But how sad is it that I actually remember the Happy Days episode you're referencing?

Ah, those were the days ...…

Yikes! The Hilary Clinton response ...

Patience Simon,

Russell's got a case of the fonz about him.

He just can't brimng himself to say the " I was wrong I'm soorr,.... sorrrrrrr, sssssssorrr,....................sorry word.
he's working on it though, possibly

Yikes! The Hilary Clinton response ...

Hmmm, bad link. Here it is again:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHFREDHB-nQ

Fair enough: I take you at your word.

Yikes! The Hilary Clinton response ...

Er, you never thought it odd that you never saw a Housequake t-shirt upon your return? Given that it was such a popular/successful event I shoulda sold some T-shirts surely?

Anyway, to put this story…

It's sad for two reasons: [1] That's all she found – my existence is reduced to a single entry in Public Address!!, and [2] it's wrong.

Sorry Russell but it never happened.

Fair enough: I take you at your word. That's just what I was told at the time.

[Russell Brown] A few weeks after I went back to London
I discovered that Simon Laan was selling Housequake t-shirts ...

[Simon Grigg] Now why does that not surprise me....

It's sad for two reasons: [1] That's all she found – my…

I'm willing to be told I'm wrong, but isn't it true that Knox used to self-harm whilst on stage around that sort of time?

for dramatic effect, yes, quite often.....indeed, that's how he survived the first Enemy gig in Ak, at Zwines...the skinhead element were going to beat the crap…

I can't think which is more extreme rock'n'roll – cutting yourself on stage, or eating beetroot on stage!

I remember seeing Toy Love perform at Sweetwaters and being enthralled/horrified by Chris Knox's onstage antics. He had a can of pineapple rings and he would slowly dip his hand in and pull one out and eat it…

I realise it's a minor quibble compared to the lovely music, etc, but there's clearly been a packaging snafu somewhere, somehow.

I thought he didn't like it as I didn't hear back form him.
It must have been two years later when he he said he had just found the demo tape…

Flying Nun it wasn't!

Speaking of more Nun stories, I was lucky enough to play in 'support' bands for a few Nun bands – SJF 'Blow' era, The Bats on several occasions, The Chills...

The Bats were one of my favourite FNun bands.…

A few weeks after I went back to London I discovered that Simon Laan was selling Housequake t-shirts ...

Now why does that not surprise me....

The House Party single, on Southside, "Dangerous Love" is a total classic though. It sold nothing, got no support, so Murray Cammick gve me…

Which brings back fuzzy memories of that huge dance party you put on in 88 or 89, Russell...that was a hell of a night....

Housequake, it was. We did two of them in early 89 (I was back from London for the summer) and got 1500 people to the second,…

railway station?

no The Powerstation. The Railway Stn was Across The Tracks I think...put on by Grant Fell, Roger Perry and a few others...and there was another called Unity.

The first dance parties in AK were a couple put on by Peter Urlich and Mark Phillips,in conjunction with Joseph from…

Which brings back fuzzy memories of that huge dance party you put on in 88 or 89, Russell...that was a hell of a night....

railway station?

Che mate, it wasn't really disco. We'll have to get you out dancing sometime. You can dance, can't you?

nah, bugger it, it was and is disco...with machines...its just that disco, the real stuff (not the Bee Gees, John Travolta, Grease stuff....that wasn't disco..the real stuff was the black urban…

It bugs me a lot that there's so much formal and informal knowledge available and no institutional vision for capturing it.

on a similar slant, an approach to the government', via a couple of channels for an audio library of New Zealand master tapes and the like was soundly rebuffed…

i had to stop when there was a threat to call a constable.

growing up in the 60s and 70s, there was this talk of cultural cringe and NZ being an outpost of England. Russell, Public Address, the Network, and most especially this long FN thread have just put that argument to bed forever. What a culture we have!

And, by way of…

re: The Gathering, and that whole 90s dance-party scene. was i the only person who thought, "wasn't disco the 70s?"

Che mate, it wasn't really disco. We'll have to get you out dancing sometime. You can dance, can't you?

So many legends from my upbringing in Ponsonby have been on this thread and so many memories brought back. Our cult album at school was AK79 – I've been looking to buy it again for the past 20 years (is it available Simon?).

Yes – it was re-released on CD…

was i the only person who thought, "wasn't disco the 70s?"

Wucked!

I don't have specific FN stories, being too young and a non-resident of NZ means I missed most of the 80's heyday

I do recall seeing the music video for the…

I've read through this wonderful thread, and it's fantastic to read all these stories about people who experienced the early FN magic first-hand. And I find it amazin that I, an American who frankly didn't know shit about New Zealand when I…

I should also thanks my fellow t-shirt winner, for it was he who told me about this thread.

He also enabled the Terminals/VDB moment that scored me a shirt, and many other moments, too.

