Alastair Galbraith- Intro Version

Roof Bolt Recordings

1994

Picked this up on a high school trip to Chicago back in '94. I had been intrigued by the track(s) on the (still great) Hey Drag City comp. This was probably the first New Zealand record I ever owned and the first inkling I had of something crazy going on on that faraway island. The two secret fantasies I harbored throughout an entire trip I made to NZ back in early '99 were 1) that I'd somehow get a chance to catch Alastair playing somewhere and 2) that I'd find more records by Thela. Neither happened, but in the end I was more than willing to settle for having seen Roy Montgomery, Bruce Russell/Kim Pieters/Peter Stapleton, The Clean, Peter Jefferies, Bailter Space, and a whole slew of lesser known though still amazing bands. Wow. If I could revisit any single month from my past...... With money for records though this time, of course. But that's neither here nor there. My point being that this record serves as a great "intro version" to both Galbraith's solo output and the wider '90's New Zealand singles scene. It's all here- bedroom production, guitar scuzz/violin scree, and fragmented suggestions of pop brilliance. Fans of Stefan Neville's Pumice records in particular should take notice. Last track also features Chris Heazlewood on guitar.

Intro Version

Roy Montgomery- Zabriskie Point

Gyttja

1995

Zabriskie Point

Various- I Hear The Devil Calling Me

Drag City

1991

This excellent early Drag City release is among the best of a handful of great Xpressway Records comps that popped up in the early/mid 90's.  Despite the limitations of format, this release manages to squeeze in 12 bands in roughly as many minutes.  A concise, but surprisingly accurate overview of the label.  Featuring:

 1. Alastair Galbraith

 2. A Handful of Dust

 3. Peter Jefferies

 4. OLLA

 5. The Renderers

 6. The Dead C

 7. Gate

 8. Cyclops

 9. Dadamah

10. David Mitchell

11. Queen Meanie Puss

12. Stephen Kilroy

I Hear The Devil Calling Me

Terminals- Medusa/Scarecrow

Roof Bolt Recordings

1996

This blog has been sorely neglected as of late, I know.  In an attempt to rectify that, I'm declaring April to be NEW ZEALAND MONTH.  Gimmicky, I know, but hopefully it'll be enough to motivate me to make time to post as many records as possible over the next few weeks.  Some choice cuts coming, so, you know, be sure to check back and all that.

First up, a real burner from the Terminals.  Though not too well known stateside, they're pretty much revered at home.  Formed in the mid 80's, they're still (somewhat) active, having released an album as recently as last year or so.  Their earliest material displayed elements of early 80's Flying Nun jangle but eventually began to morph into the much darker sort of organ driven menace that appears on this record.  This being New Zealand, of course everyone in the group was in a handful of other, equally amazing bands such as Victor Dimisch Band, Renderers, Dadamah, Flies Inside the Sun, etc. 

Medusa/Scarecrow

Pip Proud & Alastair Galbraith- Me & Gus

Emperor Jones

1998

Alastair Galbraith adds some violin ache and backwards guitar to these already fragile tunes from Australian beat hippy hermit Pip Proud.  The late '90s saw a brief return to music for Proud, who had been living in a hut without electricity out in the middle of who knows where Australia, after a 25-30 year hiatus.  That "comeback" however was cut short by a stroke that left Pip blind and/or dumb (or both maybe) and unable to perform.  The music is itself fittingly beat down and tragic.

Me & Gus

Strapping Fieldhands- Neptune's World

Siltbreeze

1995

Lo-Fi indie skiffle rock from the pop end of the classic Siltbreeze catalog.  A way underrated band, the Fieldhands traded in an idiosyncratic brand of faux-anglo pop   complete with, at times, fake accents and feigned cheekiness.  The theme here is nautical and the sea-sawing strings add to the overall shanty feel.  Well, heave-ho friends.  And watch for scurvy.

