Don never fails to impress

Whoever said that meeting your heroes can be a bad idea knew what they were talking about.

Over the years, I've been lucky enough to interview plenty of mine, and while most of them did not disappoint, a few of them did. I don't want to name names but I can think of three off the top of my head who were shockers.

There was the famous broadcaster who became incensed when I suggested that one of the network promos he fronted was gratuitous (I mean, really, what was his problem?).

There was the acclaimed director who, in a live radio interview promoting his new film, said: "I made it a while ago now and I'm kind of over talking about it."

And then there was the outwardly charismatic Wellington music star who turned out to be as interesting as a bag of frozen peas.

Someone who never disappoints, though, is Don McGlashan. In recent times, I've had a couple of interesting chats with the man who, before his solo career, gave us Blam Blam Blam, the Front Lawn and the Mutton Birds conversations in which he revealed interesting things about himself in the media for the first time.

The first was that he became a Quaker in London in the 1990s. It came up in a chat about Anzac Day. I asked him what he thought of the day, and he said he was a Quaker, and that he believed war was the worst thing people could do and peace was the best.

The cool part came when I asked, "So, how did you get to be a Quaker?" and he replied, "I've never talked about this before". If you want to get a journalist excited, get famous and then utter those fine words.

Don went on to explain that his wife discovered the movement when they were in Britain with the Mutton Birds. She spotted a sign outside a hall and went along to some meetings. He soon joined her, and they've been Quakers ever since.

The last time he gave me a scoop was a couple of weeks ago, in an interview about his Marvellous Year album tour, which brought him to Nelson on Sunday. We got on to the topic of the Front Lawn, the brilliant musical theatre group he and film-maker Harry Sinclair formed in the 1980s. I asked if there was any chance they might one day reunite in a professional sense. Don said there were plans for wait for it a feature film. He said Harry now lives in LA, and they had just finished working on the first draft of a script.

"Hopefully, we'll go into production with it in the next couple of years," he said.

"Does anyone else know about this?" I asked.

"I think you're the first I've told," Don said.

"I love you, Don," I thought.

By now many of you will be thinking, "Honestly, Lawrey who cares?". But I reckon you might be surprised by the answer to that question.

The Nelson School of Music auditorium was full of Don's fans on Sunday night, and they gave him a standing ovation after he and his band the Seven Sisters performed Anchor Me as their second encore. It was a great show, but one I nearly missed on account of completely over-reacting to the antics of our three-year-old.

Despite being repeatedly asked, our eldest boy would not sit down in his chair at dinner. I lost it and yelled at him he started crying, his baby brother started crying, and it is entirely possible that the neighbours' kids started crying, too I was that loud.

Despite apologies being exchanged, and cuddles and lots of kisses before bedtime, I still felt terrible, and going to a concert was the last thing I wanted to do. I told myself the tickets had probably sold out and, if they hadn't, all the good seats would be gone. The show started at 8pm.

At 7.40, I got a grip, kissed my wife goodnight, jumped on my bike and pedalled into town. At 7.55, I was sitting in the centre of the front row, drinking a beer. How Nelson is that?

- © Fairfax NZ News