Category Archives: Biography

Nothing better

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bFM’s music documentary series Inside Track recently looked at the Hamilton music scene. Yay.

It was interesting listening to it, because it sounds like things changed quite dramatically around the time I left Hamilton.

Back in my Hamilton gig-going days (1993 to 1996), there were two main venues – the Wailing Bongo at Waikato University, and the Exchange Tavern on Victoria Street.

The Bong’ could comfortably accommodate popular touring bands (Supergroove, Shihad, various Flying Nun artists), but also worked for local bands. For example, Mobile Stud Unit’s Superstar Extravaganza packed out the Bongo bar with all local bands in 1995.

The Exchange was a much smaller venue, decorated in ye olde Hamiltonia style. It suited local bands more, but I remember Garageland packing the place out in 1995.

There are other venues like the Hillcrest Tavern (more mainstream) and the Downunder Bar (bogans) and Governor’s Tavern. And the vile Outback Inn was rumoured to host bands, but the only music I ever heard there was cheesy European dance music. And Kenny Rodgers’ “The Gambler”.

Anyway, according to the people interviewed on the Inside Track doco, the Waikato Student Union was taken over by a group of right-wingers who promptly sold off the Wailing Bongo and student radio Contact FM. Without a venue and a means of promotion, the scene took a few blows.

But despite this, there are still a whole lot of really good bands coming from Hamilton. In the documentary, Geoff from the Shrugs says that because Hamilton is so small and everyone knows everyone, you can’t be a rock star – everyone will see through it all – so the only thing left is to be a musician.

Another thing that comes up in the documentary is the feeling that some people look back at the live scene in the mide ’90s as a golden age, and wish things were like that now.

But back then, there weren’t always good bands playing. Sometimes all there’d be to see was some lame bogan rock covers band. Sometimes staying at home was a better option than going out.

My main complaint with growing up in or near Hamilton was that it was so boring. There was nothing to do. But the good thing about this is that rather than relying on some vibrant arts and culture scene to entertain me, I had to learn to make my own fun.

I think this is situation is still around in Hamilton, and it’s still one of the reasons people get together and form bands and create music. Because it’s Saturday and there’s nothing better to do.

Packing

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I got a new job. It’s still in the fast-paced world of television, but whereas my old job was the feel-good public service side of telly, the new job is more commercial – a different kind of feel-good. And while it’s about the telly, I’m going back to my roots, as the job is all about the interwebs.

So that’s all new and exciting, but what’s even more new and exciting is that the new job is located deep in the Hutt Valley, meaning I’m going to have to move to Wellington in a few weeks.

Fortunately I like Wellington and its fine citizens, so I’m excited about the move. But my knowledge of the city is nowhere near as great as my knowledge of Auckland (or Hamilton!). I don’t know what kind of reputation different suburbs have, what sorts of areas I should live in.

But that’s a way off. At the moment I’m in the process of packing. I’ve been living at my current flat for over six years now (six years!), the longest I’ve lived in a flat, so it’s been a bit of an archaeological expedition as I’ve gone through all the stuff in my spare room.

At first glance, it looked a bit like the work of some crazy lady who buys things off TradeMe but just biffs the unopened boxes in the room. But even though there was a chaotic mess, I knew where everything was cos, like, it was all organically arranged, man.

But still, I managed to find a few things that I didn’t realise I had:

  • A sticker reading “UTBNB: Up The Bum No Babies”. (I assume you can stick it anywhere you like.)
  • A teach-yourself book on Irish Gaelic.
  • A vast collection of postcards. I knew I had quite a few, but I didn’t realise how many until I gathered them all together.
  • A badge from the ’80s saying “Telecom – I ♥ my customers”. Yeah, they had to get badges made as a reminder.
  • Too many bags. I would not consider myself a bag-loving’ gal, but yet there they were – too many bags. How did this happen?

I suspect I’ve been throwing out more than I’ve been packing. It’s easy to pack obvious things like books, CDs, DVDs, but then I’ll find and old notebook or a folder full of interesting bits of paper and I’ll want to keep it, but wonder, as it’s been in a drawer, untouched for the last six years, do I really need to keep it?

This is why nuns are content and crazy TradeMe ladies aren’t.

Seven, Eight

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At the stroke of midnight I was walking with Morgan and Andy in the grassy bit behind Maclaurin Chapel at the university, talking about the benefits of protein bars (?!). In the distance people started cheering and fireworks started spewing out of the top of the Sky Tower, so I figured that 2007 had smudged into 2008.

Ol’ 2007 turned out to be quite a good year. As far as this goes, the thing I’m most pleased with was finally ditching LiveJournal and moving back to using WordPress on my own website. It’s a bit more work running things here, but I enjoy it.

So, yeah, that was fun. Let’s do it again this year.

Season’s greetings

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So, yeah, I had a pretty good birthday.

In the morning I found various birthday greetings left by people in different corners of the interwebs: here in comments, on Facebook, Twitters, emails, and also text message. It’s all very modern, and it was lots of fun reading them all.

