Cracker by Damian Christie

The end of the golden weather this morning seems timely. It’s been great, day after day basking in the warmth under blue skies, like the Summer we never got. But it had to end sometime, and what better way to deal with the rain than by gathering with friends for the NZ International Comedy Festival.

I love May. Every year my Beloved and I gorge ourselves on the best of international and local comedic talent – and anyone who still thinks it’s clever to question whether the latter exists can get their coat now – often four or more shows a week, back to back shows on some nights. I have friends who go ga-ga for the Film Festival, taking days off work to catch the matinee screenings of the latest independent Belgian doco; others stuff themselves with culture at the Arts Festival; and while I’ll happily pick at both, it’s the chance of laughs that get me out the door.

The best place to start each year is the Five Star Comedy Preview. It’s the day before the Gala (which is today), and features a hand-picked selection of the best international talent. Each performs for about 10 minutes, which as the name suggests, is a great preview. Some acts you can’t wait to see their solo show, others you think 10 minutes was great but enough, and then there’s the odd one you’re happy it was short, although they’re pretty rare.

So I was excited to head along to last night’s preview at Sky City Theatre (yes, I felt dirty sitting in the belly of the beast). Enough preamble, here’s my thoughts on the 8 artists.

Must See: Milton Jones. English. Classic droll delivery of one liners, perfectly timed, no hurry to get through a sentence. Hilarious. Best joke of the night was an off-the-cuff jibe (at/with, I’m not sure) a couple of the previous acts who had both told the same story.

Definitely worth a look: Chris Martin (UK), Brendon Burns (Australia). Both top-class comedians with great, original, observational and not-so-observational humour.

Would like to see more: Craig Campbell (Canada). I generally love Canadian comedians and their often bogan humour – Glenn Wool, who has come the last couple of years, is a great example of that – and Craig Campbell, with his bushy beard, long hair and crazy eyes looks like he could be too. And while there were plenty of hints that he is hilarious, last night he took the unusual step of using his entire 10 minutes to re-tell a story that the night’s host, Dan Willis (UK), had just told us. It involved the two of them being mugged overseas, it was a good anecdote, and Campbell certainly added and enriched its telling, but with so little time from each comic, I personally didn’t need two different journeys towards the same punchline – although I dare say any comedians in the audience would’ve loved it (cf the film The Aristrocrats).

Undecided: Bill Dawes (USA). I’m happy to hear offensive humour on any topic. Any topic. There are pretty much no ‘no-go zones’ for me, as long as it's funny and/or clever. Brendon Burns’ Michael Barrymore material is a good example of this. But Bill Dawes’ off-hand remark about not seeing the black folk in the audience until they smiled… let’s just say that delivered by a white guy with an American accent, it definitely challenged. And followed up with lots of jokes about exactly how gay Les Mills gym was, I’m not sure if he’s on the right side of ironic for me, even if I still laughed in places that weren't overtly racist or homophobic.

Not my thing: Stuart Taylor (South Africa), Dead Cat Bounce (Ireland). Stuart Taylor, just didn’t really find him that funny, although I do have a sort of visceral reaction to the South African accent, to be fair. Dead Cat Bounce are an Irish comedy-rock trio. Very talented musicians, they could probably spend more time working on the comedy than the guitar solos. Although NZ has set the bar pretty high when it comes to musical comedy. As the final act of the night, with an audience as warmed-up as they were ever going to get, it still fell a little flat.  But judge for yourself, here’s a song they performed last night, “Kayaking”.  

A couple of flat points aside, overall it was still a fantastic preview of the weeks to come. This is the first May with a wee-one at home, so I’ll have to choose a little more carefully than in the past, but I’ll still get my fix. There are dozens of acts other than these eight of course (Jason Byrne also comes highly recommended) and a swathe of local talent (The Boy with Tape on his Face, if you haven’t seen him before, is a must-see). Do it.

[EDIT: I just remembered that the first song Dead Cat Bounce performed, a macabre take on 'Old Macdonald', was actually quite funny. So that's one out of three.]

