Today I changed my MSN tag to ‘slowly losing the will to live’ because it feels like that. My life’s blood is trickling out of me. LITERALLY. And some fuck has taken away the box of tampons that was in the first aid kit in the kitchen. How rude. I took the morning off today to stay in bed, having spent all day at work yesterday writhing around in pain, then taking so much nerofen plus that I got dizzy but still feeling the pain. That left me pretty much unable to do anything except build up a library of RSS feeds and stalk my shiny ex cow-orker after people discussed him in our project managers’ meeting (yesterday with bonus cake!). Now I remember why it was awesome not to have periods for so long. And apparently I have four months worth of cramps to get throught right now as well. Fucking radsville. At least my boobs aren’t sore anymore.

Yes, this is what my life is like. It’s Wednesday afternoon which means that I have to avoid the internets until 8.30pm so I don’t get any Rockstar spoilers before the performance show, but I’m feeling too sick to work. I would dose up on more nerofen but that’d be the easy solution. Yesterday we had a flat dinner for which I made a tagine. It was perhaps not the most authentic tagine ever, but it was fucking tasty. I still had to abandon it to lie on the couch moaning though. It’s just as well that I’m not pregnant, because my parenting skills are pretty crap and I wouldn’t want the second coming to be unable to refrain from scratching the couch.

In another example of how lame and behind the times I am, I dreamt about Chuck Norris the other night. He had grey streaks in his hair so I suggested to him it might be better for his career if he got them dyed, and he was like “I’ve got cancer, you’re so insensitive!”. Luckily I woke up before he gave me a roundhouse kick to the face. In a better example of awesome internets, I got this fantastic email this morning:

“FW: Hubris Horse Shampoo

Good afternoon

I was interested in purchasing some hors shampoo as recommended in Horse and Pony – have I got the right contact? ”

I wrote back going “hahaha no, you really really don’t”. It’s an easy mistake to make, I suppose, although why the fuck would anyone call their horse shampoo Hubris? Do you want your horse to fall? Hopefully now I’ll get like a thousand hits from people wanting the horse shampoo. At least they’ll be a better class of people than the many who land here looking for animal sex. Also, now I think maybe I shouldn’t have run that particular google search since I’m still at work, but oh well. I rang up Bond & Bond on Monday to ask them what the fuck was up with my laptop and they said it’d probably be done yesterday but they’d call me. They haven’t called me. They also said that it wasn’t the power supply, it was something else that was really expensive, so I’d better not have to pay for it if they didn’t contact me to let me know. Hopefully it’ll come under the guarantee. I should have tried to pay more attention, but the guy wasn’t quite the clearest English speaker ever, and it sounded like he was yelling so I was holding my cellie way away from my ear.

I think the new Pulp is out soon with my reviews. I’m never entirely sure though. Other things of note? There really aren’t any. This is totally a filler entry. But you guessed that already, right? And now can I take some more painkillers please? I can’t wait to go and have a spa at the gym after work. Perhaps I’ll even do a little exercise too, if I feel like going crazy. I have another boxing lesson tomorrow and I’m scared because I haven’t worked out how to wrap my hands properly yet. I think I’m getting pretty good at the cross, however, so that’s something. And my arms have finally stopped hurting from the keg stands so at least I can thank my incredible stomach pain for something.

Much in the same way that every day is Earth Day, New Zealand music is still a great and happening thing even when it?s not New Zealand Music Month. Here in no particular order (but please do feel free to cry foul and argue with your friends) are the top moments in New Zealand Music that happened between now and the last music month:

1. Channel Z, a long time supporter of New Zealand music with its 30% self imposed quota breathed its last gasp (even if according to the ratings no one was listening). All was not lost for, like a flightless nocturnal phoenix, Kiwi FM rose from its ashes, playing all NZ, all the time. Yay.

2. Because the New Zealand music scene was all too much of a love in (Betchadupa’s comments about Dimmer being “Like Marvin Gaye without the Marvin” aside), Scribe’s posse decided to keep it real by giving a bFM exec Phil Armstrong the bash at an industry Christmas Party. Some NZ hip hop artists rap in American accents because it’s official: Grey Lynn is the new Compton.

3. The Straitjacket Fits announced a reformation tour. There’s no verdict yet as to whether or not Andrew Brough will be joining the lineup, or if Miranda Harcourt will be lingering at the side of the stage to hear ‘She Speeds’ which, rumour has it, is about her

4. NZ Idol was the top rated TV show of 2004, with 24% of everyone over the age of five tuning in. Karaoke has never been so popular.

5. John Psathas composed the music for the Olympic Opening ceremony, heard by millions ? if not billions ? around the world. Unfortunately athletes got a lot more attention, funding and Macdonald’s contracts, but his work is no less impressive.

6. Helen Clarke said that it would be inappropriate for Aussie mullet-crooner John Farnham to play at Anzac Cove commemorations. Luckily the situation wasn’t reversed because if John Howard had said no to our Dobbo we’d have to go to war. There’s a joke in here somewhere about Tall Poppy Syndrome, but Pulp will not be making it.

7. Pluto finally released their second album, Pipeline Under the Ocean, and it’s bloody excellent. While Pluto had to battle their old record label at least they managed to escape Second-Album-Syndrome whereby if a band manages to stay together long enough to put out a second album it is generally crap.

8. Wellington’s favourite sons became Shihad again. Forget that Pacifier crap, we’ve got our boys back again.

9. Steriogram got to work with Michel Gondry on the video for their song ‘Walkie Talkie Man’ and the result was nominated for a Grammy for ‘Best Video’. There are some great music videos being made right here in NZ, and on a fraction of the budget, but Gondry’s work is up there amongst the Greatest Videos Ever Made, so that’s very cool. Steriogram also were chosen for an iPod ad in the U.K, which is a well known pathway to success.

