I recognised Corben Simpson, standing beside a battered vehicle that seemed to be his home, changing from one crumpled shirt into another. Someone said he was recently out of jail. Chris Seresin looked stricken, as though he had tried to run with the wind but the wind had turned around and kicked him in the teeth.
Freedom had been the catchcry of the counterculture, shouted in the ‘60s and echoing into the ‘70s and beyond. It was the slogan of the civil rights and anti-apartheid movements, the war protesters, the pro-cannabis campaigners, and Bill Dwyer’s carnival anarchists. But the pursuit of freedom had proved to be dangerous. For some it had led to imprisonment. Others had felt the blows of police batons. A few were dead or damaged by drugs. At Bruno’s tangi it seemed almost as if that idea of freedom — and all the idealism it embodied — had finally found its resting place.
But in a performance, a recording, or even the remembering of a piece of music, dreams stay alive. This is what I am thinking as I stand on the Kelburn skyline hearing Bruno drumming ‘Freedom St Marys’, although the only sound is the clatter of the Cable Car going over a bridge.
Acknowledgements
The original manuscript of this book was written in 2015 as a thesis for the MA in Creative Writing at the International Institute of Modern Letters, Victoria University of Wellington. It has benefitted greatly from the feedback of my fellow students: Jane Arthur, Louise Compagnone, Alexandra Hollis, Helen Hunter, Sam Lentle-Keenan, Nina Powles, Simon Thomas, Sarah Webster and Louise Wrightson, not to mention the creative guidance of our supervisor Cliff Fell. I am also grateful to Tom McWilliams and Fergus Barrowman, who along with Cliff were my assessors and made valuable recommendations.
Thanks to Chris Price and Harry Ricketts for encouraging me to do the MA in the first place; Paul Amies, Arthur Baysting, Chris Bourke, Stephen Canning, Mark Derby, Kathy McRae and Nic Smith, all of whom gave many useful notes; Redmer Yska for countless illuminating conversations; Matthew McKee and Keith Stewart for trawling their photographic archives; Peter Dasent and Andrew Delahunty for fact-finding and field work; Creative New Zealand for a grant to conduct interviews towards this project; Edna Carson for helping me navigate the library of New Zealand Breweries; the staff of the National Library of New Zealand and the libraries of Auckland University and Victoria University of Wellington; Infofind - Radio New Zealand Reference Library; Mary Varnham, Emma Wolff and Sarah Bennett at Awa Press, Jane Parkin, and Denis and Verna Adam and the Adam Foundation.
Thanks to everyone who spoke, corresponded or shared stories or helped in other ways: Susan Belt, Thomasin Bollinger, Tim Bollinger, Clinton Brown, Rod Bryant, Janet Clouston, Mike Corless, Paul Davies, John Dix, Bernadine Doyle, Tim Finn, Peter Frater, Ray Goodwin, Charley Gray, Jackie Matthews, Tina Matthews, Jan Melbourne, Mahina Melbourne, Rob Nesbitt, Robert Nesbitt Snr., Nigel Poysden, Chris Prowse, Trevor Reekie, Alastair Riddell, Chris Seresin, Rachel Stace, Jim Stevenson, Robert Taylor, Richard Von Sturmer and Sally Zwartz.
Special thanks to Rick Bryant and all the former members and crew of Rough Justice: Tony Backhouse, Janet Clouston, Mike Gubb, Martin Highland, Stephen Jessup, Peter Kennedy, Dennis Mason, Simon Page, Malcolm Prendevile, and Boyd.
The author and publisher are grateful for permission to quote extracts from the following lyrics: ‘Play Nasty For Me’ lyrics by Tony Backhouse; ‘Sunshine’ lyrics by Paul Hewson, © EMI Music Publishing Australia Pty Limited; ‘The Hills Are Alive...’ lyrics by The Wide Mouthed Frogs; ‘There Is No Depression In New Zealand’ lyrics by Richard Von Sturmer ; ‘Nga Iwi E’ written by Hirini Melbourne; ‘Freedom St Marys’ written by David Lawrence and Chris Seresin, © EMI Music Publishing Australia Pty Limited
Selected discography
I have included only records by New Zealand artists here; there are other places you can go to find out about the best of B.B. King, James Brown, The Beatles or Van Morrison. I have not tried to be exhaustive, but rather noted a few favourites by each act while hoping to give an idea of the breadth of their work. In some cases I refer to private, unreleased or deleted recordings. This is not to deliberately frustrate you, but to give these lost recordings the status they deserve — and perhaps hasten the day they are made widely available. Many of the individual tracks mentioned can be found on Spotify and YouTube.
