Latest / Salt of the Earth / Ep 102: Danny Phegan _ Part C

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Ep 102: Danny Phegan _ Part C · Salt of the Earth

0:01
SPEAKER_01: Step into the heart of Australian agriculture with salt of the earth farm stories.
0:06
SPEAKER_00: Everyone's got their own troubles, and you just have to keep stepping forward.
0:09
SPEAKER_00: You just have to because no one else is going to save the day for you.
0:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and a microcosm, but that is farming life.
0:13
SPEAKER_00: A lot of stuff can go wrong in one day, but it's got to keep rolling.
0:16
SPEAKER_00: That's the same with life in a more broader sense.
0:18
SPEAKER_00: You've just got to keep charging along.
0:22
SPEAKER_01: G'day and welcome to Part C with Danny Fegan, farmer, singer-songwriter, entertainer, family man, and one of the most genuine blokes you'll ever meet.
0:33
SPEAKER_01: Today we're going underground, lightning ridge style, mud, water, and even a brown snake or two.
0:40
SPEAKER_01: We chat whether Danny ever gets bored, that gigs up north, to the South Coast, and how song lyrics can start on a napkin in a plane.
0:56
SPEAKER_01: You'll hear the cheeky school titles, Truth is about farm life, the excitement of strapping on a kitar for a new song, and the very sad loss of a close mate.
1:11
SPEAKER_01: There's laughter, there's heartbreak, and plenty of big-hearted generosity along the way.
1:17
SPEAKER_01: So hang on to your hat.
1:18
SPEAKER_01: This is Danny Fegan, part C.
1:21
SPEAKER_01: What a life.
1:28
SPEAKER_01: Now you mentioned open mining before, and you spent a bit of time at Lightning Ridge.
1:32
SPEAKER_01: Tell me a bit more about that.
1:34
SPEAKER_00: After I did the Campfires Against Cancer ride, I'll go back.
1:37
SPEAKER_00: My best man and my groomsman at my wedding were two Polish immigrants, Pete I went through school with and his little brother Lucas.
1:42
SPEAKER_00: Pete moved back to Europe.
1:44
SPEAKER_00: Lucas remained here.
1:46
SPEAKER_00: We needed someone to drive the support truck, and he put his hand up.
1:50
SPEAKER_00: And he I'm only five years older than him, which isn't much now, but it was back then.
1:55
SPEAKER_00: And I daddied him a bit and I said, mate, you're a damn fool.
1:57
SPEAKER_00: You finish your apprenticeship.
1:58
SPEAKER_00: You know, there'll be plenty of these sort of adventures.
2:00
SPEAKER_00: And anyhow, he's determined to do it.
2:02
SPEAKER_00: So he came and drove the support vehicle, was our absolute right-hand man.
2:06
SPEAKER_00: When he left, when we all went our own way after the year on the road, uh his father had pegged a claim at Lightning Ridge and was going to go chasing opals.
2:15
SPEAKER_00: And so Luke went out there, and he didn't actually have a chance to work his own claim because he had no money behind it.
2:21
SPEAKER_00: We all donated that year, no one got paid the year we're on the on the ride.
2:25
SPEAKER_00: And so he was working at the local bar, didn't have any money to work his own claim that he had.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: So he ended up uh he gave it to a mate, Brucey, and famously, Brucey pulled seven million out of it.
2:37
SPEAKER_00: Um, and and Luke missed out, and it's always been in his DNA, his blood.
2:41
SPEAKER_00: And we went out two little girls, uh, Jess and Tilly, when we first met at the farm here.
2:46
SPEAKER_00: Caroline was keeping up her points, professional development points, with uh radiography and sonography.
2:51
SPEAKER_00: And she had a seminar in Cairns, it was the only one she'd get to to keep the points that year, so we went all the way up north.
2:57
SPEAKER_00: And Luke was back home in Townsville, away from the claim at Lightning Ridge.
3:02
SPEAKER_00: And I thought it was crazy.
3:03
SPEAKER_00: And he threw this opal out on the dining table.
3:06
SPEAKER_00: And as soon as I looked at it, I was hooked.
3:07
SPEAKER_00: And I said, mate, how do we get amongst this?
3:09
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Well, Dad wants to get out of it.
3:11
SPEAKER_00: He said, Why don't you buy his half share out and you and I'll go partners?
3:14
SPEAKER_00: And we did, and a lot of our life is geared around trips to Lightning Ridge these days.
3:18
SPEAKER_00: We've got quite a we we haven't found many opals.
3:20
SPEAKER_00: We drink a lot of beer looking for them, but we've had to take it more seriously because we have a lot more dirt now and a lot more machinery out there.
3:26
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, you've got machines up there.