Goes something like this, since we're taking a trip down memory…

kudos to you for your revenge

Thanks, it was small but so sweet. Getting a box set for it 10 years on almost makes all the shit I got in worth it all over again. I still listen to The Skeptics a lot. Wish I could tell the full story…

Anyway- it did seem to rate as a "flying nun moment"?!

Yup, but much more so if it found its way onto YouTube ...

My uncle worked there too and my cousin went out with Don the drummer for a while, so I will tell her that story over…

...Manakura is the winner of the Flying Nun box set...

Good choice for overall winner. I really enjoyed that story and clearly it wasn't topped.

I was actually going to suggest that Shayne Carter get the boxed set since he featured in many key FN moments posted here as well…

I guess my own memories might appear self-serving for which I apologise, but I am quite proud of the fact that…

It should be said that Stephen Cogle still has the most fantastic, booming voice that still creates chills everytime. Don't take my word for it, listen to 'Native Waiter' by the VDB, lovingly included on the fancy new boxed set.

I've wondered if that song's about the pair – rich…

Terminals, thank you Stephen Cogle!

I had a similar experience with Stephen Cogle with just as good an outcome. The Terminals played at the Gluepot in Auckland with The Puddle (maybe a year or two earlier). This was an incredibly rare event and I'm still not sure how this unlikely…

Since 1981 the…

one of my Flying Nun moments would have to be when it all coalesced into a purely nz thang – culminating in the vegetable cricket match at Sweetwaters early '80s
with the denizens of the Flying Nun/Rip It up caravan
against allcomers – with a team consisting of Roger Shepherd,…

---

SOME BANDS I LIKE THAT AREN'T AROUND NO MORE

**CHRIST THE CLEAN WERE…

Ahem, here are a few of these encounters:
* Gingerly asking Shayne Carter, Robert…

Two years later, we found out why.

The first Clean gig in Wellington, on 24 September 1981 , was one…

But I can never forget the first time i put on Somebody Ate My Planet and heard BAGPIPES in a pop song. And this wasn't The…

...buying Tall Dwarfs album 'that's the long and short of it' in 85 and carrying…

Skipped past 'Point That Thing', because I'm always playing that bugger, to the Gordons' 'Coalminers' Song'. That record still sounds incredible.

Then to 'Needles and Plastic' and 'Randolph' at the end of disc 1. Yay!

I buy a lot more music…

Look Blue Go Purple at the Railway Tavern in Auckland in…

It was some kind of market thing going on for Friday night shopping, as I recall. The shopkeepers of dear old Hastings were really getting into…

Yes indeedy, Roger himself for one. I'm sure I was involved in holding him upright for the last quarter of a Canterbury Ranfurly Shield match on the terraces at Lancaster Park in 1984.

There's a good story about Roger and Bill Direen attending a test match at the Park, and…

Also, while fitba is the sport most often associated with FN, there are a fair few closet rugbyheads among 'em as well.

Yes indeedy, Roger himself for one. I'm sure I was involved in holding him upright for the last quarter of a Canterbury Ranfurly Shield match on the terraces…

Bought Tally Ho from the boys in the back of their van
Outside the Record Warehouse in Durham lane
Just doin it.

The Chills played Clean support on the first tour.
Some able Tasmans were in the audience.
Doesn’t anyone think Coldplay were inspired…

Russell...I think Alan might be persuaded now. He's less precious about it now. Body Electric do…

The Clean and The Chills at the Rhumba bar in Victoria St ('81, 82?), everybody jumping so hard in unison the wooden floor was acting like a trampoline. I thought the building was going to pancake. The crowd a solid steaming heaving screaming clusterfuck.

Toy…

7th form. April 1984, and a strange-looking new guy who had just shifted up from CHC was in my economics class. i thought i knew quite a bit about post-punk music, but his perspective was quite different and he swore by…

Which reminds me – why has noone produced a new school production or re-edit of Sierra Leone?? That would be HUGE.

So far off topic. Sorry.

Yes, I'm afraid it is, and you'll have to leave. These two large men will see you to the door ...

The other scene that needs documenting is the eighties post punk electronic one. Andrew White, Tevor Reekie and myself all talked about it at some stage, going as far as doing a track listing.

And a remix disc!? I do think a lot of that stuff would be well served…

Trevor Reekie was doing some incredible stuff throughout the decade..his Obscure Desire single sounds, if you remaster and trim the vocal, as if it could've been released in Europe in 2006.

Heh heh!

Which reminds me – why has noone produced a new school production or re-edit of Sierra Leone??…

The other scene that needs documenting is the eighties post punk electronic one. Andrew White, Tevor Reekie and myself all talked about it at some stage, going as far as doing a track listing.

I'd definitely like to see the tracklisting if poss?

