Neville's Column

Rip It Up, Issue 13, 1 July 1978, Page 18

Neville's Column

NEVILLE PURVIS AT YOUR SERVICE ... I’m warnin’ ya. I’m two hours past the deadline, there’s a stack of lagers in front of me and already I’m fractionally more than half-cut. So this month it’s RAVE ALL THE WAY.

Amazing what passes for comedy in this laugh-starved land of milk and money (bit of verse from Purvis there). Last night I went to a club to see this stand-up comic called RAZOR LARF just checkin' out the opposition yunnerstand ... I needn’t have worried. His big finish was an impression of ELVIS PRESLEY in which he lay in a coffin and never moved for two minutes . .. As an encore he said he’d do a VOLCANO. He whipped off his shirt, lay down again and put Talcum Powder in his navel. Then he coughed.

CORBEN SIMPSON is back in town. A weirdo from way back. Corben was with BLERTA and later FEATURED at Ngaruawahia. Last week he hit the Big A after sitting out in the country for a few years. He’s already auditioning a band. He’s rumoured to have a lady singer signed up. And it looks like pretty soon it’s BACK ON THE ROAD AGAIN.

I swear I had nothin’ to do with it ... Some kind of factory cock-up meant thousands of the new JOHNNY MATHIS/DENISE WILLIAMS single went into the shops with the NEVILLE PURVIS DISCO SONG on the A-side ... By the time they discovered the mistake and recalled stocks, most of them had sold. Purvis fanatics everywhere must have rushed the shops. And as a result Johnny Mathis is on the charts for the first time since Noah was a COWBOY.

If you weren’t quick enough, don’t worry

The OFFICIAL RELEASE is now in the disc boutiques that’s if it hasn’t sold out. And that’s both hits plus a picture sleeve.

The BIG QUESTION is WHAT’S NEXT after NEW WAVE and DISCO? Believe it or don't, the answer is LOCAL PRODUCT. The energy is already building solidly. Nineteen-seventy-nine looks like the year we FINALLY discover that our music is as good as anyone else’s.

When the Kangaroos can hype OLIVIA, NEWT & JOHN and ANDY GIBB to the top of the overseas charts along with the Re-Re-Processed Bee Gees then it's time we PULLED FINGER. Of course the RECORD COMPANIES and the RADIO and TELEVISION people are gonna have to wake up. The fact of the matter is that these days it’s BIG BIKKIES! Kiwis spend thirty million bucks a year on records. And compared with the overseas market that’s a SPOONFUL OF CHICKENSHIT. A bit of HYPE (or MARKETING as they call it in business circles) is all that’s needed ... Far be it from me to criticise Rob Muldoon but someone should point out to him that ABBA have creamed VOLVO as Sweden’s top money-earner. I’ll tell you one thing for free be a hulluva lot easier than exoortina DEAD COWS.