3:27
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah, we've got the hydraulic diggers down, like we're 50 foot below on the main claim, so we've got a hydraulic hydraulic digger down there, which is run by a hydraulic pump attached to what they call a blower, which ironically actually sucks.
3:40
SPEAKER_00: It's like a big vacuum cleaner.
3:41
SPEAKER_00: So what you're digging downstairs gets sucked up the surface in the back of a truck.
3:44
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, we started with Bloody I Z do$20 jack electric jackhammers, and um, you know, now 20 something years later, we've got quite a bit of gear up there.
3:53
SPEAKER_01: Is there people using those machines when you're not there?
3:55
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no, they're just disconnected and locked up.
3:57
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, good.
3:57
SPEAKER_01: So you're having a win from time to time?
3:59
SPEAKER_00: Oh, from time to time, it's fairly few and far between.
4:02
SPEAKER_00: We've got some we've got some great mates up there who um feature on that outback opal hunters quite frequently, and they've invited us out to their opal field.
4:10
SPEAKER_00: We've been plugging away where we are for a long time, and although it's quite good ground, every time we take a guest up guest up there, I need two or three more travellers, mate.
4:18
SPEAKER_00: I'm tripping over my tongue.
4:19
SPEAKER_00: Um, every time we take a guest up there, they always pull an opal out of the wall.
4:23
SPEAKER_00: It's quite good ground, but it's low-lying ground and it floods often.
4:28
SPEAKER_00: And there's no worse a week than spending 50 feet below the surface down a three-foot shaft, swimming around like a swamp rat with water up to your chin, dodging brown snakes, swimming on the surface, trying to pump out water back to the surface 50 feet up.
4:43
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and then all your stuff is muddy and wet and clagging up, and we've just had enough.
4:47
SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah.
4:48
SPEAKER_00: We're um we're getting a bit older and we can do it a bit easier.
4:51
SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna go down to our mate's field, and you know, I don't think I'm letting the cat out of the bag.
4:55
SPEAKER_00: The um the episode that aired on Outback Opal Hunters a couple of nights ago on the Pay TV channel, not the one on the free to air, it's about five years behind.
5:02
SPEAKER_00: Um, our mate pulled half a million dollars of opal out a hundred metres away from us.
5:06
SPEAKER_00: Oh which means nothing for our claim, but gee, it's encouraging.
5:11
SPEAKER_00: Oh, mate.
5:12
SPEAKER_00: Ploody O.
5:13
SPEAKER_00: I'm just thinking, mate, do you get bored easily?
5:16
SPEAKER_00: Uh yes.
5:18
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I find it hard to settle.
5:20
SPEAKER_00: Um I I hit a little life hack the other day flying back from somewhere, I don't know where I was coming from.
5:27
SPEAKER_00: I was on a oh, Darwin, actually.
5:28
SPEAKER_00: I was flying back from Darwin.
5:30
SPEAKER_00: We've got a place up in Darwin, so we get up there a little bit.
5:32
SPEAKER_00: But I um I was flying back from Darwin and uh you know I find it hard to settle on trips too.
5:39
SPEAKER_00: I found this life hack.
5:40
SPEAKER_00: I can watch a movie on Netflix shrink that screen to the bottom left-hand corner and play solitaire at the same time, and also listen to a uh documentary in my in my ears uh 12 or 2 or something.
5:52
SPEAKER_00: But I I do that, that that settles me though.
5:55
SPEAKER_00: I um I can't be alone with the thoughts for too long.
5:59
SPEAKER_00: All right then, what's your perfect Saturday at home?
6:02
SPEAKER_00: Oh, look, at this stage, just being home's been nice.
6:05
SPEAKER_00: I've I've this year's been really uh off to a fly.
6:09
SPEAKER_00: I um you know that we've got another property up at uh Middle, which was right in the path of the bushfires there the other week.
6:16
SPEAKER_00: And while I was up there, I was running late to get to Darwin.
6:19
SPEAKER_00: And in Darwin, that then pushed things back.
6:22
SPEAKER_00: I had to get back down to Bendigo Rodeo, so I flew straight down to there, and then I got home the next day and was in a Ute and drove to Tamworth for five days and did the festival and and then crisscrossed two of our horses on the highway.
6:33
SPEAKER_00: As I was coming home, we had friends taking two horses up to sell at the big nutrient sale, which was 10 days later.
6:38
SPEAKER_00: And I I like bouncing around like that, but every now and then it's just nice to be home and be present here as well.
6:45
SPEAKER_01: I'm struggling to keep up, mate.
6:47
SPEAKER_01: Just that little episode then.
6:48
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's yeah, that can be pretty typical when it's on.
6:51
SPEAKER_00: But I had uh last weekend at home, I booked in with the kids.
6:54
SPEAKER_00: I I tried to get them up north, I tried to get all the kids up north in the 50th.
