Posts by Russell Brown
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Actually, while I wait for the taxi, I should note that the CD that comes with the controversial Real Groove - 'Awesome Feeling: Real Groove's Sound of Young New Zealand 2007' - looks really good despite its very ugly title.
So So Modern, Collapsing Cities, Pig Out, Motocade, Teenwolf ... bands I want to hear.
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Ah, is that why they get a 'special' dole? One that means they don't actually have to look for work, unlike other unemployed?
For 12 months, detailed business plan must be submitted, accounted up the wazoo. It's not really a handout.
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It seems to me the problem is, that at the same time the government has created funding bureaucracies to encourage artists to produce indigenous art (so we don’t have to rely on only foreign muck), they’ve also demanded those same funding bodies “perform”. And it’s the measures of performance that seem to be the issue. For NZOA it seems (from the outside) that the performance measures are commercial ?!?
NZOA has a bunch of different targets - although it should be noted that those don't include the radio targets, which are reported to the radio industry's own oversight committee.
But its job, to some extent, is bums-on-seats - or rather, hours on radio. So if it's got lots of local music played on radio and TV, it's doing its job. Its job isn't to play tastemaker - although its brief does include innovation.
As Simon noted, Brendan Smyth has achieved a lot there, and he is a genuine music fan. But I think that its early successes got NZOA given roles that aren't really those of a broadcast funding agency.
But if you start looking for support from the industry development agencies, you get much further into bean-counting. Maybe the Music Industry Commission is the right vehicle, but there ain't much budget there.
This actually puts me in mind of something Arthur Baysting said to me (in 1999, I think) about why it had been so hard to get support for music - because the music industry straddled art and commerce and didn't quite fit anyone's box.
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And I don't mean to be mean, but the Music Month showcase tonight that I thought would expose me to a bunch of interesting new bands seems largely stocked with not-so-interesting old bands. Hmmm.
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Really? I thought it was "if you want to be a commercially succesful musician, we'll give you money, if you want to write and perform music soley for your own pleasure, that's a hobby you can pay for."
Actually, you can apply for a Creative New Zealand recording grant. Some nice albums have been made with those.
Have to agree with Simon about the Hit Discs though. They used to be quite good compilations. Now I'm lucky if I can find two tracks I like.
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Whoever edited those ads must really not like Dave Gibson. I'm very suspicious that he's not as much of an idiot as he's made out to be.
He's not. He's a very clever guy - and one who had 10,000 MySpace friends before most of us even knew what MySpace was. When they toured Australia, they had those people out bill-postering and pestering radio to play the records.
I'm with Heather on this: you might not like their music, but Elemenop are pretty real people.
We do also tend to forget how bad "industry" bands used to be. Remember Auckland Walk? Sorry if that brings back troubling memories.
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Absolutely.....so one must question the value of all that money tossed into all those other acts, esp since it's not even giving most of them sustainable careers. Mainstream airplay in NZ doesn't really help the industry longterm.....
I thought it was pretty cool when More FM started playing Goldenhorse, who seem mainstream now but were a student radio band at the time.
And mainstream radioplay does help anyone who gets it in a material sense: that of APRA cheques.
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No, I think its much more than that...its the diversion of funds to projects inside the system, because the system validates that funding and nothing else. I can think of many examples, some in the last month or so.
I have huge respect for what NZOA, and in particular Brendan Smyth, has achieved in the past decade and a half but if any agency was screaming out for radical reform....
I could say a lot more but I'm going to edit myself.
Actually, I think you should have written that opinion piece. I'd like to read that.
Part of the problem is that NZOA started getting a lot of work that was outside its brief as a broadcast funding agency. Culture has also tended to go out the window on anything touched by the Ministry of Economic Development.
But that's not entirely the case now - the NZ Music Industry Commission has quite a different brief, and seems to do useful things - including, it appears to me, the things that Angela Means was demanding in the Real Groove piece.
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I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Something has drained NZ music of its uniqueness in the last few years.
Sorry, that's an easy thing to say, but I don't agree at all.
My feelings about "barbecue reggae" (Salmonella, Freddies, Black Seeds et al) are distinctly mixed, but I think there's no denying it's an indigenous genre.
The various James Milne projects (including the Silver Scrolls finalist the Reduction Agents) are pure Kiwi quirk. I don't think you can say the Ruby Suns or the Brunettes are aping overseas bands, and SJD and the Phoenix Foundation certainly aren't. The Nudie Suits invitation to tour Europe with the Magic Numbers is very cool.
What you can say is that the bands who target themselves at radioplay aren't the ones who succeed at any level overseas. Even Evermore - who always get left out of these discussions - seem to be doing their own thing.
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Righto - I have a copy of the Real Groove story now (two actually - an email version and the mag itself arrived simultaneously).
The story in question isn't an interview with Neil, but an opinion piece by Gavin Bertram. The quotes from Neil date from October last year, just after the Music Awards (Gavin checked them with Neil, who only rephrased himself slightly. The other person quoted is promoter Angela Means.
The main argument is one that's been made before: that the government support and involvement of NZ On Air have ushered in a mainstream that is essentially aping overseas genres to get played on the radio.
This is true to some extent but I don't think Gavin really nails his point. And there a couple of really cheap shots: notably the the suggestion that a single bad live review, in an online magazine, of The Checks somehow invalidates the fact that their UK label has funded an Ian Broudie-produced album and a year's expenses - because, evidently, it thinks The Checks might be a success.
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