In the early 1980s Glenn Turner made a comeback to the New Zealand cricket team for the 1982-83 one-day international series against Australia.
In the early 1980s Glenn Turner made a comeback to the New Zealand cricket team for the 1982-83 one-day international series against Australia. Turner’s return was as brilliant as it was ephemeral. While others in the fledgling one day caper attempted to bludgeon balls to far flung parts of the ground, Turner – who’d honed his craft in England in the 1970s – chipped balls perfectly between closely spaced fieldsman with the precision of a 16 th Italian renaissance sculptor. It wasn’t necessarily elegant, but it was an illustration of class.
What does that have to do with tonight’s gig? More than most punters would care, if they ever knew.
Prior to the appearance of The Verlaines, Panel Of Judges and Zsa Zsa provided a quality local entree. The former invoke almost picture-perfect memories of Calvin Johnson’s K Records, kit and kaboodle. Every song is a potential pop classic; there’s not a hint of fat in the delivery, and like a digital radio signal reaching the end of its propagation limits, the band’s songs drop off the proverbial cliff face with ne’er a moment of indulgence. Zsa Zsa were enigmatic, psychedelic and invigorating in the fashion that’s described wantonly as ‘hipster’; with presence of the ridiculously proficient and talented Karl Scullin on guitar and Ela Stiles on vocals. Watch that (hypnotic) space.
The so-called ‘Dunedin sound’ has been critically analysed to within an inch of its relevance; somewhere close to its heart is a jangling pop sensibility that appears to be unique to our trans-Tasman cousins. With The Bats, Robert Scott and the 3Ds all having toured Australia in recent times, and the long-awaited return of The Clean imminent, The Verlaines appeared to further remind us of how far above its notional musical weight New Zealand pop is capable of punching.
Like Turner’s short-arm jabs between mid-on and deep long-on, The Verlaines defied text-book convention: hooks solid enough to hold up song structures, but angular enough to defy obvious stylistic description. Singer and guitarist Graeme Downes’ weathered, rake-thin appearance wouldn’t be out of place in the dirty streets of the Bowery in New York; neither too, would the band’s Modern Lovers/Television melodies be struggling to find a welcoming home in that historical musical climate.
The band did their best to indulge the interests of long-term fans with C.D., Jimmy Jazz & Me and Death Of The Maiden (with its signature description of the murder of Rimbaud by Paul Verlaine); later on, it was suggested The Verlaines hadn’t done complete justice to their back catalogue, nor offered enough fresh material to keep the puntocracy happy. It’s true there were moments where exploration blurred into self-indulgence; but the line between the two has never been easy to detect.
And like Glenn Turner’s idiosyncratic style, you have to stand back to understand just why that’s so.
Loved: The crowd singalong (‘Verlaine, Verlaine,Verlaine, Verlaine’) in Death Of The Maiden.
Hated: The paralytic analysis after the gig of the preferred division between ‘old songs’ and ‘new songs’.
Drank: Cooper’s Pale Ale and copious glasses of water.
GEOFF HOWARTH