6:57
SPEAKER_00: This is how my mind works.
6:59
SPEAKER_00: I was trying to get them all up north.
7:00
SPEAKER_00: We we get a red hot deal on Great Keppel Island because it makes it the people who who run the island now.
7:04
SPEAKER_00: I've played there for eight years in a row.
7:06
SPEAKER_00: I was gonna take them all to Great Keppel Island.
7:08
SPEAKER_00: This would be a great way to spend my 50th, but I couldn't get all the kids and their partners into one place at the one time.
7:13
SPEAKER_00: So I thought, bugger, I'll go and buy this secondhand speed boat I saw down there, Coral, and that's its own story.
7:19
SPEAKER_00: That I actually asked the wrong bloke for his phone number and ended up with a much better boat at a very good price.
7:24
SPEAKER_00: But I thought I was dealing with this other fella.
7:27
SPEAKER_00: So I thought the money I'm gonna save, it's a 20-year-old boat, you know, we're not bloody, not skyting, that's um, but I've still got kids at home and we enjoy the lake here.
7:35
SPEAKER_00: We're very lucky to live in this part of the world.
7:37
SPEAKER_00: Bloody earth.
7:38
SPEAKER_00: Oh, it's a mess, isn't it?
7:39
SPEAKER_00: You mean the snowfield's an hour and a half and bloody on the lake in 20 minutes, it's incredible.
7:43
SPEAKER_01: I've just sold a ski boat after having it for nearly 15 years, since we had some fun with the kids.
7:48
SPEAKER_00: Oh, absolutely, and the kids all ski, and and like I used to spend nearly every night and night in the lake when I when I was young, but but yeah, I went down and I I came home with this speed boat and two McCaw parrots.
7:59
SPEAKER_00: I just saw them out there.
8:00
SPEAKER_00: Beautiful, but I don't know, it looked like a good idea.
8:04
SPEAKER_06: I've had one foot on the pedal, one foot in the grave.
8:09
SPEAKER_01: Bent but not broken.
8:10
SPEAKER_01: Did you write this tip?
8:13
SPEAKER_00: I I can't listen to that song, I've never listened to it since I recorded it.
8:19
SPEAKER_00: Bent But Not Broken was Inches.
8:22
SPEAKER_00: Oh, really?
8:22
SPEAKER_00: It was and it was titled Inches.
8:25
SPEAKER_00: And I uh Bent But Not Broken is is all the stuff that was the um what do you call it, the b-roll that ended up on the bloody production floor, the songwriting floor.
8:35
SPEAKER_00: And I thought it was the lyrics were too good just to disappear into the darkness.
8:40
SPEAKER_00: But I went with that song, Bent But Not Broken, when it was called Inches, to a fellow called Matt Scullion, who's a prolific songwriter.
8:46
SPEAKER_00: He's a he's a great artist, he's written songs for Lee Keenig and ACDC and heaps of people.
8:51
SPEAKER_00: But when you go with a song to co-write with someone, you have to be prepared to concede some lyrics and concede some ideas, and it's just the nature of the beast.
9:00
SPEAKER_00: And I've got a lot braver with that now because when you think it's great and you want to hang on to it with both hands, and um Inches became much more commercially palatable after I finished it with Matt, but we really kind of raped the song it was, and uh what was left I bunched together in Bent But Not Broken, and I love the lyrics on it because that was the time where the bloke had gone bankrupt on us, and I was buggered, I was trying to work out, you know, and I kept memoring, remembering dad had say, Lost the gun of inches, keep trying, get up, keep trying.
9:30
SPEAKER_00: So the lyrics, the lyrics were uh had one foot on the pedal.
9:36
SPEAKER_00: I got one foot on the pedal, one foot in the grave.
9:38
SPEAKER_00: Hey, devil, you'll have to catch up if you want to earn your pay.
9:43
SPEAKER_00: There's a road between a storm that is brewing, a fate to contemplate between the riches and the ruins.
9:48
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, at some stage you've got to pick that middle ground where money isn't everything and success isn't everything.
9:53
SPEAKER_00: Uh, but you've still got to pick that middle balance.
9:55
SPEAKER_00: You can't fall in the heap either.
9:56
SPEAKER_04: Just trying to be better than I am.
9:58
SPEAKER_00: And I just I thought it was a really uh outpouring of where I was, um, and trying to pick the balance, you know, like uh I probably wasn't that easy to get along with, even that period when I was just trying to keep us all afloat.
10:11
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, it just never really filled its boots that song, but I didn't want to waste those lyrics, so I sort of punched them together and and and put them into that song and wrote that song bent but not broken.
10:21
SPEAKER_00: But I uh I haven't been able to listen to it.
10:22
SPEAKER_00: I've never performed it.
10:23
SPEAKER_00: And you haven't performed it on a session.