As Bob Dakatari so correctly points out…

As Bob Dakatari so correctly points out on his blog, there were countless other indie lables…

I've often thought someone should put a lot of those old compilations onto CD.

I've thought about it now and then. We put Bigger Than Both of Us on CD a couple of years back, and of course we did AK79 a few years back.

The one that gets the…

A National MP does a single, one side of which is 'Working Class Hero' and the other was "Couldn't Get it Right'. Do you think she was trying to tell them something?

I remember it well, I think I may have even owned it at…

ahhh...but the NZ or the Australian edition?? They are quite different.

NZ one :) Got Goats Milk Soupmas well, but already had a copy so not as exciting

seen this before Simon?

http://home.comcast.net/~cassetto/propeller.html

sorry back to the Nun...

Friday Drinks the old phone message compilation tapes were sometimes pulled out…

that was Propeller, I was really proud of that one but it only sold about 150 copies (great reviews though)....its just gone on to Amplifier as an MP3.

I guess online MP3 sales is the sensible format to re-release old tracks that are to all intents and purposes owned by…

Perhaps a NZ post punk comp is in order? Combining best of Propellor and Ripper. Naked Spots Dance, Shoes This High etc

From memory my Doobie Doo Disc has got Brithday Party on it – does that make it the Aussie…

And the Bongos 7".

that was Propeller, I was really proud of that one but it only sold about 150 copies (great reviews though)....its just gone on to Amplifier as an MP3. The other great lost Ripper release was the Techtones home made album, TT23. And the last Ripper, The…

"With a few demos under their belt and a 6 track EP on Reverberation Records behind them, ( We Three Brave And True – 2005) Children Collide have now signed with Flying Nun Australia, sister label to indie gods Flying Nun New Zealand"

if there is any indication that they…

I gather that Warners took the plunge and agreed to it going out with the music. great call.

I would the actual contractual ownership of much of that early stuff (and indeed a lot of the later stuff) is pretty grey anyway.A lot of it was paid for by the…

A Ripper one would be interesting. Bryan had some gems in his catalogue (and like all of us, some tosh..Marilyn Waring doing John Lennon covers..what were they thinking). One of the great lost Ripper tracks was the Don McGlashan production of Otis Mace.

Yeah I really rate the Goats Milk…

http://www.flyingnun.co.nz/childrencollide.htm

"With a few demos under their belt and a 6 track EP on Reverberation Records behind them, ( We Three Brave And True – 2005) Children Collide have now signed with Flying Nun Australia, sister label to indie gods Flying…

http://www.radionz.co.nz/nr/programmes/fnr

I gather that Warners took the plunge and agreed to it going out with the music. great call.

Its always amazed me that the Dunedin Double has never been on CD....if any record defined the early years of FN in the public mind. it was that one.

And I have to wonder if there wasn't a wee bit of subtle persuasion behind the scenes to convince Roger to…

1. The Stones, Another Disc Another Dollar, plus their Dunedin Double side – WHY AREN'T THESE SONGS AVAILABLE ON C.D.? Way, way, way too good to be forgotten.

Its always amazed me that the Dunedin Double has never been on CD....if any record defined the early years of FN in…

1. The Stones, Another Disc Another Dollar, plus their Dunedin Double side – WHY AREN'T THESE SONGS AVAILABLE ON C.D.? Way, way, way too good to be forgotten.

2. As a teenager, finally listening to The Clean after being mistakenly scared off for years after seeing…

Final Children's Hour gig – stoopendous, dark and earshattering.

And last year's reunion demonstrated that we weren't just imagining it that way. What a powerful band.

Bird Nest Roys with duelling Rossies. Every time.

I'll always associate them with the Great Wine Glut of 1985. You could buy four litres…

But the gigs...

Final Children's Hour gig – stoopendous,…

Rock 'n Roll – without doubt!!

Also have fond…

Possibly the only time anyone has shagged to a JPSE song... ;-)

Anyone who can prove Johnno wrong is in contention for a prize ...

I was busy worshipping Mr Knox from this ca 2-foot distance on the basis of my almost-knackered Toy Love album, but someone less idolatrous called out "Play one you just wrote this morning!" – at which Knox snickered quietly "We already have – twice."

Goddam. I must have been there…

1. The Clean playing Cathedral Square to largely uninterested passers-by in 1981. I became an instant fan during "Point That Thing Somewhere Else."

2. Tall Dwarfs play Uni of Canterbury orientation, not long after they formed – maybe 1982? The various beery wallies assembled find the music somewhat…

1. The Clean at Gurus, Waikato University 1986(ish) – the place was completely rammed and my (then) girlfriend & I were getting majorly squashed against the front of the stage. Emboldened by beer I thought "sod…

Maybe it was Gutteridge?

Sounds more likely ...

