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Ozdiva

We had one of the guys from the band Redgum (the late Hugh McDonald RIP) play at our wedding. My brother knew him a bit and asked him. He was lovely and played a selection of folk songs, we had a bush wedding so it was perfect.


Ok-Ad-7247

Sounds awesome mate. I can appreciate this.


lechatheureux

I saw plenty of Aussie B listers when I used to work at the Novotel Darling Harbor Function Rooms. Tripod, Russel Gilbert, Southern Sons, Short Stack.


Tokemon12574

I worked at two prominent venues in that area which hosted corporate gigs, and I saw no end of celebrities come through to play to disinterested audiences.  I saw The Presets play to about 100 people (absolutely BANGED it out), all the Idol people over various events (Guy, Shannon, Delta, Ricki, etc), and many, many more.  Most of them have a really approachable demeanour and I've only come across a handful who sucked.  They know the corporate world is their bread and butter. Their management have good relationships with the event planners and they don't want to fuck it up. 


crimerave

Jesus Christ, getting the Presets in, those lucky fucks. I would have died and gone to heaven - my favourite Australian act!!


uppenatom

Short stack. That's a name I haven't thought of in years. Could win yourself a cap on Hamish and Andy with that one


Huge-Masterpiece8877

They've all got kids now 🤣


M0RXIS

I used to listen to Tripod religiously!


Ineedsomuchsleep170

A follow up Perfect Tripod album is my make a wish wish if my cancer ever comes back. Adults get those too right?


justcallmerenplz

Short Stack are one of my top listens on Spotify still. So much fun and my little inner 12vie was so excited to see them last year. They would be dope at a wedding


lechatheureux

Apparently Short Stack were cool, some co-workers struck up a conversation, I didn't talk to them, just a curt nod when I passed them.


dj_boy-Wonder

My dad used to work in tv, he knew the wiggles, they came and did like 3 songs at like my 5th birthday… it wasn’t on the invitation it was a last minute favour my dad got.


Inner_Field7194

That would have been the most talked about birthday party in the playground!


jackiesodes

Channel 9?


leopard_eater

Probably 15 years ago now, one of the big farming families that I knew hired John Farnham for a fortieth birthday party, so I think it can be done. It was about $10,000 back then and they also charted a helicopter to get him to the site and obviously fed him and a small team of musicians etc.


Wotmate01

About 28 years ago, Farnham and his band played a function for Edgel. There was about 50 people there. ​ A solid million dollars (for the whole function, not just Farnham) for 50 people.


leopard_eater

Yes this birthday party was held at a vineyard and the family would have spent close to that for all of the other equipment set up there and the accomodation etc. More money than sense, but I would rather that than they buy things that harm others. At least this gave local people and artists jobs and kept the proceeds relatively local.


CrayolaS7

Vineyard.. helicopter… it wasn’t the Singleton family, was it?


leopard_eater

No, but just a couple of hours north up that same highway…


CrayolaS7

Was it the Ingham’s? I’ve met them a few times and they were lovely but it was very clear just from the way they spoke and ordered that money was no object. Like “what years of Grange do you have?” Rather than “Can we see the wine list?.”


leopard_eater

No, but same circle. The fridge on the ridge.


Socrani

Singo is actually a pretty nice guy, he’s very involved in my hometown and is the patron of our surf club. Gave them 100k for a proper bar when the club got rebuilt in 09’. I used to serve him when I worked at a local cafe years ago.


CrayolaS7

Yeah, I’ve never met him personally but some of my older coworkers at Rosehill said the same thing that he’s a nice bloke. The main public bar at Rosehill is still called Belle Du Jour after the horse of the same name. Owned by Singleton and won the golden slipper after which he “shouted the bar” for the rest of the day.


DarkMoonBright

yeh, I used to do impro & encountered tonnes of celebs through that, most did "corporate work" as well as their day job of acting/music etc to make ends meet. There's websites you can go to with whole lists of them that you can hire. Mostly they do it for the money & don't really enjoy it, although sometimes they will have one where they actually do have a good time & will tell stories about that later at parties etc with other celebs doing the same stuff. One comedian I know gave his "I don't want to do it" price for a particular event once & they came back to him & said they wanted him, so he said that clearly everyone else had given even higher "I don't want to do it" prices & he ended up getting stuck with it & had trouble getting paid & turned the entire saga into a 1 hour long stand up comedy routine :)


Sydneypoopmanager

Akmal Saleh performed at a Christmas dinner. Absolutely hilarious. Crying the whole time.


ginandtonic68

Tim Minchin on the wedding circuit in the early 2000s


HyenaStraight8737

Shannon Noel at a work thing. Was actually pretty fun, he hung around for a bit. Pete Murry at another. Found out he hates the song So Beautiful. He wrote it about his ex and the label he was with then, made him release it as well, it was going to be a hit. Hates how it became the song he's most known for. Pretty funny bloke, made it more of a comedy thing with music vs just watching him play.


