Hard News: Friday Music! Special Records
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Went to the first night of the McGlashan/Carter tour last night. By jingo those two are good for each other. Shayne brings the toughness to Don's lyricism and vice versa. Also they chose each other's set list so there was no complacent pandering to the hits. Not sure Don was accustomed to being upstaged in the banter department though. Highly recommended to one and all anyway.
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The Top 10 Haircuts of the 80s.
Speaking of which, I will be at the Heritage Week Market Day at the Arts Centre this Sunday (Oct 16, 10am - 4pm) selling fine copies of '80s mags such as The Face, Blitz, New Sounds New Styles and at least one Zig Zig, Interview, Ray Gun - maybe even some Shake! and sundry comics; Eagle, Disney, miscellaneous others - and a gallimaufry of books and small ephemeral items...
Step Right Up Folks, Step Right up!
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...and speaking of Sunday evenings coming down...
Here is a taste of Blair Parkes and Cardigan Bay - the first song of their first ever gig at the wonderful Sumner School Hall last weekend - and a reminder of their next gig at The Dark Room (St Asaph St) on Saturday 22nd of October(8.30ish start).
Best first gig I've ever seen, they all clicked together just fine, wish I'd recorded the whole night... -
Mike O'Connell, in reply to
Looking forward to the Darkroom gig. Couldn't make the first outing as of course Bill Direen and Builders were at the Darkroom. Various musicians from the past teamed up with Bill in various line ups including - courtesy of the indefatigible Willy Biscuits - Son of Cronos (with Stephen Cogle)
and Accident (with Beatin Hearts line up of Malcom Grant and Campbell McLay)BTW Stephen Cogle will be appearing in Auckland soon with Dark Matter and the Terminals at the Nowhere! Festival, Nov 3-6. From what the Eventfinda websites say, there are two - yes two - Terminals gigs (with others) the same day (Sat 5th), afternoon at Audio Foundation and evening at Whammy Bar
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Rob Stowell, in reply to
Was that you recording these clips, Mike? I should have said hello!
Stephen was great, but the set with Campbell was dynamite :) -
Mike O'Connell, in reply to
No Rob, I am not Willy. Not quite sure who he is - but he gets around - filming the songs at 'In Love With These Times' recently plus plenty of stuff this year from RDU's Museum gigs, Delaney Davidson, etc.
John Chrisstoffels was also recording but he said he was only capturing the 'non-touring' line-up songs which will form part of the Builders tour documentary.
Yeah, the Campbell set was fab - and there's this too, appropriately, Nick Bollinger revisits a Flying Nun classic from Bill Direen's Builders - from The Sampler this week.
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I think I was sitting just behind the mysterious Willy at one stage. JC was getting close-ups for the doco, with the director/dp getting wider shots. It'd be great to get a 2-3 camera edit and good audio of those two sets. Stephen was in good voice, and 'dirty and disgusting' was an awesome rant :)
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Mike O'Connell, in reply to
I think I was sitting jst behind the mysterious Willy at one stage.
Aha, the plot thickens...
Stephen was in good voice
Apparently Bill had largely forgotten the words (!) - hadn't played those in eons - but Stephen can recall and sing just about anything I'm told. I'm not sure but are Son of Cronos and Girl at Night Vacuum-era songs? For the latter, it looked like Bill wasn't quite ready for Malcolm to join the fray - but he got up there anyway!
One thing the night missed though were the keyboards - hence no e.g. Thought I Knew You or Russian Rug. Anyway, small quibbles for what goodies we got over nearly 2 1/2 hours.
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Mike O'Connell, in reply to
Nowhere! Festival, Nov 3-6.
BTW the Friday night includes performances from Dark Matter and a Stapleton – Elborado – Kraus collaboration. Peter 'Buck' Stapleton is also of course in Eye.
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Umm The Galaxy nightclub was in downtown Auckland city on Customs St, not as Nick Bollinger says. “At the Galaxy in Mount Eden” . Unless he is quoting Alastair who is mistakenly remembering.
And he missed out The Brew with Bob Gillette and Doug Jerubim.
We had to leave at midnight to catch the last bus home to Titirangi.The Action played mainly at an uptown club run by Johnny Tabla under the Civic and the venue which turned into the 1480 Village in Durham Lane. Occasionally at The Galaxy which was mostly that wasThe Underdogs and The Brew
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Rob Stowell, in reply to
are Son of Cronos and Girl at Night Vacuum-era songs?
I think so, but I'm no expert :)
One thing the night missed though were the keyboards
I half-expected Pete Fryer (who was there too) to get on a keyboard. Missed opportunity!
