Damien Fleming unplugged: Passion for music, his last tour to India and more

You’ve always been a bit of a maverick and were also in and out of the team. How did you fit into that hard-as-nails dressing-room?

The great thing about cricket is different personalities in the dressing room. I was someone who could provide a bit of humour I suppose. Sometimes intentional, sometimes unintentional. Just by being pretty sloppy.

That’s important that you have different personalities. You are travelling with 14 or 15 of your mates. It’s a whole lot of your life. You need to enjoy it. The boys reckoned I used to talk a lot of rubbish when I was playing but guess who is in the media now. Bad luck lads.

So how did you blend in? 

Dizzy (Jason Gillespie) and Kasper (Michael Kasprowicz) were very close because we are big hard-rock fans as well. That’s one thing I liked about India. India liked their rock. So you knew you can always buy rock CDs in India. I can go pretty heavy. Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax. I go as heavy as that. That would be the limit for probably Kasper and Dizzy. But you know ACDC, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Alice n Chains, they’re all a bit out there too.

How did the rest of the team deal with all the head-banging?

The only disagreement we had in the Australian dressing-room was what went on the rock box. We had the hard rock guys like Kasper, Dizzy and me. And the big little head-banger David Boon. Loved his Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin. Cause he is a legend. I gave him a Motley Crew CD, and we get a few plays out of it. Cause no-one wanted to take Boony on. But when he retired, I had no one. So they chucked them out.

Then we had the pretty-boy bands. Warnie (Shane Warne), he likes ABBA and Aqua, and Ricky Martin. Ricky Martin? Warnie really. Binga Brett Lee and Blewy (Greg Blewett) were the same. The worse thing is they all knew the dance moves to Backstreet Boys and all that. And we are going Jeez! It was near the end of Michael Slater’s career that I found a Britney Spears CD and I am not lying. And that was Mickey, you’re out mate. You can’t open the batting for Australia.

They were the worst ones?

They weren’t the worst. The worst were the country and western fans. Guys who liked Kenny Rogers and Johnny Denver, and an Australian guy called John Williamson, like Steve Waugh the captain. And that’s where you saw the guys who wanted to please their captain.

Like Justin Langer and Matthew Hayden and Gilchrist. They would act like they actually liked that music just to get the captain handy. So that was the only dissension in there.

So you weren’t listening to the same music as your captain?

I think that shortened my career. I had serious arguments with Steve Waugh, which we still have. There’s still a bit of friction. We play a little bit of golf together, and we’ve been partners, and we haven’t been winning. I reckon that our music dissension doesn’t help us gel as a team even now.

So did you ever get to play Megadeth in the dressing-room?

Yeah, yeah. We’d get set periods where we would get to put it on. Particularly, Warnie hates my music. His brother Jason loves my music. So he would be like you’re like my brother. For every Megadeth song or Metallica song from Ride the Lightning, you would hear I’m a Barbie Girl. And you’re like are you serious? Ricky Martin, the Macarena, what you doing? And you’re dancing to it? Seriously how about you get a few more runs? Then we would get Holy Wars on. Then we’d get Metallica on.

Nobody liked Pink Floyd?

No, Classic Rock. Aussie Rock we’d all come together. Midnight Oil, Hoodoo Gurus, Metal is Anything, INXS massive. Everyone would love Australian rock. Paul Kelly, big cricket fan. INXS, we would go backstage during shows. Music was actually a real force within the team.

England once won a Test and credited it to having listened to Johnny Cash’s Ring of Fire. How can you win a Test match listening to that?

I have no idea. My last ODI in India. I had bowled pretty well in this ODI series. It was 2001. I had got a few 2 or 3 for 30s. We got slogged a bit. We are about to go out and bowl. Warnie has Easy Lover on. Phil Collins. That’s the atheist of rock n roll. I said to John Buchanan, “John, you expect me to go out and be a fiery fast bowler, bounce Tendulkar and Ganguly & Co, and rip into them with Easy Lover in my ear?” I go out there, of course I get 0/60 of 10. Walk in, see John Buchanan, and all I say is, “Are you happy?” And walk away. That was my last ODI in India.

What did Buchanan like?

Buey was pretty happy if the team was happy. He would float everywhere. He didn’t mind a bit of banter. He didn’t mind a little bit of friction within the dressing-rooms. He thrived on them a bit. He would have meetings and pose questions. Mark Waugh would be asleep. The rest of us would listen.

