After a long, drawn out 15 months that morphed from terror (aka Black Summer’s Mother of All Conflagrations) into a pervasive and enervating state of uncertainty (aka Covid-19), we are finally…cautiously…re-emerging.

What a peculiar ‘new normal’ now faces us all, with tectonic shifts on the geopolitical stage, socio-economic injustice and vulnerability more starkly exposed than ever before and the integrity and decency of the political class (once again) in absolute tatters. The perfect storm of climate change and pandemic has toppled the precarious house of cards that was the latest version of the Patriarchy’s New World Order. Has capitalism finally corrupted The System beyond repair and sent us all to the dogs? Very possibly. All of the above notwithstanding, we’re just going to bury ourselves in the studio and attempt to ride it out.

So, back to business…

We’re kicking the year off with our perennial obsession, Ned.

“Deep in the nether regions of The Melbourne Club, hidden behind fortified baize doors in the inner sanctum of the cohort’s secret Trophy Room, hangs the club’s most hallowed prize; the death mask of Edward (Ned) Kelly. Indeed, it’s a barely acknowledged fact that the very campaign to outlaw and hunt the notorious bushranger was conceived within, and directed from, this most august establishment; key players in the affair – Sir Redmond Barry, Frederick Charles Standish, et al – being not only eminent members of the club but also high ranking brethren of the Masonry.”

Bridie Bottari, Random Perplexitas