10. Lots of New Zealand artists did a lot of charity work. The Asian Tsunami was a popular cause, with a range of gig held to raise funds. Meanwhile The Breast Cancer Research Trust proved it has a sense of humour when choices for a fundraising CD included Stellar*’s ‘Part of Me’ and Bic Runga’s ‘Precious Things’. Pulp is quite glad they didn’t stoop to Strawpeople’s ‘Trick with a Knife’ or Dave Dobbyn’s ‘Slice of Heaven’.

11. A little known movie called Return of the King helped Fran Walsh win a Grammy for Best Song from a Motion Picture? because LOTR hadn’t really done very well in the prize stakes until then…

12. After having been floating around in the charts for over a year, Goldenhorse’s Riverhead finally reached the number one position, in a year positively bulging with NZ music chart successes.

13. The top selling single of 2004 was by Ben Lummis, while the top selling album was by Brooke Fraser.

14. Comedic Folk Duo Flight of the Concords (Black Seeds’ Bret McKenzie and Humourbeasts’ Jemaine Clement) were signed to NBC in the US to develop their own television show, which will still include their trademark musical numbers. Are they destined to be the next Seinfeld? And what would Figwit do?

15. Q: How many NZ hip hop artists does it take to change a lightbulb? A: Not many, if any. In part influenced by just how much that phrase has entered our lexicon, Scribe won the APRA Silver Scroll for songwriting. Hilarious sub editors everywhere are eternally grateful.

16. After being scorned for so long and yet still managing to put out a critically acclaimed first album, The Phoenix Foundation finally managed to get some funding from NZOA for their video ‘Damn The River’ and for their upcoming new album.

17. The Dawnraid Allstars demonstrated that it IS possible to make some money as a musician in New Zealand ? as long as you don?t mind selling something or ‘hooking up’.

18. New Zealand musicians started taking public transport. Remember the days when every video featured the band riding in a car? Now Britomart is the backdrop of choice.

19. Evermore made it big in Australia. Wouldn’t it be nice if artists didn’t have to make it somewhere else before they got attention here?

20. The bands played for free, NZ on Air gave a cool half million and while TVNZ won’t disclose how much it spent, 24 hours of airtime could not have come cheap. The National Anthem ? 24 hours of live New Zealand music, which ranged from the sublime to the asinine raised an underwhelming $148k for the Play It Strange Foundation. Meanwhile, TV2 canceled Squeeze.

Top Five Non Music Moments in NZ Idol
1. Wardrobe malfunctions: the surplus chains, pink ribbons, gold lame jacket on Big Dave, the bird poo, the granny curtains?
2. Ben and Sela announce their engagement. Are they NZ’s Kurt & Courtney?
3. Paul Ellis stuffs up big time when Michael Murphy?s first single is exposed via the Internet as being a cover.
4. The Filipo Family Scandal. Are they NZ’s Gottis?
5. ‘Preformance’ entered our lexicon, thanks to the Dominator’s constant mispronunciation.

NZ Music in the The 2004 Rianz Charts

Singles:
1. ‘They Can?t Take That Away’ ? Ben Lummis
4. ‘Fools Love’ ? Misfits of Science
6. ‘We Gon Ride’ ? Dei Hamo
12. ‘Stop The Music’ – P Money feat. Scribe
13. ‘So Damn Beautiful’ ? Michael Murphy
14. ‘Dreaming’ ? Scribe
17. ‘I Got’ ? Fast Crew
20. ‘Yesterday Was Just the Beginning’ ? NZ Idol The Final Ten

Albums:

1. What To Do With Daylight ? Brooke Fraiser
7. Pure – Hayley Westenra
8. Everyone is Here ? The Finn Brothers
9. Riverhead ? Goldenhorse
11. The Crusader ? Scribe
13. Into The West ? Yulia
19. Beautiful Collision ? Bic Runga.

Pulp 2005

Let’s make one thing clear: Birds is every bit as good as you expect an album from Bic Runga to be, and it’s going to sell quite a few copies. Runga has always had enough confidence in herself to produce her own albums, and for her third effort she has brought a backing band that is a who’s who of NZ talent, including Shayne Carter, Neil Finn and Ricky Gooch. Birds is more melancholic than Beautiful Collision, and far more textured than Drive. The result is something unbelievably exquisite. On the first couple of listens it comes across almost as a little bit country, especially on the bluegrass intro to ‘No crying no more’. Meanwhile ‘Blue blue heart’ is such pop perfection with its thumping piano and “oh la la” chorus it could have been written by mid-career Beatles. Runga shows exceptional control over her voice as it rises and soars over violins in the title track, while when she is backed by singers Anika Moa and Anna Coddington on ‘It’s over’ it is spine tingling and perfect. The intricate details on Birds make it an album to listen to on repeat, as each listen will reveal new beauty.
5/5

Pulp

Two different 2amish entries

Friday

I wish I:
A. Didn’t listen to people/took more responsibility for my actions/wasn’t such a stupid little miss doubter
B. Lived alone when I come home at 1am and the front door and all the windows are wide open, and Dawn of Azazel or some such is blasting out at some kind of crazy volume, and they’re playing poker in the dining room so that I can neither watch The Gilmore Girls or go straight to sleep like I’d like to
C. Didn’t have to go to my mother’s tomorrow morning to look after the house while she has an open day
D. was married to both the boys from Boulot
E. had workmates and ex-workmates who talked about more than the things that make me yell “SO, what’s your favourite fact about monkeys?” at all and sundry in hopes of changing the channel, although I do appreciate having drinks and dinner bought for me.
F. Had the ability to time travel, but like, controlled-like, not all making me cry at 3am in the morning when I finish it Timetraveller’s Wife like.