Usually I would be quite excited to let you know about a new series of my looking-back-to-look-forward show Hindsight (starting tonight, 9.05pm, on TVNZ 7 with repeats Wednesday morning and a couple of times on Sunday I believe), and I am this time too, but it’s definitely tinged with sadness. As with at least two new series starting on TVNZ 7 this week (Wallace Chapman’s The New Old, and Hearts in Crafts with Tamsin Cooper and Justin Newcombe) the show has been timed so that the final episode of the series plays on the final week of the channel.  It’s an intentional strategy – to end with a bang rather than a whimper – new New Zealand content right up until the end.

For Hindsight at least, this probably would have been the last series regardless what happened to TVNZ 7.  I have now produced 39 episodes, each looking at its own aspect of New Zealand society, and while we could probably all sit here and come up with new episodes, one thing I’ve come to realise over the past couple of years is that while the TVNZ archive is a vast resource, it’s surprisingly shallow. For each topic, even a big one, such as tonight’s look at Police, there might be a pile of potential footage, but once you’ve taken out the mute items (there used to be separate reels for vision and sound, the latter often seem to have been disposed or perhaps recycled), the items that are nothing but a long boring interview with a former Minister, the items that appear to be some esoteric 70s experiment in documentary making that doesn’t stand the test of time, any given topic seems to reduce to a few good items, if you’re lucky. There are potentially many more where both reels were lost, it’s hard to say.

Which can be frustrating. Like many people I’ve spoken to, I tend to imagine old archive – if I can dream up a story that simply must have gone to air, then it must have happened. I wanted, for instance, to do an episode on ‘Boom and Bust’, but struggled to find a suitably early piece saying how well New Zealand was doing, or anything good on the hard times of the 90s and would you believe it, even a decent item on the Yuppie Years was tough. It turns out we don’t often know what’s happening to us until after it’s happened – it’s easy enough to find other shows looking back at a trend, but doing a retrospective show using equally retrospective items doesn’t work – I need source.

Anyway, I won’t bore you with what wasn’t. What I’ve got over the next 13 weeks I’m really happy with. Great archive on gangs, housing, protest, overseas conflict, sex education, fashion, homosexuality, farming, jumping the ditch, railways, buy NZ made and children. We’ve called in some heavyweights for the interviews – tonight’s Police episode starts as we mean to carry on, with Chester Borrows MP (a former policeman with great stories) and Police Commissioner Peter Marshall. But the best thing as always is the archive, and in tonight’s episode the Traffic Cops sitting around the control room in 1977 bragging about how fast they’ve gone in a chase situation, and what a turn on it is. I love it, and I hope you do too. The launch party for Hindsight series one was the night it was announced TVNZ 7 was closing down, so I’ve always known this was a for-a-limited-time kinda deal, but it’s been a pleasure and a privilege.

On a positive note, I’ve got a new archive-based project starting next month on TVNZ Heartland (Sky Channel 17), This Week in TV History.  A 2 ½ minute package each week, containing short snippets of, well the name says it all.  But there’s always a viewer request element – think ‘I Like That One 2’ – and I’d love to get the ball rolling with some requests via this blog for old footage you’d love to see again. Just don’t be surprised if the film has gone missing, or if it never existed.

TWITVH (I’m trying that out, hoping it will catch on) premieres on Saturday May 5^th, and is repeated frequently throughout the week on TVNZ Heartland.

Winners of the Grimes CDs – George Darroch because he apparently loves Grimes and for the great Bobby Womack track I hadn’t heard; Richard Stewart for recommending we Buy Kiwi Made; and Jos just for posting twice. Get in touch with your postal addresses, if you don’t need the CD let me know. Jackson P you were close with the Best Coast – they’re great – they have a brand new single off a forthcoming album:

Just after I wrote that last post about new music, the new album from The Shins turned up in my mailbox. I’d heard the single and was excited to hear the album. I’m glad I left it in my car stereo for a couple of weeks before writing about it, because quite honestly, on first listen I was a little unsure about the full album – it had an almost brittle clarity to it, in the sense of it being quite pop-ish, quite white… I could make out the lyrics, like I don’t know, somewhere between Lloyd Cole and Cold War Kids, maybe later Manic Street Preachers?

Whatever. I left it in the stereo, and now it’s not coming out. In a good way.

