Rip It Up is a music magazine in New Zealand that was one of the biggest music magazines in the country during the 80s, where it reached a height of 30,000 copies monthly. The reason why I am so interested in this magazine is that it covered the Dunedin and Flying Nun scene extensively during its birthing period and beyond, with interesting articles detailing some of the history behind bands that may have only existed for a couple years, and wonderful pictures of these artists. It's such an interesting artifact of a time and a place that I would have loved to have seen back when it was bustling and thriving.
The particular issue that I purchased was an issue from April 1982, right at the birth of Flying Nun and after Boodle Boodle Boodle's runaway success for the label. The issue has a picture of the Clean on its cover page, which is always cool to see. The articles it discusses related to the scene discuss the Dunedin scene as it was starting to take off, covering the various bands that would be present on the compilation album that would later be called the Dunedin Double, such as the Chills and the Verlaines, and further coverage of the Clean in the lead-up to their second EP Great Sounds Great, released the following month. It's such an amazing document of a scene just getting started and I am craving to get more issues of this magazine in the future.
Ok, ok... I'm a huge music nerd, and most of what you wrote was like Latin to me (no surprises there being from the U.S.). Soooo.... I pulled up a "Dunedin Sound" playlist on Spotify.
At a cursory glance, and a quick skim thru the list, it seems like it's all a hybrid of psychedelic rock and proto-punk/grunge? All things that interest me!
What would be, in your opinion, some "must-hear" tunes/artists?
PS: now that I think about it, the only New Zealand artists I know off the top of my head are probably Fat Freddy's Drop, Flight of the Concords, and Lorde
It's essentially indie rock that mixes psychedelic rock with some Velvet Underground droney guitars and Byrdsy jangle guitar. Each band has their unique characteristics that come from different influences, but those are some of the commonalities between all of the bands.
Here's a playlist I made on youtube of the key tracks I'll be mentioning below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tf1wzg4rdE&list=PLS3FgAA2aSpIxg1dMZtrxgV6ax8V8IFvj
First, The Clean: You listened to them here, but you have to listen to their EP Boodle Boodle Boodle. The best way to describe it is "Surf Rock Velvet Underground". My favorite tracks on it are Anything Could Happen and Point That Thing Somewhere Else. They also have Getting Older, which was originally their swan song, as they broke up due to not being able to handle the success they were experiencing. They formed back together in 1989 and have released quite a few albums, but I think they don't reach the heights they reached with the first two EPs, those being Boodle Boodle Boodle(which they recently reissued along with their first single Tally Ho) and Great Sounds Great.
The Chills: They were the big band on Flying Nun in the 1980s and early 90s. They have a poppy indie sound that's appealing and almost has a Twee pop vibe to it in some aspects, and they also have some noisier tracks. Some favorites are Kaleidoscope World, Pink Frost, and Doledrums. Their first 3 albums, which are Brave Words, Submarine Bells, and Soft Bomb are great listening experiences.
The Bats: This band was the band that the bassist from the Clean founded after they initially broke up in 1983. They have more of a folk rock/indie Byrds sound to them that I like. Some favorites include By Night, Claudine, Made up in Blue, and North by North. They have quite a few good albums to check out if you want, my favorites being Daddy's Highway, The Law of Things, and Fear of God. Silverbeet and Couchmaster are good albums too. This band really doesn't have any bad albums, go for all of it.
The Verlaines: They were the more artsy band in the early period of Flying Nun. They have more of a classic rock vibe to them. They had a sizable influence on the band Pavement. Some good starting points include Death and the Maiden, Pyromaniac, and Doomsday. These are just single tracks, but their EPs and albums also have good tracks to offer, such as It Was Raining, CD Jimmy Jazz and Me, and Joed Out.
Straitjacket Fits: These guys were more of the rocking side of indie rock. They were apart of the second wave of Flying Nun bands and had some good hard rock tunes to boot, like She Speeds and Dialing a Prayer, and some Beatles-esque ballads like Down in Splendour thanks to their guitarist Andrew Brough (R.I.P). Other notable tracks include Hail and Bad Note For a Heart.
Chris Knox/Tall Dwarfs/Toy Love - I love everything this man did in the 80s and the 90s. He's basically New Zealand's David Bowie, and probably the most important person to all of New Zealand music. He first made records with his band Toy Love, who are more straight New Wave and Punk Rock, but they inspired all the bands from Dunedin to pick up a guitar and create their own songs, spawning the Dunedin scene in the first place. Chris Knox also recorded all of the early material by all the aforementioned bands. He then went on to do Tall Dwarfs, which is an experimental mindscrew and one of the original Lo-Fi/home recording bands. They have songs like Turning Brown and Torn in Two with the weirdness factor, then they do psychedelic jams like Crush, and then they do Sign the Dotted Line, an acoustic song that Jeff Mangum even did a cover of. They go all over the place. His solo career also has quite a few bangers, like the ultimate love song Not Given Lightly, rockers like Half Man, Half Mole, and more acoustic songs like Lapse. He is an interesting and important figure in New Zealand indie music and has a vast catalog to look through. It's unfortunate that he had a stroke in 2009 and can no longer create such great music anymore, but what we do have is great.
Honorable Mentions: Look Blue Go Purple(An all female Indie group), The 3D's(Noise-Pop extravaganza), Garageland(Power Pop Punk), The JSP Experience(Also pretty weird),Sneaky Feelings(Byrds/Motown Pop sound), Able Tasmans(Indie pop with a level of musical sophistication).
Hell yea! Thanks for writing this all up and giving me a new rabbit hole to dive down!
The Clean, The Bats, Look Blue Go Purple, and The Chills got a lot of real estate on this playlist I got on right now.
Also, let me know what you think of the tracks.
I listened to that Spotify playlist for a bit, and then played all of boodle boodle boodle. I dig it! I'll check out some more of your links soon. Thanks again!
No problem. Thank you very much and enjoy!