Other than that, and my right shoulder being SO FUCKING SORE, life is pretty sweet. Oh, and my friend texted me tonight to tell me that she’s become a umm, I can’t remember the word, so I will use the word “Fuckerware Demonstrator”, so if there are any ladies in Wellington who’d like to have one, let me know.

Saturday

I don’t remember the background music in Go being like this, and I saw it a bunch of times. We even had the motherfucking Go banner in our dining room, and I know that cos I was watching the Garland video again tonight. Welcome to my saturday.

I should probably point out that this entry is brought to you by the new Placebo album, which is (in theory) so new that it still says “title TBC” and it’s all one of those official “ELISABETH EASTER, I AM WATCHING YOU, DON’T YOU DARE RIP IT” versions. But anyway, my point was, and I’m sure you’ll still buy the Pulp and read this for yourself, that the albums, in order are: Hedonism, the comedown, feeling lost, reflecting on life and now the new one is: getting on with things, admittedly with meds to get you through the day. It won’t play in my computer at work, so the first time I heard it was around 9.35am when I got into my car this morning and it made me want to cry on the way to Ngaio. I was, of course, as you would know from the top half of this entry, on my way to help my mother with her open day. When I got there, there was no one else there yet, so I had raisin toast and coffee and chocolate peppermint slice, and she said “is there anything I can do for you?” and I said “can you fix my pants?” so I took them off and she fixed them and oh, it was like magic. And then my daddy came home from Dunedin or wherever he’d been andhe talked all excitedly about this processing place, and the Chinese he was showing around, and how he showed them something and how they asked for something and he showed them something else, and I was like “wow, it’s so cool how great you are at your job and how excited you are about it” and he ignored me becaue he was only paying me attention when he said “and then they got off their plane…” and I was like “got off, heh heh” and he’d laugh, and then he’d go back to talking and I’d be like “meat packing heh heh” and he’d go on and ignore the compliments.

So I decided to leave, so I texted Karen and asked her if she wanted to go to brunch somewhere on the Southern Coast, and she said “should I bring my togs?” and despite the wind, I was like “yes!” and so we went swimming at my favourite secret beach near Scorching Bay, squealing all the way cos it was cooooooooooold, and then had lunch at Chocolate Fish (haloumi and eggplant stack on sour dough). And then we went home and hung up my washing, and put on sneakers, still all salty-like, and then Miss Lisa Fur kindly came and picked us up. We got to Waitangi Park, and it was 2.20pm. I was thinking that the Phoenix Foundation were playing at 2.30pm, but there was a chalkboard saying that the Warratahs were playing at 2pm and the PF would be at 3pm. Well, we’d made jokes about how the Warratahs were like, totally down with the kids cos that wacky rap music was playing and we could see some kids breaking, so i was like “I bet they’re breaking… their HIPS” badoom chish, so we were like aaaaaaargh omg they haven’t even started yet and we’re still feeling those hands on our hearts, holding us, so we ran away to the Paramount for the best ice creams in the Courtenay area, and I had a triple chocolate ice cream, and it was accidently chocolate dipped, so like quadrupale chocolate, and holy crap, it was like an orgy in my mouth, except without the cocks and the semen and the stretching. But it was amazing ice cream. Yeah. And we went back, and sat on the ground, and the Phoenix Foundation played, and fucking oh yeah they were awesome. They didn’t play ‘Nest Egg’ for Lisa, but for me (yes, for me) they did ‘Hitchcock’ and a very rocking ‘The Drinker’ and ‘Forty Years’ and also (of course) ‘Slightest Shift’, and Karen got the Bruce Springsteening, even though she says he has no good songs, and sitting on the ground hurts my back cos I have no core strenght, but nevermind. And then I went home for nap and shower and de-salting.

In the evening I picked Brad up and saw his new house, and we came back here for drinks, and old photos – so many AUT stories to tell each other, and then the video, and sometime after midnight we headed off to Atomic, but wow, it just felt weird and strange. When they played ‘This Charming Man’, I was like “oh ho, really? But they didn’t play ‘love will tear us apart’ first”, so I thought maybe they’d swapped, but then they played the Cure’s ‘Inbetween days’ and I was like woah, parallel dimension and THEN they played ‘Love will tear us apart’ and seriously, what the fuck’s up with that shit? Also, the crowd were weird – they were waaaaaaay more Courtenay than Cuba, and Kristen wasn’t behind the bar, and I didn’t know the crowd, except for Jimmy who is apparently still alive although you wouldn’t know that from the interweb, and he said he was working on a top secret project and if I was the type to gossip I’d say the hot girl he was with was his project, but I don’t gossip. And again, I saw no one I knew, except for that really annoying “oh let me get up on the stage and dance, because I am like so awesome in my vinyl skirt and oh I’m on Suicide girls and oh I’m a drunken goth” girl who is there all the time, not that I dislike randoms that I don’t know or anything, oh no. Anyways, when we were dancing, Brad and I had an aweeeeeesome time, and just fun fun fun, but it was HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT, and so crowded, and my tummy hurt, so some time after 2am I left, and came home, and Mark was watching Go, and that brings us back into a complete circle, and the one thing I think that I’ve forgotten to mention was teh number deleting ceremony. Awesome.

If you’re a former rock star recovering from a heroin addiction, perhaps it’s a logical next step to team up with some other former rock stars to form a rock band. After all, once you?ve sold millions of records, it can’t be easy going back to a day job. Thus, in the tradition of supergroups like Audioslave, A Perfect Circle and The Travelling Wilburys, Velvet Revolver was born.

