Darwin vinyl collector in a lucky spin
Our intrepid hunter of old records has struck gold in various parts of North Australia . One is the above 1983 record described as Australia's best selling single , Australiana , packed with puns , by a joker with the stage name of Austen Tayshus , also known as the Merchant of Menace .
There is a worn sticker on the sleeve with a quirky warning that some of the language could be a record. The multi-talented performer is the American Jewish comedian Alexander Jacob Gutman, known as Sandy Gutman, brought to Sydney from New York , aged one, by his Polish parents in 1954.
He grew into a 6ft 6in comedian who usually fronted up in a black suit , wearing dark sunglasses. His 1983 Australiana single , filled with Aussie puns , such as "my mate Boomer rang " and " how much can a Koala bear? ", was top of the charts for 13 weeks, banned from playing on some radio stations ,there being a risque remark about a Cockatoo.
Briefly , he attended Sydney's Vaucluse High School, participated in cultural events in Israel, took part in the Yom Kippur War , gave up dentistry ,became a film- maker, worked for the ABC.
In 1990 he moved to Los Angeles furthering his successful career in comedy , movies and film- making , exposing the Yanks to Australiana along the way.
Returning to Australia, he resumed his active life , causing a sensation when in 1998 he won a Topfest award for a film, Intolerance, which he entered under the name of a fictitious feminist filmmaker , Laura Feinstein.
How much more can you bear reading about this bloke's creative life in the nation's rapidly vanishing eucalypt forests ?
Chew on this . In 2010 he stood for election to the House of Representatives as an Australian Sex Party candidate against Tony Abbott ,Liberal Party Leader. Later, he ran for the Outdoor Recreation Party in the NSW state election against Barry O'Farrell .
In 1999, he participated in a television series, Aussie Jokers, produced and directed by Paul Fenech for SBS TV. His segment was an historical journey about his father's Holocaust experiences in Poland from his hometown of Łódź to the death camp Treblinka to his rescue from Bergen Belsen. An emotional and deeply moving double header tracing Isaac Gutmans’ life from 1939-1945, when most of his family was murdered by the Germans just for being Jewish. The documentary has been shown several times on SBS and is available on YouTube.
Other singles he cut had titles such as Phantom Shuffle, The Pope Down Under, Put Down That Stubbie, Alive and Shticking . Aussie football codes received the same kind of treatment, also in a television comedy performance .
The Austen Tayshus record ,displayed here , belonged to an Australian woman in North Queensland , who travelled the American music trail , her story , hopefully , to appear in this blog .
The Austen Tayshus website states he can be booked for a wide range of events, including corporate functions, bar mitzvahs... circumcisions .
