A friendly chat with some Aussie roadies...

[KiwiCoromandel]

Sunanda Creagh of the Sydney Morning Herald explores the hidden world of the Australian roadie.......

They have the patience of saints, the proportional strength of ants and the organisational skills of CEOs. They are roadies.

Roadies. If something goes wrong, they get the blame.

If everything goes right, no one notices them. They're the muscle of the music industry, charged with unloading heavy gear and setting up stages, and the brains behind complex light and sound equipment. Everything has to be done at breakneck speed, with no margin for error. Some roadies such as Kurt Cobain end up getting their own gigs or go on to manage bands. For most, though, life as a roadie is a tough and thankless job. But being invisible has its advantages: roadies see and hear everything that goes on backstage.

Geoffro Stevenson, 36

"I have been in the business since I was about 18. I've taken the Dandy Warhols out, I've after-partied with Muse and Metallica, I've looked after bands like Grinspoon, Taxiride, the Angels. Paul Kelly is coming up - those crowds are usually easy to handle.

"I do security for the bands, too. I deal with a lot of pissed dickheads. I have a black leather vest and with my headband and long black hair, people are always wanting to fight me.

"When you got a band like Shihad, my job is to look after the singer. He jumps into the crowd and I have to chase him and set up the mic. I follow him around as close as a fly to shit.

"There are people who want to get up onstage in front of a thousand people and you gotta hustle them off. I don't like being forceful but if they want to be difficult you have to use a little bit of force. In a nice manner.

"The hardest person to get off stage was a woman.

I asked her nicely but this one had a go at me, so I had to pick her up in a bear hug. Her arms and legs were going everywhere. It was hard to get her off without trashing all the band gear.

"Travelling is a pain. In the last month, I'd be lucky to be home for a week. I'm quite used to living on about four hours' sleep. I get up early to be with my kids after having gone out with the bands the night before.

"My missus believes I am indestructible. With Shihad, he jumped off a PA box and landed on my finger and he snapped it right back. I snapped it back in and went into instant shock but was still on the job. I've had a truckload bar pierce the side of my kneecap and I kept going. I've had my leg crushed between two 200 kilogram boxes. I've gone to work with the shingles. The only thing that will stop me working is if I'm dead."

Samara Kinney, 23

"I've been in the business 21/2 years. I had no training at all when I started, but you learn a lot after the first couple of weeks. The hardest part to teach anybody is to roll a cable properly.

"The people are probably the best part of the job. We are all mates and we all keep an eye out for each other.

"In the last year we've done Kylie, Cher, Black Eyed Peas, Blink-182. In the next few weeks I'll do the Finn Brothers, Ryan Adams.

"It's considered unprofessional to approach [the bands]. They are there to do their job and we are here to do ours. But it's cool when they say, 'Thanks, guys.'

"When we bump in rock'n'roll shows it's hard and fast, there's not much time to stop. Everything's got to be up there now.

"My worst moment was being sconed on the head by a pole at the Easter Show. I was setting up some of the seating around some of the arenas. I picked up the first rail of a set of stairs, turned around and the pole that it was attached to fell on my noggin. It was a blood-gushing moment. I got my head glued back together. I couldn't have a shower for three days.

"I really admire the chicks in this job because you gotta be tough and not take crap from anyone. Generally you're the only female in a crew of guys and sometimes it can be hard to be a girl and a roadie.

"The earnings aren't that crash hot. In winter, there isn't that much on so some weeks we'll have a little bit of money and other weeks we're all broke. In summer, though, it's fantastic."

Trevor Fitzsimmons, 39

"I started when I was 15 and I've worked with just about every Australian band you can think of and international bands, too. I've got the Queens of the Stone Age coming up.

"When I started, it was wild as. There's an old code: 'What goes on the road, stays on the road.' I could tell you some worldwide front-page headlines about the stuff I've seen but I won't be working in the industry no more. The old roadies, the few of us left, had to adapt, clean our acts up, stop getting so drunk at gigs. These days you don't get a chance to muck around.

"Often there is huge money at stake and there's a lot of pressure on everyone. But it all has to work when the band walks onstage, that's the bottom line. We are in showbiz, after all.

"I've never really hurt myself other than falling down a few flights of stairs

at a Midnight Oil gig. It was what we call a 'stair gig', where you've got to carry everything in the trucks upstairs and set it up in three hours. But WorkCover's gotten onto that and I don't miss those days.

"One of the most unbelievable moments was on the AC/DC Stiff Upper Lip tour. They did an overnight run from Sydney to Tokyo. The last truck had to be at the airport by 4am and the Tokyo show was that night.

The American production manager said we were nuts for trying but it was all on a plane by morning.

"We are like prostitutes: the phone rings and we go to work. I could be working 2am to 10 in the morning and then back up and doing a gig again in the afternoon. Sometimes it's shit, like any job, but I can't think of doing anything else."

Nathan Barnes, 24

"I've been a roadie for about a year-and-a-half and have done some big concerts like Good Vibrations and the ARIAs.

"The worst day I have ever had on the job was on the Sydney Harbour Bridge. You know how they have those lighting shows around New Year's Eve? We were getting that equipment down after it had been up there for two months - up and down steps carrying awkward heavy stuff for a nine-hour day.

"At the ARIAs I met all the guys from Jet and Eskimo Joe; they were really cool blokes. But generally we just try to be professional and concentrate on the job.

"I have had to deal with groupies a few times. They are the most annoying thing on the face of the earth. They are mostly gacked out on drugs and they don't realise how dangerous it is backstage and we have to get rid of 'em.

"I've got a degree in music from the Con, where I studied composition. I can play the piano but these days I just jam with a few mates. I have been able to show off on occasion. When we were at the ARIAs, this guy was having some trouble with the keyboard sound, it was coming out really fuzzy. I said, 'Mate, give me the headphones, I'll have a listen.' He thought he was gonna have to play me something, thinking, 'Stupid loader, doesn't know anything.' I said, 'Thank you very much, mate, I have played eighth grade piano.' So I kicked his arse."

image:Roadie Geoffro Stevenson says people always want to fight him....