10:25
SPEAKER_01: Really?
10:26
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
10:27
SPEAKER_05: I've done enough, I've had enough, there's nothing more to do.
10:30
SPEAKER_01: What do people get wrong about you and your life, Denny?
10:33
SPEAKER_00: Getting back to me and Oh wow, you throw some curveballs at me.
10:37
SPEAKER_00: I guess I'd have to ask a heap of people that.
10:39
SPEAKER_00: Uh, one thing that jumps straight to mind is uh one of our friends in the horse game, I don't need to mention her, she shoes our horses from from time.
10:49
SPEAKER_00: She cited to me one day, this is a very loose story, but she cited to me one day about some friends of hers that made the same mistake that she made until she got to know me was that I come with an ego.
11:00
SPEAKER_00: And uh if you're on stage and I don't know what other people think of me.
11:04
SPEAKER_00: I I know what's going inside of my wills turning inside my head, and I I'm not that confident, I'm not that um sure of myself, but I do back myself in always.
11:15
SPEAKER_00: And from the outside looking in, maybe that looks like ego or confidence or straighting out.
11:20
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, but it was nice for Haley to say, you know, we just figured that you'd be up yourself being in front of all those people all the time and that type of thing.
11:26
SPEAKER_00: And and I don't know if that's a generally perceived conception or not.
11:30
SPEAKER_00: I don't know, but I'm I'm not that guy anyway.
11:33
SPEAKER_01: There's definitely no ego, mate.
11:34
SPEAKER_01: Uh you're Danny Fegan, and I've known you for a long time, and uh and you're true to yourself.
11:40
SPEAKER_00: I'm just trying, mate.
11:41
SPEAKER_00: I there's no blueprint, is there?
11:43
SPEAKER_00: Um there's no blueprint, there's no blueprint, and we're all long time dead.
11:46
SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm just trying to leave the bloke my dog thinks I am.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: It's um I'm still working it out.
11:56
SPEAKER_04: Right a break of four dare I'll take a twenty book.
12:04
SPEAKER_04: Working the What a life.
12:11
SPEAKER_01: What's this one about?
12:12
SPEAKER_00: What a life.
12:13
SPEAKER_00: I was uh we've done the Weaper Bull ride for a number of years, and I've become really close mates with um members of the committee up there.
12:21
SPEAKER_00: I think this is our eighth or ninth.
12:23
SPEAKER_00: And this is how this is how your circles in life overlap.
12:27
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's uh and sometimes they only overlap on the periphery or just the edge, but uh you have mutual friends sometimes in a very fine lane.
12:36
SPEAKER_00: A fella, when we did the Campfires Against Cancer ride, there was a fella in a place called Grenfell who asked if I would deviate off the cowry young track with our horses to come through Grandfall because they'd done a lot of fun fundraising for us, and it means a lot on the ride we're doing.
12:51
SPEAKER_00: And it was a pain in the neck being that close to home and add two or three days to the ride.
12:56
SPEAKER_00: But I did it because he seemed like a sincere, genuine sort of a bloke, and we did it, and you know, we had a good time, and that's all another story.
13:02
SPEAKER_00: Rode through the pub with the horses and everything.
13:04
SPEAKER_00: And I kind of lost contact with Mark a bit and he busted up with his missus.
13:10
SPEAKER_00: Um, I don't know who put who back in the draft, but the uh the result was the same.
13:14
SPEAKER_00: They split the sheets anyway.
13:15
SPEAKER_00: And he he went working around the country plumbing, and he ended up at Weaper, and they're looking for a band up there because the Wolf brothers were getting more famous and more expensive, and they couldn't afford them.
13:24
SPEAKER_00: And uh he said, give this bloke a call, Danny Feagan, he's he goes really good.
13:29
SPEAKER_00: So this bloke, Steve, rang me and he said, Oh mate, this fella's put you in, he's put your name in.
13:33
SPEAKER_00: It's a pretty big radio up here, you know, it's one of the biggest things on the tip of the cape.
13:37
SPEAKER_00: And um, can you send us some recording?
13:40
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Well, it must have been more than eight years ago, because I recorded when I was 40, and I said, I've never recorded it.
13:46
SPEAKER_00: I said, I'm about to, but I've got nothing.
13:48
SPEAKER_00: He said, Oh, that's okay, give us your bloody YouTube channel, so I'm gonna go on.
13:52
SPEAKER_00: He said, Your Facebook?
13:54
SPEAKER_00: I said, Oh, I don't really have one, I've only got my own personal one, it's not much on it.
13:57
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Jesus, mate, I'm trying to help you out here.
13:59
SPEAKER_00: He said, What have you got?
14:00
SPEAKER_00: I said, Well, I got a poster from Kinross last Saturday night in Mum's mobile, she thinks we're awesome.