Also in my in tray, the new Black Seeds album, Dust and Dirt. I’ve never been a huge Black Seeds fan, but this I like. It seems to be in a more minor key than earlier offerings, which is good for me at least, although the single, Pippy Pip, is probably the most traditional 'Black Seeds' offering on the album, and therefore not especially representative:

 

More CDs to give away soon – go set your PVRs for Hindsight tonight.

I know it’s more traditional to have time-wasting linky love here-are-my-favourite-youtube-clips posts on a Friday, but personally I think some of us are in far more need of that kind of distraction and gentle cerebral massage on a rainy old wintry Monday, when the previous weekend is laughing at you, rather than the new one beckoning.

 So I thought I’d share some new and/or newish music with you, and hopefully you can share some new and/or old music back.  In a non-copyright violating YouTube kinda way.  And in celebration of doing things the right way, I have some CDs to give away. Real CDs, with covers and credits and that sort of thing, not just a selection of 3M disks scrawled illegibly in permanent marker.  And not just any old CDs, but the impressive and brand new Grimes album, on which more soon (o.w.m.s).

 Back story:  I’m a bit crap at keeping up with things.  Regardless of how many I nick from the Koru lounge each week on my way to Back Benches, I find it difficult to get through a magazine each week.  I barely read any blogs regularly, (other than those of my colleagues here at Public Address, of course), and no matter how many people have recommended This American Life to me, I find it almost impossible to maintain a steady relationship with podcasts.  What do I do? Well mostly I work. At present each week I'm doing Back Benches, Q+A, producing a new series of Hindsight (starting April 3) and another project (o.w.m.s.) starting on the first week of April.  I'm not complaining - I love what I do - but she's a busy wee spell from now until the time TVNZ 7 gets kicked to the curb at the end of June. I'm attempting to make hay.

One of the things I do regret though, is the lack of time I have to find new music. So when a friend of mine recommended a podcast called All Songs Considered, I had a listen. And nearly wept.

It's a 30 min+ weekly podcast where host Bob Boilen and friends consider a huge range of new songs and play you their favourites. Some weeks they do different stuff - in the last week they've been doing regular updates from South by Southwest, occasionally they will have themed shows, genre specials and the like. 

What makes All Songs Considered so different - and whether you feel the same is going to come down to how similar our tastes in music are - is that in almost every podcast there are two or three songs by artists I've never heard of, that I instantly fall in love with. It's often skewed towards the alt-country/bluesy/folky sort of stuff, but there's enough variation that you'll find hip-hop, electronica and most other contemporary forms thrown in there. As well as some downright weird shit. 

Unlike the only other podcast I've listened to regularly, Mark Kermode and Simon Mayo's BBC 5 film review, I'm not especially enamoured of the hosts. Mark and Simon are hilarious, their in-jokes make you feel part of the family very quickly. On All Songs Considered, Bob and co-host/producer Robin Hilton - particularly Hilton - come across at times a bit cringy, geeky and earnest. You may disgaree of course. But really, it's earnest cringy geeky types that I want choosing my music for me. They put the effort in. 

One artist I discovered via ASC and more recently on bFM is Grimes. Despite the name, she has nothing to do with the Grime genre; if she did I mostly likely wouldn't be recommending it here. Grimes is Canadian, Visions is her third album, but don't be surprised if like me you've come late - the debut came out only on cassette, and this is her first release since signing to 4AD. 

My favourite track on the album is this one, 'Genesis', which they appear to be giving away as a free download on the site.  I think it's what it would sound like if Clannad and Kraftwerk got together for an orgy. Erm, in a good way. It's lovely, girly, electronica. That's what I'm trying to say.

Download and listen to the album version, then watch this more deconstructed version here if you like. And if you really like, then keep reading cos I've got a few copies of the full CD to give away, like I said.

 

Another artist I'd heard of, but hadn't really listened to at all until ASC came along was Lambchop.  I don't know if this is standard for them, but the vocalist reminds me of The National, my favourite 'new' band of the past ten years.