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New album from freshly-announced hall-of-fame honouree Bic Runga, Close Your Eyes , out November 18.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
Speaking of which, I will be at the Heritage Week Market Day at the Arts Centre this Sunday
I have alerted the Twitter hordes.
I actually have issue #1 of The Face, although it unfortunately has various bits cut out of it. It was along with I.D. #1 and various others when I broke into squat in Elephant & Castle many years ago.
The prior inhabitants may have been a bunch of junkies who left the toilet set solid to the brim with shit and paper (we had to pour hydrochloric acid in it and shovel the shit out with a trowel), but they did have good taste in magazines.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
Umm The Galaxy nightclub was in downtown Auckland city on Customs St, not as Nick Bollinger says. “At the Galaxy in Mount Eden” . Unless he is quoting Alastair who is mistakenly remembering.
Ah, I can see what's happened here. There was a more recent Galaxy on Mt Eden Road – it's now the Powerstation. I'll let the editors know.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
are Son of Cronos and Girl at Night Vacuum-era songs?
I think so, but I’m no expert :)
Hmmm ... same.
I would like to point out that the first time I heard 'Bedrock Bay' it was being played by the Volkswagens. Bill was quite the hit factory.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
their next gig at The Dark Room (St Asaph St) on XXx xx xx of October(8.30ish start).
Okay scrub that I got the date completely wrong!!
It’s Blair Parkes and Cardigan Bay on Thursday October 20th!!! at the Dark Room
http://darkroom.bar/ -
Ian Dalziel, in reply to
The prior inhabitants may have been a bunch of junkies who left the toilet set solid to the brim with shit and paper (we had to pour hydrochloric acid in it and shovel the shit out with a trowel)
Very Trainspotting!
The Galaxy nightclub was in downtown Auckland city on Customs St,
http://www.elsewhere.co.nz/culturalelsewhere/3469/auckland-rock-venues-2003-pull-down-the-shades/
Wasn’t the club that Gary from This Sporting Life’s family owned or ran, down Customs Street somewhere ?(I forget its name) – wasn’t the Rheineck Rock Awards there one year ?(or was that Fort Street)…
There is a modern Galaxy Club I see, which is a more Trumpian 'men's club'… and now will show up on my search history – dooomed! -
Ian Dalziel, in reply to
hall-of-fame honouree
I note that the NZ Music Hall of Fame Toy Love page only lists
Alec Bathgate (guitar) • Mike Dooley (drums) • Chris Knox (vocals) • Jane Walker (keyboards)
as inductees - somehow Paul Kean (bass) has been left off!!
...and their site photo resizing cuts Paul off and partly obscures Alec - though I have just discovered if I make the site smaller in the browser (and the type unreadable to my ageing eyes) they come into view - bloody technology!
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Tangible evidence!
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Please note that this morning – flummoxed by the passing of Helen Kelly, tbh – I forgot what I was going to write about and have just now updated the post with the story of my first girlfriend, her exotic parents and a certain record.
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Russell, wonderful to read of Bruce & Adele King! I think Bill Direen introduced them to Maryrose & I and soon after they became semi-regular guests for dinner, which usually mean't they would come over armed with exotic cooking ingredients, weapons, and you guessed it African LPs by Fela Kuti, Ebenezer Obey and Sunny Ade. One memorable dish that we made was a garlic curry, the recipe called for 100 cloves of garlic! I remember 24 hours later feeling that I'd been cleansed in a very special way! (Actually the garlic ends up being very sweet when cooked long and slow at a low temperature). I still have and use a large and very sharp Chinese vegetable cleaver that Bruce gave me before they left NZ, along with a few great LPs as well. I am sorry to hear about Nicole, I only heard of her but never met her. Thanks for the memories and a bit more of an insight into that fab couple!
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Re: The Builders tour, at the forthcoming Auckland show (Audio Foundation Sat 22) there will be keyboards for at least part of the set, and two drummers. A few people have asked if there's ticket pre-sales, as far as I know it's door sales only $10
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Russell Brown, in reply to
Thanks for the memories and a bit more of an insight into that fab couple!
Yay! I was hoping someone else here would have memories of them. Bruce had reputedly sat in on percussion with Brownie McGhee. He got up from the audience and played congas once at a gig at Wayne Manor – it was totally beatnik.
Last I heard of them they were, to quote the person who told me, "smoking hash on the beach in Goa".
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Russell Brown, in reply to
I am sorry to hear about Nicole, I only heard of her but never met her.
I literally wouldn't be who I am today had I not met her.
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For anyone interested, Fela’s recordings are somewhat scarce on the streaming services, but copious on Bandcamp.
Some of them aren’t cheap by modern music standards – $9 for the 23 minutes of I.T.T. – but they are awesome.
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