You Am I ProfileYou Am I’s Davey Lane has shared a lovely story after a surprise reunion with Jude, an individual who was inside a detention centre in 2004.
In a post shared to You Am I’s social media pages on Wednesday (28 October), Lane explained that last week, upon flying to Brisbane to play at The Tivoli, the band was struck with a significant setback: two of their ensemble string players could no longer make it due to illness, and their pre-arranged transportation was cancelled. So, he booked a “contingency Uber.”
Jude picked him up. Lane wrote that chatter with Uber drivers often goes to music, as he’s often lugging guitar cases in the boot. He told Jude he was in a band called You Am I, a statement that can be met with “tumbleweeds,” “never heard of ya mate,” or a question about whether he likes Foo Fighters. Jude said something different: “I’ve met you before.”
Lane went down memory lane, explaining that in 2004, You Am I visited the Port Hedland Detention Centre during a tour of regional Western Australia, with the hope of “providing some light entertainment and a wee lil distraction for the inmates.”
“To say it was one of the more overwhelming experiences of my life to that point was to put it mildly,” Lane wrote. “It was so for my infinitely more worldly, learned older brothers let alone this naive, terrified 23-year-old.”
He continued, “Horribly conflicting feelings, meeting gentle, intelligent, thoughtful kind people detained (some for years on end) for fleeing their war-torn homes in hope of finding a skerrick of the ‘luck’ this country seems to love tooting its horn about.
“Frustration. Anger, disgust and guilt (especially) vastly overrode any good we may have felt for going in with gifts of snacks and busking our songs (some of them sad songs, though they DO say so much) for these people who could hear just metres away the lapping of waves from the ocean that they were never allowed to see let alone wade in.”
Lane added that Jude was in the detention centre that day. At their reunion, Jude told Lane he'd been there for five years and said he remembered the guitarist, who was “much younger and much shyer.”
“We discussed his time in there, and how his background in tech allowed him to use something infrared to connect a mobile phone via laptop to the internet (an explanation that went right over this luddite’s head), allowing the inmates to communicate with the outside world - relaying photographic evidence of the conditions of their incarceration and communicating with their loved ones,” Lane shared.
His post continued, “He married in detention and moved to Melbourne after his release in 2005, and now has two kids and is driving whilst following his trajectory as a life coach.”
Noting that Jude outlined his “aversion to social media of any kind,” Lane wrote that he’s aware his friend might never see the post, but said he was “sooooo incredibly grateful to have met him again” and witness his “enduring wisdom, resilience and optimism through everything he’d endured. A small semblance of a happy ending and a huge dollop of much needed real life perspective.”
Lane concluded the post by noting that he’s recently experienced a “wobbly couple of months” and, early last week, had a dream “with the fully formed thought that everything that happens in my life moving forward will be soulful, enlightening and nourishing. Positivity or delusion?”
He doesn’t know if maybe it’s both, but for now, he’s content. “Boy, did the cosmos tap me on the shoulder and deliver Thursday morning,” Lane wrote. “Thank you, Jude.”
Check out the post and a picture of their reunion below.
You Am I are currently touring across the country celebrating 30 years of their seminal record, Hourly Daily.
For the Strung Up tour, the ARIA Hall of Famers will be joined by a string quartet to reimagine their songs in a spectacular, ambitious new light. The Hourly Daily tracks will be brought to life in a remarkable new fashion – with orchestral takes – along with selections from across their incredible career.
Following last week’s shows in Brisbane, You Am I conclude the run in Melbourne next week. Tickets are now available.
