Category Archives: Music

Going out and staying in

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Oh hey – NZmusic.com. Remember that site?

NZmusic.com was a community-based website about New Zealand music. It was created as a side project by Wellington-based web design house Morse Media. I think it just came down to the Morse founders Dust and Teina being massive New Zealand music fans and wanting to have a little side project to experiment on.

I logged into NZmusic.com for the first time in ages. It told me I’ve been a member for 10 years and 4 weeks. That’s ancient in internet years.

I first joined in December 2000, and I had one very specific reason for joining: I wanted to watch an MC OJ and the Rhythm Slave video, which in turn led me to write this piece on their album a few months later.

In the days before Wikipedia, in the days before YouTube, in the days before Myspace, NZmusic.com was a place you could go to find out information about local bands, and watch a few of their music videos, even though they were low-quality and took ages to download on dial-up.

If the world wouldn’t listen to your favourite band, who didn’t even have a record deal and had barely toured outside of their hometown, you could find a handful of genuine fans of this band who’d be quite happy to discuss how, yeah, this band were musical geniuses and if there was any justice in the world, they’d be huge.

NZmusic.com was also a refuge for small-town teens who’d never have the chance to see their favourite bands play live, and probably didn’t have many, if any, friends who liked the same music that they did. A 14-year-old and a 28-year-old could equally argue about who was the best New Zealand drummer of all time, and no one really cared about (or noticed) the other’s age.

After I moved back to Auckland in 2002, NZmusic.com was the gentle hand that guided me out of the house. I’d go out to gigs at tiny bars like the now-closed Temple bar on Queen Street (and see Paselode blow the roof off), or to more populated gigs at the good old King’s Arse.

“The Shrugs are my new favourite band,” I declared on Sunday 17 November 2002 at the outrageous time of 3.41am “Anyone who can add in a bit of that Gwen Stefani/Eve song into a slow rock song is surely deserving of my adoration.” This was not overtiredness. The Shrugs are still one of my favourite bands, though they don’t play that particular song these days.

And it wasn’t just fans – actual proper band members were forum regulars too. In a discussion of music videos, I reckoned that Shihad’s “Pacifier” video didn’t really work because it was a direct copy of “A Clockwork Orange” and didn’t add anything new to the mix. Then along came Shihad’s drummer Tom, who commented “I’m alone on the issue within the band but I think the use of Clockwork Orange was trite at best – Lots of people love it though.” Whoa!

There’s an idea that any successful online community will eventually go offline. That is, with all the forum posts being made, eventually someone will say, “Hey, let’s meet up.” And that’s what happened with NZmusic.com. I eventually came to know some of the regulars from the forums, meeting up at gigs. There were also rumours of secret hook-ups, but also good friendships formed from it.

But then I stopped posting. It seems to have happened at some point in 2006, giving me at least five solid years of NZmusic.com before the decline.

The site started to fade when the New Zealand music area of the forum changed from discussions of New Zealand music to bands promoting their gigs. “hey we’re playing at shaykz on saturday come along and support nz music!!!!” No. We never went to gigs to “support New Zealand music”. We went out to see good bands play and to have fun.

So the site filled with boring posts and somehow NZmusic.com lost its heart. People noticed and made a few requests for something to be done (what?), but the Morse team were busy working hard with their paying jobs.

Rather than any sort of dramatic flouncy departure (“That’s it! I’m never posting here again! Hmph!”) I accidentally stopped posting, stopped visiting the site, until one day I realised it had been well over a year since I’d last visited.

NZmusic.com still exists, but it’s significantly pared down from its glory days. The forum is still there, but it’s filled with comment spam and doesn’t seem to have any regular users anymore. None of the older content remains – all the information about bands, the videos, the hilarious press releases is all gone.

It’s easy to blame Facebook for the decline of a community-based website, but there are now sites to pick up the slack, like Cheese On Toast by NZmusic.com regular Andrew Tidball, and A Low Hum‘s glorious celebrations of music, organised by another NZmusic regular, Blink. And that’s not to mention the whippersnappers behind sites like The Corner, keeping the music love going.