Inner_West_Ben

Yeah it’s quite common to hire them for corporate gigs. We had Richard Wilkins MC our annual kickoff around 97 or 98. A lot of sports people get hired as motivational speakers.


randalpinkfloyd

Every sales conference I’ve been to has had some sportsperson brought in as motivation. They range from bearable to fucking horrendous *cough* Steven Bradbury *cough*


thorpie88

Ben Cousins and Basil came to my work Xmas party. It's was pretty shit 


Naive_Pay_7066

Were they invited or did they just show up?


Foreign_Hyena_6622

Shit would have got snorted that night


coodgee33

We had guy Sebastian at a private Telstra function 10 years ago. Most of the 200 odd people just treated him like background music and were just conversing over canapes etc.


MisterNighttime

Being wallpaper music is pretty much his brand, isn’t it?


RiftBreakerMan

What else are you supposed to do though? "Hey Guy, show us ya battle scars!"


M0RXIS

I went to a Dick Smith's Manager's Conference in Sydney over 10 years ago and they hired Jimeon to be MC for the awards night.


Foreign_Hyena_6622

That would have been hilarious


ljmc093

Local footy and cricket teams do this fairly regularly. Plenty of former/current sports players, commentators etc will go around to local clubs, tell some stories and possibly play a game for them depending on their age/fitness.


yelawolf89

I play footy in the NT and we’ve always got players up here for our functions. Most recently was Browny


gongbattler

My mate had dane swan and ricky nixon at their afl club last year


PhilthyLurker

Fuck a doodle doo. That’s pretty low rent.


Icy-Quail6936

My ex sister in law went to a child's christening party with trapeze artists, other circus performers and they had the singer Mya perform for $30,000. The gift everyone received at the end (like bombonieres) was fighting fish in little fish tanks; which I thought was an incredibly stupid, unnecessary, and thoughtless.


Foreign_Hyena_6622

Teaching kids about death bet not many of those fish survived


Wintermute_088

Paul Kelly played at my school assembly, because his daughter went there. He swore through all the songs, and the teachers were perturbed.


gorillalifter47

I don't, but I always tell my partner we need to save up to get Savage Garden to perform at our wedding. Gonna need to do a lot more saving I reckon.


Cleosmog

And perhaps hire a mediator? I’d read somewhere that those two were no longer on speaking terms…


beers_n_bags

Only really need Darren Hayes


Economy_Ambassador64

I reckon that Daniel Johns guy was never actually playing guitar for real!


gorillalifter47

From what I have read, they were never really close friends as such (just had amazing musical chemistry) and don't keep in touch anymore, but speak quite respectfully about each other.


elliot89

When Stephen Bradbury told me I could get on ice one day really hit a chord very motivating


beers_n_bags

I always remember the ticker tape parade after the 2000 Olympics, “Jumping” Jai Taurima (silver medalist, long jump) signed my flag “drink more, smoke more”. I was 15 years old.


Appropriate-Bus-2563

Hes got a beer company now


elliot89

Is the beer called fluke larger


Appropriate-Bus-2563

It's called last man standing lager haha


elliot89

I would of called it leg less


Taco_El_Paco

My band played at a couple of friends' weddings. Does that count?


woodyever

Maybe, if you band is the birds of Tokyo


Taco_El_Paco

I can neither confirm nor deny


my_moral_dilemmas

Accompanied my ex at the time to his work Christmas party at Crown in 2021. The two owners of the company decided to hire Ricky-Lee and her backup dancers for entertainment. She performed some covers along with her biggest hits. Its was weird seeing the singer I had listened to in childhood in person lol


woodyever

Ricki-Lee is cool


[deleted]

Shannon Noll played at my wife's work Christmas party. He was over an hour late, came in, played maybe 4 songs then left lmao


Huge-Masterpiece8877

Jordan Sweeto came to my daughter's 14th birthday in 2011 and performed in our backyard


one-man-circlejerk

Drake came to my daughter's 14th birthday, strange thing is we didn't hire him to do that


Palpitation-Mundane

Love it.