Later in the afternoon, I co-opted a Christmas party I’d been invited to and turned it into my birthday party. Well, at least that was my plan. When I got there, I found myself having such a good time that I gave up on the “Hey, um, it’s my 33rd birthday!”.

Things were going well at the party – there was good booze and good food, but then things got even better when David Saunders showed up. He was in The 3Ds, which is my second favourite New Zealand band of all time. Part of me was being 18 years old and wanting to go “OMG! You are so cool!!!!!”, but another part of me was being all 33 and grown-up.

Then a bunch of partygoers went to the King’s Arms for their Christmas party gig thing, featuring Blam Blam Blam (yeah, them). So I went along to that and did something that I’ve never done at the King’s Arms before (that sounds ominous, but it’s not). The Blams were good, but I reckon the Wellington gig was better.

So now I can finally get into the whole Christmas spirit. Really, for me, the build-up for Christmas is two days long.

Now I’m with the whanau. It looks like one of the cats is anorexic or something. She won’t can has cheeseburger? She’s currently curled up next to my right foot, which is not an unpleasant thing.

Season’s greetings.

MMVI

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So that 2006, eh. It was a rather good year, yes?

I took a lot of photos.

I travelled a lot around the North Island, getting as far as Waitangi in the north, Napier in the east, New Plymouth in the west, and Wellington in the south. And Whangamomona. (I suppose this means next year I’ll have to go to Gore.)

I don’t want to pick favourites, but I had such a lovely time in Napier that I want to go back soon, and New Plymouth surprised me with its sophistication (even though the local cinema was sticky).

I survived the power cut that plunged Auckland into Third World poverty for a few hours. Boohoo, no latte, I’m an Aucklander, etc.

I had Lasik, which was a somewhat unpleasant experience, but being liberated from the need to wear bits of glass, metal and plastic on my face is just the best thing ever and has enhanced my everyday life in so many different ways.

I celebrated the 10th anniversary of my www cybertron web page thing. Actually, not celebrated. Maybe I’ll leave that for the 25th anniversary or the book launch.

I made another short film along with the talented and completely rad Fractured Radius team.

I cut a demo with my folk/industrial/grindcore band Protest Pyg, but it needs work.

I was part of an interesting discussion panel with Danah Boyd and others on the subject of MySpace and online communities. And later I shared what I learned with some people at work.

Ryan published some of my stuff in Craccum, and apparently someone complained that it was condoning date rape, which made me feel like it was 1998. I also told a story or two.

And some other stuff which I refuse to immortalise online.

Hey, that was fun. Let’s do it again in 2007.

MMVI

Ten things

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I don’t normally do those so-called meme things, she said, but this one’s all right cos it’s not about ticking boxes but coming up with real things. It’s the “10 weird things/habits/little known facts about yourself” one.

  1. In late 2000/early 2001, I was the co-host of the Computer Chat show on Radio Pacific. I didn’t mean to. It was an accident, I swear. I haven’t mentioned much it because I used to be horribly embarrassed by it.
  2. I was saddened to discover that my favourite orphan from the “Annie” movie has grown up to be a fat housewife in real life.
  3. I have grade eight in choral speaking from the Trinity College in London. You’ll have to take my word for it – there was only one certificate and a dozen of us in the group.
  4. I have seen all the James Bond movies. However, as it was done as part of a completionist splurge, I only Bonded with about half of them.
  5. I can recite the name of all secretaries-general of the United Nations in chronological order. I cannot, however, guarantee that I’ll pronounce their names properly.
  6. I can write backwards, and upside down. I’d demonstrate, but it doesn’t work with a keyboard.
  7. When I was at tech, a visual arts tutor wanted me to switch from the communication stream into the visual arts stream cos I had the skillz.
  8. When I was 5, I entered a colouring competition in the Waikato Times and won tickets to see the Village People’s motion picture debut “Can’t Stop The Music”. It remains one of my favourite films, even though it is nine different shades of awful.
  9. I never learned to ride a bike. I had no motivation – everything was either within walking distance or too far to bike.
  10. Even though I’m a gangsta, sometimes I like to sit down and do cross-stitch kittens designs.

In the ’80s, everything was big

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My mum recently visited her sister in England and came back with a photo taken of my whanau in 1987.

I was looking at it trying to pick out who was who when I saw this woman wearing some hideous ’80s clothes. I chuckled to myself, but my chuckled soon turned to horror when I realised it was me. And I wasn’t a woman, I was a 12-year-old girl.

I don’t know what I was thinking, but I do know that I was so tall that I’d outgrown girls clothes by the time I was 10, so in the days before Glassons, I had to buy my clothes from trendy lady shops, but without the fashion sense of a trendy lady. Er… something like that.

1987

This is the ’80s that is dragged out for “I love the ’80s!!!” kinds of ’80s nostalgia. It was part of the ’80s I thought I was too young to have been part of… until now.