Neptune's World

Tyvek/Cheveu Split

S-S Records

2007

A split release to coincide with a joint US trek last summer.  Detroit's Tyvek deal in the sort of attitude heavy, no fidelity scuzz that the midwest seems to spew out every 15 years or so.  It takes some cajones to flog a past dead horse like Punk Rock anymore, but Tyvek have managed to turn out a few singles worth of greatness that should be enough to placate even the most jaded curmudgeons out there.  I haven't heard enough from Parisian Art-Rock weirdos Cheveu to completely wrap my head around what exactly it is they do.  The handful of tracks I've heard haven't provided any real answers, just raised more questions.  This go around they come across like a team of Mexican wrestlers trying to cover Chrome tunes or something.  That description would probably sound retarded without a record like this to back it up.

Tyvek/Cheveu

Urinals- First EP

Happy Squid

1979

First release from the seminal LA band released on their own Happy Squid label in '79.  I first heard about these guys via the Minutemen's version of Ack, Ack, Ack, and a great track on the Homestead Human Music comp, but it was years before I was able to track down any of their albums proper.  Started in a dorm room in 1978, these guys took punk primitivism  to an extreme.  Their songs usually clocked in at under two minutes and rarely consisted of more than a single chord or two.  They were barley competent on their instruments and their setup was so stripped down that initially the bass and guitar were run through the same amplifier while the drummer banged away incoherently on a toy drum set.  But damn did it sound good.  Eventually they learned to play their instruments and adopted a sound that was something like a lighter Mission of Burma or Wire c.Pink Flag and changed their name to 100 Flowers (which was still great, btw).  But man, there's just a real charm to these early Urinals records.  This stuff sits very comfortably with a lot of the stuff on those messthetics comps which is, of course, a compliment of the hightest order.  

Urinals First EP

Trumans Water- Hey Fish

Drunken Fish

1994

Nice early single from this very  prolific band.  It's a name you don't hear that much these days, which is a shame.  Their output, which includes, christ, I think like a dozen singles or something in addition to a bunch of EPs, full lengths, and compilation contributions,  is all over the place.  When it works though it can be quite a nice bit of racket.  A couple of particularly great tracks here make this one of their stronger records for sure.  This is on Drunken Fish out of L.A.which for awhile put out some great records. Most notably was probably the Harmony of the Spheres triple LP set, but the whole roster was pretty solid.  lots of gems from the noisier fringes of the indi world of the time.  One of these guys was born again and left the group to start the christian-themed Soul Junk.  Now that's something you don't hear about everyday.

Hey Fish

Dadamah- Scratch Sun

Majora

1991

Music scenes are by nature incestuous.  But the word still seems wholly inadequate when applied to the heyday of the New Zealand post-punk underground (c. late 70's- mid 90's).  There is an amazing body of work from that corner of the world at that time spread over a myriad of cassette, 7", hyper-limited lathe cut, compilation, and LP/CD releases.  Delve in and you'll immediately start to notice a handful or so names that seem to pop up everywhere.  everywhere.  With Dadamah we have Roy Montgomery, Peter Stapleton, and Kim Pieters who had been in or would go on to a number of bands like (but certainly not limited to) The Pin Group, Terminals, Flies Inside the Sun, Victor Dimisich, band, Dissolve, Scorched Earth Policy, etc.  Montgomery also eventually went on to release a number of solo and collaborative records and garnered something of a cult following by the late 90's.  

As far as the pantheon of Kiwi Rock goes, Dadamah is a near perfect example of a particularly virulent strain of NZ noise weaned on equal parts White Light era Velvets, Kill Yr Idols era Sonic Youth and the darker corners of UK Post-Punk a la Joy Division, Wire, and the Fall.  They didn't last long, but what they left behind still resonates pretty strongly.  This record along with everything else they ever recorded (a scant 2 singles, an LP and a single comp track in all) were compiled on a CD collection by Kranky back in the mid-90's.  Amazing.

Scratch Sun