Sometimes I find myself feeling a little nostalgic for the old NZmusic.com, but realistically, it’s gone and it’s never coming back, just as surely as 2002 can’t come back again. Instead NZmusic.com has left a legacy, a fragmented but staunch community of New Zealand music fans who continue to share the love.

All the artists of the world: The case of Milli Vanilli

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Exhibit M

22 February 1990. The 1990 Grammy Awards, recognising the musical output of 1989. Young MC and Kris Kristofferson present the Grammy for Best New Artist. “This year, the nominees for Best New Artist are making all kinds of music,” the bespectacled author of Keep It In Your Pants says. “And each one of them expresses himself in a unique way that commands attention,” Young’s elder co-presenter concludes.

The nominees are announced, along with a video clip of a respresentative song. There’s Neneh Cherry, rippin’ shit up with Buffalo Stance; the Indigo Girls belting out some harmonious acoustic pop on Closer To Fine. So far the applause is polite and appreciative.

Then comes Milli Vanilii’s nomination, along with the braided pair singing, “Girl you know it’s true. Ooh, ooh, ooh, I love you.” And dancing. And staring with those needy eyes. The audience breaks out into screaming and rapturous applause. Yes, yes, Rob and Fab!

Back to Soul II Soul and a bit of their art/house/soul/pop song Back to Life (However Do You Want Me); and finally gravel-voiced rapper Tone Loc rounds out the nominations with his Young MC-penned track Funky Cold Medina.

The winner is announced. Milli Vanilli. The room erupts with screams. Yay!

Rob and Fab receive their award, and Rob makes this speech:

“We wanna say thank you very much, but we wanna say there are a lot of artists here in this room, there are a lot of artists outside in the world, who could achieve the same award that we achieved today. And it’s an award for all artists in the world. Thank you very much.”

That night, all the artists in the world gave silent thanks to Milli Vanilli.

Exhibit L

April 27, 2034

“Come here, my little comes. Gather around and I’ll tell you why we used to like the Milli Vanillis in the olden days. Oh, they were so pretty. It was like if you got Justin Beiber, made him brown, cloned him, gave him too many hair extensions, and dressed him in lycra bike pants, a jacket with giant shoulder pads and clompy boots. And how they could dance! They used to do this thing where they would jump up and spin around and their dreadlocks and braids flew about gaily. And that Rob, he had the most beautiful eyes.”

“Grandma?”

“Yes, child.”

“Who’s Justin Bieber?”

Exhibit K

November 16 1990. The National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences withdraws Milli Vanilli’s Grammy for Best New Artist.

The main point comes down to that the vocal credit on the album specifically named Rob and Fab.

But the awarded recordings themself hadn’t changed. Milli Vanilli hadn’t changed. It was just that the two fellows on the album cover and in the music videos and dancing on stage were different from the men who sang on the record.

But somehow that affected the recording.

Exhibit J

It’s a bit like Schrödinger’s Cat. It’s not until you lift the lid on the album that you can form an opinion on the music. If the cat is alive, there’s a couple of handsome singers on the album and it’s a great album; if the cat is dead, it’s ordinary looking session singers on the album and it’s a terrible album.

Exhibit H

January 1990. Happy new decade. I had a $15 record voucher from either my recent 15th birthday present and/or Christmas the week before. I’d recently purchased De La Soul’s debut album Three Feet High and Rising and was really enjoying it. Yeah, soundtrack of summer.

So I was feeling a bit adventurous. I wanted something a bit urban, a bit gritty. Something that would keep reminding me of my summer holiday in Auckland and not the impending return to rural Hamilton.

I looked around a forgettable record shop (remember, kids, this was the early ’90s, when record shops were all over the place and could easily be forgettable), but couldn’t find anything that took my fancy.

Then I saw something on the top 20 rack of tapes. It was Milli Vanilli’s All or Nothing (US Remix Album). I’d heard their songs. They were ok. I bought the tape, listened to it a few times but it wasn’t very captivating.

