Still Rockin' It - Cheryl Lee
Still Rockin' It - Cheryl Lee
What has Graham Cornes been up to lately? OR Which song should be the anthem for the Adelaide Crows Football Club?
Join Cheryl Lee - That Radio Chick on STILL ROCKIN' IT for news, reviews, music and interviews with some of our favourite Australian musicians.
Today we have “Conversations with Cheryl Lee” with guest Graham Cornes.
Graham has enjoyed long careers at the top of each of his chosen fields.
Firstly, both playing and coaching SANFL and AFL football - who could forget his spectacular mark in the last minutes of the 1973 grandfinal for Glenelg, and calmly kicking the goal to regain the lead.
Graham has also enjoyed longevity in the historically cut throat world of media, with 17 years in radio hosting the 5AA Sports Show and now “Conversations with Cornsey”.
And, all the while performing guitar and vocal duties around Adelaide with his rock band.
Overcoming the adversity of a tumultuous childhood, Graham is a testament to following your instincts and getting by with a little help from your friends.
Includes Songs:
The Angels - Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again
Daddy Cool - Eagle Rock
Guns n' Roses - Sweet Child O' Mine
The Rolling Stones - Start Me Up
Jimmy Barnes - No Second Prize
Eagles - Peaceful Easy Feeling
The Who - Won't Get Fooled Again
Josh Groban - You Raise Me Up
What’s Studley been up to lately … let’s find out
Get out when you can, support local music and I'll see you down the front!!
Visit: ThatRadioChick.com.au
that radio chick, cheryl lee, here with you. Welcome to the still rocking a podcast where we'll have music news, reviews and interviews with some of our favorite australian musicians and artists. Today we have conversations with cheryl lee for the guest, graham Corns. Graham has enjoyed long careers at the top of his chosen fields. Firstly, both playing and coaching SANFL and AFL football. Who could forget his spectacular mark in the last minute of the 1973 Grand Final for Glenelg and calmly kicking the goal to regain the lead? Graham has also enjoyed longevity in the historically cutthroat world of media, with 17 years in radio, hosting the 5AA sports show and now conversations with Kornsy, all the while performing guitar and vocal duties around Adelaide with his rock band. Overcoming the adversity of a tumultuous childhood, graham is a testament to following your instincts and getting by with a little help from your friends. What's Studly been up to lately? Let's find out. You're with Shirley, that radio chick. I'd like to welcome into Crabtree Studios in the city Graham Studly Corns.
Speaker 3:Thank you. Is it Shirley or Rock Chick or whatever? What would you like to be called?
Speaker 2:I answer to anything, graham. So Graham, 74 years young, you've got an amazing history an incredible football career, a media career, the all-important career that I want to talk about, your music career. Perhaps we'll start at the very beginning. So you were with Glenelg Football Club from 67 to 82, as a player. As a player, yeah, player, what a player. 339 goals, best and fairest three times, and the spectacular mark in the 73 grand final giving Glenelg the lead again. You must have some amazing memories oh look, I really do, I.
Speaker 3:And I drown in nostalgia from time to time. I don't know whether that's a good thing or a bad thing. I mean I just love recounting the old days. I was so lucky to play footy. I mean I played footy for fun when I was a kid and I had no ambition at all of playing league football. Never thought I would somehow got the opportunity from Wyala to be invited down to Glenelg and Neil Curley just guided me through. You know, the first 10 years of my career and I just loved footy. You know, the highlights were great. There weren't too many downs. We lost too many grand finals. That's always disappointing, but I just love footy. I've loved it since I was four, you know.
Speaker 2:You also went to Ron Barassi's North Melbourne for a little while in 79 and then, as a Glenelg supporter from way back, I was a member of the Glenelg cheer squad from 79 to 84 five years waving the flags and the banners and throwing all the paper, the torn up telephone books in those days they were the days we were devastated when you came back to Adelaide and went to coach South Adelaide.
Speaker 3:I mean 79 was right at the end. 78. We were coached by John Nicholls and it hadn't been a happy year. I was captain that year and John Nicholls had a great career as a player but as a coach we felt he was distracted. So I had a chance to go to North Melbourne at the end of 1978 and went over there. That didn't work out. I had a holiday through Europe already booked and didn't get there until February, so I was behind the eight ball and then it didn't work out. We had the chance to come back halfway through 79, and I did, but I mean I still had quite a few like three years after that playing. But the great years were the, you know the mid-70s, you know the 73, 4, 5 and 6. They were the glory years, I reckon.
Speaker 2:Then, when you retired as a player, you did come back to the Bay in 85 to coach.
Speaker 3:So you asked me about going to South Adelaide. Yeah, I skipped that part. At the end of 1982, john Halbert had coached us after John Nicholls. I was getting towards the end and starting to think about coaching and we believe that John Halbert wasn't going to be reappointed at Glenelg and John Cale was going to be the coach for 83. I was pretty excited about that.
