Happy Father’s Day!

Spring has arrived in Australia!

After the long, cold winter we experienced this year, the change of seasons is most welcome, and hopefully the sunny skies will return soon.

This month I will indulge with a very simple, European style champagne cocktail that pops with flavour.

Rose prosecco

20ml Rose Liquor*
Prosecco

Method: pour the rose liquor into a champagne class and top it with chilled prosecco.

_{*I first came across rose liquor attending a wonderful wedding in Italy. You might have to shop around in Australia to find it, but it’s worth the effort.}

While you are enjoying your Rose prosecco, here are a few of my favourite tunes I am currently listening to.

‘How Will I Know’ by Bright Light Bright Light

Bright Light Bright Light, a.k.a. Rod Thomas is a fantastic electro-pop artist with elements of dance and house music. Over the last few years he produced a number of sophisticated club hits with great tunes and poetic lyrics, from ‘Moves‘ to ‘An Open Heart‘ and ‘In Your Care‘, among others. You could call him the thinking gay men’s sexy house artist.

Rod is of course openly gay, which makes his career so much more special, breaking through a still largely heteronormative industry. His latest offering is a cover of a Whitney Houston classic ‘How Will I Know’, which is destined to become a gay classic, simply by virtue of his refusal to change the lyrics of the song, proudly belting out ‘how will I know if he really loves me’ …

‘Dooo It’ by Miley Cyrus

Little Hannah Montana came a long way.

She crushed it on a wrecking ball, lit up a joint at the 2013 MTV European Music Awards, and blew the 2015 MTV Video Music Awards out of the water by hosting the absolute crap out of it.

And then, just as the credits rolled, she announced her new, free album just dropped, titled ‘Miley Cyrus & Her Dead Petz‘ …

These latest 23 new songs of her increasingly edgy post-Disney era are experimental and cutting-edge with titles such as ‘Dooo It‘, ‘Space Boots‘, ‘Fuckin Fucked Up‘, and ‘Bang Me Box.’

I suspect middle-America has just opened fire on their TVs and computers in a desperate attempt to avoid all the strange fabulousness that’s Miley.

‘Heroes’ by David Bowie

David Bowie’s ‘Heroes’ is a trip down memory lane.

…
And you, you can be mean
And I, I’ll drink all the time
‘Cause we’re lovers, and that is a fact
Yes we’re lovers, and that is that

Though nothing, will keep us together
We could steal time,
just for one day
We can be Heroes, for ever and ever
What d’you say?
…

David Bowie wrote this song with Brian Eno in 1977. It is a product of what’s known as his ‘Berlin period’, characterised by a minimalist and instrumental approach. The album ‘Heroes’, the second album of a trilogy born from this period, was successful. However, the single didn’t fare well in the charts. It only reached number 24 in the UK charts, and failed to make the US Billboard Hot 100. But, by 1999 Q Magazine listed ‘Heroes’ as one of the 100 greatest singles of all time as voted by readers and in 2004 Rolling Stone rated it number 46 in its list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

‘Finding ecstasy – The true story of a teenage closet case,’ by Norman Fox

If you prefer a literary journey with your Rose prosecco, my choice this month is a book by my partner, Norman Fox, ‘Finding ecstasy – The true story of a teenage closet case.’

I wrote a review of this book when it was published last year, and since then I have read the book a couple of more times. This is a fascinating, highly biographical first novel, recounting the teenage years of an extremely closeted young gay man.

The book is best described as a cautionary tale about the psychological damage caused by hiding your true self, and its likely manifestation in risky and unsafe behaviours, including addiction. In my view every parent and teenager should read this book as the message is universal and too important no to be discussed. Subsequently, Norman also penned an article for Australian parenting website Kidspot, titled ‘Eight clues your high-achieving teen does drugs.’

He was also invited to do a live reading from his book as part of the Sydney Pride Festival in June 2015 at an event titled ‘Gay Stories’:

He is now working on the sequel ‘One big incestuous family – The true story about club kids,’ due to be published in early 2016.

https://instagram.com/p/4sfddTpecz/?taken-by=findingecstasy

https://instagram.com/p/5EcnA7pefx/?taken-by=findingecstasy

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