One of the album tracks was Girl You Know It’s True (NY Subway Mix). This suggests someone has taken the original Girl You Know It’s True and remixed it to reflect the gritty urban beat of New York’s public transport system.

In reality it’s like someone’s heard MARRS’s groundbreaking samplefest Pump Up the Volume and decided to apply a similar style to Milli Vanilli. But instead of using an experienced DJ, it sounds like they gave the work-experience kid a Fairlight and some Grace Jones, Sly and Robbie, Michael Jackson, and Deep Purple singles and let them have at it. With disastrous results.

If I really want to feel a stab of regret, I can remind myself that at the time, The Stone Roses album would have been out there on the shelves for me to buy.

Exhibit G

April 2 1998. Let’s try not to think of Rob Pilatus’ final night on earth, alone in a hotel room in Hamburg, an accidental overdose. Let’s try not to think of the drug rehab and the assault charges and the relapsing and the neediness and the depression. Let’s try to remember the good things.

Exhibit F

After it was revealed that Rob and Fab were not the people singing on the Milli Vanilli records or dancing in their videos, the public outrage made it clear – there is no room for lack of authenticity in pop music.

Yet, surprisingly, the Indigo Girls did not see their sales go through the roof in response to this newfound desire for musical authenticity.

A lesson was learned – cheat, just don’t get caught. Today no one’s quite so bold as to hire pretty frontmen for frumpy singers. But there’s Auto-Tune to tidy up messy singers. Or what about getting a great singer to record the demo, which the mediocre singer memorises, right down to the quirky phrasing. And the potential that ProTools offers for chopping and layering to disguise flaws.

But why are we still obsessed with authenticity in music? Why is it ok for some types of art to be polished to an artifical state of perfection, but not ok for others.

Exhibit E

We hide our love for Milli Vanilli. We disguise it as contempt for the ’90s, beecause the ’90s were awful. At the moment, at least.

Milli Vanilli gets filed away with Crystal Pepsi, biker shorts and giant hair – pop culture anomalies that will never happen again.

Because the past was awful and the present is better. Apart from the bits of the past that were golden. We cherish those.

But that’s not the Milli Vanilli bit. That’s the bit where we pretend we never bought a Milli Vanilli album. Or if we did, we thought it was awful.

We don’t remember all the songs that went to number one all over the world, or the joy people got from dancing to Baby Don’t Forget My Number (NY Subway Mix).

Perhaps that actually happened in a parallel universe, where Al Gore was president and the World Trade Center still stands.

Exhibit D


Q. Do you like Milli Vanilli?

A. No, I do not like Milli Vanilli because I think that they are crap!!!! I mean, they don’t even write their own songs or sing on their records and they have those braids which look really STUPID. Also, they do those dumb dances where they go from side to side, which look really LAME. Plus they wear really weird clothes with giant shoulder pads. Shoulder pads are so mental. I like proper singers who are actually talented, like Margaret Urlich, Jamie J Morgan, Ngaire and Madonna.

Exhibit C

I mean, it’s not like they were the only ones doing it. Technotronic had blue-lipped fashion model Felly lip-syncing in their Pump Up the Jam video; petit Zelma Davis stood in for plus-size Martha Walsh in C+C Music Factory’s Gonna Make You Sweat video; and it was shockingly revealed that Paula Abdul’s singing partner MC Skat Kat was not actually a streetwise cat, but was, in fact, two human males.

Exhibit B

Rob did the grunty singing and Fab did the rapping, but there always seemed to be a few more male voices in there too. And maybe there was even a voice of caution from the future.

It’s a tragedy for me to see the dream is over.
And I never will forget the day we met.
[Multi-platinum pop career], I’m gonna miss you.

- Girl I’m Gonna Miss You

Exhibit A

Such a lovely place

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I’m used to people getting to my website through unusual googles, but every now and then something comes along that manages to surprise me. And indeed recently someone got to my website by searching for hotel california lyrics about the hutt valley.