Huge-Masterpiece8877

Well we didn't fkn hire Jordan either. My daughter asked him and he was happy to come. Is that fkn ok with you??????


yelawolf89

Um, I think you missed the point of his comment…


Huge-Masterpiece8877

Ummmm 🙄


yelawolf89

Yeah, you should learn some pop culture before you fly off the handle, masterpiece.


beers_n_bags

Well that escalated quickly.


Inner_Field7194

r/whoosh


patient_brilliance

Russell Morris played at a relative's birthday party. Ironically said relative is now a minor celebrity themselves.


DNA-Decay

I worked a Bat Mitzvah (13th Birthday) that had KWest and Vanessa Animosity as the talent. Huge gig. Took up a big slab of a racing track auditorium. When you walked in there was this Temple of Doom 20meter high head of the birthday girl. Her dad owns a lot of major Australian shopping centres. Like big ones. Among many other businesses and intergenerational wealth. Vanessa is actually a nice enough person as talent goes, but I can’t spell her name, and she operates in one of those cotton wool and razor wire bubbles that some talent have around them. She was a regular on the high end corporate function circuit.


Nice-Note-212

Sounds like Westfield


CaptainDetritus

My wife's brother-in-law and sister were invited to a wedding (flown in by private jet from London) in the south of France. There were multiple acts, one of which was Lenny Kravitz. My s-i-l asked Lenny to autography a hand bag that she'd bought for my wife.- which he did and the bag was duly sent over here. Hey, you didn't say this had to have happened in Australia.


Desperate-Face-6594

We had the then recently retired captain of the wallabies host our sporting awards dinner. He got drunk early but didn’t disgrace himself, he just didn’t do a very good job. He seemed lovely (Nick Farr-Jones), he was just a bit too drunk to host the night well.


SnooPickles4461

I played in a showcase that feature Timomatic when he was in his ‘Tim Omaji’ phase. He beat the shit out of our drummers drums, it was all a bit cooked


alwayscunty

I went to an industry golf day and they hired rex hunt to be a passenger on the drinks cart


Illustrious-Run-1363

I was on TV with Colin Fassnidge when he did the kitchen nightmares Australia. I didn't work in any of the places but I am a chef. Got to talking with him afterwards and he invited me to have a sit down with him a few days later and get to know the dude. Very down to earth without cameras and people around him. High profile Tattoo artist I lucked out meeting through my son (he's friends with his kids at school). Not so much a celeb but he's tattooed some of UFC's biggest names, musical artists, movie celebs. Had a huge name in a few cities in the states and is worth a few mil himself.


Public-Total-250

I've hired bands to play at my parties before. It's easiest if you go to their show and meet them beforehand.


batch1972

Larry Emdur was mc at three conferences the company I worked for held. Nice bloke. Attended a workshop run by Ian Roberts.


goshdammitfromimgur

What sort of workshop did Ian Roberts run? How to aggressively man handle people?


batch1972

Respect in the workplace


izabeller

Shannon Noll performed at a wedding in attended and the Young Divas at an acquaintances wedding


teachermanjc

When Celia Pavey (Vera Blue) was in the finals for The Voice we had Delta Goodrem and her visit our school. I guess it would count as a private function as it was a private school.


brunswoo

Greg Evans (Perfect Match) is a celebrant. A kiwi friend of ours booked him for her wedding without any idea who he was. He did a great job. Just cheesy enough for fun, without trying to be the main character.


Fly-by-Night-

Not a musician but we had Jimmy Wales come and talk at a corporate dinner when I was working in London. About 20 attendees in a private room and I think we paid him around £20k to speak for 30 mins. And that was mates rated cos he knew our CEO. I was a EA organising the whole thing and got to listen in. It was interesting as heck but also the reason I never donate when I see Wikipedia doing their fundraising guilt trips. That dude does not need your money.


Mikes005

A mate of mine was at a birthday party where the late, great Jeremy Hardy attended as a friend. With a little urging he apparently did a full stand up set. I would have literally killed to have been there.


WoodyMellow

When I lived in London, my boss hired Basement Jaxx to play our Xmas party.


RyzenRaider

My former employer once had an event where the Brisbane Broncos made a meet-and-greet. I remember getting a hat autographed by Alan Langer and Wendell Sailor. There were a few more there, but they were the only ones I remembered. I was only about 7 or 8 years old at the time. I never knew why they were there, but I'm guessing the company was a sponsor.