Then there's Alabama Shakes. Excuse me if I'm not saying anything entirely new right here because they've kinda blown up and received rave reviews and celebrity endorsements - as well as being signed to Rough Trade Records in the UK and a recording session by one Mr J. White, but their EP is well worth a download - and it looks like they've got a couple of tunes for free on their website too, ahead of an early April album launch.  Most seem to agree it's never going to be the most original stuff you've ever heard, but they do what they do incredibly well.

Right. Your turn. Post away, my pretties. Or email me if you're shy, but that's not really sharing now, is it. My three favourite brand new/brand old tune (i.e. new to me) will get a Grimes CD, and you too can be bouncing to the mutant love chil' of Enya and Ralf.

(thanks to Lisa @ The Label for the freebees!)

It had all the makings of a bad horror flick.  A group of attractive young things venture to an island.  A severe storm is brewing, which will soon cut power and any means of escape.  Half the group will make it, although we don’t know this at the time.  And the legend of a Hook Hand Joe, a former patient of the old rehabilitation centre there, who went mad and escaped – not before chewing his hand off – and is said to live in the hills somewhere,

Well, that’s mostly true.  Apart from the bit about ol’ hook hand.  And maybe our youth – we were there for a 40th, so I suppose it’s all relative.  But dammit, we were an attractive bunch that head across to Rotoroa Island last weekend.

The occasion, as I say, was my friend Sofia’s 40th.  She’d rented the one of only three rental properties on Rotoroa Island for the weekend, and invited a dozen friends along to celebrate with her.  The fortnight before hand involved much planning and seemingly endless group emails flying back and forth.  Everything was accounted for. Music, check. A menu taking into account various dietary requirements, check. Supply and quality of coffee, check. Even a separate set of group emails for secret party surprise stuff like a cake and presents.  We were on like the proverbial Donkey Kong.

 Rotoroa Island, if I may backtrack, is a small island off the back of Waiheke.  It was purchased by the Salvation Army the year after the Inebriates and Drunkards Act of 1906, and housed a drug and alcohol rehabilitation centre for nearly a century, until it closed in 2005.  12,000 odd inebriates and drunkards sobered up there over the years, an irony that wasn’t lost on us as we packed lashings of booze for our friend’s big day.

 In recent years Rotoroa, still owned by the Salvation Army, and run through a trust, the island’s history is being preserved, and as well as its buildings, its native bush and wildlife are also gradually being restored – 20,000 pine trees have been cut down, and some 400,000 native plants established. Two families live on the island permanently, engaged in maintenance and seeing to the islands guests.

 There’s one ferry a day on Saturday and Sunday (plus Tuesday, Thursday and Friday during Summer), leaving Auckland at 8.45am.  It being a holiday and all, we decided bundling up our lives, baby, and battling morning traffic on Friday morning was going to be too hard, so the six of us adults, and two children, booked a water taxi instead.  At $360 for the boatload of us, and our considerable provisions, it wasn’t too bad a deal we thought.  The other five adults, who had work commitments on Friday they couldn’t get out of, were going to jump on the Saturday morning ferry.

 Or so we thought.  Friday was gorgeous, the sun was shining, the sea was flat, and we kept to our 11am departure time without a hitch.  But though we set sail on the (surprisingly petite) water taxi with narry a problem, trouble was literally on the horizon. The weathermen and women, fickle though they might be, were in agreement – a storm was a brewin’.  And not just any storm, but that most pants-wettingly exciting of all meteorological media creations: A weather bomb.

 On arrival Rotoroa seems almost strangely well-developed.  The visitor terminal, inside which one waits for the ferry, I assume, was new and flash, to the extent of giving some regional airports a run for their money.  There were other buildings too: A modern exhibition centre and a restored church visible from the harbour.  Having assumed heading to a little-known island was going to be a tad intrepid, first impressions were more like what I imagine Norfolk Island might be like – a preserved colonial feel.  Or Kawau Island, minus the mansion.  And there are weka by the truckload.

 We were picked up by one of the caretakers, piling our gear in the back of the 4WD for the short hop up to the house, and then settled in.  The house was nice, recently renovated, with everything one might need right there – no need to bring towels and linen and that, which makes sense I guess given the ferrying involved.  There’s even Wi-Fi.  Phew.

