SEARCH! AND DESTROY!: NEW ZEALAND

Ya na na na na na na na na na na na naaaaah!

thanks, michael. this is a good start.

one that's gone unmentioned - Plagal Grind was a supergroup, except they didn't get individually big til afterwards. really great.

also, 'oddity' by the Clean is a great song, and Snapper is pretty good. Also, the Gordons.

"Wave Watching" will always be my favorite Chills song.

loved the Chills so so much. "Pink Frost" one of the great tracks.

Jean Paul Sartre Experience - "Walking Wild In Your Firetime", if you liked Galaxie 500...

Proud Scum's "Suicide 2" is the best song ever from New Zealand.

O YEZ I DiD

a wealth of material can be heard here: http://thedoledrums.blogspot.com/

That is to say:

Terminals- Touch

like Elvis having a very very very very very very bad dream.

of being crap

another website of note:

http://kiwitapes.blogspot.com/

Just realized I had this archive sitting around of 40 NZ songs that I sent to a younger, curious cousin. If anyone's interested, I'll leave it here for a week:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/5y9g0y

Sort of on the punchier, catchier side to get his White Stripes–loving attention. Light on the real punk and noise/drone angle.

Able Tasmans What Was That Thing
Bats Get Fat
Bats Passed By
Bilders America
Bird Nest Roys Bided
Bored Games I Don't Get It
The Cakekitchen Dave the Pimp
Children's Hour Looking For the Sun
The Chills Rolling Moon
The Clean Thumbs Off
The Dead C Mighty
Double Happys I Don't Wanna See You Again
Gordons Adults and Children
Henderson, George & A. Galbraith Macquarie Island
Jean Paul Sartre Experience Elemental
Jefferies, Peter On an Unknown Beach
Knox, Chris The Face of Fashion
The Max Block Burn David Burn
Nocturnal Projections Isn't That Strange?
Nocturnal Projections Nerve Ends in Power Lines
The Orange Fruit salad lives
Plagal Grind Midnight Blue Vision
Proud Scum Suicide 2
Scavengers True Love
Scorched Earth Policy Green Cigar
Screaming Meemees Can't Take It
Shoes This High The Nose One
Snapper Emmanuelle
Spelling Mistakes Feels so Good
Strange Loves She Said Let's Kiss
Suburban Reptiles Saturday Night, Stay at Home
Tall Dwarfs Think Small
Tall Dwarfs I've Left Memories Behind
The Terminals Uncoffined
This Is Heaven Deep Blue Sea
This Kind of Punishment Immigration Song
Toy Love Fingernail on Blackboard Grin
Toy Love Squeeze
Verlaines Death And The Maiden
The Victor Dimisch Band Native Waiter

FFS, only rolling out Flying Nun/Xpressway stuff is like having a Search & Destroy: Scotland thread and only talking about Postcard. Someone take a fire extinguisher to the keepers of the flame, please.

Between them, Flying Nun and Xpressway (and all the interconnected bands) are a vastly larger percentage of worthwhile NZ music than Postcard was for Scotland. Postcard's had what, less than 20 releases (in a "nation" of 5-ish million), while the two NZ labels have had hundreds in country with about a million less people, right? I mean, you could do an 80s Scotland compilation (and I know what I'm talking about since I did one, and assisted on others) that avoids Aztec Camera, Orange Juice, and Josef K, but it'd be hard to cover NZ without touching on Flying Nun and Xpressway. I mean, you'd have to almost be as willful as the people who write novels without the letter "e" to pull that off.

I take it you're a big Hello Sailor and Split Enz fan?

There is, of course, that nifty little single ("True Love") by the Marching Girls (formerly the Scavengers, from Auckland), that came out on the Scottish Pop:Aural label....And pre-Dead Can Dance, by the way....

I heard a load of work by The Verlaines and The Clean earlier this year. It was weak and evidently very overrated.

it's impossible to overrate The Clean, though you might've heard some of the newer stuff, which is a bit less compelling than the older, classic stuff.

I've never heard the good Verlaines stuff. I've only heard Way Out Where which to me just sounded like bland alt-rock, apparently their early albums are good. But I love the Clean.