Speaker 3:I was on a holiday and driving through Victoria and then I hear the news come over the radio that John Cale had been appointed coach of Collingwood. So I thought, hang on, well, we need a coach, it's my chance. So I rang Harry Kernaghan, who was the general manager, and said, harry, I'd like to apply for that coaching job. And he said well, come in and see us at. I thought he said 4 30. So I got there at 4 30 for this interview and that you know there was Harry Kernaghan and the president, bob Campbell, and they weren't very impressed, you know. I knew I wasn't cutting through to them and right at the end Bob said do you realize you were late? I said no, I wasn't 4 30. He said no, the meeting was four o'clock. Oh my gosh. So anyway, that didn't go. So they appointed Graham Campbell and I was there. I was there for the first meeting with Graham Campbell, an enthusiastic guy, but then South Adelaide rang me almost immediately, said well, we'd like you to come down and coach us. Basically, I didn't really have to do. I mean I had to do an interview, but I didn't really have to do. I mean I had to do an interview but I didn't feel as though I was competing against anyone. So I had two years at South and they were great guys. They really were.
Speaker 3:It was so hard to leave. In the end we made the finals, won one of the night premierships, played in the grand final the following year in the same competition. But then Glenelg came and said look, we'd like you to come back. So I went to Neil Curley. I mean I don't know whether you want me to stop talking. No, not at all. So I went and saw Neil Curley, who's you know he was, as I've said so many times publicly, he was the most dominant male figure in my life, basically the opportunities that he gave me and I talked about it. He said, look, be the right move to go back. So I had to say goodbye to the South Adelaide guys. That was really hard, but I went back to Glenelg, where the only expectation was to win a premiership, because we'd come second so many times. And you did that. We did that, not easily.
Speaker 2:In 85 and 86.
Speaker 3:85, and 86, yeah.
Speaker 2:And then we had a horror run where we lost three 87. And then we had a horror run where we lost three 87, 88, 90.
Speaker 3:Yeah well, 87,. We limped into that grand final against North Adelaide and they smashed us. We'd beaten them convincingly the previous two years, but it was only a six-day break between the prelim and the grand final. Half the guys came down with a cold or flu type thing. We were going off site to get vitamin injections, intravenous injections, but we were never in it. That was their turn and they deserved to win a grand final. So we had to eat humble pie and they smashed us as well because they beat us up. A couple of guys got reported and we didn't strike a blow.
Speaker 1:You are listening to Still Rocking it. The podcast with Cheryl Lee.
Speaker 2:Stay with us. We're going to speak more to Graham Corns about his time at the Crows, about his media career and his music career. In the meantime, we're going to have a song that his band loves to play. We saw them perform this just the other day the Angels with. Am I Ever Gonna See your Face Again, MUSIC. I could go on talking about Glenelg all day and half the night, but we also have to mention your 1991 appointment as the inaugural senior coach of the Adelaide Crows in their first year in the AFL. Congratulations.
Speaker 3:Thank you. Well, that was a whole new change. That was a change of seismic proportions. We were all so anti about having a team going into the AFL. We had such a good competition but it was slowly being weakened by. We're losing players Every year.
Speaker 3:The best players had been taken out but we weren't going to go in until it was ready, till we had all the right conditions. But that was blown apart by Port Adelaide accepting the bid to go in and then the Sandville was forced into doing it. They had to pay more money than they should have. Our entry restrictions were tougher than anybody else's. We can only pick South Australia. We couldn't go to the draft till the end of the second year. But you know it was a continuation of the people say we had a state team and yes, it's true, we can only pick players from the Sandville, but um, 10 of the best players had already been drafted. So we were, we were really limited and, as I said, we couldn't go to the draft till the second year.
Speaker 3:But it was exciting, it was new. We, you know the guys were fantastic. They trained. They went from being semi-professional almost to professional footballers still being paid as semi-professionals. You know, they'd never trained so hard. Nothing but admiration for the guys in that first squad because they just committed. They trained 13 days out of 14, then did three weight sessions doing stuff that they'd never done before teddy, teddy, the poodle cross mongrel has come to say hello to grady um, so look, that was exciting it.
Speaker 3:But I felt so. I felt as though I deceived south australia because you know, I had to leave the sand for, but I felt it was also a responsibility to the state to prepare it and have the best. I felt as though I'd deceived South Australia because, you know, I had to leave the Sandfull, but I felt it was also a responsibility to the state to prepare it and have the best possible team we could. We were competitive immediately, but not dominant. You know that we could win here. Go to Melbourne and some of those Victorian suburban grounds like Moorabbin and the Western Oval and Collingwood's Ground at Victoria Park. They were killing grounds. We got smashed. But you know, we were competitive. It was exciting and 93 was particularly exciting when we got through to the prelim final, which was of course a disaster in the end, but it was still a pretty good year.
Speaker 2:I might not know this, but I actually filled in for you. I was your proxy at a game of blackjack at the Adelaide Casino. Really, my husband, barry and I think it was about 88 or 89. The casino put on a promotion where you could go into a competition to win a game of blackjack with the final I think it was final five coaches. Back then, every time you got a blackjackjack you got a ticket into the draw. Well, my husband won to sit down at the table have a game of blackjack with neil barm, jack kale, neil curly, you we couldn't remember who the fifth one was. Anyway, you couldn't come, so you were sending one of the players. The plane ever turned up, really. So we're sitting at the blackjack table in the casino in the days when you used to have to dress up a bit, yeah, and they're looking at their watch like this and I said, excuse me, I'm a Glenelg supporter, I'll play.