BILLY TK AND THE POWERHOUSE
Move On Up: The Unreleased 1972 HMV Tapes (EMI CD, 2009)
Life Beyond the Material Sky (Little Wing album, 1990)
After leaving Human Instinct in 1971, Billy Te Kahika formed The Powerhouse, a fluid ensemble of anything up to 15 members. Move On Up: The Unreleased 1972 HMV Tapes captures the band in its embryonic phase, covering Curtis Mayfield, Van Morrison and Neil Young. Over the next few years Te Kahika would become increasingly influenced by the jazz—rock fusion of Carlos Santana and John McLaughlin. This period is represented by Life Beyond the Material Sky, a live 1975 recording from Wellington’s St James Theatre released by German label Little Wing.
BLAM BLAM BLAM
‘There Is No Depression in New Zealand’/’Got to Be Guilty’ (Propeller single, 1981)
Maids To Order (Propeller EP, 1981)
Luxury Length (Propeller album, 1982)
The Complete Blam Blam Blam (Festival/Mushroom CD, 2003)
No single track captures more vividly the uneasy mood of the country in 1981 than Blam Blam Blam’s ‘There Is No Depression in New Zealand’, although similar strains of paranoia and division run through many other Blams’ songs, including ‘Blue Belmonts’ from the Maids To Order EP (‘the Secret Service makes us nervous’) and ‘Got to Be Guilty’, about the scapegoating of the wrongfully convicted Arthur Allan Thomas. By the time the Blams released their only studio album, their sound had grown more sophisticated, without giving up its edge. Tim Mahon’s spiky basslines sound as though they are being played on an instrument strung with barbed wire. ‘Don’t Fight It Marsha, It’s Bigger Than Both of Us’ turns to personal politics and hints at the career Don McGlashan would go on to have as one of the country’s most beloved singer-songwriters. All the material mentioned can be found on the 2003 compilation The Complete Blam Blam Blam.
BLERTA
‘Freedom St Marys’ (HMV single, 1972)
'Aunty Ada’ (HMV single, 1972)
‘This Is the Life’ (HMV single, 1974)
The Return Trip (EMI CD, 2001)
When an Australian interviewer asked Blerta in 1973 if their name meant anything, Bruno Lawrence answered, ‘Bruno Lawrence’s electric revelations and travelling apparitions’. Pianist Chris Seresin countered with the alternative: ‘Bus load of egocentric, raving, tripping adults’. The band could be both. ‘Freedom St Marys’ was the B-side of Blerta’s only hit, ‘Dance All Around the World’, the Trojan-horse hit that snuck them on to family television as a Golden Disc Awards finalist in 1972, and you’ll find a section of this book devoted to it (see pages 247—251) ‘Aunty Ada’ was the madly uncommercial follow-up: spectacular drumming and a good Seresin keyboard hook, plus an unhinged performance from Simpson of a lyric inspired by a discarded telegram found in a provincial post office. ‘This Is the Life’ is a bluesy ode to hedonism, written by Geoff Murphy and Ian Watkin. There have been at least three recordings of it, but the best one — if you can find it — is the first. Released only as a single, it features a vocal by Australian singer Renee Geyer, who sings as if she is fully committed to the song’s manifesto. Unfortunately, Geyer’s contractual conflicts meant the record was quickly withdrawn. The Return Trip is a Blerta retrospective compiled by Geoff Murphy, and combines most of the band’s singles (although sadly not ‘Aunty Ada’), a live ‘This Is the Life’ (with vocals by Beaver), plus representative selections from Blerta’s two albums, This Is the Life (1975) and Wild Man (1976).
RICK BRYANT
As I have heard Rick Bryant sing on hundreds, perhaps thousands, of occasions, many of his greatest performances exist for me only in memory. On his earliest recordings he is almost unrecognisable a
s the singer he became. His voice is lighter and less assured, although still capable of conveying deep feeling. There’s plenty of that in ‘Wild About You’, his debut recording with Gutbucket (In The Blue Vein, 1969, Ode Records). By the time of the Sam Hunt/Mammal album Beware The Man he has grown more confident (see Mammal). But my favourite recordings of Rick are from much later. Some of the performances recorded as Rick Bryant and The Jive Bombers are extraordinary. A standout is ‘Time’, a wry, sad and soulful memoir, from the album of the same name (Red Rocks, 1999). Since the early ‘90s Rick has recorded extensively with the reunited Windy City Strugglers. It’s hard to be objective. Full disclosure: I produced and played on the recordings. But a few personal favourites are ‘Can’t Get Back’ (On Top of the World, 1998), ‘Loving You Is Not an Easy Game’ (Kingfisher, 2005) and ‘If I Was Thirsty’ (Shine On, 2008) — all written by Bill Lake and Arthur Baysting — plus Rick’s own tour-de-force ‘Snow On the Desert Road’ (Snow on the Desert Road, 2001).