'true love' is awesome, but the b-side 'first in line' is 10x better

the good verlaines stuff is bird dog and juvenilia

For something to be impossible to overrate, if that is possible at all, it would have to be staggeringly, world-dazzlingly good?

I think maybe one cannot overrate the Beatles, or the Magnetic Fields, or even MBV at their best. But the Clean don't really live on the same planet as them, in this regard.

I actually liked one or later Clean songs better than the early ones, though can't remember the names. Maybe I should find that CD again. I think that Dr C upthread also liked this later work.

Logically, it's of course correct to point out that something would have to be ideal in order to avoid the chance of being overrated, but in the real world we have only real bands, some of them closer to perfection than others....

There's a pretty large territory between the ground claimed by the Beatles and that by the Magnetic Fields and My Bloody Valentine, respectively, at least when it comes to the question of being so close to world-dazzingly good as to beggar overrating. And I'm not even a big Beatles guy. Take the ten best songs by each band and the Beatles are well ahead, but the others are at about the same distance behind, allowing for personal taste. Your perhaps a case of the Clean undoing their own legend by going on too long while MBV had the grace (well, until this past year) to shut down at their peak. As for the MF comparison, I don't know how you'd even start, given how different the bands are, the one being essentially a one-man pop songwriting project and the other a post-VU guitar-rock band. Put the 1983 Clean on a stage just after the 2008 Magnetic Fields finish up a chamber pop set and you might feel differently. Which would be fine—the two groups are after different things, and there's room for both in the (demi-god) pantheon.

Logically, it's of course correct to point out that something would have to be ideal in order to avoid the chance of being overrated, but in the real world we have only real bands, some of them closer to perfection than others....

There's a pretty large territory between the ground claimed by the Beatles and that by the Magnetic Fields and My Bloody Valentine, respectively, at least when it comes to the question of being so close to world-dazzingly good as to beggar overrating. And I'm not even a big Beatles guy. Take the ten best songs by each band and the Beatles are well ahead, but the others are at about the same distance behind, allowing for personal taste. Your judgement is perhaps a result of the Clean undoing their own legend by going on too long while MBV had the grace (well, until this past year) to shut down at their peak. As for the MF comparison, I don't know how you'd even start, given how different the bands are, the one being essentially a one-man pop songwriting project and the other a post-VU guitar-rock band. Put the 1983 Clean on a stage just after the 2008 Magnetic Fields finish up a chamber pop set and you might feel differently. Which would be fine—the two groups are after different things, and there's room for both in the (demi-god) pantheon.

OK, I love a lot of this stuff too, but you're debating as if Clean/MBV/MF have something in common. They have their common decline in common, I guess.

MF and Clean fans alike know that their best days are behind 'em. Pete & the Pirates have filled the gap for a lot of Clean fans, not sure what MF fans do. Zombie Boy sure was bad.

On the mbv note:

MBV have responded to their obsolescence with a gimmick: we're the loudest. didn't sound all that great though. combined lack of onstage charisma with pre-sets. loveless as rote-noise-routine. and somehow managed to convince people that new material would be good. mbv were 4 years. 17 years have passed since.

Some of these Beat Rhythm Fashion songs are really good.
and holy shit this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1MfeLx6Uds

duh
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSwvQsMY2Bs

No mention of Bachelorette on here? Surprising!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWViyhzLCPw
title song of this album is amazing. boo youtube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wfocIcoXLs

Flying Nun's got some new and old material brewing. A compilation tribute to The Clean's "Tally Ho" and a new retrospective comp due out in Nov.

Dearest ILMers. Incredibly, I'm going on tour to Auckland and Wellington in November. I'm doing what I can to find out about what might be happening there, and in NZ more generally, in terms of interesting and unusual musics but would welcome any thoughts you might have. Specifically in terms of bands/artists, venues, record shops and related things. Currently, my knowledge extends as far as a microscopic amount of the Flying Nun back catalogue and The D4, but I'm curious about anything that you are aware of and think is worthwhile. Any thoughts you have would be very greatly appreciated.

Oh, and Look Blue Go Purple, whom I absolutely love to bits.

My sister is a big fan of Aldous Harding, though I don't know if Harding identifies with any particular NZ scene or sound. I just read a comment describing her as "like if Feist was a sleep paralysis demon."

