How being in a band helped me form lasting friendships

Luke Bartolo is a musician, writer and specialist learning and support high-school teacher who lives in Western Sydney.

At a time of life when men can find their social circles diminishing, Luke credits the years he spent playing in bands and being part of the live music scene with helping him form long-lasting friendships and pursue positive creative projects outside his work as a teacher.

"[My friend] Colden lives five doors down from me now and we still do things together," he tells ABC Everyday. "That wouldn't be the case if we hadn't played in a couple of bands together in our 20s."

These are Luke's words.

The days of the old schoolyard

I met Colden Locke in year 5 when I started at a new school. 

I'd just moved house and we lived across the road from the school and I met Colden in class and we became friends. I don't even know if we had shared interests at that time, but we just sort of hung out, went bike-riding around the neighbourhood.

At the end of year 10, he left and got a trade and I changed schools, so I moved away from all my friends.

I wanted to keep connected with them and they were all getting into music and didn't know anyone who could play the drums, so I said, "Oh, I'll learn how to play the drums."

I got a drum kit for my 16th birthday and started getting lessons, and I did that just so I could stay connected with my old friends — and it worked out.

It was the mid-'90s and it was all about … Nirvana and before that it had been Guns N' Roses. We had other close friends who already had a school-based band and I guess we looked at that and went, "We should do a band."

Banding together and drifting apart

That band became The Shenanigans and by the time we were playing, we were all over 18, so we could start playing shows at bars.

There was a pub in Katoomba called Hotel Gearin, which later became owned by the actor Jack Thompson (now it's not a pub at all). We used to play there and put shows on there — it was maybe the least-attended pub in Katoomba, so they were quite happy to have us.

The Shenanigans eventually broke up, but I think breaking the band up … helped to preserve my friendships with everyone.

We talked about this afterwards, because I stayed friends with them and saw them regularly, and I said, "I don't think we'd still be friends if we had stayed in the band with the way that it was at that point in time", because we weren't all necessarily pulling in the same direction.

I played bass in a couple of bands and drums in another band after that, and then I gave Colden a call and said, "Do you want to be in a band again, play bass again?" And he was keen.

That band was called the Bernie Lomax 5 and we played for about five years and recorded pretty much every song we wrote, but we just sort of stopped playing.

I blinked and I was 40

About 10 years ago, my wife and I bought a house in the Penrith area and it just happened to be five doors down from where Colden lives, so I see him regularly.

I'll walk up to his house and every time we walk past his house my two-year-old son wants to go in there and pat his dogs. We're both in our early to mid-40s now and are still fairly close.

I think I blinked one day and suddenly I was in my 40s. Recently I was wondering what happened to all these people I used to know.

I started a Facebook group about bands from Western Sydney and the surrounds and it had around 100 people at first, just people I'd invited to it, and then something happened ... and in the last couple of weeks, it's gone up to 550 people.

It's really cool because all these people are getting on there and sharing information.  

Keeping the creative side of us alive

My mate Colden, he's on [the Facebook page], of course, and he said, "Let's do a podcast."

I have always wanted to do a podcast. I don't have the technological know-how, but Colden's daughter, Ava, is a podcaster and she's going to produce it for us.

It's our friendship continuing because we have that shared connection in music and we're just going to talk about some of our favourite bands and share some of the archival material which people probably haven't heard or seen for ages.

It lets us be ourselves a little bit and not just Luke the teacher or Colden the draftsman.