14:05
SPEAKER_00: So he he started laughing and he decided to give us a go, and we've been back there ever since, except for one year I got benched for having an infringement with the sound guy.
14:12
SPEAKER_00: I I um I had a blue with him and yeah, anyway.
14:17
SPEAKER_00: Gave him a little touch-up about a couple of things they had to sack me for a year.
14:20
SPEAKER_00: They said, Danny, we can get a band from anywhere, we can't get a sound guy from anywhere.
14:23
SPEAKER_00: This bloke's from Cairns, and he's got to put all the music gear on a barge and sail it around to Weapon, which takes three weeks.
14:28
SPEAKER_00: He said, mate, we've just got to bench it for 12 months.
14:30
SPEAKER_00: And uh luckily the bloke they replaced me with wasn't much chopped, so we're back there again.
14:34
SPEAKER_00: But um uh what a life came from flying home from Weeper.
14:38
SPEAKER_00: We've got our bit of a what we do, we we always overnight in Cairns on the way home.
14:42
SPEAKER_00: And when I was flying out of Weaper to Cairns, I thought, what a life, you know.
14:45
SPEAKER_00: I get to spend a weekend like this with these amazing people, all these bloody real, real deal cowboys up here, the mates in the band.
14:52
SPEAKER_00: And I get to fly home to Caroline and the kids on this place, you know.
14:57
SPEAKER_00: So I started having this idea for a song, and I asked the Quattus lady for a napkin and a pen.
15:01
SPEAKER_00: I started writing it down and got the got the nuts and bolts of it.
15:04
SPEAKER_00: And again, uh that fit that song finished its life in uh the lounge of Matt Skulling's place at Newcastle.
15:15
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we had some fun in here, bucked some bulls out and some horses and things.
15:18
SPEAKER_01: During the film clip.
15:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's a cracking film clip.
15:29
SPEAKER_01: Right, Danny, we're up to the off the wall questions.
15:32
SPEAKER_01: Right.
15:32
SPEAKER_01: These are a little bit I thought they're all off the wall.
15:34
SPEAKER_01: They they have been.
15:36
SPEAKER_01: These are a little bit uh quirky.
15:38
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they're just short answers.
15:41
SPEAKER_01: What's more dangerous?
15:42
SPEAKER_01: Livestock or musicians?
15:45
SPEAKER_00: Uh at least you know what you're gonna get with livestock.
15:51
SPEAKER_00: They've got you lined up, they don't disguise it too well.
15:55
SPEAKER_00: My and all that is my boys and the band, they're the best blokes you ever met in your life.
15:59
SPEAKER_00: But um, yeah, musicians in general.
16:02
SPEAKER_00: Most of them are good, you know, but everyone's trying to row a boat to get to an end goal, and there's only just so much space to get there.
16:09
SPEAKER_00: I read a quote and then it was relayed to me to try and agree with it uh through someone interviewing me that the country music industry is made up of one big happy family, and that's the greatest load of bullshit I've ever heard in my life.
16:19
SPEAKER_00: There are certainly there are certainly people you you um morph and and warm to and and vice versa, and there are there are clicks within clicks and circles, but it's no different any other walk in life, you know.
16:29
SPEAKER_00: Like the ones who have a seat at the table have their elbows firmly out.
16:33
SPEAKER_00: Um, they might be smiling while they do it, but no one's gonna give away what they've worked all their careers in life for to get as well, and I respect that.
16:41
SPEAKER_00: That's that's no worries in the world, but call it for what it is.
16:43
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
16:44
SPEAKER_00: So I'd say musos.
16:46
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
16:47
SPEAKER_01: How interesting.
16:48
SPEAKER_01: Well said.
16:49
SPEAKER_01: What's playing in the youth at the moment, mate?
16:52
SPEAKER_00: Uh I've got to learn a couple of songs.
16:54
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna learn a Muscatine bloodline song called Me On You, which is very challenging.
17:01
SPEAKER_00: For a bit of a lark, I've got a keitar there.
17:03
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna do a Paul Simon song, Call Me Owl.
17:06
SPEAKER_00: Oh wow.
17:07
SPEAKER_00: So I'm learning that.
17:08
SPEAKER_00: But if I want to settle into my own space, I'll listen to Core Blunt or a few of those old sort of quirky country fellas.
17:14
SPEAKER_00: What's one thing farming has taught you?
17:17
SPEAKER_00: Oh, look, it's just an extension of an extension of life, really, that you have to be resilient, you have to just keep trying.
17:23
SPEAKER_00: No one gets out of this alive.
17:24
SPEAKER_00: Everyone's got their own troubles.
17:26
SPEAKER_00: Um, and you just have to keep stepping forward.
17:28
SPEAKER_00: You just have to because no one else is gonna save the day for you.