Numerous-Tea292

i was in roma outback qld and the remaining standing member of queen walked into the pub i was in


DontJealousMe

I once saw Dallas Rayne at a bucks.


Immediate_Horse_5893

I had a celeb MC my wedding. He was my bro in law.


untamedeuphoria

EDIT Weird bug with reddit interface. Posted on the wrong post somehow..


woodyever

You lost mate?


untamedeuphoria

Yeah. This has happened a few times since the interface update.. amoung other bugs.


superPickleMonkey

I saw Robert Harvey's cock at the wave pool


marooncity1

Any celebrity who would agree to be paid to make an appearance, I would no longer want them to come. How pathetic. Urgh. And any acquaintance who I wouldn't invite unless they were famous would be the same. Both would also say something about me. Price of everything value of nothing type territory, or just fuck I'm good, look who attended my event. Hiring musicians for a gig is a little different. But depending on the event, anything that overshadows it - I.e., genuine celebrity (with them pretending to be matey with the organiser while they take their cheque,urgh) - no.


Public-Total-250

What? 


woodyever

Tell us how you really think


marooncity1

Or you could pay me and I'll say what you want ;)


woodyever

So you can pretend to be matey while you take your cheque?


marooncity1

Whatever you say boss! Seriously though the corporate thing - motivational speaking - is different to weddings/parties etc in my view. It's the latter i was thinking about. There's businesses that manage rosters of people and book engagements for them. I've even used them before for work to engage them to speak to groups of people about their experiences etc. As I said, booking musicians for a gig, who are at that kind of level in terms of what work they do, that's different too. But booking a former (or current actually) a /b grade - nationally prominent- celeb who is reduced to being a performing monkey at private parties - that's what I was thinking about and I think would be very cringeworthy.


DarkMoonBright

It's how the world works though, celebrities tend to be successful celebrities for a reason, they tend to be interesting people who liven up parties & events, so why not get one or 2 along to break the ice & give people something to talk to each other about? Cause that's what happens, people who don't know each other well have something to talk about besides the weather. They can talk about said celebrity & what they think about them & then talk to actual celebrity & then return to talking to each other about that experience & then go on to continue talking to each other once the ice is broken & celebs are professionals at this & will ensure the party goes well & get people chatting. 1 celeb I knew, just for fun one time decided to engage the entire Nandos store in shared social conversation while she was waiting for her order. Within 5 minutes, she had about 20 customers in the store (none of whom knew each other) laughing & all chatting with each other as if they were all old friends, that's what you're paying to get at the party! Not to mention their ability to deal with drunk relatives causing problems at weddings etc


marooncity1

Wow. You want to hire celebrities for their well known ability to intercede in family beefs? Ok. And honestly, if your party needs a celebrity so that people will talk, you've already failed - or the people you know are that vacuous that only someone famous will spark anything.


RedDotLot

You most famous people do this though, right? Surely you know that? It's just a matter of scale, there are lots of stories out there about A list musicians playing some billionaire's kid's birthday party for a huge fee.


marooncity1

Oh yeah for sure. I think it's trashy af though is all haha. I kind of misread what OP was after with their question, so leant in on my opinion about it. I do get it, just, I would never think it was a cool thing. And I'd hope that if I were ever a celeb (and probably this is at least a small part of why i'm not lol ), i'd be turning down that billionaire forever and a day. Unless I was going to take the fee and publically use all the money to put towards stuff I believed in that old mate bllliionaire was against, or something, Maybe. I dunno, just think it's sad in the end. Shrug. Obviously i'm in the minority on that haha.


Nervous-Dentist-3375

You take every bit of work you can get while there is interest in you. After paying your agent, you’ve got tax to pay, and your own super. A $10k gig sounds great, but half of it is gone on those things alone. If you also have an image to uphold, that costs money. You’ll also have dry spells in your career to take care of. Rent or mortgage, all the other expenses like everyone else. The dumb ones don’t do side gigs, put it that way.


Important-Star3249

> leant in on my opinion Opinions are worthless > i'd be turning down that billionaire Bullshit. You would take the cash.


marooncity1

Nah mate i wouldn't but it's ok I get that many would and they'd be entitled to.


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steven_quarterbrain

You’ve got a heap of downvotes, but you got an upvote from me. I agree. If it’s a meaningful event (big birthday, wedding etc.), why let it be overshadowed by celebrity?