There is a What’s New in New Zealand Music thread that’s regularly updated, but I can’t find it in Search somehow.

That'd be What's New in New Zealand Music? , which I've been a bit slack about posting in.

Just moved to Auckland from Wellington, so I can probably help out a little. If you're into marquee Flying Nun stuff, there's a David Kilgour show in early Nov and the Beths are playing a homecoming show mid November (though the first date has sold out). For record stores, Flying Out and Real Groovy in Auckland and Slow Boat in Wellington will probably have what you're after. For indie-ish stuff, there are venues like Whammy Bar/Wine Cellar in Auckland, and Caroline/Meow/SFBH in Wellington; for more experimental/noise stuff, the Audio Foundation in Auckland and Pyramid Club in Wellington are havens.

Aldous Harding I'd lump in with both the Christchurch/Lyttleton folk/country scene (Marlon Williams, Delaney Davidson etc) plus a more NZ-wide wave of stuff like Nadia Reid/Tiny Ruins.

There is a What’s New in New Zealand Music thread that’s regularly updated, but I can’t find it in Search somehow.

― breastcrawl, maandag 19 augustus 2019 15:16 bookmarkflaglink

That'd be What's New in New Zealand Music? , which I've been a bit slack about posting in.

― etc, dinsdag 20 augustus 2019 5:32 bookmarkflaglink

lol, it's literally called that? I should have looked harder, I guess, but I assumed it was a recent-ish thread.

This is great advice and direction. Thank you so much!

This is an extremely useful thread. Many thanks sbahnhof for your diligence.

― neilasimpson, Saturday, August 24, 2019 1:49 AM

Cheers, Neil...

I'm not from here either.

When you first arrive, you hope life is all gonna be like this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Evx3J-bzNRQ

But then it turns out it's mostly like this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxm-wutKi7k

HHAHAHAHAHAHAH

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS5fN9bo1Vc

"Blue Smoke" was the first ever single from New Zealand, here's the story:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMBBttcTVwo

If Pixie Williams had done nothing else, she would still be in the history books for what happened on October 3, 1948 when she turned up at a makeshift recording studio in Wellington, New Zealand, still wearing her hockey uniform. ... It was a huge hit (and was covered by the likes of Dean Martin) and it would have seemed Williams -- then living in a hostel and working in a battery factory -- would have a wonderful career. It was, however, brief.

Pixie Williams: "Maori Land" (1949)
https://www.elsewhere.co.nz/fromthevaults/4306/pixie-williams-maori-land-1949

https://www.audioculture.co.nz/content/images/857/hero_thumb_Blue_Smoke_Songsheet.jpg

That's pretty cool.

That RSA thing is great. And kinda topical today. I can see myself foisting it on others now.

I've long been puzzled by the relative lack of chatter about Blam Blam Blam. Including here, apparently.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HVogejKx_c

They would've achieved Nunnesque popularity, if only they'd had a sensible name like The Blams

Good band tho – this is their last live gig, on Radio with Pictures

- https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/rwp-live-at-mainstreet-blam-blam-blam-1984
-

That RSA thing is great. And kinda topical today. I can see myself foisting it on others now.

― Nag! Nag! Nag!, Saturday, April 25, 2020 12:01

OK, but

You must sign in

This may not be the right place to ask but an RFI question about NZ music scene...

I'm fairly familiar with the popular (and some fringe) releases of the Flying Nun/Xpressway catalogs, but something I've also been curious about: are/were there any indigenous/maori/polynesian members of any of the bands/scenes?

Living ~1/3 of the world away, my only exposure to crossover (non-traditional) NZ artists are like OMC or Jemaine Clement (or maybe Te Vaka counts?) which seems fairly scant, but maybe there could be other factors other than the obvious.

I should note that I'm fairly unfamiliar with the Urban Pasifika genre.

So there it is: RFI nontraditional NZ artists with indigenous/maori/polynesian roots.

(working through this thread backwards, that Pateo Maori Club - "Poi E" embed upthread is a jam)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8frPD7DgqI

OUT FRONT WITH THE KNOBZ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKColaFHHg0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tDBjJGnfrY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZiddntlexkY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQFI2yqyYO4