17:31
SPEAKER_00: And it becomes a microcosm of that is farming life, you know.
17:34
SPEAKER_00: It's uh a lot of stuff can go wrong in one day, but no one's gonna jump out of the clouds and fix it.
17:39
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna keep rolling.
17:40
SPEAKER_00: That's the same with life in a more broader sense.
17:42
SPEAKER_00: You just gotta keep charging along.
17:44
SPEAKER_00: We're all volunteers at the end of the day.
17:46
SPEAKER_00: If you don't like what you're doing, change it.
17:48
SPEAKER_00: Uh but if you're gonna stay in that lane, make it work.
17:50
SPEAKER_00: She's well said.
17:51
SPEAKER_00: What's one thing music taught you?
17:53
SPEAKER_00: Uh appreciation.
17:55
SPEAKER_00: If you want one thing, appreciation, it's uh on the same theme that you know everyone's got a life to live, and from the outside looking in, it doesn't matter how well it you look like you're doing, it's a grind, and life will kill you eventually.
18:09
SPEAKER_00: But there's a lot of beauty in it too.
18:11
SPEAKER_00: But music has taught me appreciation because when we have, like last weekend, a couple of thousand, might have been two and a half thousand people bouncing around having a good time in front of us, they have all got their own life struggles in their own time, but for that moment, they are all happy, and it's a release, and we're the reason.
18:28
SPEAKER_00: You've got them happy.
18:29
SPEAKER_00: We got them happy for that little bit.
18:30
SPEAKER_00: Jumping around, and it makes me happy.
18:32
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I love that.
18:34
SPEAKER_00: What's one thing the kids have taught you?
18:36
SPEAKER_00: Oh, look, I could be sappy and just say love, but it it's uh it's true.
18:41
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna say that actually, it's just true.
18:42
SPEAKER_00: I when Jess was a baby, we didn't watch TV for six months, and we'll we'll convince she was gifted.
18:48
SPEAKER_00: You know, she'll gonna take a dump.
18:49
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna go can they do that at that age?
18:52
SPEAKER_00: I think she's gifted.
18:53
SPEAKER_00: This kid's gonna be something amazing.
18:55
SPEAKER_00: But I remember when I was just staring at her one day asleep in the cot, and Carolyn said, What are you thinking?
19:00
SPEAKER_00: I said, I never knew that humans could love something so much.
19:03
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and she looked at me and said, Thanks very much, Dickhead.
19:05
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Oh no, no, I love you too.
19:07
SPEAKER_01: Mate, I remember thinking the same.
19:09
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
19:09
SPEAKER_01: And when the next one's about to be born, you're thinking, How can I love this next one the same amount?
19:14
SPEAKER_01: But you do.
19:15
SPEAKER_00: You do, yeah.
19:16
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
19:17
SPEAKER_00: I I think uh your capacity just increases.
19:19
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, for the extra kids that you've got, it doesn't diminish it for the other ones.
19:24
SPEAKER_00: What's your favourite tool on the farm?
19:26
SPEAKER_00: Oh Jesus, these questions.
19:29
SPEAKER_00: Um wire cutters.
19:32
SPEAKER_00: That'll do.
19:32
SPEAKER_00: Got them in every year, got them in every vehicle.
19:34
SPEAKER_01: Now, if you could give your 18-year-old self some advice, what would it be?
19:38
SPEAKER_01: You're going alright.
19:40
SPEAKER_00: You're going alright, just keep charging on.
19:42
SPEAKER_00: Um I probably had a lot more faith that I was getting it right, ironically, when I was 18 than I do when I'm 50, but um no, I I was going I I was going alright, and I I'd just send that message back.
19:54
SPEAKER_00: You going alright?
19:55
SPEAKER_00: Just stay the course.
19:56
SPEAKER_00: Keep setting your goals.
19:57
SPEAKER_00: So I had those big goals, and I I didn't tell you that the I I got two of the three out of the three of them by the time I was 30, and the uh one of the big ones was I wanted my own farm.
20:09
SPEAKER_00: And I turned 30 in February, and Caroline, my mum and dad, and all my family got me this big cake, which was a farm.
20:18
SPEAKER_00: And I had a mob of cattle at mum and dad's farm still, but not our own dirt, we're still living in town, and uh that was in February.
20:25
SPEAKER_00: In March we went to contract for this place and settled on the 21st of April, so I missed my 10-year goal for the three big items or two months.
20:33
SPEAKER_01: Uh well, if you had to give away farming today, what would you miss the most?
20:38
SPEAKER_00: The solitude and the space.
20:40
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
20:41
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, co-joined.
20:42
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
20:42
SPEAKER_00: What's a life lesson you learned late?
20:45
SPEAKER_00: It's a it's a great question, and I feel like you need a better answer than I can probably master up for you on short notice.