THE CLEAN
‘Tally Ho’/’Platypus’ (Flying Nun single, 1981)
Boodle Boodle Boodle (Flying Nun EP, 1981)
Great Sounds Great (Flying Nun EP, 1982)
Anthology (Flying Nun album, 2002)
The Clean introduced their engaging mix of garage-pop, folk-rock and psychedelia with their 1981 debut single ‘Tally Ho’ and have continued to create fresh music out of those vintage styles, off and on, ever since. The short form suits them best: the early singles and EPs remain their most concise and consistent records. Yet there are fine things to be found throughout their catalogue, a good representation of which can be found on the Anthology album.
Interestingly, some four decades after Mammal, Clean guitarist David Kilgour collaborated with Sam Hunt on a pair of albums -Falling Debris (Arch Hill, 2008) and The 8th (Bandit King, 2015) -that combine Hunt’s poetry with Kilgour’s blazing guitars.
JOHNNY DEVLIN
‘Lawdy Miss Clawdy’ (Prestige single, 1958)
How Would Ya Be (Ode CD, 2007)
Already discussed in detail (see pages 127—132) the first version of ‘Lawdy Miss Clawdy’, if extremely raw, has excitement the remake lacks. It also has the essential spoken intro. How Would Ya Be, a bursting-at-the-seams compilation album, contains 37 tracks, all recorded for Phil Warren’s Prestige label between 1958 and 1959. Both recordings of ‘Lawdy Miss Clawdy’ are included, along with such credible slices of south seas rock ‘n’ roll as Johnny’s version of Jimmy Lloyd’s ‘I Got a Rocket in My Pocket.’
DRAGON
‘Education’ (Vertigo single, 1975)
Sunshine (CBS album, 1977)
‘April Sun in Cuba’ (CBS single, 1978)
‘I’m Still in Love with You’ (CBS single, 1978)
Unlike many bands noted here, Dragon have had a long recording career, from their first albums Universal Radio (Vertigo, 1974) and Scented Gardens for the Blind (Vertigo, 1975), right up to today. They released EPs of new material in 2011 and 2012, and continue to perform as a live band, led by founder Todd Hunter. Their earliest material is not to my taste: Marc Hunter described it as ‘period comedy’ and I concur. Nor do I like much of the music they made after the ‘70s. Their songwriting peak remains Sunshine, the first album they made after moving to Australia. Dominated by the songs of Paul Hewson, it captures the ambivalence of a band from provincial New Zealand buzzing on the first rush of international success while navigating the pitfalls of the rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle that had already cost the life of their first drummer.
‘April Sun in Cuba’ and ‘I’m Still in Love with You’ are the best of their Australian hits, both examples of Hewson’s genius as a pop craftsman. The first is based on a two-note rock rhumba, mindlessly simple and utterly addictive. The second is a masterpiece of jaded melancholy — remarkable for, among other things, a chorus that simply repeats the verse melody while functioning as the song’s central hook. Just before they left New Zealand, the band cut their funkiest single, ‘Education’. Robert Taylor sings and plays, while Marc Hunter is relegated to congas. Graeme Nesbitt produces.
HELLO SAILOR
Hello Sailor (Key album, 1977)
Containing the group’s three biggest singles — Dave McArtney’s ‘Gutter Black’, Graham Brazier’s ‘Blue Lady’ and Harry Lyon’s ‘Lyin’ in the Sand’ — Sailor’s debut album represented a milestone in putting original indigenous songs before a receptive local audience. Elsewhere on their first and finest album are further snapshots of late-night, late’70s Auckland: the loping ‘Ponsonby reggae’ of ‘All Round This Town’; the cautionary tales of ‘Hooked’ and ‘When Your Lights are Out’.
HERBS
Whats’ Be Happen? (Warrior EP, 1981)
Light of the Pacific (Warrior album, 1982)
Pacific reggae begins with Herbs’ great debut. The six-song Whats’ Be Happen? doesn’t have a bad track, although it’s Toni Fonoti’s ‘Dragons and Demons’ and the bilingual title track that stand out, as do Fonoti’s songs on the following year’s Light of the Pacific.
