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Spacious

In 1995 The 3Ds guitarist and vocalist Dave Saunders got together with well-known drummer Alan Haig to record a 3-song single for Flying Nun Records under the name Spacious – all 3 songs were eventually re-recorded by The 3Ds for their final album ‘Strange News from the Angels’.

#nzmusic #spacious #the3ds

The Flamin’ Werepigs

The Flamin’ Werepigs were a gritty 3-piece garage-rock outfit from Mid-Late 1990’s Palmerston North who got a couple of recordings put out by Kato Records thanks to pestering label head-honcho Andrew Tolley by faxing a cache of found pornography!

#nzmusic #flaminwerepigs

Junkanoo

Junkanoo were a percussive band from Christchurch who put out a split album release on Campbell McLay’s Onset/Offset label in 1986, recorded at Arne van Bussell’s Nightshift Studios. The name ‘Junkanoo’ stems from a festival that was originated during the period of African chattel slavery in British American colonies.

#nzmusic #junkanoo

The Gardening Angels

The Gardening Angels were a Wellington group that featured a fairly fluid line-up over their 2-album time-span, including members of a number of local Ska bans, plus Richard Caigou from The Holidaymakers, and experienced bassist Steve Hemmens (formerly of fames 1970’s group Mammal).

The group regularly played at Bar Bodega during the early to mid 1990s.

#nzmusic #thegardeningangels

Satellite Spies

Mainstream kiwi pop-rock group out of Auckland with a very disputed history thanks to a split between the two key members – frontman and original song-writer Mark Loveys and guitarist / vocalist Deane Sutherland (aka Tommy Joy).

Best known for their 1985 hit ‘Destiny in Motion’ and the 1994 single ‘It must be love’ – released by Sutherland’s later edition of the group.

#nzmusic #satelliteSpies

Anji Sami

Auckland-born singer songwriter who made an impact in 2006 while studying a Bachelor of Music at the University of Otago in Dunedin, with several choice support slots and a mega-talented backing band. Self-released an EP produced by Arc Life Records Thomas Bell, utilising the Universities Albany Street Studio.

Moved to Auckland and formed The Sami Sisters, along with Priya and (comedic actress) Madeline Sami, then the 2012 Taite Music Prize nominated shoe-gaze group She’s So Rad.

#nzmusic #anjisami #shessorad #thesamisisters

Hyphen-Smythe

The early 1980’s solo recording alias of Kevin Smith – who went on to find fame as an actor with the character Ares in the Hercules and Xena: Warrior Princes franchises before his life was tragically cut short.

Smith recorded and released a series of lo-fi underground rock cassettes, often with Pat Faigan (aka Duane Zarakov – later of Space Dust, King Loser etc) and Steve Watson – initially as part of The Picnic Boys collective and later as a member of Say Yes to Apes, who self-recorded and released a variety of lo-fi DIY releases on their own TV Eye label.

#nzmusic #undergroundmusic #hyphensmythe #kevinsmith

King Loser

Led by the dynamic duo of Celia Mancini and Chris Heazlewood, New Zealand’s surf and noise guitar gods King Loser were one of the best local groups for much of the 1990’s with 3 terrific albums and a handful of singles and bootleg releases before their split in 1997.

#nzmusic #kingloser

Say Yes To Apes

Say Yes To Apes were a loose, noisy, often sloppy and usually creative Dunedin-then-Christchurch-based underground rock outfit formed by frontman Kevin Smith (several years before his acting career took off), drummer Pat Faigan (aka Duane Zarakov of Space Dust, King Loserand multi-instrumentalist Steve Watson, born out of the earlier Picnic Boys.

Hyphen-Ears

Hyphen-Ears was an underground group formed by South Island-based duo Kevin Smith (aka Hyphen-Smythe) and Steve Watson (aka Legacy of Ears) as a sideline to their Dunedin-based group Say Yes to Apes – which itself was an outgrowth of the The Picnic Boys recording collective).

The two Hyphen-Ears releases were some of the last by the TV Eye collective – vocalist Kevin Smith was soon channelling his creativity into acting…

#nzmusic #hyphenears #tveye

The Picnic Boys

The Picnic Boys was a loose collective formed around the core trio of Kevin Smith, Patrick Faigan and Steve Watson (who later became Say Yes to Apes). At Faigan’s behest the various members recorded their own take on ‘experimental’ music to tape, which was later compiled into a handful of cassette releases on the groups TV Eye label in the early 1980s.

#nzmusic #thepicnicboys #sayyestoapes #tveye

Celebrate Psi Phenomenon

Celebrate Psi Phenomenon is a drone, noise and experimental music-focused label from Upper Hutt’s Campbell Kneale, the prolific performer behind Birchville Cat Motel and Black Boned Angel. The label often utilises a distinctive wallpaper aesthetic to their cover designs.

The label was particularly prolific from the mid 1990s until around 2008.

#nzmusic #experimentalmusic #dronemusic #celebratepsiphenomenon

Interview: The New Originals

Flashback to January 2006 and an article I wrote for A Low Hum on Christchurch Indie-pop group The New Originals, based around an interview conducted with vocalist and song-writer Tim Moore.

#nzmusic #theneworiginals