Posts by Greg Wood
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The Back Lawn is Don McGlashan’s edgy experimental pre-ambient noisecore reworking of the entire Front Lawn catalogue into a single track consisting of every single Front Lawn song, all played at the same time by the Dominion Road Halfway House Drainpipe and Jandal Ensemble. The true genius of the man is made clear when the single is played backwards: a perfect rendition of Harry Sinclair’s voice floats eerily from the speakers, straining as he screams “euphonium” very, very slowly – in fact, that one word takes the entire 4:47 to say. Police say the single has a street value of nearly ten million dollars.
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I should also point readers towards They Might Be The Finn Brothers' Luckiest Man Alive in Istanbul (not Constantinople) -- the real reason for the Crowded House reunion, given the cost of the ongoing legal ménage-a-trois between lawyers for They Might Be Giants, the Finn Brothers, and the Muppets as to who should pay the costs associated with psychotherapy for the millions of children exposed to this horror. Particularly scary bits include Tim Finn dressed as Rizzo the Rat, and the line “…a man finds love by his side / must be the luckiest man alive / but if he has a date in Constantinople / she’ll be waiting in Istanbul”. Luckily never released in physical form, the bootleg video was anonymously leaked onto the net in 2006, leaving a permanent stain.
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I have in my hand a copy of Kaleidoscopium Worldopium by the Red Hot Chillsie Peppers; Martin Phillips’ ill-fated tilt at a mid-90s genre shift-slash-comeback, written and recorded over one blurred weekend at Anthony Kiedis’ plot on the Coromandel. This little known collaboration is largely incomprehensible, in part due to Phillips’ having to ensure every fourth word ended in or rhymed with “-opium”.
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Russell:
I agree about her drum skillz. In fact, here's a story about a time when she might have had some kind of plans to test interesting new rhythms on a friend of mine...
We were down at the Grey Lynn Park half-pipe in the early 90s, all Vision Street Wear and Bad Boy Club spikey nonsense hair, going through our Faith No More period and generally being single, young and smelly. Suddenly David dived off the side of the ramp and started trying to clamber under it... he'd spotted what he thought was Ms Paris heading our way, and was convinced not only that it was her, but that she'd been harrassing him at a party the night before; and now he wasn't sure if anything had happened... I had no idea who she was, or whether she was interested in skinny smelly boys, or if indeed it was her walking towards us all leather jacket and purple hair, but later that afternoon when Phil put LBGPEP2 on the stereo by way of explanation. That weekend we saw Faith No More at the Town Hall (a disappointingly aggressive gig), and ended up out at Bob with Billy the Bass Player and Roddy the Keyboard Guy, both of whom were really very boring. I remember wishing David had pulled after all so we could be friends with the amazing Lesley and her Cactus Cat instead of hanging out with these Hollywood borons. LBGP, what a sound...
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Rock. On. iTMS. !.
Took seconds to sign in, and send Breaks Co-op as a gift to my superGirl, here in Singapore using our NZ Westpac card. At bloody last. And frankly awesome pricing!
Now, hurry up the full catalogue of everything - and fix the search function. Yay.
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Since he rang, one ad break into What Now, I'd been waiting for him to turn up. And then, mid afternoon on a South Auckland Sunday sometime in 1986, my sixth-form schoolfriend John appears at the front door, flushed and focused, fresh from Real Groovy with the Holy Grail: the just-released I Love My Leather Jacket; the 12" version as hefty, weighty, and valuable as the subject of the song. He somehow persuaded his mum to let him borrow the Avenger, and on his two-month-old license has driven all the way to Queen Street, on the motorway, by himself, and back, with the Leather Jacket on the passenger seat, without losing it. Legend.
Before I go on, sip your Santos Flat White and think back to those vinyl times when only the Open Late Café was ever open, unless you knew where to find DKD; remember cold night fumblings in mum's car, big sisters with access to Swappas, and the tactility of lowering the needle into the groove -- the closest any of us got to sex back then.
So, let’s play it.
Problem: John has no turntable.
Solution: My dad has a stereo.
Problem: Mum and Dad have friends over for a beer, in the lounge.
Solution: "Just once. We'll play it just once and then leave."Four bemused adults on wide velour couches.
Three bottles of Khutze on the coffee table.
Two spotty 16-year-olds.
One three-minute moment in time.