Live at the Wireless


aired on Triple J
3rd August 1998

Ben Folds Five recorded a "Live at the Wireless" session on the 29th of July, 1998 in Australia. The following stuff lists the songs they played and what they said in between the songs.

Most of the songs and the connected conversations are now available on CD's. The Australian bonus disc to The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner has three of the songs on it: Emaline, Steven's Last Night In Town and Brick. The Australian single for Don't Change Your Plans also has two of the tracks: Song For The Dumped and Missing the War.


DJ -- ... Ben Folds Five, I'll give you all the details about who recorded it, and, and where it was recorded after this.


Ben -- This is Ben Folds Five, we're Live At The Wireless on Triple J, and this song is called "Theme From 'Dr Pyser'".

(music = "Theme From 'Dr Pyser'")

(clapping)

???? -- woohoo

Ben -- um, this, uh, next song is, uh, an older song of, of ours and it's called "Emaline", and, um, uh, I'd like to say hello to Robert Sledge on the bass guitar.

Robert -- Hey everybody in radioland. I'm gonna first play G then I'm gonna play a D harmonic but then the A doesn't sound quite as full as the G and D harmonic so I'm gonna play an A second octave.

Ben -- Cool.

Robert -- Yeah.

Ben -- What are you going to do Darren?

Darren -- Well, I'm thinking about, uh, well, at first play this high hat on all the quarter notes (hits high hat on all the quarter notes)

Ben -- Okay.

Darren -- Then I'm gonna put the bass drum on one (hits the bass drum on the first beat) and the snare drum on two (hits the snare drum on the second beat) and kinda build up something (plays it all together) yeah, just like, uh, something like that, but, uh, first I'm, I have to apply some lip moisturiser... ok, here we go.

(music = "Emaline")

Ben -- we're Ben Folds Five and this next song on "Live at the Wireless" on Triple J is called "Missing the War".

(music = "Missing the War")

Ben -- well, this next song then, is uh, called "Steven's Last Night In Town".

(music = "Steven's Last Night In Town")

Ben -- Thank you

(3 claps and 2 whistles)

Ben -- this next song...

??? -- (in high pitched girly voice) I love you Ben!

Ben -- security... get that girl out of here. This is Ben Folds Five again, we're still here at "Live at the Wireless" on Triple J, this song is called "Brick"

(music = "Brick")

Ben -- that was "Brick", and this next song is um, quite a bit sadder than "Brick"...

(weird country music thing about 3 seconds long, which was not meant to be there)

Ben -- ...still getting over it now, it's um, I can't really say that much more about it, it's just a breakup song.

(drawn out bass sounds)

Ben -- You broke my heart. Why did you? You hurt me real bad.

(music = "Song For The Dumped")

Ben -- thank you very much, Ben Folds Five, at, at the wire, live at the wireless, on Triple J, damnit.


DJ -- "Live at the Wireless", Ben Folds Five right there, "Song for the Dumped", it, uh, started off with "Theme From Dr. Pyser", also "Emuline", oh, "Emalene" or "Emalyn", missing, uh, "Missing the War", "Steven's Last Night on Town, "Brick" and as I said, "Song for the Dumped". It, um, it was produced and engineered by Triple J's Kerryn McCauley, it was recorded in studio 227 at Ultimo in Sydney on the 29th of July 1998. If you want to hear that again, it will be, be, it will be played on "1998", uh, at uh, 5pm on Sunday afternoon with Richard Kingsmill, "Live at the Wireless", so there you go. Next week it's going to be, uh, "Best of Stomping Grounds", you might have, uh, seen the series on ABC TV, uh, it's going to be featuring the (??) band and also Leah Purcell, so what they've done is they've edited it down to all the best songs, and they're gonna put it into a "Live at the Wireless", uh, package for you next week...

This was transcribed by me, probably not completely right but close enough. That last line by the DJ -- those are not typos, the guy managed to get something wrong about every song except "Brick" and "Song for the Dumped". He said "Theme from Dr. Pyser" more like it was spelt and not the way it's actually pronounced, he said "Emaline" three times trying to pronounce that right and still didn't manage it (that takes talent). He was just pathetic.