 While the weather was beautiful, it soon became clear that our city-side companions might have a few issues getting to us.  The 360 ferry, which we were told cancels sailings at the first wisp of wind, had cancelled its sailings for Saturday.  The water taxi reckoned they could head out super-early, and hopefully outrun the storm, but (understandably) two of its would-be passengers weren’t so keen.  We were down to three, which made it expensive for those left.  As it turned out, by day break even the water taxi wasn’t leaving port.

 On the island, as often happens out in the Gulf (it’s not just a rumour spread by smug Waiheke-dwellers), the bomb barely made itself known.  Well, the wind whipped along, and the sea was messy with whitecaps, but above it was predominantly blue skies.  It wasn’t great exploring weather though, so we stuck to the house.  During the afternoon there were a few short sharp downpours, and the power went out but was soon back on – although I suspect that was the island’s generators kicking in, rather than a prompt repair job.  The Wi-Fi kept us updated with the damage toll back on the mainland.

 While those we’d left behind were missed, we made do.  We had twice as much food as expected, although the list of stuff we’d forgotten and given to the reinforcements to bring, was never going to make it.  By day two the beer was gone, coffee was running short and cigarettes were being rationed.  On the other hand we had pork chops and bubbly for (the non-Muslim bits of) Africa, the former cooked to perfection by our volunteer chef Scott (whose Taco Truck is a Sunday must). And realistically, the house we were staying in, Serenity, might sleep twelve, but only six fit comfortably around the dinner table, and no-one was left without a seat in the lounge.

 Sunday morning, the bomb was gone, the sun was out and the sea flat again.  Dozens of visitors had arrived on the island for some sort of Open Day – many were involved in planting and other conservation projects by the looks of it. 

 We had arranged the taxi to meet us at half two, so we had time to wander over to Men’s Bay (there’s a Ladies’ Bay next to it, separated – quite rightly – by an impassable rocky outcrop) for a swim. The last of the pork chops were consumed, we packed our belongings and wandered down to the ferry.  Like the ride over, the ride back betrayed no sign of the previous day’s tempest, which was probably for the best, as some of us inebriates weren’t exactly ship-shape.  Happy though, and with a careful eye on the weather, I’d head there again in a flash, and recommend it for anyone wanting to escape the 09, without losing the Wi-Fi.

Show first:

 Let’s just put it out there to start with. New Order weren’t very good.

 That’s going to sound like heresy to some, and I’m sure others will emphatically state that they thought they were bloody fantastic and they had the best night ever.  Of course it’s possible to have a great night and enjoy seeing the band you love simply because you love them, not because they’re doing a particularly good job.  Or, as was the case with the couple in front of me who were giving each other vigorous head massages, you might’ve had some extra help.

 I mean, I said the same thing about the Pixies when they came a couple of years back – I went to both Powerstation and Vector gigs then, and was really glad to see them, but also completely underwhelmed – and people couldn’t believe I was being serious. 

 So let’s put a few facts in there.  Barney’s voice was completely shaky and not-particularly-in-tune for the first bit of the show.  He kept fiddling with his headphone-monitors, I wonder if they weren’t working properly.  But still, that wouldn’t excuse his total lack of vocal energy.  ‘Regret’ trundled along well enough.  I saw some friends leaving early, disgusted.  “You didn’t see us here”, they said. 

 When they performed pretty much my favourite tune ever, ‘Ceremony’, early on, I found a wave of excitement.  Which was tampered by Barney forgetting the words to the second verse and instead just repeating the final verse twice.  I mean, it’s only their debut single. They’ve only been performing it since 1981.

 Everything else ticked along, but that was kinda it.  Ticked along.  And I felt like I was ticking off a box, “New Order, tick”. I’d missed them in 2002 – the much discussed line-up change at the Big Day Out which saw them playing the last set to everyone’s wonder saw me cursing in a car back to the CBD to open up the nightclub I was managing in time for the post BDO crowds.  Sorta wish I hadn’t, in retrospect. No-one ever arrived at that nightclub until 3am.

 If I was thinking “New Order, tick”, Barney was probably thinking “Monday night, Auckland, tick.”  He looked at his watch during the Blue Monday encore.  And then during the final song of the night, Love Will Tear Us Apart, added rather stupid stadium-rock-esque yelps into the chorus.  Ian Curtis, grave, rolling etc.

