Ben's upright tack piano on stage.

Unless you’ve been living in a hole, you’ll know that Australia has recently experienced its worst natural disaster in over a century. The bushfires in Victoria claimed too many lives and even more homes and businesses. In some cases, entire towns were levelled. And what’s even more frustrating about all of this is that parts of the disaster weren’t strictly ‘natural’ due to absolute scum-of-the-earth arsonists who started some of the fires.

Seeing Australia’s Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on the BBC at a total loss for what to say about such a thing aside from calling it mass murder made me feel awful for him, and I rarely feel bad for politicians. But how do you even process something like that happening in your country? What can you say to all those people whose lives have been ripped up? We all know that W was no expert at finding the right words after Katrina either, but at least Rudd took some action for the citizens he’s responsible for protecting. He also promised that communities would be rebuilt with no limit on federal spending. Suck on that, FEMA.

In any case, I was happy to find out that Ben Folds has auctioned off his tack piano (and a signed photograph he took) as part of a benefit for the victims of the bushfires. The auction closed on the first of April, and I have yet to find any information on how much the piano went for, but when I looked a week ago it was at $4,000 with an estimated value of $10,000. If I were rich, I would have been all over that!

For those of you who weren’t massive Ben Folds Five fans, the tack piano is one of two pianos Ben played on tour as well as on some album tracks. It’s got tacks in the hammers which gives it a kind of tinny, metallic sound, and it was a treat to see Ben play it back to back with his normal piano. Unfortunately, I don’t have over $10,000 plus shipping costs from Australia to pay for such a thing, but it seems that someone does and a bunch of Australian families will be all the happier for it.

Another pleasant surprise in all this was that the auction was set up by Music for Relief, which was started by members of Linkin Park and has raised tons of money for the victims of natural disasters all over the world. I kind of hate Linkin Park and always thought they were a bunch of whingers, but this kind of thing is seriously commendable. I may never like their music, but I can certainly respect the work they’ve done here.

For those of us who can’t drop a few grand in an auction but still want to help out the Australians, the Australian Red Cross is taking donations for the bushfire victims. The appeal is closing soon, so please go and give a little. Australia is an amazing place. Donating some money (and asking other people to do the same) is the least I can do to help out a country that showed me an amazing holiday.