Buzzcocks at The Dux 30/04/2013

 

Christchurch Obliterates Vorn.

The night was advertised as ‘Vorn Obliterates The Dux!’ 

Oh if only! 

I really need to get checked out at 52 for dyslexia, or is this just a case of spoonerising the words Christchurch, Vorn and Obliterate in the same sentence?    

 

What wasn't confusing was the lack of audience.

Christchurch music goers proved to be the most fickle in the land by lounging in front of telly’s on a nothing Wednesday night instead of getting off the chuffs and seeing one of N.Z’s most talented artists and tightest, harmonised groups.   

“I can’t wait for the city to be re-built” is a constant reverb around Christchurch. 

Well the fucking Dux has been re-built you prats, bigger and better than its predecessor and you still can’t be fucked.  

Cantabs apathy means bands give Christchurch a miss, pubs don’t make money, staff aren’t employed, taxis aren’t called and the place goes down the tubes with cries of “Help us Mr Key” when the solution to the re-build, rejuvenated city lies far closer to home, watching re-runs of Coro Street.    

A two year old earthquake doesn’t wash it as an excuse either.   

If having a few beers and watching an entertaining, up-lifting act like Vorn plus side-kicks isn’t a good enough panacea to ones woes in itself you need the quack or your local tinny house to prescribe something heavier, post haste.    

And whilst I’m venting it doesn’t help the cause of attracting acts from outside Christchurch by The Darkroom deciding their staff’s pet-project band should have an impromptu gig on the very same night.   

The shameless folk who missed Vorn and Pals on 13^th Feb 2013 should at least absolve themselves of the guilt they now carry by going to Vorns Bandcamp site and downloading an album of theirs.

 

Die! Die! Die! Live at WunderBar Lyttelton 26th Dec

VINEYARD CONCERTS IN THIS COUNTRY SUCK

Until recently, 15^th December 2012 to be exact, I had never attended a music concert held in a Vineyard.  

Perhaps my neurosis was not on par with other Kiwis my vintage because wine vineyards seem to be the ‘in’ place these-days when it comes to open-air concerts in N.Z.   

I had previously been well out of the loop confining my concert going to the strangest of venues – a concert hall.    

On Saturday 15^th I tasted (pun intended) my first experience of bands plonked among the vines, deckchairs, blankets and pissed kindy mums.   

Devo, Simple Minds and the Church playing Villa Maria in Auckland. 

If this was a bottle of over-priced vintage I would have spat it out, protested to the waiter it was corked – not that I even drink wine – I’m way too unsophisticated to waste money on that muck.   

I’m not taking away anything from the bands or the sound on the night. 

Devo had lost nothing from the last time I saw them 25 years ago.

Simple Minds were on key, played too little of their ‘interesting’ earlier stuff for my liking.  

The Church were always a bit soppy for my tastes but to be fair to their fans they put on a great performance.  

However all of these bands performances were impinged by the incessant chatter from the crowd.  

Soon after The Church twanged their first chord I learnt a sizeable chunk of the crowd was only there to sing-along to the one or two songs they could vaguely remember from their last listen.

That was when cars came with cassette players.  

It may as well have been the races at Ellerslie or Addington as far as they were concerned. 

Now I’m not adverse to getting pissed at concerts – even if the beer offerings on this occasion was isolated to the sponsors watery, sugary lager offering – but at least I have respect for people who paid money to listen to the bands by keeping my trap shut.  

This was thought of as more of a social occasion for many rather than a musical occasion.  

A chance for four-wheel-drive owning mums to compare kids reports and government property values, eat cheese and crackers from well-appointed picnic baskets.          

A grand opportunity for their similarly over-dressed husbands to get-together, natter about sailing on the harbour earlier in the day, golf handicaps whilst their kids, yes couples turned-up with brats, could kick an empty wine bottle about getting bored shitless with their parents taste in music. So much for it being a R18 gig.    

I would doubt it most punters at Villa Maria would even own an album by Devo or Simple Minds.  

Conclusion: If you are vaguely into music, truly love a band Vineyard Concerts are going to piss you off, better left alone unopened on the shelf.  

                                                      SEE WHAT I MEAN ANNOYING?! 

     

So where's the Songs about Christchurch?

Christchurch’s devastating earthquakes have spawned a whole range of cathartic ‘support’ songs.  

But really for the number of songs penned by N.Z musicians pre-quake wise on the topic of ‘Christchurch’ as a living-place, is by my count thin on the proverbial ground.    

Taking-out The Exponents anthem until recently Christchurch hasn’t been top of the subject matter amongst local song writers.   

This is bemusing since writing about a place you know must surely make easy subject-matter, stir up the mental juices – apparently not?    

A situation made more perplexing when you take into account over their lifespans most Christchurch bands are lucky to travel further afield than Dunedin, sell their music as north as Whangarei so when ‘Christchurch’ pop-ups in the lyrics somewhere it isn’t going to be exactly ‘foreign’ to the prime audience.  

The only reason I can think of why Christchurch song-writers avoid penning tunes about a place so dear to their heart is: embarrassment.  

The traditional Kiwi cringe factor (TV Ones Sunday at 7:30) 

 

Kiwi's are somehow inferior, no one in Britain or USA wants to hear what we have to say.  

A notable exception amongst the locals is probably Roy Montgomery. 

I am open to further submissions here but it is kind-of sad Christchurch bands don’t sing the praises or otherwise of the place they live and often die.     

 

My humble ‘off the top’ list comprises just:

Exponents ‘Christchurch’

Roy Montgomery (heaps on above album)

Steve Allen ‘Join Together’ (1974 Commonwealth Games Tune)

Opshop ‘City of Cities’  

And who could rightfully leave out……

 

 

 

 

  

Is this what six grand gets ya?

ARTIST: Victoria Girling-Butcher (no she didn’t ride in The British Equestrian Team)

TAX-PAYER FUNDING: $6,000

FUNDING APPROVED BY NZOA: April 2012

VIDEO UP-LOADED ON YOU TUBE:  September 2012

VIEWS PER DAY IN ITS FIRST WEEK: 50  

Come-on you are pulling my leg – this is what six grand gets you in terms of a video??  

Some tart jiggling up & down like she wants to go to the toilet, then twirling her hair and dancing around like a singer from B52’s all in a darkened studio?

Is there a Jungian concept to this I am not deep enough to grasp hold of?

Will it look different if I have ‘a smoke’ first?  

Is this video impossible to view if you are over 30?  

Just how many similar videos could one shoot in an eight hour day? 

Aren't all computers loaded with Windows Video Maker?  

Corporate Welfare courtesy of N.Z On Air

This is a video by Dictaphone Blues that came out a week or so back.

It was funded by you and me courtesy of N.Z On Air.

In-fact the $6,000 it cost you and me was allocated back in April.   

  

Around the same time I spent six hours of my own time making a humble You Tube Video of my own.

This is it:

  

Both videos are currently attracting about 20 views a day.

Theirs is better – but better doesn’t always mean more popular as this example shows.

Piss all views in the overall scheme of things.

But I’m not too worried because I do it for the love not to make money for myself, certainly not to support a multi-national corporate like EMI.

I hear you ask "What’s this got to do with EMI, a company that made approx NZ$600 million in 2010?"   

Well Dictaphone Blues are signed to EMI.

Do you feel this is a good use of your taxes?