Velvet Revolver had been a rumour since it was announced that everyone but Axl Rose was quitting Guns’n Roses due to his insistence on pursuing electronica and industrial music. Axl was left with the band name, which he’d been given the rights to after he’d threatened to leave during the Use Your Illusion tour. His new version of GNR, with an ever changing line-up of band members, has spent the last nine years and $12 million on the still unfinished Chinese Democracy album. Meanwhile guitarist Saul Hudson (Slash), drummer Matt Sorum, and bassist Michael McKagan (Duff) all pursued different projects.

Slash was always the most recognisable member of GNR, with his long curly hair and trademark top hat winning over the ladies everywhere. During one tour, he was keeping three or four hotel rooms at a time so he could alternate between groupies. Slash has said that his hair and hat were just a way of hiding from audiences so he wouldn?t have to look at them. At one stage he found himself needing to hide from his own bodyguard ? who, in a move that Slash dubbed “very Single White Female” had started dressing exactly like him.

Slash managed to kick his heroin addiction while he was in GNR, but he wasn’t into clean living, securing a product endorsement deal with Black Death Vodka, the logo of which features a skull in a top hat. Perhaps he needed the vodka to drown the memories of his soloing on two songs from Michael Jackson’s 1992 album Dangerous. Slash’s fans were less confused when he formed the platinum-selling Slash’s Snakepit in 1995, which at times also featured his former bandmate Duff.

Duff had originally moved to L.A in an attempt to escape the copious heroin usage that was part of the punk scene in Seattle that he’d been playing in from 1979-1984. GNR was probably the wrong band for him to have joined if he’d wanted to stay clean. In 1990, Axl announced on stage that he?d be breaking up GNR if certain members of the band didn’t stop “dancing with Mr Brownstone”, so Duff took up drinking instead. After eight years of the GNR lifestyle, Duff was hospitalised in 1994 with pancreatitis, and told that if he didn’t stop drinking right then he would die. Having released his first solo album, Believe in Me, the year before, Duff obviously had something to live for, and so he cleaned up his act to the point where he was able to run a marathon in 2001. Fans had another chance to see him looking half dead, however, when he appeared in the TV show Sliders as a rockstar vampire in 1997. Duff formed and played in various bands, included Loaded and The Neurotic Outsiders, which included members of the Sex Pistols, Duran Duran and Matt Sorum from GNR.

Sorum is probably one of the world’s most famous replacement drummers. Early in his music career he was also widely known as a drummer-for-hire, playing in up to ten bands at a time. One of his first recordings was with Tori Amos, on her (extremely hard to find) glam rock album Y Kant Tori Read. In 1988 he got the job of drumming for British band The Cult after their drummer left, and he joined GNR after Steven Adler was fired for refusing to give up drugs. His first show with the Gunners was in Rio de Janeiro, playing to 140,000 people. After GNR broke up, Sorum had a multitude of gigs, including playing on tracks for Slash and Duff’s other projects, touring with The Cult again, and releasing his own solo album in 2003.

In 2002, Slash, Duff and Sorum played a benefit gig and decided to start a project together, which left a vacancy for a singer. Names like Sebastian Bach (of Skid Row and now TV?s The Gilmore Girls fame) and Travis Meeks (from Days of The New) and at one stage even Courtney Love were bandied about, but they clearly weren?t anything like Axl. How to replace the most arrogant man in rock? With one of the most fucked up ? Scott Weiland from Stone Temple Pilots.

STP was formed in 1990 when Weiland met bassist Robert DeLeo at a Black Flag concert and discovered that they were both dating the same woman. The group rode the grunge wave to stardom in the early nineties. While critics claimed they sounded like the poor man?s Pearl Jam, they sold seven million copies of their debut album Core in 1992, and its 1994 follow-up Purple stayed at #1 in the US for three weeks. A year later, Weiland was arrested for the first time for crack and heroin possession and given one year?s probation. Weiland is a man with many problems. As well as refusing to take medication for his bi polar disorder, because it flattens his personality, Weiland also had to deal with Hustler receiving photos of him and Courtney Love in a compromising position, which luckily publisher Larry Flynt refused to print. STP managed to squeeze out another three albums and a Greatest Hits collection in between his stints in rehab and jail, but Weiland caused problems for the whole band, and by their last tour he was trading punches with other band members on stage.

Despite this, Velvet Revolver was happy to take him on board. “Scott’s whole problem is tangible ? it’s just a drug problem. It’s not something completely insane that we can?t understand,” said Slash. Indeed, the video for Velvet Revolver?s second single ‘Fall To Pieces’ even depicts Weiland overdosing and being rescued by Slash.

Weiland had worked with the band in 2002 on songs for the soundtracks to The Italian Job and Hulk although at the time these songs were supposed to be one-off projects. Then in May 2003 he was arrested yet again for drug possession. Although he was ordered into rehab, a judge allowed him to be released to film a video. A month later, he was announced as the official vocalist of the group.

The final member of Velvet Revolver who isn’t as well known is Dave Kushner ? who actually went to school with Slash, and who played in Duff’s band Loaded, as well as being a session musician for various big names. With Slash’s solos being very flashy, Kushner compliments him perfectly by slipping under the radar.

Live, Velvet Revolver plays not just their new songs from their album Contraband, but also some of GNR’s less Axl-y songs (such as ‘Mr Brownstone’) and a couple of STP hits. The connection between the two bands isn’t so hard to see – Weiland says in the official band biography that STP’s hit ‘Sex Type Thing’ was written based on the low vocal of GNR’s ‘It’s So Easy’. Velvet Revolver quickly moved from playing small clubs to gigs of 15,000 people.
“I call it the Evveil Knievel factor,” Weiland told Newsweek. “He filled stadiums, but not because people wanted to see him make the jump. They wanted to see if he’d crash and burn”.