Behind a screen were the Headless Chickens (pre-Fiona McDonald, because we all know that was the beginning of the end) so all you could see was their silhouettes and all you could head was a War of the…

Sometime in late 1993, around the time 'The Venus Trail' was released, the 3D's played the Gluepot.

Hi Jonathan, i was at that gig, man you bring back memories. Was that the same night that a heckler climbed on stage and gave David Merritt a blast before being told to…

I agree about her drum skillz. In fact, here's a story about a time when she might have had some kind of plans to test interesting new rhythms on a friend of mine...

We were down at the Grey Lynn Park half-pipe in the early 90s, all Vision Street…

1. 1981 or 1982 I think. Shirley Boys' High. The Gordon's playing a lunchtime set with a reasonable amount of volume (for a school assembly hall) to the utter horror of all the teachers – and the delight of many of us...

2. A year later or…

Maybe it was Gutteridge?

Anyway, I thought it illustrated how it's actually a good thing to have those fanboy illusions shattered. Makes you realise that, after all, music is made…

I'll never forget Look Blue Go Purple, although I never saw them, the EP is great.

They were great. And Lesley Paris was an awesome drummer. Women just play rhythm instruments differently from men.

Yeah, right. FN titles continue to be produced and listened to 20 years later.

I'll never forget Look Blue…

I also have fond memories of visiting Dunedin just after 'Pink Frost' came out. It seemed like that song was everywhere. You'd hear it wafting out windows,…

The 3Ds doing a two night stint at The Empire in 1993. The Friday show was a blistering set; so blistering in fact that David Mitchell's aged and troublesome Orange amp burst into flames. Nonchalent as you like, the weird-haired one casually doused…

Straightjacket Fits blowing The Jesus and Mary Chain off the stage at Sammy’s in 1988

That was a highlight for me as well. We passed the JaMC van on the road the next morning as they headed to the airport. We slowed down alongside them and gawped at them but…

1994(?) at the uni cafe in auckland about to witness the very first incarnation of Dimmer – Peter (hope I'm right!) Jeffries was on drums (sorry I can't remember…

Late 80s, hitching onto a Chills tour in Europe for the second time. We're passing from Belgium (where the promoters had very generously laid on huge steaks…

Shortly after arriving, we had a cuppa,…

More topically, but nothing to do with the Dunedin Sound, I enjoyed watching the Flying Nun doco on telly a couple of years back when the story of the infamous "Fall In A Hole" album unfolded.…

Virtual high school reunion, happening right in front of your eyes.

Danielle, who last I saw working in a music store in Takapuna.

About fifteen years ago! Sorry to hijack the thread, but holy crap. *That* Kyle Matthews, who I believe went right through school with me from go to…

Did I mention it was at a Clean concert??

It was 1983 and I was dragged into the senior boys common room at Timaru Boys High, (no shame here for all the wonderful years I spent in that town/city), thinking I was about to be reintroduced…

(Martin Lambert, from the Shore. Hmmmm. I went to school with a Martin Lambert. At Rangitoto College. 1988-1991. You don't happen to be him, do you?)

Virtual high school reunion, happening right in front of your eyes.

Danielle, who last I saw working in a music store in Takapuna.

My…

Sneaking a copy of The Skeptics 'AFFCO' music vid into a conference presentation organised and attended by Meat industry bigwigs. A small revenge for making half my whanau redundant in 1986 at Whakatu, and the other half redundant in '94 at Tomoana. It was 1996, so…

"RUSSELL IS FROM TIMARU, HE'S STILL SENSITIVE ABOUT IT".

AAARRRGGGHHHH!!!!!

The first time I went along to a Radio Massey announcers meeting and they had a few spare copies of "In Love With These Times" that they thought they'd give away to the hard working announcers.

Yep, I won one. I felt like…

This recollection involves Russell Brown and Grant Fell of the Headless Chickens.

Back in '91 when Planet Magazine – Russell and Grant were both driving forces…

The Bats playing the Wanaka Rugby Club rooms, August 1985. Crazy farm boys hanging off the rafters, drunk 13 year olds puking in the car park and in the middle of all this… The Bats, playing their own brand of gentle-jangle pop. Fantastic incongruity.

What about… Straightjacket…

She says that at Canterbury University the prize for deluded ideas went to her fellow studentl, Roger Sheppard, when he announced he was off to start a record label.

I used to drink far too much whiskey with Roger in 81-82 upstairs at Warners in the Square. He was working…

– seeing Garageland play one of their first gigs of their UK residency period – bloody great show in small venue, mostly Kiwis on their OE (like myself) in the crowd, after the show having a…

At the time I would have been 18 or 19 (so over a decade ago) and had got myself hooked up with a…

yes, it's that damn football thing (y'know, soccer).

for example there was the last bFM vs Flying Nun game…

'1982'.

Last night
K…