Speaker 2:So I played the game with the fellas and beat my husband. Oh, did you? Yeah, I came third and he came fourth. So he wasn't very happy about that. Neil curly, he wanted to like put it all in on the first hand. Okay, I think, because his wife was waiting for him and they said you can't do that. So he did it in two. He was out in two hands lost the first half and then lost the second half. So I came fourth and he was gone. Yeah, we came third, I guess my checks in the mail still rocking that podcast with that radio chick, cheryl Lee.
Speaker 2:We'll be back more to speak with Graeme. We're going to talk about his very talented children, his extensive media career and then the all-important music career. Another song that he played at the Norwood Live with his band, this is Daddy Cool Eagle Rock. While we're talking about footy, I wanted to talk a little bit about your amazing family, your two boys especially. Right at this minute, kane has just done an amazing feat for charity.
Speaker 3:Well Cain, he's ran from Adelaide to Melbourne over 12 days and so he's averaging 65, 66, 67 kilometres a day. He's phenomenal. The charity was called my Room. It's a children's cancer charity. He raised $350,000. I mean, he was fanatical about his running and I keep telling him to stop running because it's good for your aerobic capacity but, gee, for your bones and your muscular skeletal system. I think he's starting to realize now. He was in a lot of pain at the end but he did it. Chad's an assistant coach at Port Adelaide. They both had great careers. Really, when you think about it, they're both all Australians, premiership players and have all teams to play for. They got drafted to Port Adelaide. It was the greatest. Still, we won't hold that against them, can't hold them against them, but it was. It was the greatest football. Irony, it was almost like a football goddess Punishing me for this. Yes, because the Port Adelaide-Lenox thing Was really intense and really bitter. Oh, it was Particularly towards the end Of my playing days. You know like of my playing days, you know like.
Speaker 2:Anyway, I remember a few incidences.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you do.
Speaker 2:Behind the goals.
Speaker 3:Oh, okay.
Speaker 2:In the cheer squad? I mean, do you get the fights in the cheer squad? Whatever you know happened on the field was happening behind the goals as well.
Speaker 3:Really.
Speaker 2:Not me personally, no, no.
Speaker 3:You would have called a bit of flack for that duffel coat, though, yeah, it's got one of the patches that says I hate wharfies.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so the closest I ever came to a physical altercation in my entire life, my nearly 60 years on the planet was with a Port Adelaide supporter waiting for the tram. I don't think she liked my patch.
Speaker 3:It's a very distinctive duffel coat.
Speaker 2:It is, it's vintage now no-transcript.
Speaker 2:Oh, the stupid things we got away with in our youth. Time for a song. Now we're going to play one of Graham's top ten favourite songs and I must admit it is in my top ten too Guns N' Roses, sweet Child of Mine. We'll be back to speak more with Graham Studley Corns shortly. She's got a smile that, it seems to me, reminds me of childhood memories where everything was a. You must be proud of both of them. And you've also got three beautiful daughters as well. You've got five. I've got five kids. I've got five too, have you? Yeah, really, barry. And I have got five, five children. Yeah, wow, it's very quiet here at the moment. They're all still at home. Three of them are a month in Greece.
Speaker 3:In Greece. Oh lucky things. How are they handling all the COVID restrictions?
Speaker 2:Someone's got to do it. No, they seem to be going really well. So the two of the older girls have taken my baby. He's just turned 15.
Speaker 3:Oh, wow. And they've taken him how old's the oldest of them, 23. 23. You happy with? That I couldn't think of a good enough reason not to let him go oh, good luck to him, but my three daughters are still at home and Amy's now 28, so and tells us how to parent the eldest which come on mine?
Speaker 2:does that my eldest, does that? In fact, they all do? And how old are the other two?
Speaker 3:so 28, 18 and 13? She's 13. She's the. And how old are the other two? So 28, 18 and 13. She is 13. She's the youngest one. So I just started playing footy two years ago actually oh good on her.
Speaker 3:I tried to talk her out. Are you worried? Yeah, because they haven't had the grounding, the basic grounding of skills for a start and how to learn how to protect yourself from a young age and they're so fierce and aggressive in their tackling. You know, she's been hurt a couple of times, but not seriously. But in fact I can't complain because I looked at how she loves it so and it's exactly how I was. You know, I couldn't wait for saturday to play. She wears number 12. Oh, she's got long skinny legs and so and it sort of takes me back, you know.
Speaker 2:Oh, I can't imagine, though Both our boys played footy for Jets Unley Jets.
Speaker 3:Oh, okay.
Speaker 2:And the school our oldest one got knocked out playing for Adelaide High. That was pretty scary, yeah, that is scary.
Speaker 3:Yeah, when you play long enough, you're going to have an injury like that from time to time so the only other thing I'm gonna say before we move on from okay 40 is graham studley corn.
Speaker 2:When people used to call you studley when I was in the cheer squad, I thought that that was a nickname because they thought you were a stud and I didn't actually realize until I was doing my research for today and I'm like his name is really Studley.