It doesn’t appear that Velvet Revolver will be crashing and burning any time soon. Hitting 40 has apparently had a mellowing effect on Slash ? during one show in Chicago, the audience started chanting “Fuck Axl Rose!” to which Slash merely replied, “Was that really necessary?”

Pulp

I’ve been consuming media like crazy lately, and maybe I haven’t told you about it, so here goes:

Mysterious Skin made me ache in so many ways, and made me think far far too much

Elizabethtown, which was mostly really bad, but there were some really good moments in it too, like the face that Kirsten Dunst makes when she’s in the bath, and she’s holding her breath, and then Orlando says something that confirms to her that he’s into her too, and it’s just perfect. But the movie was too many different films at once. When Lisa and I were talking about what movie we’d go to, I described the plot to her, and she was like “Oh, it’s Garden State“, and I suppose you could compare the two, but Elizabethtown would lose every time.

Serenity which I can’t really write about here without any spoilers, but suffice to say HOLY FUCKING CRAPPING OH MY GOD it was fantastic and good and great and I want to go back again and again and again. If I was going to go over the top with analogies – which I am – seeing those familiar and dear characters on the big screen was like giving birth (or, since I haven’t actually given birth, holding the first printed version of a magazine you did mostly all by yourself in your hands. Because yes, I made it. Oh no wait…) And now I’m singing the ‘where do we go from here?’ song from Buffy in my head over and over adn wanting to see the sequel RIGHT NOW although of course, it might not even get made…

Oh, and did i mention that Robert Downey Junior is my new boyfriend after Kiss kiss, bang bang? I’m sure I did, but I was probably drunk…

I am also of course really looking forward to King Kong, and The Lion, the Witch & The Wardrobe, and the divine Kateh has sent/is sending me tickets to Harry Potter for next Wednesday, so wooo, no cultural snobbery here. I did, however have an arguement with Karen last night while watching the trailers for the Narnia pic, cos she’s all “they’re going to put The Horse and his Boy into the first movie” and I’m all like “no they’re not,” and she’s all “but they’re making Prince Caspian next,” and I’m like “but that’s the order they were written in, and then I was like dude, you might know books, but you don’t use the internet except to go to McSweeny’s, and so who are you to tell me what’s what? Except that I just said that she was wrong.

Speaking of blagged preview stuff, the new Bic Runga album Birds is of course absolutely fantastic. And the new My Morning Jacket album has pictures of pandas on the disc (which makes me laugh, since Kateh sent me the first album cos it has a bear on the cover) and lyrics that go “a kitten on fire and a baby in a blender / both sound as sweet / as a night of surrender”, which is genius, although of course Hubris does NOT advocate setting kittens on fire. But you will be reading more about that in the next issue of Pulp, I’m sure.

And so back to the real life. Yesterday Anji and I got our invites to my cousin Iain‘s wedding – or rather, second wedding, since he and Anny already got married in China. I think. It’s the day after my work Xmas party, but luckily isn’t a morning ceremony, so that is very choice and exciting. I can wear my Going to Weddings dress (Chelsea’s, Penny’s…).

And speaking of my work party, thanks to all the none of you (except for Esther) who gave me Loveboat themed costume suggestions. That’s the last time I bother writing an entry while I’m sober! Except for um, this one.

Finally, it’s occured to me that I really need to stop spending money and start saving if I intend to do anything over the summer other than sit at home and reread rockstar biographies. Shirley and I are discussing going to Whakatane, possibly over New Year’s, to see Brad, if anyone wants to join us. I’ll do my best to promise not to give anyone handjobs on the couch this time. And then there’s the Big Day Out, so there’ll be flights and hotels up for that. Who’s going? I need friends who AREN’T going to the Melbourne one for reasons that they won’t disclose. And I’m not talking to Heather anymore for the rest of the day! Don’t worry, this is not a jumping-the-shark moment though, and that’s not just because Karen asked me the other day when that phrase will jump the shark. Oh the injokes!

For a guy whose name has appeared on over 50 million album sales, Butch (real name Bryan) Vig is extremely down to earth. While he admits that doing interviews can be awkward, he seems happy to be doing press for Garbage’s new album Bleed Like Me ? perhaps because at one stage he thought that their fourth album would never get finished. “It’s a huge fucking relief because this record almost broke us as a band, so we see it as a huge triumph
“.

The fact that Garbage have been together for so long, having watched many of their contemporaries fall by the wayside can also be regarded as a triumph. Their story starts over twenty years ago, in Madison, Wisconsin, when Vig dropped out of his pre med studies in order to play the drums in a band called Spooner, led by Doug Erikson. A fan named Steve Marker had a four track in his basement, and he offered to record the band. While Spooner broke up, Vig’s friendship with Marker lasted. In 1983 they formed Smart Studios together, borrowing $3000 from Vig’s parents. In an old warehouse with egg cartons glued to the wall they started recording singles for local bands at $100 a pop.

While neither Marker nor Vig had any prior experience, by 1989 Smart Studios had gained enough of a reputation that they were asked to produce Gish, the debut album for The Smashing Pumpkins. The next year in April Vig started production work on Nevermind for Nirvana’s major label debut. After Nirvana catapulted into the mainstream, Vig was seen as a superstar producer and he worked with a variety of other alternative bands such as Sonic Youth and L7 on their crossover albums.

