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November 15, 2018Your summer gig guide
Read moreBetween catching up with family, watching the cricket and hitting the beach with the kids, there is never a shortage of things to do over the scorching season. That’s not to mention the proliferation of summer music festivals and concerts. With so many on offer, we’ve made a list of our picks. These are the gigs to add to your Christmas wishlist, and the musicians to add to your Spotify playlists.
A Summer’s Day
March 21, 2018On the cusp: 1972 interviews rising Auckland band Alae
Read moreAlae are an Auckland band on the cusp. After two years of gigging, a tour of New Zealand and Australia, and appearances at sizeable music festivals like Rhythm & Vines and Brisbane's Big Sound Festival, they're preparing to release their debut full-length album later this year.
Their folk-inspired, expressive music already has a decent following. Last year, their self-funded six-song EP was nominated for a Taite Music Prize for Best Independent Release, and their
June 27, 2017Life in Style: Jupiter Project
Read moreDon Rowe talks to Jupiter Project, a New Zealand electro duo who look as good as they sound, about why fashion and music are inseparable.
Every genre of music has its own subculture and aesthetic, from safety pins through the nose to Eminem do-rags. What does that relationship mean to you guys?
Marty: I think they’re
May 17, 2017The Chill's Martin Phillipps
Read moreMartin Phillipps is one of New Zealand’s great songwriters. As the only constant member of The Chills, Phillipps helped invent the sound that came to define Flying Nun Records in the ‘80s and early-’90s. You can’t imagine that era without having ‘Pink Frost’ and ‘Heavenly Pop Hit’ roll around in your brain. And while the band’s productivity has ebbed and flowed ever since, Phillipps is currently as productive as ever. Martin
March 29, 2017How to resolve workplace radio squabblesÂ
Read moreNo techno, trance, classical or heavy metal, and other strategies.
It’s widely believed that listening to music in the workplace can boost productivity, but I suspect that’s only because there’s less research funding for the obvious corollary — that having to listen to other people’s music in the workplace can boost irritation.
January 27, 2017Things to know ahead of the Guns N Roses concert
Read moreThe gloriously storied LA rock band Guns N Roses tours New Zealand next month (Wellington Feb 2, Auckland Feb 4), and fans are frothing. The past two decades have at times been marked by bitterness, recriminations and lawsuits over royalties, but Axl Rose, Slash and Duff McKagan are sharing the stage again, in a monster tour once considered so unlikely it’s titled “Not In This Lifetime”. We revel in memories of outlandish behaviour, and make a few predictions about
May 25, 2016Music History Saviour Simon Grigg is Unboxing Rip It Up’s Archive.
Read moreA huge chunk of buried New Zealand music history is set to be unpacked now that Rip It Up magazine’s archive has been sold to Simon Grigg.
As a label owner or manager, Grigg has been behind much of New Zealand’s most successful music. In the 70s, he formed the Suburban Reptiles and managed The Screaming MeeMees. His subsequent record labels put out singles like There is No Depression in New Zealand by Blam Blam Blam; In the Neighbourhood by Sisters Underground, and OMC’s
February 05, 2015Another Number For The Road: Connan Mockasin
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They are wailing like cats. More than 100 French Canadians, united in a chorus of howls. The sound of it – accompanied by a slow, down-beat bass riff - is filling the ballroom of the Montreal theatre Cabaret Mile-End. Meow, meow, meow, meow meow. Meow, meow, meow, meow meow. On the stage in front of this wailing crowd is, just maybe, a musical genius, a long way from his native Te Awanga in the Hawke’s Bay. Connan Mockasin, psychedelic pop prince, is wearing a wooly Russian ushanka hat