Speaker 3:Well, it's a family name and it was a family name before it had any other connotations. My father was William Alfred Studley, and Chad is Chad Studley. Cain came to me crying one day when he was a little boy. He said I want to be Cain Studley. I said well, when you turn 18, you can change it if you want to do that.
Speaker 2:He's Cain Graham. That's studley. I said, well, when you turn 18 you can.
Speaker 3:You can change it if you want. If you want to do that, he's kane graham kane, graham kane, graham bryant, after kevin bryant, who was a friend of mine when I went to north melbourne in 1979. Uh, so the studley was a like. There was an ann studley, one of my ancestors, who was the last of the studleys. Apparently this is the? What's the word? The fable, perhaps folklore, the folklore, she, the folklore. She married a sea captain and they went to sea and they were shipwrecked and she didn't come back. Now that's the folklore. I don't know how accurate that is. The urban myth. The Anne Studley was the last of the Studleys, except, I reckon, chad. He was tempted to name his little daughter but his partner had other ideas.
Speaker 2:I bet, as I say, I could talk about footy all day and all night but, apart from an amazing footy career half of it with my favourite footy team, glenelg you have had a pretty amazing media career since then as well, co-hosting your 5AA sports show, first with KG for about 13 years and then with former Adelaide Crow Stephen Rowe for another four years. Rowe, yeah, that's in media, in radio. That's a lifetime.
Speaker 3:I just don't know how that all happened. To be quite frank, I look back. When I do talks, I talk about some of them who I've met who've had a clearly defined pathway since they were young. They set their goals at an early age and they follow it and they study and they do this and they have it all worked out and all plotted and planned and it's so inspirational. I can't claim to have any of that. I've been given these opportunities and you have to make a decision whether you accept them or you don't accept them.
Speaker 3:So the media thing I don't know why I was asked. There used to be a footy publication called Football Times and they asked me to write a column on the back of that footy times just little snippets of them, which was, you know, a bit of fun to do. Then the news, the old news. David Capel, who was the sports editor, andrew Capel's father, andrew, still writes for the advertiser asked father, his sounder still writes for the advertiser asked me to do a column for the news and then just kept doing it and then when I got the job as the crows coach, I had to stop. But when I got sacked as crows coach, they asked me to resume the column, and that was 1994 and I've been doing it ever since. So, um, it's just being given the opportunities and being, I don't know lucky enough to pursue.
Speaker 3:The radio thing came completely out of the blue. You used to do panel. You know you'd go on like a panel, you'd get invited onto a panel. But the program director of 5AA back in the day when 5AA used to broadcast the racing, when 5AA first got its licence it was just a music station, easy music. Then the TAB bought it and used to broadcast the races and that sort of. Most of their audience disappeared, unless you're a racing fanatic. So this guy rang me, said look, uh, our morning announcer, graham Goodings, is going on holidays. Would you come in for a day to do a guest spot? Okay, a bit of fun for breakfast. What time I have to be there? So so about 5.30.
Speaker 2:You're kidding me, but I don't have breakfast till 9.
Speaker 3:Much even later than that. So I did and we sat down. Kim Dewhurst was a panelist. Kim Dewhurst has amazing positions within government these days, but he was the co-host and it was great fun and just enjoyed talking about music, talking about stuff. So I went back to work. I was running the car dealership Graham Cornstater.
Speaker 2:I bought my first car from there.
Speaker 3:Oh, did you? Well done. So I was running that and that was part of the Steel Wolf Ward group, the Ad Trans group, which was eventually taken over by AP Eagers at the moment. So the GM of that was Graham Bignall, a very hard but fair businessman but he was understanding with footy things. And AA rang me back a couple of weeks later and said would you consider doing this full time? What Breakfast Radio? He said yeah, we think you'd be okay at it. I said well, I can't. I'm running a dealership and I'm coaching Glenelg. He said oh, I just can't do it. So okay. So they rang me back again. So I went and saw Graham, we sat down and he said look, you don't quite have the killer instinct as a car dealer. I'm not a trader. When you sell a car, I want the customer to have the best possible deal, and maybe customer relationship was so important to me that the art of trading wasn't my strongest point. But I figured if you could satisfy the customer that everything else would take care of itself. But anyway, he said look, I think you're going to enjoy media and coaching more than the car trade. So I still have a strong connection with Korns Toyota.
Speaker 3:So we did it for a year. They put in a general manager and I'd go to the radio station, come to work at 10 o'clock, leave at four to coach glennell. That was a hard year and at the end of the 12 months we said, okay, okay, we'll do the radio. So the kenny dickens I was working on breakfast with ken dickens, who was a fantastic radio talent, and then the crows job came along. So for the first three years of the crows I was still doing breakfast radio, that's nuts and bob hamm. When they re-signed me for my first contract extension they said look, you'll have to give up the radio program. And I understood that. So I did that and four months later they sacked me.
Speaker 3:Anyway, when my time at the Crows came to an end, david Hooks had been working with KG Hooks. He went to Melbourne, so there was a spot. So they offered me to work with KG. Hooksey went to Melbourne, so there was a spot. So they offered me to work with KG. Even though they made it hard, they just left it there. I said, oh yeah, well, maybe we'll consider. I said well, hang on, do you want me or not? That was a great pairing.