Now, at first glance, this would suggest a hilarious radio-station parody of the Eagles’ classic song with the lyrics changed to reflect the unique cultural nature of the Hutt Valley.

But it could also mean that the “Hotel California” lyrics are actually about the Hutt Valley. This isn’t about the dirty LA music scene of the ’70s. No, it’s about life in the Hutt.

I think the latter is the more likely scenario. Let’s examine a selection of lyrics.

The mist

On a dark desert highway

Dark – the high hills of the Hutt Valley mean that the sun sets earlier, plunging the valley into darkness.
Desert – while not technically a desert, there are parts of the Hutt Valley that do feel like a barren desert. If not geographically, then architecturally.
Highway – State Highway 2 runs the length of the Hutt Valley, and includes the road engineering marvel that is the Petone Interchange.

I heard the mission bell

This is actually when you get a text from your mate who says “wanna do a mish?” and you are all “kewl” and then you show up to his place and go real hard, eh.

And I was thinking to myself, “This could be heaven or this could be hell.”

The Hutt Valley offers many different types of experiences – the New Dowse gallery, the Lower Hutt civic buildings, the Upper Hutt Roller Skating Club, vast tracts of car-centric suburbs, gangs, Queensgate mall. These could be considered “heaven” and/or “hell” depending on what your hobbies and interests are.

So I called up the captain, “Please bring me my wine.”

The Hutt Valley is just over the Rimutakas from the Wairarapa, a rich wine-growing and grape-growing area of New Zealand. The “captain” this lyric refers to is obviously involved with the Toast Martinborough festival, and is about to pour a festival-goer a sample glass of pinot gris.

Welcome to the Hotel California

The Hutt offers a range of fine accomodations, ranging from budget accommodation, to four-star motels for the dicerning traveller. And there’s also that one with the steakhouse attached, which is quite good if you like steak but don’t want to have to walk too far to your bed.

Mirrors on the ceiling, the pink champagne on ice.

This is obviously a reference to the wide range of products available from Westfield Queensgate. You can go to the Warehouse and buy some mirrors and then No-More-Nails them to your bedroom ceiling. Then you can celebrate your handiwork with some strawberry Lindauer. Man, that stuff’s real yum. But you should make sure the No More Nails has set hard before you lie down under it, because if you were sitting there enjoying a Lindauer and one of the mirrors fell on you, that would be really annoying and you’d probably spill the Lindauer and then you’d have to go and change the sheets. What a blimmin’ hassle.

You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.

The Hutt Valley is a prison that will trap you for life.

High on the roof was a lonely Jesus sign

Golden moments from the Poi E video

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Poi E has recently reentered the charts, thanks to its inclusion in Taika Waititi’s rather good film Boy, and his new video for the song.

But I’m rather fond of the original video. In fact, I’d say that the video for the Patea Maori Club’s 1984 number one single is almost as famous as the song itself.

It has a simple structure: first verse and chorus – down on the marae; second verse – down by the Aotea canoe; second chorus – out on the streets of Patea; funky break down – the big city; final choruses – back in the Patea hall.

But within these few locations, there are little visual gems that make this video a treat. Here are my ten favourite bits from the original Poi E video.

Mt Taranaki

The video opens with an upwards pan over this image of Mt Taranaki. It’s later shown to be a mural painted at the back of local hall, but with this slightly grainy footage, if you squint it almost looks like Mt Taranaki on a misty morning. Interestingly, when Poi E was released, the official name of this volcano was Mt Egmont. It would be two more years before Mt Taranaki got equal name status. I like to think the Patea Maori Club had a little to do with that.

The dog with the poi

The first section of the video is the Patea Maori Club performing Poi E in front of a whare nui. This could lead to a disastrously boring video – like “Sailing Away” two years later – but the Poi E video mixes it up by including footage of this crazy dog running around with a poi in its mouth. Did the dog steal the poi or was he the club’s special kuri performer?

Mutton chops

Look at those mutton chops. Just look at them. Now, this video was made in 1984. Mutton chops were at their fashion peak in the mid-’70s. Yet this fellow has lovingly held on to his unfashionable facial hair. In fact, it looks like a bit of a ’70s shag do lurking underneath that headband. He has his look and he’s not changing for anyone.