Maybe he was writing his own tunes?

He might have been. He was a bit loopy Buey. Pink Floyd might have been up his alley. He was a little out there John.

What brought you fast bowlers together apart from metal music?

We call ourselves the fast bowling cartel. Obviously Glenn McGrath is the president. But the rest of us … James Sutherland an ex-fast bowler is the CEO of Cricket Australia, Tony Dodemaide Cricket Victoria, Kasper is on the Australian board. I am in the media. Dizzy is Yorkshire coach. We have an Indian brand ambassador as well. (Javagal) Srinath is an ICC match referee.

But what about the all-powerful N Srinivasan sitting there who’s never bowled…

He’s not part of the cartel.

But he owns everything….

Yeah at the moment yes. But the fast bowling cartel is sitting here, very well-poised boys. We are all set to strike.

There was something else too, apart from music and running the cartel?

We actually got a bit bored on the 2001 series in India. In Delhi, I think. We mixed mini golf with WWE. We called it Slam Punk Mania 2001. So we dressed up and we filmed it all. Just for the boys. But as you’d imagine, with the Indian people that were staying at the hotel, we ended up with a massive crowd thinking what the hell is going on. I was FFF. I’ll say that but I don’t want to say the rest. Dizzy was goofball Gillespie. And what was Kasper? He was the hooded avenger. He had a bit of a sock as an ally.

Your other memories from that 2001 tour. You just played the first Test in Mumbai.

I played the Test in Mumbai and we won to go 16 in a row, which is a record to this day. And guess what? They dropped Fleming and guess what happens to the streak? It stopped. I didn’t bowl very well in Mumbai. I got dropped and I was annoyed and that was the ‘infamous’ Kolkata Test when VVS and Rahul batted beautifully. And I remember, it was about early Day 4 and they had been batting for what seemed like a week. And it was hot and I was running out drinks to the poor bowlers. I saw a glimpse of myself in the mirror and I just thought, ‘Good one to miss Flem’.

You said you’ve always had a personality that likes to be left of centre.

I roomed with Mervyn Hughes for six years. I left school and got picked two weeks later at the age of 18. Nothing prepares you for that. No wonder my personality is slightly off the kilt. Because to room with Merv for six years and survive, one I deserve a medal, and two I am not going to come out normal. I blame it on Mervyn Hughes. Glenn was like Merv, a pest in the dressing room. He was always throwing forks and knives. He is a real wildlife person. I was always there as a bit of wingman if someone wants to go out for a bit of a beer.

How was your first night with Merv?

It was in Queensland. Tony Dodemaide and Michael Di Venuto wished me luck going up in the lift. I went what am I in for here? Going in there, he asked “What bed you want? Double or single?” I said single. And he went, “Oh gee you are good to room with”. And then he ended up putting his arm around me, and said mate you will be all right. We didn’t room together only one time in those six years, and we lost, so went back together.

And now you go around calling yourself the Bowlologist?

I was doing a bit of radio at that time. I remember a guy died, called Parry White. That didn’t mean much. His nickname was Ministry of Defence. I thought gee that’s good. I came up with bowlology. People struggled to say it. We started to have a lot more fun in the media, but had a serious assessment about fast bowlers and how to coach them. I think Wasim Akram is an idol and a bit of an influence. He could just bowl about every delivery there is in the coaching manual. In some ways, he is the Bowlologist Buddha. All the guys pray to Wasim every day. “Please give us little bit of your skill please”.

As bowlologist you have rewritten the cricket dictionary too?

We played this beach cricket series. Australia, New Zealand England, West Indies. Really good fun. Great way to play with legends like Viv Richards and Thommo and Dennis Lille and Richard Hadlee. I remember talking to sir Richard one night. About Geoff Boycott’s corridor of uncertainty. I can’t remember what exactly, but sir Richard wanted to ban that. Next day on ABC Radio he said I am going to ban it, let’s come up with some options. And so we came up with avenue of apprehension, snick street, and hallway of hesitation.

Based on Bowlology, is listening to hard rock essential to bowl fast?

Sometimes, especially for fast bowlers and this is in the bowlology handbook, you got to listen to hard rock. If you are going to bowl fast, you just got to rock. I used to have a pump-up tape and a mellow tape. Just if I was getting a little bit over. But mellow for me was ACDC or Pearl Jam.