Speaker 2:You've survived two pretty cutthroat industries actually, haven't you? Footy's pretty tough, Media's probably tougher.
Speaker 3:Well, he did get sacked in the end at footy. I mean, I think every coach gets sacked. Yeah, very few can go out on their own terms. Even Alistair Clarkson chose to do so and as we speak he's embroiled now in this issue with how he treated Indigenous players at Hawthorne. So the greatest coaches not that I'm saying I was, but even the best coaches get sacked. Neil Curley was sacked, you know.
Speaker 2:Well, that's right. I think that's how most of it ends. It always ends in tears. It doesn't end well. No, I was going to mention KG did an hour, I think, sports show on Radio Adelaide with Phil Smythe for a little while back there. Do you remember that? Yeah, I do yeah. Yes, I was the Friday producer for that.
Speaker 3:Well, you know what a great guy he is and how caring and how sensitive and really generous, generous with time and personality as well. But I've never known a man to be so self-effacing, so modest and so lacking in confidence for somebody who's done such great things as we're speaking. Previous Monday we opened the Ken KG Cunningham Media Centre at Adelaide Oval. It's named after him. It's a huge honour and he's still blubbering away and I don't mean that he was blubbering because he was so emotional.
Speaker 3:I said, kg, you do. We had the Premier presenting all these dignitaries, so anyway, where were we?
Speaker 2:Where were we Still rocking the podcast with that radio chick, cheryl Lee? Being completely lost is probably a good time for a song. Let's have another one from Graeme's Top Ten, which is also another one of my favourites. The Stones Start me up. We'll be right back and see if we can find out what we were up to. You've got Conversations with Cornish, so this is Conversations with Cheryl. That's fair enough, or?
Speaker 3:is that already taken? No, no. Well, that's strange too, because I was working with KG years ago and this is back in 2006,. I reckon I always thought there was a bit more than sport. So I asked if I could do an interview program and we called it Conversations with Quancy. Only half an hour then, but they didn't really know where to put it. You know which part of the weekend or where did where did it fit in the program? So it sort of lapsed. We interviewed some interesting people, but and then richard feidler starts up. With conversations with richard feidler and I say, hang on now people think conversations with corns. He pitched it from richard feidler, but it's the other way around. You heard it first here. It was a great delight to interview richard. He released his book about Prague and he came on as Conversations. He was fantastic. I'm a huge fan, Richard. I'm a huge fan.
Speaker 2:I have had the opportunity to interview so many people that I never would have had the opportunity to speak to before.
Speaker 3:Big fan girl sometimes Sounds like you too, yeah well, richard Feiler was, because he's such a, he's so smart and he's so witty. You know so witty. So he was, he rubbed it in. He let me know how many millions of downloads his podcast has. It's good. I don't. Can't remember being. I was a little overawed with you know, prime ministers, and you know, when you speak to someone like Malcolm Turnbull or Julia Gillard, you know they've led the country, haven't you? Yeah, so it's hard not to be overawed on occasions like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I get that. Have you ever interviewed Jimmy Barnes?
Speaker 3:I have interviewed him, but he was in a studio in Melbourne and I was here in Adelaide. It wasn't face-to-face. I want the Crows to use one of his songs for their theme song no Second Prize. Yes, it's a great song and he won't allow it because he barracks for Port Adelaide Jeepers. I said, Jimmy, come on.
Speaker 2:I'll work on him.
Speaker 3:I'll get my people to speak to his people, see what we can do, but that would actually be really good and really commercial sense for him, because look at In Excess, you know I really commercial sense for him, because look at In Excess, you know, I know. Anyway. But he said no, I'll back for Port Adelaide, damn it, but I tried.
Speaker 2:Well, port have already got theirs. They have, haven't they? Yeah yeah, I have a hashtag called interview Jimmy. Before I die, we'll have to make another hashtag and make it go viral. No second prize for the Crows. You've not interviewed him yet have you.
Speaker 3:No, it's not from lack of trying, Graeme. He was very generous but I guess coincided, I think, with the release of his book, which is always easy to get some of these more retiring celebrities.
Speaker 2:I've emailed his very polite and very PR people every time there's a new book, a new tour releasing 30 year anniversary of this album or that album. Every time I get a really nice, polite answer back. But I think I understand because you know their level of commitment to media would be national tv, local tv, national radio, local radio and then community radio and there's 400 on stations.
Speaker 3:I listen a lot to community radio and I guess it's because I'm certain things. You like this, so that there's music, probably mainly for the music, then less advertising. I know I mean some of them fm shows with just you know so and so and so and so and so and they just they're trying to talk and trying to be funny, and trying to be funny from the next person that's just play the music and tell us about the music and look if there's a current affair issue that you want to have a comment about, yeah, fine, do it. But you've got an fm station, use it for the music.
Speaker 2:Use it wisely, don't flitter it away. What do I know? I can imagine that if he was to give an interview to someone on community radio there's 400-odd community radio stations in Australia. One of the ones that I'm on because I'm on three they've got 70 announcers.
