Almanac Music: Songs And Moments #1 – The Dugites And Lynton Luff’s Piano Shop
Have you ever heard a song that can take you right back to a memorable moment in your life? I can think of three.
Song and Moments #1 – The Dugites and Lynton Luff’s Piano Shop
It’s a week before I fly out to join the army in July 1980 and three mates decide they want to take me for one last night out to The Raffles Hotel, Canning Highway, right on the Swan River about forty minutes drive north of our home town of Kwinana.
We are in a beautiful early 70’s Falcon owned and driven by Patrick, Jim and Pete are in the back and I’m in the passenger seat with the best part of a carton of Emu Export stubbies between Patrick and I on the bench seat. I’m not wearing a seat belt.
Before you get to The Raffles coming from the south, there is a slight uphill section of the Canning Highway where traffic lights are strategically positioned to slow you down as its downhill from there to the river.
Patrick sees the amber light and is in a position to brake but decides to beat it but we are too far out and he finds himself going through a red light at high speed.
A car comes roaring out from the left and has the good sense to brake just in time but Patrick veers to the right instinctively and the car suddenly starts ‘snaking’.
He does his best to straighten it, but the car turns at ninety degrees left and crashes through the window of Lynton Luff’s iconic Piano Shop which proudly houses a grand piano on the roof.
We are literally inside the shop and the song that accompanied us on this remarkable, hair brained ride was ‘In Your Car’, by The Dugites. A Western Australian song by a Western Australian Band named after a Western Australian reptile.
Patrick turns the radio off, steps outside and starts kicking the car. I can barely get out, blocked by a Wurlitzer Organ, and along with some passers-by we push the car back out on the street.
Patrick believes the best course of action is for me and Pete to shove whatever stubbies that have survived the crash into our lumber jackets and hitch hike home while he and Jim deal with the mess and aftermath.
Back home in Medina I notice blood in my urine from getting thrown into Patrick’s steering wheel as we turned left into the shop. Thankfully my ribs would heal in time to get on the plane to Melbourne a week later.
Lynton Luff moved out of that location ages ago but still makes pianos, Patrick is still alive and probably still drives a nice vintage car and the Dugites had their moment in the sun just like their slithering namesake does.
Dugites have a nasty bite just like that horrendous ‘ear worm’ that refused to go away that fateful night. I’ve still never been to The Raffles.
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About Ian Wilson
Former army aircraft mechanic, sales manager, VFA footballer and coach. Now mental health worker and blogger. Lifelong St Kilda FC tragic and father to 2 x girls.
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I wonder whatever happened to The Dugites?
I remember them playing (err, miming) this on Hey Hey Its Saturday.
I’m also an Almanacker and I was the bass player in The Dugites. I left Dave Warner’s From The Suburbs to join The Dugites. We recorded three albums and an EP, did lots of fabulous gigs in lots great venues, and finished up in 1984. I love this piece by Ian Wilson.
One more thing: before I joined The Dugites I owned an old Falcon station wagon myself. I bought it from a sailor who was stationed at HMAS Leeuwin in north freo and used to come and drink at Clancy’s bar in Fremantle when my earlier (pre-Warner) band Touchstone were playing there. I paid him $400. It had a great engine but you could see the road through the rust holes in the floor on the front passenger’s side. It had a metal badge with the word “falcon” on the side; the letter “c” was loose and tipped sideways so it became known as “The Faloon”. It was subsequently abandoned (note judicious use of the passive tense) in a side street down the road from the share house I was living in: a dilapidated mansion in Hampton Road Fremantle.
Thanks for the memory. The Dugites definitely garnered respect when they came across and played in Melbourne. We were a bit snobby and biased toward local bands but they were great. I think I saw them at the Armadale or maybe the Mt Erica.