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Rik Starrr

Biography

Appearing as a one-off 7″ single in 1995 (during a stint of similar projects from the likes of King Loser and The 3Ds side-projects such as Chris Heazlewood‘s solo debut Spacious etc), the mysterious ‘A Sort of Holiday‘ / ‘Terry is Here‘ single was something of an undiscovered gem – the only Flying Nun Records release from Auckland wacko Edward McWilliams (aka Edmund Cake).

The reverse side of the single gives some hints to who’s on the recording, with maps of both Australia and New Zealand, flanking the innocuous ‘Rik Starrr Has the Hits!‘, and in image (supposedly of Starrr) with two lists of phrases:

Gutter Wizzard

Beef Saw

Command

No More

Wooden Car

Weed Phone

Cut Feet

Power Corpse

Stereo Bucket

Ampar

Scepter

Monument

Soon Good

Wings of Jelly

The big hint being ‘Gutter Wizard’ as the single was actually McWilliams 2nd release; as a teenage he’d appeared in The Gutter Wizards, a short-lived group who found some fame on Auckland student radio station bFM with their single ‘I am the normal me‘. McWilliams formed Bressa Creeting Cake with his University chums Geoff Maddock and Joel Wilton in 1991, though the ‘Papa People’ EP wouldn’t surface until 1996, a year after the Rik Starrr single.

After Bressa Creeting Cake split, McWilliams would go on to release a couple stellar solo albums (under the Edmund Cake nom de plume) and also find himself in demand as a producer for the likes of the Neil and Tim Finn, Anika Moa, The Brunettes etc.

Members

Discography

  • ‘A Sort Of Holiday’ / ‘Terry is here’ 7″ single (1995, Flying Nun Records, FN338)

Links

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