Speaker 3:Oh really.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so imagine 400 stations, even if each one only had a rotation of 50 announcers.
Speaker 3:Why three radio stations? Are you compulsive about that?
Speaker 2:I'm late to media in my mid-50s. I'm an accountant. I've been in administration and accounting all my life. I just love it. I think, like you when you got into the studio, there's something about the buttons.
Speaker 3:Yeah, look it's addictive and it's a great job. And I used to work with Kenny Dickin and we would always laugh. There's not one day that I've never wanted to go to work. You know, sometimes you wake up in some jobs and I just can't face it, but there's not one day that I've never wanted to go to work. You know, sometimes you wake up in some jobs and I just can't face it, but there's not one day that I haven't wanted to go to work.
Speaker 2:I'm the same, and on one of the radio stations I'm midnight till 3am. Uh-oh, what happened?
Speaker 3:Did you take calls?
Speaker 2:Not to air.
Speaker 3:Oh, ok, because I think we've stopped our local mid to dawn announcement. We've got a national program, but yeah, often wonder who listens in the middle of the night.
Speaker 2:There are a lot of carers caring after patients and a lot of shift workers from the railways. Yeah, okay, the other one is Saturday night and the other one is Sunday night.
Speaker 3:So much for your social life.
Speaker 2:Because I just love it. Luckily, one of them lets you upload a pre-record to the Twitterverse so you can be out watching the Graham Corns All-Stars while you're on the radio. We have the technology. Amazing. That's a good segue, isn't it?
Speaker 3:It is, yeah, it is.
Speaker 2:Let's talk about music now.
Speaker 1:You are listening to Still Rocking it. The podcast with Cheryl Lee.
Speaker 2:Let's have a listen to the Barnsley song that Graeme thinks might make a good song for the Crows. No second prize, jimmy Barnes from the Working Class man album, and then we'll be back to talk to Graeme about his rock and roll career.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, I feel a real fraud when we talk about music, because I've been in this band now for I don't know, it must be 20-odd years, 25 years, 26 years, and it's been so much fun but I can't play and I can't sing. I mean I can play a few chords and it doesn't matter, does it? It doesn't Well. Luckily the guys in the band are all great musos and they don't mind. If you know I stuff up, play the wrong chord or don't hit a right note, so just great fun.
Speaker 2:They're very generous. You're committed, aren't you? You're doing everything for a long time. Well, it is.
Speaker 3:It's been a lot quieter since the COVID hit, but you know we've got regular gigs throughout the year so you know, always good fun. The best one, the one we love most, is the union hotel on anzac day, where they shut down the street and have a big street party. That's. That's like being in a big concert. You know awesome. All these young, all these young vets just jumping and singing along.
Speaker 2:It's great you started all those years ago as the five double a rock and roll all stars it was the most ridiculous thing.
Speaker 3:We we had a Christmas party coming up. There was no organised entertainment. They said, look, what we're going to do is everyone has to do an act. That'll be our entertainment. Someone will sing a song, someone will tell a story, someone will tell a joke. You know there was a few, a couple of guys. One guy played in a band and so we said, well, we could get a band together, we could do a couple of rock and roll songs. That'd be because some are really easy. I said yeah yeah.
Speaker 3:I said, all right, let's do that. So we got really enthusiastic. We had two drummers. We didn't have a bass player, so we got John Bywaters from the Twilights Twilights, so he was a proper Larry Cavallaro was. He was a lead singer and he came with a set of bongos and it was at the down to semaphore. Anyway, we said so. Everyone loved it. They loved it because of nothing else.
Speaker 3:There's a guy who managed the pub at the highlander hotel and he rang, but he knew our drummer, daryl bevan. He said you guys want to do gigs, are you serious? We hadn't thought about that all the time. And daryl says hey, guys, boys, we've got a gig. If you want it, yeah, let's do it. So we went out to the highlander hotel and there was a few people came along and we just kept getting jobs, but then guys would leave or didn't want to do it, or they left the station and, and so when they left we'd replace them with really good musos. So now I'm the only one left and, david, you're the last man's dad, david Heath, came along for the second gig.
Speaker 3:So we've got us who aren't very good. The rest are great musos and we still keep getting jobs, so it's fantastic.
Speaker 2:I think, apart from the other night at Baby Boomers perform at Baby Boomers the last one was Glenelg's 100 year anniversary at the Grand. You guys played that night. That was a great Were you there that night.
Speaker 3:Yeah, okay, we didn't come on till late. That was a great gig Really. I really loved that, and the crowd seemed to like it too, so that's right.
Speaker 2:I think you're very smart in that you play songs that everybody loves. Yeah, you've got to To get up and dancing.
Speaker 3:We're not going to do original. We do, actually. We do occasionally do an original. Simon wilson, our lead singer, uh, play space in these little combos. He had an album out last year or the year before. We take a couple of songs off his album from time to time, just chuck it in there, just chuck it in, because a couple of them are really well, they're all good, but a couple really sort of suit the mood both times I remember the dance floor being full.
Speaker 2:As a punter, you know going to watch bands perform. You don't go there for perfection. You know what you might lack in what are you trying to say?
