Flame Trees

It speaks to the regrets that we all have about our past, someone we left behind, but never fully quite left in our hearts.

In a way, to my way of thinking anyway, sorta like Flame Trees.

Do you recall how that particular song came to life, and were you thinking about places that you'd left?

Well, yes, I had a certain scene in, in mind and a certain person and a certain town, but that's not important really.

Now, if I have to go through... and tell you who he is, then we have a problem, Houston.

Flame Trees, Cheap Wine, Choir Girl, K-Sun.

He wrote all the, you know, great Cold Chisel songs.

And now, of course, still dabbling with Cold Chisel.

And I can't stop.

Time to book a room and stay tonight Number one is to find some friends to say you're doing well After all this time you boys look just the same Number two is to have the eye at one of two hotels That will interplay to you Remember so and so Number three is never to say her name For the flame trees will blind the weary driver And there's nothing else can set fire to this town Just makes it harder to believe That she won't be around Who needs that sentimental bullshit anyway? It takes more than just a memory To make me cry And I'm happy just to see you And see which one of us can tell the biggest lies.

And there's a girl, she's falling in love, near where the piano stands.

With a young local factory out of work, just holding hands.

Yeah.

Flame Trees and K-San, of course.

Yeah, well, I could run through the list.

It's a big list.

And as he mentioned, he writes for others too.

Absolutely.

And so for those unaware of the context, we took a purposeful approach with Don because in an Australian context, there are these, well, it's more than a handful, Paul, but it's these iconic songs, K-San, Flame Trees, Choir Girl, Saturday Night, Don mentioned, I'm not, oh, Bow River, like they just go on and on and on.

We purposely tried to avoid going into that territory because it is so well-trodden, and we sort of looked for some deeper cuts, and Don was very generous with his time to do that.