Doctor Rock Bio, Somewhat abridged, Incomplete and UnSpellchecked

The Axiom. Doctor Rock is possibly the worlds first Private Investigating Network Consultant, System Administrator, Underground Rock Drummer, Photographer, Classic Car Enthusiast, and commentator on the state and nature of reality and fate itself. This website is his final stronghold from where he can observe, research and publish his conclusions on anything that takes his fancy.

This Doctor Rock was born on October 22nd 1962, the first official day of the Cuban Missile Crisis. He was being slapped on the arse probably at the same moment as Kennedy was announcing to the world that it was on the brink of nuclear devastation.
  Raised in the small colonial town of East Maitland he was committed to the government education system. First East Maitland Primary School thence to Maitland Boys High School, a cultural and philosophical vacuum with few aspirations towards even education. Where corporal punishment by the cane and butter paddle was a daily occurrence that could only endured, seldom avoided.
  Cohabitating a room with his brother, 10 years his senior, was woken up every morning to solid blues coming from Ken's huge first generation cassette tape recorder. Blues was indeed the only thing that his brother would class as music.
  Fortunately for The Doc his brother somewhat compromised his criteria for what constituted blues to include Led Zepplin, Black Sabbath, Early Jethro Tull and similar classic rock of the sixties and seventies. It seemed to imprint.
 

Doctor Rock with first percussion instrument 1978

Suffering severely at high school from the stigma of being a withdrawn dorky looking red headed boy with glasses, and being prone to inappropriate verbose assertions and silent insubordination to his teachers and increasingly antagonistic fellow students, and with no hope for reprieve for at least four years The Doc undertook his first bold politico/philosophical move. Using the current labor model seen everywhere at that time of protest and union strike action, he effectively went "on strike" at school.
  The Doc refused to do any form of schoolwork unless he felt it was of some entertainment or value to himself. Essays and compositions of a bizarre and generally inappropriate nature began to be handed in to teachers sporadically, crafted to the amusement of The Doc rather than the requirements of the establishment.
  Frequent caneings for lack of work in the beginning soon subsided as teachers and masters realized that they were now ineffectual against The Doc and only drew attention to his silent protest, which the establishment certainly didn't want any other students to see and The Doc being so isolated from the student population had no intention of telling them of the actual effectiveness of his methodology. In spite of this he managed to stay in the top science class at least.
  As soon as his legal obligations were dispensed with at 16, The Doc ventured out into the world to gainful employment at the astonishing rates of pay in the unskilled labor force of seventy dollars per week.
Finding he had some aptitude for driving the 1957 Morris Minor that had been in the family for untold years, and when his income had increased to the point that he could get a loan, The Doc purchased his first own car, a 2300 dollar Mk3 Austin Healy Sprite in tragic but serviceable condition.
 

Mk III Sprite, feared no man.

After one particularly competitive road rally with another Sprite to Sydney via the twisty but largely unused "Old Highway", and discovering that the rear end differential had shifted several centimeters to the left due to the forces exerted upon the rusted rear chassis of the Sprite, he decided to strip that Sprite and another wrecked Sprite to the ground and rebuild one Super Sprite from the two, finding in the course that he had some considerable aptitude for mechanics and performance engine tuning.
  The combination of The Doc and this new Sprite (which in his words "feared no man") struck fear into the hearts of the local inhabitants of East Maitland as it was hurled around the back streets and challenging country roads of the district at all times of the day and night.
  At this stage he was 18 and of legal drinking age, which he discovered he had some considerable aptitude for. Skulling triple scotch straight at the counter of The George an Dragon Tavern before the bar man had time to get his change became a hobby for which he began to gain notoriety even amongst the most antagonistic members of East Maitland society in the early 1980's
  Some notable instances of over indulgence saw small crowds of onlookers staying behind after the movie at the local drivin theater had ended just to watch The Doc perform a series of bizarre and amusing activities, often to parody the state of the nation and the human condition in general and usually concluding in extensive vomiting around the vicinity of the cars he was traveling in, at least until he could be contained to a point that he could be transported to other venues for the evening. But his tales of mystery and imagination during these periods became items of localized legend.   Intuitive pundits of the time were already touting Doctor Rock as having potentially good prospects in the field of unemployment.   Nineteen saw the Doc leave the Maitland region, (where it has been well said that nothing interesting had happened since the 1955 flood), for the big city lights of Newcastle 30 minutes down the highway. Lodging in proletariat conditions with fellow workers from the Industrial Radiography profession who also tended to be bikers. His time was now consumed with crawling around the top of power stations and the bottom of mining establishments carrying nuclear materials for six dollars an hour, and being pillioned on the back of Ducatti 900 SD's to the strangest biker events at Bathurst where he was permitted to participate in riots against the police and anything with 4 wheels.
  And still under these conditions the Doc earned respect for a limited set of 4 wheeled vehicles from the bikers, with his rambunctious demonstrations of the capabilities of the Austin Healy Sprite and Mini Coopers.
But the lure of unemployment loomed large on the imagination, and with increasing dissilusionment with the high casualty rates in the heavy industries and insane working hours (not to mention the absurdly low rate of pay), the Doc continually looked toward more Bohemian lifestyles.
  Rock began to find, through no particular fault of his own, that he was associating more and more with professional local musicians and Dj's, mainly in the pursuit of more drugs. In this new world he saw there was another existence that was completely alien to him, there were no nuclear materials, no fearfully claustrophobic anhydrous ammonia tankers to be locked in all day testing, no insanely high structures with little or no safety that had to be scaled carrying tonnes of xray equipment. There were actually another form of human beings, women (whom he found to be most appealing) and a far more prolific supply of drugs.
The key factor to the bountiful world, so near but yet so far, seemed to him to be unemployment.   With ever increasing downturn in the federal economy and after a long overdue run in with the traffic authorities and subsequent suspension of drivers license for 6 months) the element of choice disappeared and the Doc was thrust headlong into the deep end of unemployment.   Unemployed and moving from house to house living Musicians, Actors, Philosophers and Beat Poets. Sampling their drugs, their ideals, their attitudes and their means and motives the Doc still found the rewards of chronic unemployment were not flowing on to him. He was still an outsider, no one knew or respected him but for his weird tolerance for different lifestyles and behaviors and his tendency towards strange observations and statements of an unruly nature. And women too still avoided him as if he still smelled of kerosene from back in the industries.   Perhaps Music itself was an answer, he thought, and proceeded to sneak behind certain musicians drum kits and hammer out some beats. Something the musicians of the time found, to their dismay and disbelief, he had some considerable aptitude for.
  Being yelled at by disgruntal drummers (who never liked anyone touching their kits) got too much for the Doc, so he sold his camera equipment bought with the money paid to him in the heavy industries and was ripped off for a second hand drum kit, a 20 year old Hayman kit (though the old series matching Zildjian cymbals really did make up for it). Armed with this new weapon of mass destruction he was able to practice and by 1986 had fallen into several bands and began to play in a somewhat professional situation with The Red Room.
 