Speaker 3:musical brilliance I think you make up for in passion no, you can't offend me, because I know I can't play and I can't sing.
Speaker 2:But you're having a great time and we're all singing along with you, so I can't sing either.
Speaker 3:I hope it's infectious. We had one of our drummers, bill Shapple. A great guy used to work with special needs kids and can sing a bit, but he passed away a few years ago. Now, when the drummer tells you to turn your amp down, you're in trouble. I get the message.
Speaker 2:Good on you. You know, if I had the guts I would do it.
Speaker 3:Have you got a favourite song, though? Have you got a song you've built out?
Speaker 2:Yeah, tequila, yeah, it's got one word.
Speaker 3:That's not a song, I know, but I won. Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da.
Speaker 2:You know what? If ever you do need a tambourinist, I'm your woman Lots of offers for tambourinists.
Speaker 3:There's always a spot in Stick Together in that midsection, where the girls come up and do the Jerry Hall part, where she marches out on. It was Jerry Hall, wasn't it?
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, yes, it was, there's my tambourine. That's actually Brian Borton's tambourine, oh really.
Speaker 3:The Master's Apprentices? Yeah, borton's tambourine. Oh really, the Masters Apprentices? Yeah, good man, brian, he lent it to me and I've never given it back. He didn't give it back, he's a good man. Great group too, masters Apprentices yeah.
Speaker 2:New Leaves of Life, with Craig Holden singing yeah, well.
Speaker 3:Craig's actually sung with us a few times because every now and again your lead singer's crook or you know he's double booked or something. But he's moved on to bigger and better things now with the Masters, with the Masters, yeah. With the Masters Apprentices.
Speaker 2:Speaking of John Bywaters. I'm the fundraising coordinator for Support Act SA and he's on the committee. Okay, we'd like to invite you and your band to come and sing with us at one of our fundraising lunches.
Speaker 3:But if you've done that once before out of Norwood Pretty hard to get the guys to do it during the day, but I can put it to them.
Speaker 2:One of the radio shows I have is with Gary Burrows, co-host. He was here last night trying to get the earphones working but we couldn't so hence we were just winging. It Plays guitars, yeah, Drums, sings. He's the chairman. Last night he said for me to extend you an open invitation. It may not happen overnight, but hopefully it will happen.
Speaker 3:I'm happy to do charity shows. Of course I'll do them all day, but the professional users, we give them a token payment which reimburses them for petrol.
Speaker 2:and what have you? They get a bottle of wine from our sponsor and free lunch.
Speaker 3:I'll speak to them for you.
Speaker 2:How could they refuse? No?
Speaker 3:exactly.
Speaker 2:Still rocking the podcast with that radio chick, cheryl lee. Another song now from graham's top 10 favorites. This is the eagles from their self-titled album peaceful, easy feeling. And we'll be back to discuss one last topic with graham about his parents difficulties and he and his little brother's time in care. Thank you for coming in, graham, and having a chat with us. There's one more topic that I thought we might just touch on because, if you don't mind, because it really just shows how you can persevere and overcome, because a lot of people think, oh, you know, graham corn's football champion, media personality, rock god that's a little extreme yeah, he probably was born with a silver spoon in his mouth.
Speaker 2:But, graham, you and your brother had a pretty tough, rough start to life.
Speaker 3:It sounds really dramatic when I look back and when I recount the story. After Vietnam I needed help, you know, in terms of the mental issues you go through, and part of that is you do recount. When I was telling the psychiatrist that the Department of Veteran Affairs put me onto about that and I said it was okay. And then he said, no, you've had significant trauma in your life. And I said, well, I didn't see it that way.
Speaker 3:My mum and dad, my real mother and my father had a really nasty divorce when I was six I reckon it was had to be six. They separated and I was put into a boarding school. We had no money, dad worked two jobs, we drove a cab at night and I was six going on, was put into a boarding school. We had no money, dad worked two jobs, we drove a cab at night and I was six going on. Seven, put into Ivanhoe Grammar School. My brother Wayne's, four years younger, but I don't know what happened to him. So, ivanhoe Grammar School. I obviously hated it and I would write to my mother how much I hated it.
Speaker 3:Then one night, in the middle of the night, I could hear. This woke up In the middle of the night I could hear this woke up and this match was struck in my face like a match, like old redhead matches. And this voice said Graham. And I knew straight away it was my mother. I said Mummy, she's picked me up out of the dormitory and basically abducted me. Stole you, stole me out of the dormitory. I don't know what. I've tried to ring, I've tried to contact the school to get hold of the history department to find out. You know what the records say about the next morning, imagine, there's a kid missing. So then we were on the run in different parts of Victoria and ended up at Dramana, down on the Mornington Peninsula. I had been to Warburton and places like that.
Speaker 3:She didn't have any money, she was a single mother. When I look back, you know it was a wild lifestyle for what was then in the 50s. She said look, I can't look after you anymore. You're going to have to go back to your father, which was terrifying for me because she used to say when I was naughty if you can't do that, I'll send you back to your father. Like, couldn't even tell dad where we were. He wasn't overly violent. There was domestic violence that I witnessed, of course, but he wasn't an overtly violent man, anyway. So she took me back to my grandmother. How much time have we got? That's a long story. As long as you like, okay. So she arranged for me to be handed over to my grandmother, my dad's mother. I was the favorite grandchild, I think. I didn't know much about my mother's. I didn't know my mother's mother because she died early. Just met briefly my mother's father.