But by 1994, Vig was getting tired of guitar music. His work on remixes for Nine Inch Nails and House of Pain, which headed in the direction of electronic loops and samples, inspired him to start working on writing songs with his old friends Marker and Erikson. Their project took on the self-deprecating name of Garbage, and then the three decided that they needed a woman singer.

“It’s a damn shame that there?s not more bands fronted by girls today,” he says, citing PJ Harvey, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs and The Distillers as current examples of groups led by strong women. “Perhaps girls were put off by all the bullshit macho bands in the late ’90s like Limp Bizkit. Hopefully they?ll come to our shows and see Shirley and decide to give it a go”.

They first spotted Shirley Manson on MTV, singing in her band Angelfish. After making contact, they met her in London ? for conspiracy theorists, on the same day that that Kurt Cobain died.

Manson was fierce, Scottish and strikingly beautiful; seemingly the opposite of the men in Garbage. Indeed, even biographies straight from the record company describe their early videos as “[appearing to be] three covert government operatives keeping tabs on a red-haired geisha” but the chemistry that developed over the course of making their eponymous first album was undeniable. Manson’s lyrics had a rage and aggression that the intricate production channelled with finesse, making it stand out in the grunge aftermath of music charts in 1995. With singles ‘Queer’, ‘Stupid Girl’ (their highest charting single, at #4 in the UK charts and #24 in the US) and ‘Only Happy When It Rains’ and three Grammy nominations to drive it along, Garbage sold four million copies.

Meanwhile the band started performing live for the first time, touring extensively. Manson quickly began to be seen as the band’s Most Valuable Player, or at least the most recognisable. In an interview in 1996, Vig said that when the band had first formed everyone wanted to talk to him, due to his success with Nirvana, but a year later he was referred to as “the drummer in Shirley Manson?s band”. While that kind of focus had a negative influence on No Doubt, a female-fronted band Garbage has toured with, Vig doesn’t see it as a problem for Garbage.

“Shirley should get all the focus, because they?re her lyrics and she’s up front,” he says, “I don’t want to be the centre of attention, I still have enough fans from Nevermind, I get plenty of ego boosts”.

In 1998, Garbage released their second album, Version 2.0. It was slower to take off than Garbage, but eventually sales reached similar figures. Musically, the album was very much a second version of the first, with new features and a metaphorically shinier interface built in. The electric imagery that the production called up was echoed in the video of ‘Push It’, in which people’s heads were replaced by light bulbs. Manson’s lyrics continued to spit out venom (“If we sleep together / will you like me better?”) which no doubt endeared her to those raised on Alanis Morrisette records, and indeed the band toured New Zealand with Morrisette. Meanwhile Manson’s status as a sex symbol was cemented in 1999, when the band were asked to do the theme for the James Bond film The World is Not Enough, and she got to play a killer robot in the video.

But while Manson’s appearance may have helped record sales, fans turned on her when she cut her hair and dyed it blonde before the third album, beautifulgarbage was released. Others were put off by its more eclectic nature, and the fact that the record was polished within an inch of its life. Many talk about beautifulgarbage as a failure because it ‘only’ sold 2 million copies, which is admittedly half of its predecessors. Vig points out that the single ‘Cherry Lips’ was huge outside of America, and it is worth noting that Garbage singles never charted particularly well in the US, even while the albums were selling platinum. He also blames the comparative failure of the album on the fact that it was released on September 4th, 2001, and so America was in a state of shock, not ready to embrace a pop album. Certainly Garbage didn?t have fun touring the album, even though they were doing a support slot for U2.

Mid tour, in 2002, Vig was diagnosed with Type A Hepatitis, and was replaced on tour by drummers Matt Chamberlain (who has played with Fiona Apple, Tori Amos and NZ’s own Anika Moa) and Matt Walker (The Smashing Pumpkins, Filter). “First time I?ve played with another drummer in 20 years,” said Erikson at the time. Manson also had a health scare when she needed to have a cyst on her vocal chord removed. None of this helped to get the band in the right state of mind to record their fourth album. Nevertheless, Garbage returned to Smart Studios in 2003, liking the isolation that Madison provided. They laid down ‘Right Between The Eyes’ in 30 minutes, and then as Vig describes it, the band spiralled into a black hole. Everyone needed to take time out.

Eventually it was their long suffering management ? who also manage Metallica and were responsible for calling in that band’s therapist when it seemed Metallica couldn’t work together anymore as depicted in Some Kind of Monster ? who pushed Garbage back into jamming together. Vig felt rejuvenated, and he believes that everyone had needed to hit the bottom and take a good hard look in the mirror and decide that they actually wanted to be in the band making music together before they could proceed. Manson had come back with lyrics that were more topical and political, with what Vig describes as a ‘frenetic scrappiness’. Bleed Like Me signals a return to Garbage’s earlier work, sounding more raw and guitar-based than beautifulgarbage. Vig called in Dave Grohl to drum on ‘Bad Boyfriend’, bringing in the wild, chaotic rhythm that Garbage fans have learnt to love, and with the exception of that track, which was produced by Dust Brother John King, the band handled production themselves since they are stuck in their ways. The lower overheads of recording in predominantly in Madison meant that the budget didn?t spiral out of control when the record took so long to perfect.

Putting aside their scrapping, Garbage are back on the road touring. “Everyone is in a good mood,” says Vig optimistically, “due to how well the record has been received”. ‘Bleed Like Me’ is currently the most added record to radio in the USA. Once they?re done with this round of touring, Vig intends to take a year off from Garbage to produce albums. He is also keen to get into scoring for films, which isn’t surprising given that he does have a degree in film from the University of Wisconsin.

Aside from Garbage, the obvious question to ask is does Vig see a new Nirvana ready to emerge? “That?s something you can’t predict. If I knew who they were, I?d be in the studio with them right now,” he laughs.

