Ten 80s Electro/Dance Obscurities from New Zealand
It's Saturday, so I decided to have some fun on YouTube.
Selected Works is a weekly (usually) newsletter by the Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Aotearoa (Wellington, New Zealand) based freelance music journalist, broadcaster, copywriter and sometimes DJ Martyn Pepperell, aka Yours Truly. Most weeks, Selected Works consists of a recap of what I’ve been doing lately and some of what I’ve been listening to and reading, paired with film photographs I’ve taken + some bonuses. All of that said, sometimes, it takes completely different forms.
Today’s newsletter is fairly straightforward. Here’s a list of ten 80s electro/dance obscurities from New Zealand. Most of these songs are available on YouTube. Some of them are available on streaming services or Bandcamp. Some are locked away in other places. This list is by no means definitive; it’s really just what I was able to dig up while I had some free time this morning. If you want a window into what was going on down here during the Decade of Decadence, it’s as good a place to start as any. Big hair and bigger beats ahoy.
The Body Electric, Rubber Knife (Jayrem, 1983)
Here’s a taut slab of instrumental EBM/Synth-Pop recorded by pioneering New Zealand electronic music band The Body Electric in the early 1980s. It came out in 1983 on their Dreaming In A Life EP, released through Jayrem Records. Here’s Simon Grigg’s 2022 profile of the group for Audio Culture.
Patea Maori Club Featuring Dalvanius, Poi-E (Maui Records, 1983)
Down here in Aotearoa, ‘Poi E’ by Pātea Māori Club is the unofficial national anthem. We’re talking traditional waiata (song), drum machines and synthesisers delivering a breakdance groove, video game noises and a music video that captured the past colliding with the future. Here’s an article about the big man, Dalvanius Maui Prime and the Road to ‘Poi E’.
Ballare, Dancing (Propeller, 1983)
Ballare’s infectious ‘Dancing’ had a hard electronic groove, a strong experimental edge that bubbled over two-thirds of the way through, and its eye fixed firmly on the dancefloor. According to Discogs, it was released in 1983 on a Propeller Records compilation, but this great Audio Culture article suggests it was kicking around in 1982, which would arguably make it New Zealand’s first fully synthesised dance track.
Decades later, ‘Dancing’ showed up on the Stranglove Music compilation Kiwi Animals. You can read an article I wrote about it for Test Pressing here.
Snap, Sidewalk City (Mushroom NZ, 1984)
Aside from ‘Poi E’ ‘Sidewalk City’ by Snap was one of the first electro-breakdance record produced in New Zealand. If you go and have a look on Discogs, it appears to be a collaboration between the New Zealand keyboard player and composer Tom Ludvigson (the father of the DJ/producer Surly) and a cotiere of fellow Aucklanders, including songwriter Graeme Gash, bassist Max Stowers and Noel Connolly. The great singer Annie Crummer even shows up in the credits. Peter McLennan dug into the whole thing back in 2009. Read his blog entry here.
Obscure Desire, Obscure Desire (Pagan Records, 1986)
When this cult New Zealand synth-pop/dance jam came out in 1986, reviewers thought it was funny to make a joke about how the hairdressers had made a record. Several decades on, I think it’s pretty clear to see that’s the best thing about it: Auckland’s cool party kids made a cool party record, and while it didn’t take like it should have at the time, over the following decades, it found a niche global audience. Here’s an article I wrote about Obscure Desire for Test Pressing.
Ardijah, Your Love Is Blind (Pagan Records, 1986)
I still remember how blown away I was when Palmerston North’s DJ DFresh played me this record back in the late 2010s. It’s really everything I was looking for from an ‘80s New Zealand electro-boogie record. I’d still love a copy of it on 12”, but I’m not paying NZ$392.57 on discogs, nah. Ardijah’s catalogue runs deep. Read their story here.
Moana, Kua Makona (Maui Records, 1986)
“Here's a rare slice of mid-Eighties pop from Moana and produced by Dalvanius and Ryan Monga, with harmonies from Ardijah and keyboards played by Simon Lynch. Kua Makona, with te reo-sung lyrics denouncing drink-driving, was another fearless step in the trailblazing career of Moana Maniapoto Jackson, who'd recently left the politically-charged Wellington-based group Aotearoa, and would go on to form the highly successful Moana and the Moahunters...” - Slydogmania
This is another one that absolutely blew me away the first time I heard it. Outstanding IMO.
Tom Ludvigson & Graeme Gash, Uallang Jnr (date unknown)
This is a chopped-down version of a fifteen-minute dance piece Tom Ludvigson & Graeme Gash cooked up in the 1980s. Ben Stevens from Strangelove Music resurrected it for his Kiwi Animals compilation. It’s absolutely wild.
Jam This Record, Jam This Record (Propeller, 1988)
“NZ's first house record was a one-off studio project for Simon Grigg, Alan Jansson, Dave Bulog and James Pinker. With a nod to UK act MARRS' indie/electro hit 'Pump up the Volume' — and a sample from Indeep's 'Last Night a DJ Saved My Life' — it briefly featured in the UK club charts. The TVNZ-made music video borrows the record's original graphics (by novelist Chad Taylor) and marries them to a mash-up of 1960s black and white, music-related archive footage (including C'mon) with the occasional novelty act and politician added for good measure.” - NZ On Screen
You can check the video out/listen to the music here.
Sistermatic, Bullion Dance (Propeller, 1989)
The story behind this one is wild. A one-off hip-house / hip-hop group formed by members of The Newmatics with DJs and rappers. Their only release, ‘Million Dollar’, was withdrawn on the day of release due to the threat of legal action from a banker mentioned sub-judice in the lyrics. You can read more about it over here.
TEST PRESSING REVIEWS:
Susumu Yokota, ‘Magic Thread (Skintone Edition)’ (Lo Recordings): Originally released in a 500 CD run for the Japanese market in 1998, Susumu Yokota's "Magic Thread" album is an eleven-song window into the years that the late Japanese composer, producer and DJ's friends and collaborators remember as some of the happiest of his life. Read here.
Sampology, ‘Ripen Vol. 1’, (Middle Name Records): The first time I listened to "Ripen Vol.1", the latest EP from the Meanjin/Brisbane-based Australian DJ, composer and producer, Sampology, I experienced the unique set of sensations you feel when you hear an artist finally realise the creative visions you've long suspected them to be capable of. Read here.
FIN.