The boy

I love this kid because he’s really enjoying himself. While the rest of the kids look like they’re just there to participate in the filming of the music video, this chap looks like he’s there because he loves the song. Standing tall and proud and really digging the music. Nice one, little fellow.

The milk tanker

I think this was a happy accident. At this point in the video, the group are standing in front of the concrete canoe, but trucks keep thundering past, ruining the shot. But the film-makers cleverly incorporate the trucks into the video. Here comes a milk truck, and a bit later there’s a cattle truck. Hey, this is what life is like in Patea.

Aotea waka arch

This isn’t actually a hidden delight of the video. No, this concrete waka is one of the main stars of the vid. It’s a slightly kitschy design, but has come to be an icon of Patea. It commemorates the Aotea canoe that brought the first Maori to the Taranaki. This takes the PMC out of the traditional marae setting and puts them firmly in a what can only be a small New Zealand town.

McDonald’s

The action moves to Manners Mall, Wellington. And when it’s the mid-1980s and you’re from a small town, what symbolises the big city? McDonald’s. It’s cool, it’s urban and the outside of the building has “McDonald’s” embossed in plastic. I bet they all had Big Macs after filming was complete.

The girl

Look how happy she is! Arms reaching out as if to hug the world. Every performer wants this sort of reaction from the audience. Absolute genuine adulation and appreciation. She doesn’t care about the music video shoot either. She just want to dance along to her favourite band.

The new wave chicks

We’re back at the local hall for the finale, then suddenly these two truly outrageous ladies show up. The hair, the eyeliner, the off-the-shoulder top, the jewellery, the pout – just what are these two new wave babes doing in a Patea Maori Club video? I’m not sure, but it is a nice nod to the sort of other culture the PMC were up against in the pop charts.

Poi George

The new wave chicks can’t keep a straight face for long. The camera zooms out to reveal this fellow who we shall call Poi George. A Maori fulla with Boy-George-style plaits and non-Boy-George-style poi. I don’t even know where all this action is taking place in relation to the rest of the video, but this is my absolute favourite bit of the video. They knew exactly what they were doing – they knew they were making a video for a song that was going to be a hit.

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Aspects of a downhill slide

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I came across Wikipedia’s list of songs that have been in the #1 spot in the New Zealand pop charts for over eight weeks continuously. These are the songs that everyone loved and loved so much that they just kept buying them more and more and playing them more and more.

Figuring this says something about New Zealand, I went to YouTube and listened to all the songs. These are my scientific findings.

Dawn featuring Tony Orlando – “Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree“, 1973. (10 weeks)
There’s something magical ’bout “Ribbon”. On the surface it sounds like a novelty song, with its oompah beat and simple lyrics. But then there’s a killer melody lurking, and the emotional depths of an ex-con who finds his woman still loves him. I can’t help but love it, and shall tie a yellow ribbon around my ole MP3 player.

Pussycat – “Mississippi“, 1976. (10 weeks)
Where did this song come from? And where did it go? Pussycat were a Dutch girl group, and “Mississippi” was their lament to the popularity of rock over country music. It has that not-quite-America feeling to it, largely due to the Eastern European guitar flourishes. This song seems like a case of pop actually eating itself – a sweet country pop farewelled country music, and then was swallowed whole by punk. Or was it?

Boney M. – “Rivers of Babylon“, 1978. (14 weeks)
“Rivers of Babylon” was originally written by reggae band The Melodians, with the lyrics almost straight from Psalms 137. Boney M’s version took the rough, glorious Jamaican original and added some European glamour and disco cool, turning it into a cheerful pop hit. Its 14-week run also makes it the single with the longest run at #1 (that’s three and a half months). This tune helped reggae cross over and made it an Aotearoan favourite. Without the success of “Rivers of Babylon”, there would be no barbecue dub today.