 For pure energy and I suppose authenticity, I actually far preferred Peter Hook’s ‘Unknown Pleasures’ Powerstation appearance in 2010.  He’s coming again in April, hauling out another Joy Division album as an excuse.  I would, but I’ve already got a tick in that column, and I’m going to start being a lot more careful before throwing money in the direction of ageing rockers trying to eek out a living on past glories.

Dinner:

 The stereotype-breakingly lovely mother-in-law was across from Waiheke on babysitting duties giving us our first night out as a couple in some time, so we decided to head out for dinner first.  I was keen to check out the new development of Imperial Lane, which runs between Queen Street and Fort Lane.  Roxy, the fine dining establishment there is closed on Sunday and Monday, and we wanted something a bit more casual anyway, so we went to Everybody’s Bar and Bistro. 

 First, I fricken love what they’ve done with the fit-out.  Decaying urban meets faded 1920s – aged mirrors, upholstered ceilings with exposed brick and concrete.  Auckland just became a better place to live.  It’s the sort of place I would take a friend who was back from the UK and wouldn’t shut up about how much better it is there.  It reminded me of the better parts of Melbourne, or a Lower East Side restaurant in Manhattan. There's an inside bit with lush booths, and an open air atrium, which feels like a little secret in the city.

 Someone told me that they famously don’t employ New Zealanders there (or it could be Roxy, I’m not sure), because they’re just not up to it.  Well there were a few kiwis on last night, and a few non-kiwis – we were served by a handful of different people during dinner.  And everyone seemed remarkably well informed as to where the food originated from, how it was prepared, and what we would think about it.  Signs were good.

 Unfortunately, they weren’t that great at the getting-stuff-to-and-from-the-table bit, which some might say is even more important.  There was an awful lot of faffing and announcing what was going to happen.  “I’m going to bring you your water, and then I will begin the bread service.”  Ten minutes later, we’d got a glass of water and been told a free bit of bread – produced in Newmarket by the wife of the owner, served with butter made in our own kitchen, unsalted other than the sea salt we sprinkle on it (making it salted, I guess) – was imminent, but we hadn’t had our drinks delivered. 

 This sort of continued, trying to catch the eye of the staff to order another drink, having to call out to remind them we hadn’t any cutlery for our entrees, or perhaps they could clear our empty plates when they left with our drink order, and we still hadn’t received the salt and pepper we’d asked for, but maybe we didn’t need as we’d eaten half our mains by that stage.  Despite having a show to get to we weren’t in any particular hurry, so the delays were real rather than situational.

 I’ve worked in enough restaurants that this stuff irks me a bit.  Don’t deliver drinks to our table and not take the dirty plates back to the kitchen with you at the same time, unless there’s a really good reason not to.  It makes things faster.  It makes people not even realise until later how brilliant the service is because it has gone unnoticed, it’s that swish. 

 The food, for the most part, was great.  Or should I say, the owner’s wife in Newmarket knows how to make a good loaf of bread.  The “pig’s head”, which is actually the pig’s face meat removed and reconstituted into a sort of warm, fleshy terrine, served on mash and with wispy crispy bits of pig ear, was the best pork meal I’ve had in years.  Better than any pork belly, as rich and tender as a good confit duck (which they also do), really impressive, as was the Matawhero Chardonnay I ate it with.

 On the other hand, I don’t know why the waiter trumpeted the oysters, some deep sea variety that were small, grey and disappointing.  Out of season, I’d say from their condition.  Not the kitchen’s fault necessarily, but don’t put them on the menu, and certainly don’t recommend them to the table with an enthusiastic smack of your lips.  The kingfish sashimi – unlike the way Al Brown does it at Depot, nice and simple with apple, toasted fennel and an oyster cream – disappears into a watery mess, buried beneath pink grapefruit, a pile of micro greens and barley of some description.  It wasn’t bad, just lost. A bit like the cutlery.

I will however, be back.  Just with lower expectations, and possibly an annoying friend from the UK. I suspect on a good night, with the right staff, it could be one of the best places in town.