Originally published in Pulp.

Run “sales, rich profit re-emerging” through any good anagram website, and you’ll come up with the much more exciting phrase “the Spice Girls are reforming”. Pulp investigates whether there’s any truth to the rumours, and why the hell you should care about a cheesy manufactured band (that changed the face of pop music forever).

5 become 1

It?s been ten years since Chris Herbert first ran an ad asking “R. U. 18-23 with the ability to sing/dance? R.U. streetwise, outgoing, ambitious, and dedicated?”. He and his father Bob planned to put together the female equivalent of Take That. This wasn?t the Herberts’ first time attempt at a pop group ? they had brought the boy band Bros together in the late 1980s but missed out on signing them.

The girls who answered Chris’s advertisement were a mix of singers, dancers and attention seekers. Five girls were chosen – Melanie Chisholm, Melanie Brown, Geri Halliwell, Victoria Adams, and Michelle Stephenson, and they were given a weekly stipend as well as signing onto the dole, and placed in a house together where they were meant to bond, learn to sing and dance together. Most of the girls got along, swapping eating disorder tips, and according to some tabloids becoming rather special friends, but Michelle was altogether too serious. She was fired and replaced by Emma Bunton.

The Herberts hadn’t learnt their lesson from Bros about contracts, so the girls took their demos and scampered off to the welcoming arms of Simon Fuller and 19 Management instead. After a battle between labels they signed to Virgin for a rumoured ?2 million. Don’t feel too bad for the Herberts though, because they took their payoff from legal action and went on to inflict 5ive and Hear’Say on the world.

Spice Up Your Life,

The girls renamed themselves the ‘The Spice Girls’ and in a move straight out of The Smurfs, the girls adopted the personalities that a teen magazine had assigned to them. Mel C as Sporty Spice only ever wore trainers and tracksuits, Victoria as Posh Spice stopped smiling, Emma as Baby Spice grew pigtails, Scary Spice Mel B got louder, and Ginger Spice Geri’s shoes got taller and her makeup thicker. The resulting caricatures allowed young fans a range of personalities to identify with (everyone’s thought about which Spice Girl they are, right?), while men could chose their favourite fantasy ? a winning combination.

Their first single ‘Wannabe’, was released in July 1996, and it shot to #1 in the UK, as did eight more of their singles. The album Spice sold 23 million copies around the world, driven by the phenomenon of kids pestering their parents to buy the records. Tying in to the new ‘tweenies’ market, as pre-teens are called, by the end of 1996 the Spice Girls were endorsing over 35 products and had eight sponsorship deals – totally over ?5.5 million, including Asda, Sony Playstation (the Spice Girls game is, very amusingly, a dancing variation on ‘Simon Says’), Walkers Crisps and Pepsi each signing them for ?1 million.

Too Much

Of course along with their saturation of airwaves and magazines came the backlash. Some critics carried on as if a prefabricated pop group achieving success was the first sign of the apocalypse, instead of something that had been happening ever since The Monkees had been on TV in the ’60s. It is probably worth pointing out here that along with the swags of Teen Choice & Smash Hits awards it won, Spice was also nominated for the very prestigious Mercury Music Prize in 1997, alongside OK Computer and Roni Size’s New Forms.

Music snobs aside, the Spice Girls could do no wrong. Their second album Spiceworld sold a cool 18 million copies, and their movie of the same name, written by Simon Fuller’s brother Kim with tongue firmly in cheek, had moderate success at the box office, despite receiving a record five Golden Raspberry awards for ‘Worst Film’.

In a case of real life imitating art, just as in the movie they’d fought to free themselves of their manager, the Spice Girls decided that they?d had enough of Simon Fuller and took over management of themselves. As one of the few British bands to truly crack America, they off on a stadium tour. But then Geri announced she?d had enough.

Goodbye

In her biography, If Only, Geri says that she always knew that the Spice Girls would have a short life. Although she?d originally intended to stay until the end of the tour, she skipped out early. The remaining Spice Girls released ‘Goodbye’ ostensibly as a tribute to her, but handily just in time to catch the coveted Christmas #1 for the third year in a row. Everyone then went off to side projects for a while.

The Geri-less Spice Girls released their much delayed third album in 2000, but by then the market had changed a great deal. When the Spice Girls had first started out, the only girl groups around were slick R&B ones like Eternal and En Vogue, the members of whom appeared to be sophisticated but homogenous. The Spice Girls seemed younger, louder and more approachable, wearing high street fashion and cheekily acting up. Their success paved the way for similar bands like B*witched, S Club 7 (put together by Simon Fuller), bands for the TV show Popstars, and even younger female singers like Billie and Britney Spears. But by 2000, pop records had become increasingly layered and overproduced. The sheer glee of Spice sounded tinny in comparison to Destiny’s Child, so the Spice Girls tried to catch up. The result, the bland Forever meant that the joy and enthusiasm that had made the Spice Girls so catchy was missing. While the first single, ‘Holler’ went to #1, the record “only” sold 4 million copies. Although there was no official announcement, it was generally accepted that the Spice Girls were dead.

Say they?ll be there?

Of course, no band who has sold 45 million albums and 30 million singles can ever really be thought of as finished. Rumours of a reunification tour have grabbed headlines ever since Geri left. Given the mixed levels of success that each Spice has had in their solo careers (see sidebar), and the reported ?10 million each Simon Fuller, who has kept himself busy (and rich) with the Pop Idol franchise, has offered for a final tour, the urge to strap on the platform boots must be pretty strong.

