 The front left to right: Ray Essery, Shirley Friend and Pat Drummond
back row: Murray Hartin and Marco Gliori inset: Bobby Miller |
In the early 1990’s Marco Gliori and Muzza Hartin had become good mates, both having won The Imperial Hotel Bush Poetry Awards, and more importantly, established themselves as a couple of young larrikins who loved spruiking their original poems around the various venues at the Tamworth Country Music Festival.
Not long after they hit their straps, along came the ‘real’ larrikin, Bobby Miller, and together these three mates began doing shows and hitting the road through Queensland and Northern New South Wales performing to packed outhouses, and lubricating their throats in the process.
It was around this time, another Poet, Shirley Friend (whom like Marco had cut his teeth in the Folk Festival Scene) was upsetting some of the Bush Poetry ‘Traditionalists’ with her raunchy yarns, delivered in her unique and very cheeky pommy accent. Marco, Muzz and Bobby loved her style.
It was Shirley who first put on a Naked Poet’s Show in The Wamuran Hall, via Caboolture, sponsored by the local FM Station, compared by the Naked DJ (with a strategically placed gumleaf) and featuring as one of their guests (check this out) The Territory Drover, Bruce Simpson. I doubt if you’ll find that on Bruce’s resume. Marco and Bobby were also on Shirley’s Naked Poets Show that night.
At this stage, Marco, Muzz and Bobby, who were being featured at The Longyard Poets Breakfast during Tamworth Country Music Week, decided to do a night show… (where they could give their audiences a little more, play around with some theatre pieces) and invite a heap of other Bush Poets to be part of this ‘experiment’.
These original shows were called ‘Not The Elvis Presley Show’ and ‘Laughs Lies and Larrikins’ and, over two years , in a small church, they packed in 100 willing guests each night, invited singer Dennis ‘Dingo’ Dryden to join them, and the concept was off and rolling.
After a couple of years in the Church, The Tamworth Golf Club offered the Poets a bigger venue, and this is where The Naked Poets were born. Marco, Muzz and Bobby, invited Shirley Friend and Ray Essery to join them as a 5 person Poetry Team, and that first year at The Golf Club, linked up with Scrubby Gully, an Inverell Bush Band featuring Fats Hardy and ………………… and each night the crowds continued to swell.
Like Dingo Dryden, Scrubby Gully were unavailable the next year, so Singer/Song Writer Pat Drummond was invited into the fold, and the package was complete.
In 1999, Marco quite casually asked Pat to record the Naked Poets Show, so that he (Marco) might consider releasing a ‘live’ album, but after hearing the entire show, the crew realized that with popular pieces like Turbulence, The Mr Whippy Rip-off, Toilet Paper Line Dance, and a heap of raw comedy, this was a unique album
that just might appeal to a wide audience.
Radio Stations around the Country had been screaming out for an Australian Album just like this. With unprecedented ‘Poetry’ Airplay, and on the back of an amazing ‘most requested’ track by Muzza called Turbulence, Naked Poets 1 took off.
The rest is history. Five albums with Shoestring Records, two Bush laureate Album of The Year Awards (They didn’t enter Naked Poets No1…they thought it wasn’t Bushy enough), several other individual awards from Naked Poets Show Recordings, and an amazing run of album sales across Australia, The success of this troupe is testament to the ‘behind the scenes’ mateship that existed from the start, and from which the Naked Poets concept was born.
In 2009 The Naked Poets performed their last shows at Tamworth and The Gympie Muster, released Naked Poets Number 5 and decided to finish up on their own terms.
The most noticeable thing about the troupe is that each of the Performers were unique entertainers in their own right, travelling around Australia performing at corporate functions and festivals, walking the boards at Pubs and Clubs, whilst inspiring a whole new generation of comedy fans, to find a little humour in their own lives, and celebrate the good natured Aussie ribbing, that we all deserve.
The Naked Poets were like a fine recipe, so many different flavours, very filling, and with an delicious aftertaste that will have us licking our fingers for years to come.
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