20:50
SPEAKER_00: A life lesson that I learnt late.
20:54
SPEAKER_00: One thing is school is not that important.
20:57
SPEAKER_00: It's important, but it's not the only thing.
21:00
SPEAKER_00: It's doing well at school makes a lot of things easier, but it's not the most important thing.
21:07
SPEAKER_00: I I went right through school.
21:09
SPEAKER_00: I did year 12 twice, I did three and a half years of uni, and there's not one single thing that I've done in my adult life, and all that I've been lucky to accumulate that I couldn't have left in year ten and still achieved.
21:23
SPEAKER_00: If you want to work and you've got goals and um you know, and you're not dragging your feet, it's not that important.
21:30
SPEAKER_00: It looked it and it does make some things easier.
21:33
SPEAKER_00: I was under a fair bit of pressure to do well at school, and I was I was a bad student.
21:37
SPEAKER_00: I didn't like school and I was cheeky, and but I was always scared of dad.
21:42
SPEAKER_00: But my high school reports in year eleven and twelve, I I I had a key to the music room because I used to get on well with the music teacher and the and an old nun called sister Mary.
21:51
SPEAKER_00: The only two that ever thought anything of me at school.
21:54
SPEAKER_00: So I I would have a key to the music and and sister Mary was musical too, so I had a key to the school room.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: So I'd go down there on a Saturday when no one else was there.
22:02
SPEAKER_00: And when it was report time, I would blank out my reports and then send blank sheets out to all my mates and get them to rewrite them for me so I wouldn't get a hide in my own home.
22:12
SPEAKER_00: And the way I'd get my reports was I had a mate, uh James Follett, who was quite mature and had a mature voice, and uh I would get James to ring the principal from the blue phone in the quadrangle and say that he was Warwick Fegan, so they didn't so the parents wouldn't have to get the reports, and the report would get some on with me, and I'd be straight back down to school in the Sandy and blank the pages out.
22:30
SPEAKER_01: Um if he could sit around a campfire with four people, that could be dead or alive, who would it be?
22:37
SPEAKER_00: I definitely want my grandfather there.
22:41
SPEAKER_00: I definitely want my grandfather there because I would want him to know that I turned out alright.
22:46
SPEAKER_01: Um, that can be actually emotional because you were there holding his hand as he took his last breath.
22:53
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I was, and I was there for the next fella too, which I'll quote when I just get myself together real quick.
22:58
SPEAKER_00: But I I would definitely want my grandfather here.
23:00
SPEAKER_00: I'd want him, I'd want him to see that I turned out alright.
23:04
SPEAKER_00: And he um he would love this, he would love this lifestyle.
23:08
SPEAKER_00: He he lived it, but he didn't own it.
23:11
SPEAKER_00: He he lived in a three-bedroom home in North in in East Aubrey, in Norfolk Street, and he he made fortunes for other blokes, but he uh I don't know if he didn't have the backing and nan to take risks or what it was, but he uh he would love this.
23:26
SPEAKER_00: And I'd love him to see it.
23:27
SPEAKER_00: Um and the other fellow, uh Cole Mitchell was my best mate.
23:32
SPEAKER_00: I sat with him when he died of cancer.
23:34
SPEAKER_00: Oh god, time gets away, might be six or seven years ago.
23:36
SPEAKER_01: Oh mate.
23:37
SPEAKER_00: He did the campfires against cancer ride with me across Australia.
23:40
SPEAKER_00: We clicked heels for five and a half thousand kilometres, got to Coro and decided that we're gonna keep going.
23:46
SPEAKER_00: So I rode down to Melbourne, got on the spirit of Tasmania with nine horses and rode across Tassie too.
23:50
SPEAKER_00: And I sat with him when he died of cancer and um we left nothing unspoken, Col and I, and uh I'm scared of dying.
24:00
SPEAKER_00: I I am.
24:01
SPEAKER_00: I'm not religious, I don't know what's out there, and I uh and I I asked Col, I said, Col, are you scared?
24:10
SPEAKER_00: Because we both knew.
24:11
SPEAKER_00: He worked here for a little while, because he's in between jobs, so he worked here for three months, and I didn't see him for about six weeks.
24:16
SPEAKER_00: We spoke twice a week though.
24:17
SPEAKER_00: Uh and he turned up out here one day, I was doing a fundraiser and he wanted to give me something to put into the charity auction, and he insisted on coming out here to give it to me.
24:25
SPEAKER_00: I was doing my head in a little bit, and um Cole had his own way, he was his own man, and when I came out here, I I got out of this garage out of my Ute.
24:33
SPEAKER_00: He just pulled up here, and my eyes met him across the driveway, and we didn't have to say a word.
24:38
SPEAKER_00: I just shook my head and he just nodded.
24:39
SPEAKER_00: I just knew he had cancer, he'd lost so much weight.
