best nz rock band ever. maybe.

More videos from these guys! Please! How about the videos for DONE and IF I WERE YOU?
They're great.

You need some more videos from these guys :(

argh! i tried to get 'hail' on cd and it was deleted! a greatest hits album just isn't sexy enough i'm afraid. everyone email flying nun and pester them to re-release it. throw a extra live track or two on it for sheer commercialism's sake maybe. in the meantime, anyone who has a spare copy of 'hail' email me at athelas@hotmail.com and i will pay cash money to you for it. happy new year.

Does anyone know what time the bands are expected to kick off on Thursday at the Studio? I spend way too much time standing around and it makes me cranky.

So who is playing in wellington?

I think the highlights for me were the translucent orange drumkit and watching Mark Peterson's magnificent guitar work.

They did take a while to warm up, but a very worthy show to see.

die die die were not appealling, shane's choice for opening act and his only bum note for the night.

chrysleregal: I was against the right hand wall, about half way back. I swear it wasn't me! :) What was said guy wearing?
That was one amazing gig. Just a couple of corrections: The first song was APS, not the second, and Cassette were the opening act last night, not Die! Die! Die! I loved Cassette, but I thought their first 3 songs were just perfect, and their final song was amazing too. I could have been happy with their other songs, but I think they overstayed their welcome as an opening act a little, and that may have impacted on my enjoyment. Highlights: Getting to hear Cast Stone live, that manic version of She Speeds, and, of course, A.P.S. I was hoping for some new songs, signifying this is more than just a one off, and a new album could happen! ;) How do you suppose we convince Flying Nun to re-release their old albums?

Excuse me while I smash my head with a frying pan to attempt to numb the pain of realising that I, um, forgot to go.

i went to the Chch and Dunedin gigs. had never seen them before, only slightly too young first time around. but not old enough to dance me ass off. weird audiences at both gigs - either people were young 'uns and thought they were at a museum or something (you groove at a Dimmer gig, but don't rock out, unless it's Seed or Drift), or they had seen the Fits first time round and nodded sagely. but being in-between - say late 20s or early 30s or just plain got the Fits bug, meant you were dancing and yelling out words, sounds of words you never knew what exactly they were, and making guitar sounds. probably looked quite dorky but was heaps of fun.

hardly anyone boogied or moshed. it must actually take a concerted effort to stand still in the face of such brilliant nasty rock tunes.

Chch - Diex3 were good, sound wasn't too great, but the room was set up real odd - at least 10 metres between the stage and where the PA was pointing. anyone in front of the PA was getting monitor and amp sound only. hence ears still ringing. Henry broke two bass strings. respect.

Fits - wow. first time me! went nuts with opening of APS. couldn't believe what i was hearing. so nice. what a great song. sorry, i didn't remember set list. sob. so good. sound was much better, even though we were right up the front and nowhere near the PA output. everyone but me and myshkin were pretty damned museum-gawping until halfway through with Dialling a Prayer, which came down like a tonne of heavy metal bricks and melody. very yum. at that, big fans came forward and boogied and sang their wee tonsils out. Hail was also very very good, a big curtain of loud acclamatory bash melody. She Speeds was a big awesome collapse of maelstrom and melody - starting to detect a theme in the live thing that doesn't quite come across on the albums.

they played incredibly well and were really enjoying it. always a close call on reunion tours, but well, the Fits are playing very interesting enjoyable well-written rock-arse songs, so that would help. they did very well in the face of crowd apathy/distanced respect.

slowly little mosh-pits formed here and there. people, out of a group of around 30 of us up the front, were starting to go religious! ha! brilliant! the crowd in the end was actually a lot better (for me anyway, and where i ended up) than Dunedin. heaps of respect for the Leader-Amongst-Men guy who got up on stage after we'd try to call them back for their third encore - he got us going, implored the band through the stage door (i think they told him 2 minutes, but nothing happened), and generally everyone went home grinning cos of him. summed up the celebration of the gig.

then travelled back to Dunners - wow Sammy's is looking great! grand old lady, very opulent and gorgeous, history, "supper" signs still up, lots of lovely dark corners. stage looked great, i've never seen it look so big 'n epic.

bigger crowd at Sammy's, i expect there would've been dancing pits all over, as people who came here because of bands like the Fits are still living here in hope of gigs like this. like me in the second wave of kids who arrived in the 90s.

band were still having fun with the material, Grate was particularly good, so was Life in One Chord - completely different to the album version ... wow, really took off like a rocket, everyone's hair was on end, well mine was. took a while for the audience to warm up where i was, eventually i managed to get up the front, but seemed to be the only one yelling words like an idiot and jumping and just getting into that rhythm. me and myshkin and my mate chris got a three person mosh going, but we're all nearing 30 years old or above ... that might have been for Grate, and Headwind earlier (Mark really good on that one). my favourites Burn it Up and Train were so much more intense than Chch, but that might've been cos i realised this would be the last chance to hear 'em live. slower meaner tunes like If I Were You and Way had a lot more slipperiness and sinister fun in them than Chch too, thanks perhaps to the locals and location.

at times couldn't believe what i was hearing - such great songs, such brilliant organics and developments within the tunes, so well written, everything so appropriate, and hearing them live - blew my mind. that they are great tunes, yeah, well, duh! but the delivery was the thing. just absolute utter beautiful chaos in a straightjacket, contained and channelled. heaven and hell. geez i go on, but i was just so pleased to be there, to realise that the songs can sound better than the perfection that's on the albums - listening to Blow now and how weird to think i've got memories where the songs sound better than utter perfection. Thanks to anyone who got this thing going, i never thought i'd have the chance to hear the songs like that, they way they should be heard.

only issues were the treble at Sammy's - my ears really REALLY farked now; and they didn't play Spacing (probably for the best, as my brain would've exploded for sure, i mean Cast Stone was difficult enough to contain my guts/soul/nerves from dissipating in response) ... Skin To Wear would've been good - utter brilliance of a song, everything good and unique about the Fits is in it. there's enough jems and precious metal left unsung for a second tour in five or so year's time. bet ya they'll still play like geniuses on fire - man how good was it seeing David Wood break out a meander-groove (I were You especially great to see it done and delivered), and John play like he was singing through the drums like no-one else on the planet, and Mark, yeah! great ebow, awesome backing vocals, mean melody guitar, and of course Shayne was 'good as'. excellent solos, a bit loud at times (i'm not that much of a solo-appreciator, but it might have been about where i was - pretty much angled to his amp, in front of Mark) and sometimes a bit long. but hell, he was having fun, the crowd loved it, it wasn't at all detrimental - i just like bands rather than bits of bands.

both gigs had a slightly awkward start - but i adored that. perhaps there was an awkward on stage sound for them, but i reckon it was more a choice of material - hell i was barely sane hearing APS open, but a lot of people only know the big three (Bad Note, Speeds and Dialing) - at both gigs when one of those came on, most of the museum crowd started to nod and the rest of us got wind in our sails.

heaps more i've thought about, but haven't got the brains to articulate right now. and i should probably keep a lot to myself, not everyone wants to know. but i love living vicariously through other people's gig memories ... the lovely chrysleregal was there filming bits of songs, was a pity the Dunedin crowd wasn't as ape as i expected - hope we don't look too bystander-esque. will the footage be used for anything?