kate Lynch is quite a cranky journalist of several decades who prefers making things up to recording them accurately. This is not very good if you are a journalist, which may explain (a) the crankiness and (b) why she now writes novels.
She also writes two columns in New Zealand Woman's Day, New Zealand's biggest selling magazine. One is about nothing and the other is about travel.
Sarah-Kate lives in a cliff top house on the wild west coast of New Zealand's North Island and is currently very glad she has not bothered to amass a fortune thereby saving herself the angst of having it halved.
She is also glad she lives on a cliff top because what with global warming and all, she could be underwater as well as poor.
As it is she lives very happily with a lovely dog called Ginger and a husband called Ted. Oh, hang on, no, that's not right. The dog is called Ted and the husband is Ginger.
You really should read her books - we have along with millions of others - Blessed Are The Cheesemakers, House of Daughters, By Bread Alone, Dolci di Love, Finding Tom Connor, etc.... A rainy arvo and one of these will see you right!
But not tonight it's time to get down ... and rock out with the funky, adorable, hilarious, remarkable ... the gorgeous ... SARAH-KATE LYNCH!!
My first musical memory is of sitting in the good room at home in Dunedin having a cup of tea and listening to The Sound of Music on the record player. I was four and in my happy place. I repeated this ritual most afternoons until I was forced to go to school. Decades later I had the hilarious pelvic-floor-clenching exercise of going to the official Sound of Music singalong at the Prince of Wales Theatre in London's Leicester Square. I sat next to six gay bees from Brighton who'd come up by train for the express purpose of standing up and waving whenever they were mentioned. This happens in My Favourite Things. Twice. I was 44 and in my happy place. Since then whenever I need a little something like Maria, I watch the Belgian flashmob version of Do Rey Mi.
First heartbreak. Still can't think of anything funny to say about it. But Ricky Lee got me through. And James Taylor helped. Thank God I didn't know about Patsy Kline then.
Anyone who lived in Wellington in the ‘80s knows about Clare's. Anyone except my mother, that is, who still asks, “Who's Clare?”. It was a nightclub off Cuba Street, plain as a pyrex dish in the daytime but full of endless shady possibilities once night fell. I used to go there on my own after a late shift at Radio New Zealand and would always know someone, if not everyone. It was like Cheers, but with more hair product. One night the DJ played Smooth Operator and a snake-hipped man in a cream linen suit whisked a Sade-lookalike in a skin-tight red dress on to the floor and they moved together like they were made just for that song. It was brand new, not yet playing in every café, and it was a sight to behold.
Carly Simon has a voice like dark chocolate, my favourite kind, so it's not surprising that I fell in love with this song which she sings, uncredited, from the Dancing For Mental Health album. I was kissing someone with confidence myself at the time although I might not have been quite so confident had I known he was doing a lot more kissing than I was. Anyway, my flatmates hated this song so much I came home one night and found the cassette shoved down the waste disposal. Losers! Like that would work. It did, however, burn quite well.
The first time I heard this song was the last time I ate Kentucky Fried Chicken. I'm still trying to figure out the connection but in the meantime, I just love George Michael. I even flew from Auckland to London one year just to see him be the first musician to play live at the new Wembley Stadium. Worth every penny. I have a recurring dream where George picks me over Kylie Minogue to be his best friend although sometimes Steve Buscemi is there which is a bit weird. Freedom 90 makes me want to dance, an impulse I often give in to, while You Have Been Loved makes me want to cry. Ditto.
I'll love KD Lang forever just for dedicating a song to Big Boned Gals. Who else is going to do that - Justin Beiber? I think not. KD is a goddess - I have so many favourites -- but the one I've been listening to most over the past couple of years is this from Hymns of the 49th Parallel. The combination of Jane Siberry's lyrics and KD Lang's heart-wrenching vocals undoes me every time. “So take a lesson from the strangeness you feel, and know you'll never be the same”? I defy anyone not to take that lesson who hasn't already learned it after listening to this 150 times, which you will want to do.
This is my hands-down all time favourite song for singing at the top of my lungs when I'm driving on my own. Place both hands on the steering wheel and when you hear “I feel it like a sickness how this love is killing me,” get ready so that when “I will walk into the fingers of your fire willingly” comes along your digits are spread out as straight as you can get them and you can dance the edge of sanity -- you've never been this close. In love with your ghost. Yes!
She had me at Holiday and I'll be there till she's locked up in the Las Vegas Eventide Home For Half-Dressed Pop Stars. I have a lot of Madonna on my iPod when I exercise because she's mean about fat people, which motivates me not to keep being one. This album had just come out when I went to Kenya a few years ago. We stayed with friends at Lake Naivasha and every morning I would get up and run down to the lake. As Let It Will Be played, I would pass a family of giraffes, two adults, two teenagers, and a baby. At the beginning of the week they ran when they saw me coming (a common approach) but by day six as Let It Will Be thundered in my ears, the giraffe family stayed put, just a few feet from where my own pounded the dust. It was a truly happy moment.
Like any connoisseur of a decent red lipstick, I've long had a soft spot for The Cure but I near had a religious experience when I saw them play at the Vector arena in Auckland a few years ago. We were in the last row at the very back but this mattered not a jot and when Robert Smith started lamenting if only he'd known of the right words. I'm sure I had, but I couldn't remember ever having heard this song before. Now I can't imagine a world without it.
If you're ever at Woody's Bar in Golden, Colorado, you absolutely must have a muy fuerte margarita, possibly two, then get in the pick up truck, put this on the stereo, turn up the volume and drive to Red Rocks. It is THE perfect time-place-tequila-buzz cocktail.
A big Dayglo hand, if you please for one of the best Top 10s of all time!
And a rousing cheer for a great broad, a fine woman, a delightful person, and a charming friend - the one and only ... SARAH-KATE LYNCH!!
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Sale of Liquor License Ref: OF129
Licence No. 67/OFF/30/2022
Expires 24th August 2025
