![]() ![]() It reminded me of amped up Kinks, being not much more than an amazing riff, separated by a naked almost acoustic middle eight that created both power and tension. ‘You Really Lose Me’, the flipside of their single ‘Big Hair’, stood out that night, just as it stood on record exhibiting a rock and roll power that was still not that common in New Zealand in the mid 1990s. ![]() Drummer Ken E Bear had played in recent Auckland based groups, but this was a Christchurch band that featured Rob Haakman and Wade Churton (The Scuzzbuckets). Guitarist Dave Clarke in silky satin longs strutting with his axe. This was a group that performed, they didn’t just stand there. Ape Management returned in March on the Booty and The Beast tour. The building housed Frisbee Studio and practice rooms as well as the living quarters of a number of reprobates. The Clean at Kurtz Lounge, 1995 - photos by Simon McKenzieįrisbee’s Leisure Lounge pushed on into 1996. Yet to retreat to art galleries and more rarefied environments, The Dead C showed their expansive sound was still at home on more traditional rock turf. Bailter Space, HDU, Stayfree Carefree, Nothing At All!, Twelve Tribes of Israel, US garage rockers Dead Moon, Spacesuit, Salmonella Dub, Dark Tower, US punks SNFU, Evilis, Slambodia, Martin Phillipps solo with Chris Knox, Chris Matthews and Danny Manetto, The Spinnanes, Bike and Graeme Downes took to the stage there in the first half of the year.Ī rare Dead C show in Auckland on July 14 supported by Marcel Bear and Rosy Parlane’s Empirical widened the musical palette as the sonorous pair sawing away at Bear’s sculpture like self-made shim saws. Hallelujah Picassos, Semi Lemon Kola and Muckhole saw the New Year in.Īlready well established, Kurtz Lounge presented a diverse bill of rising and established acts local and touring groups in 1996. In the space of two weeks, King Loser, The Chills, Bike, Muckhole, The Warners and Sticky Filth lugged their equipment up the stairs. The Hit List, Lure of Shoes and Figure 60 soon followed.ĭecember 1995 was full to bursting with shows. A week later, King Loser returned with Virginia Reel. ![]() All three acts would release compelling albums on IMD that still remain lost amidst the many overlooked riches the South Island’s music capital produced in the 1990s. In October, it was turn of The Renderers and Caneslide.ĭunedin’s long-lived indie scene showed a new face in late November, when up the wide angled wooden staircase, with the bar to your right as you entered and the stage on the left up against the wall, Trash, Suka and Fats Thompson stated their case. Greg Johnson and Bic Runga arrived at Kurtz on 26 August. May found new punks Future Stupid and Muckhole there. The Clean, and five days later, Alastair Galbraith and King Loser brought the south to the north. The best New Zealand indie groups played there alongside touring acts from the vibrant American alternative community.Ĭome April 1995 and Kurtz Lounge was fully firing. The picture used on the cover of the 1997 Eye TV album Birdy-O of the top of Symonds St with Kurtz Lounge on the right-hand side before it was demolished to widen the street - photo by Ian McRaeĪ few doors up on the second floor of another slated-for-demolition building at 178 Symonds Street nestled the languid Kurtz Lounge.Ī few doors up on the second floor of another slated-for-demolition building at 178 Symonds Street nestled the languid Kurtz Lounge, a live space and bar that would become the popular haunt in early 1997. In March 1995, Nothing At All!, Balance, Marty Sauce and The Source and Christchurch’s Ape Management reflected the hardening rock of the time. In the mid-1990s, the sound of drums and electric guitar echoed again when Frisbee’s Leisure Lounge established itself in the old BNZ Bank. A few years on, all-age clubs S.P.A.M and Russell Crowe’s The Venue found temporary favour on the worn out retail strip. Early punk venues sprang up in and around the city thoroughfare in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Symonds Street in Auckland is no stranger to the dark delights of nocturnal rock and roll. ![]()
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