HIGHWAY
Highway (HMV album, 1971)
This album is for those who want to listen. It was made hurriedly but is an honest effort,’ begin the liner notes to the only album these Wellington psych-rock pioneers ever made. Compared to the expansive form that Highway’s songs would take on stage, the seven tracks here, averaging seven minutes each, are relatively concise. Singer Bruce Sontgen may not be the most poetic of lyricists, but his gritty vocals provide funky punctuation throughout, while the interplay of guitarists Phil Pritchard and George Barris and the spare groove of bassist George Limbidis and drummer Jim Lawrie remain an exemplar for any band looking for the perfect balance between loose and tight. Favourite tracks are ‘Listen to the Band’ and ‘The Ride’ but it’s all good.
HUMAN INSTINCT
Burning Up Years (Pye album, 1969)
Stoned Guitar (Pye/Air album, 1970)
Pins In It (Pye album, 1971)
Flamboyant singing drummer Maurice Greer joined veteran Auckland beat group The Four Fours in 1966. Before long they had changed their name to Human Instinct and added Bunnythorpe-born Billy Te Kahika, who brought his Hendrix-influenced guitar skills. Of the three albums made while Te Kahika was with the band, Stoned Guitar is the standout, with the funk-rock evergreen ‘Black Sally’, two songs by Auckland guitar legend turned Krishna monk Doug Jerebine (also known as Jesse Harper), and the long instrumental title track on which Te Kahika — by now known as Billy TK — sculpts shapes of pure sound from his overdriven Gibson SG guitar.
MAMMAL
Beware the Man, Mammal/Sam Hunt (Red Rat album, 1972)
‘Wait’/’Whisper’ (Red Rat single, 1973)
‘Play Nasty for Me’ (unreleased live recording, 1974)
The only album of Mammal ever released is unrepresentative. A collaboration with poet Sam Hunt, it intersperses Hunt’s distinctive readings with settings of his poems by Mammal’s Tony Backhouse and composer Ian McDonald, and includes interludes by the Alex Lindsay String Quartet and early synthesiser soundscapes. The title song is a powerful piece of psychedelic funk and would remain a staple of the Mammal repertoire. Hunt’s lyric, cautioning listeners to ‘beware the man who tries to fit you out/in his idea of a hat’ caught the us-against-them mood of the counterculture. Other songs are more pastoral and reflective: ‘A Valley Called Moonshine’, ‘Hot Water Bottle Baby Blues’, ‘When Morning Comes’ and ‘A Wind of Wolves’ stand out. Mammal’s 1973 single paired two originals, ‘Wait’ and ‘Whisper’, and gives a greater hint of what this band could be like in full flight. Tony Backhouse’s vocal arrangement on Taylor’s song ‘Wait’ is baroque ‘n’ roll; Backhouse and Bryant’s voices are contrasted to great effect on ‘Whisper’. But unreleased live recordings (see pages 47—54) come closest to showing what a great and under-documented band this was.
THE Māori VOLCANICS
Live At The Broderick Inn (Revolution album, 1975)
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bsp; Although one of the country’s longest-running, farthest-travelled showbands, The Māori Volcanics are underrepresented on disc. Nor does the medium really do justice to an act that was comic and visual as much as musical. As it stands, only one side of their ‘live’ album is in fact live, and intersperses skits of the soon to be legendary Billy T. James (then known as Bill Taitoko) with showy covers of Otis Redding and Joe Tex. The studio side is soul with a Vegas veneer, but Mahora Waaka (later Mahora Peters) shows off her diamond voice on a couple of originals, ‘All I Ever Want is You’ and ‘Mirage’.
THE QUINCY CONSERVE
‘Ride the Rain’ (HMV single, 1970)
‘Everybody Has Their Way’ (HMV single, 1970)
Listen to the Band (HMV album, 1970)
Aire of Good Feeling: Best of (EMI CD, 2008)
They released more records than just about any other New Zealand band in the 1970s, but The Quincy Conserve were on disc, as on stage, essentially just a really good covers band, apart from the brief time when Bruno Lawrence was with them. During those few months they cut a number of tracks as good as any of the horn-based rock-jazz bands in the world at the time — think Blood, Sweat & Tears and Chicago. ‘Sugar Man’ had been a lost single for Bobby Darin, but on the Listen to the Band album the Quincys’ arrangement improved markedly on the original. Then there were the peerless ‘Ride the Rain’ (see pages 147—149) and ‘Everybody Has Their Way’, both Lawrence originals and each philosophical in its own way.
ROCKINGHORSE
‘Through the Southern Moonlight’ (HMV single, 1975)
Thoroughbred (HMV album, 1975)
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