The Red Room. "Don't play gigs where you have to hire the PA, do all the buging in and out, collect money at the door and still have to play support".

The Red Room was an oddly conceived 3 piece band, playing often to unruly mobs under insufferable conditions. This is where, by accident, the Doc discovered an un-before known talent for throwing drum sticks with uncanny accuracy. At first mainly gravitating towards Matt the bass player but in time being able to be targeted at audience members within the first 3 rows at average distance from the stage.
  As a 3 piece in those times provided them with being cheap, easily intimidated and quick to bug off stage, a marketing strategy that saw them used as a substitute for a support band during the year of 1986.
  The work of The Red Room met with universal apathy for a year or so till the other two members disappeared, where to is still something of a mystery to the Doc.
 

"I've done my bit for the country, I worked on Bream B and Tuna Mackerill oil platforms now pumping millions of petro dollars into the country, so don't hassle me man untill you've contributed as much to the GNP!"

1987 to 1990 saw the Doc in something of a hiatus as he recovered from an alarming bout with employment on the oil rigs under construction and a nasty instance of computer programming, something some say he never quite recovered from.
  Watching The Gulf War proved too much for the Doc to take, and he was forced into the awareness of a need to play more music, but alas he had sold his drums.
 

Go Ask Alice or If a band plays in a pub, and there is no one there to hear it, does it make any sound.

Early 1991 one Saturday morning the Doc finding himself with 300 dollars and no immediate bills to pay, decided to look in the for sale page of a local newspaper, just out of curiosity. He found in the musical instruments section one, and one only drum kit, which also happened to be priced at 300 dollars to add to the synchronicity. He went to check out the instrument and found it to be a crappy kit befitting it's dollar value but serviceable none the less. He purchased it on the spot.
  Upon arriving back home he was greeted by a band tuning up in one of the rooms preparing for a recording session in Dave Garners bedroom/recording studio, the Brunker Road house. They needed drums for the session so Rock volunteered with the caveat that he had not played drums for some considerable time. This band ended up being Go Ask Alice, A 4ish piece playing unpopular rock, yet again.
  Go Ask Alice played many times at all the usual local pubs, mainly supporting but with somewhat more support than the Red Room.
 

Nick Patey and the Oxygen Thieves, it is possible for a singer to drink too much.

Nick Patey, notorious local beat poet, Ma in English lit and guitarist then showed up on the Brunker Road scene needing a bass player and drummer for his latest band project. He formed Nick Patey and the Oxygen Thieves, a three piece with bass player and the Doc from Go Ask Alice.
 

The Flesh Flowers, no not Fresh Flowers, Flesh Flowers. F-L-E-S-H Flowers

Then yet another band fractured off the Brunker Road residence, The Flesh Flowers, also with Doctor Rock Drumming and also predominantly playing support.
  This situation would often result in the Doc playing at the same venue in 3 different bands in 1 night, at this stage he had lost track of whether he was playing support or headline or even at all.
 

All mediocre things must come to an end.

Nick Patey and the Oxygen thieves broke up, only to reform with a new drummer with a more impressive looking drum kit and better technique. They then played a couple of gigs and disappeared into oblivion.
  Flesh Flowers and Go Ask Alice evolved into the same band eventually due to logistical reasons more than anything, 1 band being easier to transport than 2, and played around town till 1997.
 

Everything old is new again. "They wanted us to play, but they never wanted to insult our artistic sensibilities by offering us any actual payment".

Thats about the story then in a nutshell, so far. Hopefully there will be an audience out there somewhere for the new incarnation of Go Ask Alice that is occasionally contemplated.
  Doctor Rock is currently unemployed with no money or assets of his own and no apparent future income. Though with nothing left to lose has the strength of character that comes only with being almost totally outside conventional corporate society. So please don't expend too much effort trying to sue him for anything.
He is currently drinking far less and undertaking the task of constructing this web site due to extreme boredom, also reducing his intake of prescription medications much to the dismay of his private brain care specialist and the Upjohn Pharmaceuticals corporation.