Speaker 3:You know, handed over to my grandmother, who I loved and adored and who I thought loved and adored me. Flinders Street Railway Station. Late one night I was getting out of a cab. You know the goodbyes you know always love you Memories are made of. This will always be our song, the Dean Martin song. You know all those shake hands when you meet somebody, look them in the eye, the final instructions from my mother. And then my grandmother takes me out to this kid's home at Kew. I didn't know what it was, this place at Kew like an orphanage.
Speaker 3:So back into care Back into care. Well, I didn't know. I didn't really know what it was, and one of my mother's friends had given me a. They knew I was going to meet my little brother who had the scene for a while. Wayne, one of my mother's friends, had knitted a little beanie and a set of mittens for him. So when I got there, the matron took me into her room and he was in a cot in the matron's room.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 3:I put the mittens and the beanie on and they took me into the dormitory. I guess it was a dormitory. There must have been about a dozen other kids in it. The next morning little Wayne comes out in his dressing gown and his beanie on. We don't know how long Wayne has been there. He's scarred by that, but I was only there for a couple of weeks at the most. I remember going to school. I remember going to the school there and being a bit shy there. But then Dad rocked up in the 38 Studio Baker one day and we jumped in the car and drove to Adelaide. He decided to move to Adelaide. He'd met my stepmother and they had moved to Adelaide. He drove back, got us and we lived at Glenelg for three years and at Rinella. So it was a tough start, maybe tough start Maybe Tough start, but you know what?
Speaker 2:doesn't kill, you makes you stronger.
Speaker 3:We got fed. I don't know how my stepmother did it, because we were living in an easy built garage. We built this easy built garage on this block of land at Rinella Acre Avenue at Rinella. It's all built up now it's like a source of energy, but it was a 90 acre paddock with no water, no electricity, and she had my youngest brother, kim, who's 11 years younger than me, so we'd go to school, daddy'd go to work and she'd be stuck in this shed in the middle of this paddock with her little baby. But, you know, had geese and ducks and chickens and rabbits and grew vegetables, and not that I was any good at that Didn't hurt us.
Speaker 2:Still rocking that podcast with that radio chick, cheryl lee. I quite like graham's top 10. Let's have another one from it now.
Speaker 3:The who won't get fooled again and we'll be back to speak with graham corn shortly he went to school, had friends at school, played foot footy at Rinella under 14s and then I was able to go to Seacombe High School. We caught the bus down to Seacombe High School, which was sort of suburbia, so I was able to get a good education. You had to go to school and I was half smart. When I turned 16, dad said look, at the end of year 11, which was leaving, he came to me with this advert out of the paper for a job with the bhp as a trainee chemist, industrial chemist. He said you should take that because he's one of my. Teachers said look, he's smart at science and maths, which I wasn't that smart at, but anyway. So I interviewed for the job and job and left home at 16 and went to Wyola to work as a trainee chemist, which I wasn't very good at. But footy then opened up.
Speaker 2:That's where the footy came. Yeah, that's where the footy started.
Speaker 3:I played for Central Wyola, played the first year senior Colts, then into the A grade, and Harry Kernaghan was coaching South Wyola, the opposition team, and he introduced me to Glenelg, which was a whole new world, but that's another. And the rest is history, that's another long story, but they were the opportunities that you have.
Speaker 2:You were obviously smart enough to take the right opportunities. That's what it is.
Speaker 3:I mean, I think about it as a coach and someone who's now older. Can I give a younger person an opportunity? What opportunities? How can I make them better? As a football coach, you're always doing that?
Speaker 2:um, I was just lucky. I guess I was lucky, lucky and smart. You make your own luck, but you have your ups and downs.
Speaker 3:You know you make obviously make undisciplined decisions in your personal life. But it brings me to where I am now.
Speaker 2:That's right. Everything brings you to now, so it's all meant to be. I know it's meant to be thank you so much again, graham, for coming to crabtree studios and having a great old chat with conversations with cheryl today. We really appreciate it and we appreciate you being so open and letting us know about the man, the myth, the legend, uh I hope I haven't bored you, but thank you for having me.
Speaker 3:I see you running around at Glendale Games occasionally with that number 12 double coat on. I think that girl is too young to have seen me play.
Speaker 2:Oh, thank you, I'll take that.
Speaker 3:But it's quite flattering.
Speaker 2:You might be the only one left in existence, Graeme.
Speaker 3:Well, my daughter wants it.
Speaker 2:It's not for sale.
Speaker 3:Thanks again, good wants it. It's not for sale. Thanks again, you're good. Thanks, shirley. Thank you.
Speaker 2:We'll leave you with a beautiful version of you. Raise me up from graham's top 10 list. It's by josh groban. You're with shirley, that radio chick. Thank you so much for joining me on the still rocking it podcast. Hope to catch you again next time. Get out when you can support aussie music and I'll see you down the front.