24:43
SPEAKER_00: And you know, I it'd be nice f for Cole, because he always he was he was such he was such a loyal friend.
24:53
SPEAKER_00: If we went out today and I said that sky was grey and it's quite clearly blue, if someone said that it wasn't grey, he'd belt to protect me, to to stick up for me.
25:02
SPEAKER_00: He's he was such a a good mate, and it was a horrible way for me.
25:06
SPEAKER_00: Well, I don't think I've never seen anyone die well, to be honest, but uh I'd love him to be here.
25:11
SPEAKER_00: It was it was a horrible end for Kyle.
25:14
SPEAKER_00: I kind of had to put him down.
25:16
SPEAKER_00: I was there with his wife and uh and I and and he was in clearly in a lot of pain and uh Donna was too distressed to give the nurse the go-ahead to give him another painkiller, which they knew would would kill him.
25:29
SPEAKER_00: So I shook him to wake him and I said, Col, I need a one-word answer, are you in pain?
25:33
SPEAKER_00: And he he shouted out yes.
25:37
SPEAKER_01: Oh, mate.
25:42
SPEAKER_00: No, I'm fine, but I um but I uh I gave the nod for the needle and mate, that's and he slipped off.
25:49
SPEAKER_00: I'd love those two blokes back, and I uh on that on that same sort of sentiment, I tracked down my old music school teacher, Mrs.
25:55
SPEAKER_00: Davis, a few years ago because I wanted her to know that I'd done alright and I turned out alright as well.
25:59
SPEAKER_00: And it was hard to get her number.
26:01
SPEAKER_00: She was down working with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra at Melbourne, and and when I rang her expecting arms to be wide open uh with her attitude, she all she wanted to know is how I got a mobile number.
26:10
SPEAKER_00: So maybe she could sit in around a five or five minutes too.
26:15
SPEAKER_01: Uh you got one more, mate.
26:18
SPEAKER_00: Uh Caroline.
26:20
SPEAKER_00: Oh no, Caroline will call them all my stories out for bullshit.
26:24
SPEAKER_00: She's not invited.
26:28
SPEAKER_00: I tell you, I I am name dropping now.
26:30
SPEAKER_00: I'd lunch with John Howard uh quite a few years ago.
26:32
SPEAKER_00: Um, he was an amazing conversationalist, had an amazing clear mind.
26:37
SPEAKER_00: I think you could light up any campfire there, bro.
26:39
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, good on you.
26:40
SPEAKER_01: Well, mate, if you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?
26:44
SPEAKER_00: Oh, here.
26:45
SPEAKER_00: Here, any of us could live anywhere in the world.
26:47
SPEAKER_00: Uh it's uh not that hard to travel now.
26:50
SPEAKER_00: Um right here, we're we're so lucky, you know, that everything is right within a footy kick of where you want to be.
26:58
SPEAKER_00: I'll be buried here.
26:59
SPEAKER_00: I'm not moving.
27:00
SPEAKER_00: Uh we knew when we bought a place that that would be our last move.
27:03
SPEAKER_00: I hate moving too.
27:04
SPEAKER_00: It's a bastard of a job loading up uts and trailers and things.
27:07
SPEAKER_00: No, if I could live anywhere, it'd be right here.
27:09
SPEAKER_00: I'm certainly going to visit a few places, but I don't have to.
27:12
SPEAKER_00: I'm not that ambitious on overseas traveling.
27:14
SPEAKER_00: I've been lucky enough to see a fair bit of it in my 20s, but I'm not interested in all them screwed-up countries.
27:19
SPEAKER_00: I don't need to see those and wouldn't mind going back to America to see a few mates again, maybe see Canada.
27:24
SPEAKER_01: Well, mate, I can see this is home, and I've had a cracking afternoon with you here at the Halfway Hotel.
27:29
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, as it's been rebadged.
27:31
SPEAKER_01: And uh I really feel quite privileged to um be able to share this story of yours, and I want to congratulate you on your career so far, what you've achieved, both with family, the respect you have within our country in both music and farming.
27:46
SPEAKER_01: So thank you very much, mate, and put it here.
27:49
SPEAKER_01: Thanks, Mike.
27:49
SPEAKER_01: Thanks for watching.
27:56
SPEAKER_01: And that's a wrap on part C.
27:59
SPEAKER_01: And the full three-part journey with Danny Fagan.
28:02
SPEAKER_01: From farm life to Aria chart, from underground open minds to ketas and napkins in the sky.
28:10
SPEAKER_01: What a ride it's been.
28:23
SPEAKER_01: A family man, a storyteller, and a legend in his own ride.
28:28
SPEAKER_01: Danny, thank you, Mike.
28:30
SPEAKER_01: It's been an absolute honour to share your story though starting.