Live

Rip It Up, Issue 69, 1 April 1983, Page 24

Live

George Kay

Mockers r-j' kX.. ' V-;• Terror of Tiny town Windsor, ■ April 2. ■ The ;■ trash . aesthetic lives! It walks! ,It : talks! It sings! It plays guitar! And synthesiser! Some of these things it doesn't do very well, . but it tries. Some things it does are wonderful. Its name is Julian Hanson and it lives in the foolishly named Terror of Tinytown. Andrew Fagan's towering foldaway . persona i has always been part and parcel of : the Mockers. Some people say it makes the band, some people say it spoils it., The truth (as usual) is a bit of both. . : xx-: But the Mockers' strength has always been their songs. Those great songs —.'Good Old j Days', Trendy Lefties', 'Murder in Manners St', 'Woke Up Today', the new 'Cleopatra . Those' great songs that get steamrollered every time the Mockers play. They seem to have left subtlety behind in an effort to be a widelyloved dance band. It's small wonder that chief songwriter Gary Curtis stays in Wellington while |the band plays in Auckland.'. • The Mockers are fun, they make very good records, but they've a way to go before they really do themselves justice live. I think they've got it in them. Russell Brown The Spines The Body Electric DB Tavern. March' 19 The pulse is this: pop's heartbeat right now is the synthesiser. :

The question is this: Are the Body Electric the heart or the same music in a different- vein? Sure, they have their fingers on the beat of current (chart) successes, but is the formula right? As much as BE are to be admired, there is something missing. But some songs rise above others 'Yid-Wog War' (great chorus), . Babies on Parade',the melodramatic 'Cleudo'. am* f .iwfn*m v *.. Visually chilling, the band features actor. turned singer Gary Smith and, yes, all! you've heard about his voice is true. It is strong. Smith (the. Body) leaves Andy Drey and Alan Jimson (the Electricians) in the shadows, providing the musical platform for his voice. Now the punch. The Spines have it. Magnificent musicians with some great songs. Try 'Agatha',, where the.rhythm section of ,Wendy Calder and Ross Burge shines. Calder's flanged bassline still echoes round my head. Of the remaining songs, the recorded material stands out - 'Fishing', the atmospheric 'Your Body Stays' and Punch' (NZ songs of the year, so far). ; ' / • Spines' backbone Jon McLeary seems modest, even embarassed on stage with his smooth, jazzy guitar sound and deliberate vocal stance. McLeary doesn't attempt to elevate Himself from the audience, thereby a .personal fatmosphere.'BßriwflimßßWl Unlike the Body Electric, the Spines' influences aren't obvious. They have it in them to be among the" year's finest. Alister Cain Blue Meanies . Sneaky Feelings The. Chant; '

University Union, - Dunedin. The first of three Easter hops saw three of Dunedin's best bands struggling , with a PA that 'was

under-powered to deal with the cavernous Union Hall. That said the bands did impress particularly with their wide range of original material. First up were the Blue Meanies who blend sixties sensibility with Dunedin relevance. Sneaky Feelings followed and they took the night with a honed set that deliberately emphasised the crowd-pleasing, up-tempo Byrds-inspired aspects of their repertoire. It may not have been representative of their typical gig but guitarists/vocalists Matthew Bannister and David Pine, drummer Martin Durrant and bassist Kathryn Tyrie have a welter of fine songs in 'Broken Man', 'She's

Not Here', 'Someone Else's Eyes' and their new Flying Nun single 'Be My Friend'. Finally the babes, the Chant, a five piece fronted by vocalist Damian Woodhouse who've been building up a fair reputation over the last year. In 'Stand In Flame', Tambourine' and 'Echoes and Gray' they have their own sound/ songs with a Cure-ish drive but punctuated by haunting synth lines that give the band real individuality. George Kay No Tag Star and Garter, March 25. As the song goes, "woodwork squeaks and out come the freaks.''