All Of Us – “Sailing Away“, 1986. (9 weeks)
It’s eight years before another song has a long run at number one, and this time it’s a New Zealand song. But does it have to be “Sailing Away”? This was New Zealand’s attempt at a “We Are the World” style group song. But rather than being in aid of or protesting apartheid, it was virtually an ad to get the general public to support the New Zealand boat in the America’s Cup. The song was a who’s who of New Zealand singers, many of whom are better known as ad jingle singers. Also, those guys from Satellite Spies – whose idea was it get them on board? New Zealand lost, both the Louis Vuitton Cup and musically.

Whitney Houston – “I Will Always Love You“, 1992-1993. (11 weeks)
Hey, Pussycat! Country didn’t die – it was reworked into soul. Dolly Parton‘s ’70s ballad became a powerhouse tune for a pre-crack Whitney Houston to belt out on the soundtrack of “The Bodyguard”. I can’t quite understand why this song was so popular – it’s like a sticky caramel – once is ok, but more than that in one sitting becomes rather unpleasant.

UB40 – “Can’t Help Falling in Love“, 1993. (10 weeks)
Ok, so it’s a cover version (tick), of an Elvis song (tick), in a reggae style (tick), by UB40 (tick) – it’s almost a perfect New Zealand number one song. The video is particularly hilarious, with UB40′s cheery performance cut with scenes from the Sharon Stone shithouse thriller “Sliver”. What was it about the early ’90s that required such massive declarations of love in pop form? (Meanwhile, down the other end of the charts, grunge was getting all up in your face.)

Avril Lavigne – “Complicated“, 2002. (9 weeks)
Hey, Pussycat II! Country didn’t die – it was cleverly disguised as skater punk. I mean, sk8r punk, man. Take the cute teen girl, iron her hair, give her some eyeliner and proto-emo jeans and everyone will be so distracted with her California skater chick look that they’ll overlook the fact that she is singing a bloody country song. The big love of the early ’90s had changed its Facebook status to “It’s complicated”.

Smashproof featuring Gin Wigmore – “Brother“, 2009. (11 weeks)
Finally. It’s a New Zealand song that enjoyed a long run at number one and it’s a really good song. Based on smooth strings, reminiscent of “Unfinished Sympathy“, the song examines the reality of growing up in South Auckland. It took 23 years for “Sailing Away” to lose its top spot, but when it finally happened, its arse was kicked.

Lady Gaga – “Poker Face“, 2008-2009. (10 weeks)
“Poker Face” sounds a bit like ’80s synth pop and a bit like ’90s Euro dance pop, but a song sounding like this would never ever have topped the charts in those decades. There’s a bit of the ol’ Tony Orlando magic there – the elements of a potentially naff song, but something wondrous that pulls it all together into a perfect pop song about poker and/or sex.

Black Eyed Peas – “I Gotta Feeling“, 2009. (9 weeks)
I used to work with a guy who’d sit at his desk, headphones on, singing “Tonight gonna be a good night,” over and over. I didn’t know the song, but I imagined that line was a small part of the whole. It turns out that line is pretty much the entire song, an ode to the early, hopeful, exciting part of the evening, when your make-up still looks good and you’re not sitting on the staircase crying into your twelfth wine.

Stan Walker – “Black Box“, 2009-2010. (10 weeks)
Stan’s the 2009 winner of Australian Idol, and this is the winner’s song. Insert pop idol here. It’s a perfectly fine pop song, one that has benefitted from the accompanying TV show to boost its popularity. Curiously enough, “Black Box” only ever made it to #2 in the Australian charts. Stan did better in his homeland, making the efforts of TrueBliss and the NZ Idol winners pale in comparison.

The pop charts of Tony Orlando’s day are very different to the charts of Stan Walker’s time. It’s a careful blend of physical music sales, digital sales and radio play. But it makes me wonder – in 35 years time, will Stan Walker (or indeed Lady Gaga) be as well known still as Boney M, or as delightfully obscure as Pussycat?

Further reading
John-Paul at Man of Errors has a splendid series looking at the New Zealand number one songs in 1973, including “Tie A Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree“.