My Blog

I've been bloggin at WordPress

BluesBro — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 04:33:24 GMT

Hey friends, I haven't been here for ages, seems like I am on so many sites that I don't know which one to work through. I need an aggregator that lets me post to all my favourite places at once. Anyway, if you want to know what I amthinking, check out my blog at http://luigicappel.wordpress.com/

Podcast User Magazine Review

BluesBro — Mon, 13 Nov 2006 04:27:47 GMT

Hey folks, I just got a really good review for my Blog called A Kiwi Songwriter in PUM. You can get the awesome free magazine at www.podcastusermagazine.com as a PDF. My new song Mr Bush Why Can't We Be Friends has gone straight to Number One in the Music Forte Country Music Top 20, you can help me keep it there by listening to it at http://www.musicforte.com/top_songs_country.php :)

Mr Bush - Why Can't we Be Friends

BluesBro — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 04:42:36 GMT

Hey Tribe Friends I have finally recorded my new song called Mr Bush Why Can't We Be Friends which you can listen to for free at www.musicforte.com/member/bluesbro The background is that 20 or so years ago our country voted to ban nuclear powered and armed ships from our ports. That had nothing to do with our feelings of friendship with the USA, we have always been friends, but we have a democracy and pride ourselves on being clean and green (most of the time) and the only things nuclear in New Zealand are for cancer treatment and research in hospitals. Anyway, as a consequence, the United States decided that we were no longer friends of the US. They banned us from ANZUS, which was our local defence treaty, stopped allowing us to participate in defence training, denied us free trade agreements, shut us out from most military intelligence and in effect all but shut the door on us. Things have thawed a little recently. We have been allowed to participate in 3 defence training programs and recently 17 New Zealand soldiers were given US Medals of Honor for service in Afghanistan. Other than that, we are still not friends. So. I think its about time this stopped, so I wrote a song to protest about it and to try to get people aware of this. As the song says, "Our men fought along with yours on a dozen foreign shores". Why does New Zealand have to look to the likes of China for a Free Trade Agreement rather than the US? If you are still reading, sorry it took so long to get to the point. I would be super grateful if you would go to www.musicforte.com/member/bluesbro and listen to my song and get your friends to do the same. If enough people listen to it, it will go to the Music Forte Country Top 20 and more people will hear about it and ultimately with a bit of luck, someone at the White House will hear it and tell Mr Bush that we really aren't that bad down under. My thanks in anticipation.............................................................

Come listen to my podcast

BluesBro — Tue, 17 Oct 2006 00:36:28 GMT

I have a new podcast caled A Kiwi Songwriter. The second edition is out now and its about goal setting. It includes my daughter's first single called From Me To You on which I had the priviledge of doing backing vocals and guitar. You can check it out at http://luigicappel.libsyn.com/rss

Mr Bush - Why can't we be friends?

BluesBro — Thu, 24 Aug 2006 01:12:43 GMT

I'm currently writing a new song - yes I'm a songe songwriter and if you want to hear some of my songs, you can hear them at www.musicforte.com/member/bluesbro. Anyway I'm writing a protest song about the relationship between New Zealand and the USA. back in the late 1970's lots of US ships used to come to New Zealand for R & R. We would have thousands, well hundreds of marines with haircuts like mine, sailors, officers etc coming in and we took pride in hosting them. We had a dial a sailor program and each time a ship came in, we would invite a group of te guys to come stay in our flat, play cards, do some sight seeing and generally make friends. We also got to visit the ships and submarines which was an awesome experience. Then our anti nuclear movement started, particularly in relation to the French nuclear testing in the Pacific, but that's another story. As a result and in keeping with our philosophy of being clean and green (which is why we have such a great eco-tourism industry) we banned nuclear ships from visiting our ports. We also banned ships that were carrying nuclear weapons. This was not a political protest and had nothing to do wit how we viewed the US, which had always been very friendly going back to the days that we shared the trenches in WWll, Korea, Viet Nam and other places. Because the US would not confirm or deny that there were nuclear weapons on board, they stopped coming and our relationship turned to shit. The US decided that we were no longer an ally and put a stop to economic and military relationships. We had a local treaty called ANZUS which was between NZ, Australia and the US and the US refused to train and run war games wit us, which we had done for decades prior. We are a peaceful nation and have always valued our relationships with our US friends, but because we wanted to eliminate the risk of any nuclear accidents, we were penalised and were no longer considered allies or friends of the US. There is a diplomatic term for our relationship, but I can't remember what it is called. The status is lower than the relationship with countries like China and Iraq to put it inperspective. Whether you agree with the policy we decided on doesn't matter, many Kiwi's don't agree with it or believe it is no longer relevant. We are a small country in the South Pacific with a population of a few people over 4,000,000 in the entire country, the equivalent of a large US city! Despite that, we have sent small peace keeping forces all over the world including Afghanistan, Iraq, Korean Peninsula, Kosovo, Sudan, East Timor, Fiji, New Guinea, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bouganville, Sinai, Solomon Islands, Cambodia, Mozambique, Sierra Leone and more. I think that illustrates that we care for world peace and are prepared to shoulder some responsibility, even for a small country. We have free trade agreements with Australia and many oter countries, but we can't get one with the USA, which forced us to seek and receive free trade agreements with countries like China, where we now have an official friend relationship which we can't get with the USA. So I ask you, are we bad people? Are we a security risk to the US? We like Americans and many of us visit the US regularly for business or pleasure. I have been over myself probably 10 times and have personal friends all over the US. But te US won't recognise us as friends or allies. Is that appropriate? So Mr Bush, why can't we be friends? As to the song, I hope to record it in the next month and it will appear on my website at Music Forte. Maybe Mr President will come and listen? I doubt it, though. Don't you?

Ghosts

BluesBro — Tue, 23 Aug 2005 01:22:55 GMT

I had the strangest experieince last night. I was driving home from Real Groovy Records at around 6 p.m. which was about twilight. The sun was coming in at my eyes on an angle. About 150 metres ahead I saw a woman in a winter coat holding hands with a child on each side of her crossing the road. They crossed the other side OK and then they looked as though they were going to cross straight in front of my car. I said "what the .........something or other" and slammed on the anchors stopping the car on the side of the road. As suddenly as they appeared, they were gone, but there was nowhere for them to go. I was straight, mentally in a good space. Now I'm not prone to seeing things and wasn't under the effect of anything that could cause me to see things that weren't there. I'm not using any medicines or anything else that could cause ahllucinations. The bush walk I did on Saturday was next to a cemetary and I was told later that the bush is full of ghosts. I didn't see anything and found the place to be very peaceful. I can't find a rational explanation for this experieince. If I was artistic, I could draw the people for you as I saw them. Now I'm wondering if it could have been an extra sensory experience. Must find out if anyone was ever killed on that spot in an accident. I love science fiction but I am also a major sceptic. I just can't explain this one away. Were they ghosts? Was I looking through the dying suns rays into another dimension? What do you reckon?

My Blog is mostly on Buzznet

BluesBro — Tue, 23 Aug 2005 01:21:26 GMT

But I didn't realise that you couldn't see it unless you went into my profile, so I guess I should say the odd word or two here as well. No point in having a tribe if you don't share with them ay?