An invitation to the future? We'll see. Boak and co. begin with 'Legalised Dogs' and from then on it's blitzkrieg bop violence at towering intensity. Their tone belies a value and necessity of discipline. This is no forced ramble of rock-a-rolla tirades, it's precise, channelled, controlled. Out front, Paul is all startling bellicosity, a tight knot of passion and fury. Behind, Mark, Carl and Andrew provide the fuel for this wrath. No Tag's music is a philosophy of defence and reaction. There remains a tension between individual freedom and popular role. A sense of anxiety lies at the very base of this music. Succumb to tailoring your music/behaviour to other people's expectations because of your punk associations or enforce your individuality by scorning all these so-called labels. I suggest No Tag resist parody by moving towards the latter. Watching No Tag can be a revelation of sorts. Their playing out is expansive and cathartic: it allows for full and often violent expression. I confess, it beats any other rock performance I've seen this year. If only they could develop into the Bad Brains/ Flipper/Meat Puppets hardcore of this world, now wouldn't that be something? S. J. Townshend Velvet Vipers Cabaret Mercury 2, March 16. Ssss ... you wanna see a dirty show? Just off K'Road ... the Velvet Vipers launched their late night cabaret. As soon as 1 saw these three fatally fascinating females coiled on fallen totems and one of them reared back her head and declaimed "K'Road is the Armpit of Auckland," I sensed the finely distilled venom of true satire. These daughters of Lenny Bruce .and Bertolt Brecht passed a nod to Red Mole and Broadway's smash Cats and struck directly below the reptilian belts of their trendy first night audience. Sparing no shade of nuance, inflexion, facial expression or double entendre Judith Gibson, Andrea Kelland and Teresa Woodham mercilessly white-trashed contemporary values. Have you a weakness for Performance Art? Heroin? New Wave music, masturbation, or a timely abortion? These ladies strip away pretensions with gusto and don't scruple a black sequinned gstring (total nudity finally appalled their M.C.P. heckler into

total silence). : They fine actresses with skills ranging from mime to poetry, but not great singers. found that their I rough edges rendered their humour more abrasive. Perhaps John Gibson's arrangements were a little too Noel Coward for the (three worldly-wise monkeys who t swarmed font to the piano and hotted up the music with the explicit action of their erectile tails. They brought the , house down. Jewel Sanyo The Troggs Out To Lunch Richie Venus and - The Blue Beatles Shoreline, Dunedin. ' Two support bands, -first was Out VTo Lunch, a]trio] headed by ex Tibet and Broken Models' guitarist Ross Nichols. It's Nichols' most pertinent venture : so far. With Andy Anderson on drums and Sid Somerville ion bass the band l is tight, metallic and confident for a three piece.' Their) original stuff has its moments,. The Outsider' springs to mind, but they, often tend to bludgeon when they should caress. Encouraging though. Christchurch's Richie Venus provided the sort of fun that was to evade the Troggs. With a short mixed set of classics 'Six Days On The Road', 'Green River', 'Money' and self-penned Flying Nun recorded songs, they had a ramshackled sense of enjoyment and authenticity that blended well with Venus' goofiness. The Troggs have long been punk fantasies of distilled sixties' rawness, the back-to-basics of honest trash and adrenalin. Their legend was built on three songs. Chip Taylor's 'Wild Thing' and their own sex anthems 'I •. Can't Control Myself* and 'With A Girl Like You'. These are their aces, and they delivered them and the timeless Love Is All Around'' with a panache and spirit that brought tears to the eyes. So much for the good news. The rest of their set was like a nostalgia-ridden thickwaisted Troggs meets Iron Maiden ~ as they overdosed on heavy metal versions of peripheral hits like I Need You' and old reliables like the (Rolling) Stones"Satisfaction’ and Holly's 'Peggy Sue'. ' Reg Presley’s open-legged mid-dle-aged sexuality, all paunch and penis, pretty well summed up the excesses and incongruity of the rTroggs}i^l£BHißAM