It was widely believed that the Spice Girls would reform for the recent Live 8 series of concerts, but according to Bob Geldof, Mel B, now living in L.A, was the only holdout. Meanwhile plenty of other media outlets have quoted her as saying that the Spice Girls will tour in July 2006, just in time for their ten year anniversary and no doubt a Greatest Hits album. Although Mel C has been heard to say that they?re too old now, their ages will offer one advantage ? they?ll be able to play in licensed venues since the main body of their fans will have finally reached the drinking age.

Who Do You Think You Are? – Life Post Spice

Emma:
Emma?s first single ‘What I am’ famously battled for the #1 position (and lost) with Geri?s second, ‘Lift Me Up’, but she got her #1 in 2001 with “What took you so long?”. After being dropped by her record company, she signed with 19 Management, dropped her last name and picked up some TV work. She still hangs out with her mum a lot.
Star rating: 2/5

Mel B:
At their wedding, Mel B?s husband Jimmy Gulzar allegedly sung “I will always love you” to the best man. Their marriage didn?t last long, but at least it gave Mel B a daughter, Phoenix Chi to go along side her one #1 hit with Missy Elliot on ‘I want you back’. She can also be proud that nu metallers Korn’s cover of Cameo?s ‘Word Up’ sounds eerily identical to hers. No wonder she’s trying to make a life for herself acting in L.A now.
Star rating:1/5

Mel C:
Everyone always said Mel C was the best singer in the Spice Girls and was most likely to have a successful solo career. Whether that proved to be the case is fairly subjective. She got #1s with duets with Bryan Adams and Lisa Lopez, and a dance remix, but her second album sold abysmally, and after she was dropped by Virgin she started up her own record label to release her third album. She maintains a fairly low profile when she doesn?t have an album to promote.
Star rating: 3.5/5

Geri:
With four solo #1s under her belt, as well as two best selling autobiographies Geri could be considered the most successful post-Spice Girl. She attracts more column inches chronicling her struggles with eating disorders than for her work as a Goodwill Ambassador for the UN, but at least she?ll never have to worry about anyone coming up with topless pictures of her because the world has seen that all before.
Star rating: 4/5

Victoria:
Victoria is the only Spice Girl who can claim to have her own football chant ? though it’s unlikely that she lists “Posh Spice takes it up the ass” on her CV. She hasn?t had her own #1 hit, but she?s the only one married to David Beckham. She gathers the most attention these days, mostly for her skeletal frame and her bad choice in nannies. Many ears were glad to hear she?s giving up music to pursue a career in fashion instead.
Star rating: 3/5

Joanna McLeod

Please note, this is the FULL text of the story that was cut down and published in the last issue of Pulp

I have dreamt about Bic Runga two nights in a row now. I blame my friend who emails me with tales of woe like “I have a blood blister from playing Foozeball with Bic. I am sore from playing soccer with Shayne”. Not that dreaming about Bic Runga is really that bad, but I was just disappointed when I woke up this morning and realised that I wasn’t actually working on my first solo album.

You know who should go solo? Like, in Antartica or something? The guy in the hat at the Pluto gig who was TALKING THROUGH THE WHOLE GIG. Up the front. Near the stage. In the sad songs. If punching him to knock off his hat and pissing on it wouldn’t have been just as distracting I would have gladly done it. Pluto have played better gigs, but I didn’t say that when Karen and I were retroly having cake at Midnight Esspresso (retro cos we used to do that in the olden days after seeing Garageland or Superette or the 3Ds at the old Bodega) and Milan came in and sat behind us and perked up his ears at what I was saying (mostly about how gleeful I was that they’d played ’8 O’Clock’, and how annoyed at Stupid Talking Guy I was. Then I saw Miss Lucy_Fur walking down the road and I waved but she didn’t see me, so I called her cellie cos it’s very amusing to watch people do the “ooh is that my phone ringing?” look, and then the mad scramble in the bag to find the phone. She and her friend Dawn came back down to the cafe to say hello.

Now, a confession: I am sometimes somewhat lacking in self confidence! No really! Sometimes when I meet them I don’t know if people actually like me, and I feel a little iffy around them. It took me ages to realise that Heather could actually stand me, and then the same thing happened with Jessie (I was like, wow, she must really like eating roti and must dislike being alone) and it just goes on and on. I am a spazz.

Anyways. That was Friday night. I stumbled home drunkenly around 2am and knocked over everything in the house, but didn’t wake Anji up, excellent. I cleaned on Saturday. It takes me like half an hour to vacuum both the couches. No it’s not just Seb-shed, it’s funny rub-off chenille stuff, and hair and tangles. Yum. I hope that once my couches are less new they’ll be less sheddy. Then KateB came over for takeaways and gossip and wine and we watched Mean Girls and then she left for like, a year. With a dagger.

Last night Dave and my parents and I went to a Serisen Wines dinner at Capitol. Holy crap it was amazing! We had Moana bubbles to begin with, then a first course of salmon gravlax with crumbed oysters and a lime olive oil matched with a limey 2004 Riesling. I don’t like salmon, and I’d never eaten oysters before. I figuratively licked my plate clean. I suppose pretty much anything tastes good when it’s deep fried, but the oysters were light and fluffy, not sluggish like I imagined that they’d be, and the salmon was paper thin, and didn’t smell or taste fishy in the way that salmon so often can. Mmmmmmm. The next course was bass and chive ravioli with clam sauce, matched with a chardonnay. I don’t know how clammy the sauce was – it seemed more buttery than anything, but it was really really nice. I don’t think that the accompanying clams were much good, but that is of course coming from the perspective of someone who doesn’t like shellfish. I don’t like cheap chardonnay either, but this stuff was lovely. The courses were pretty small, and spread out well, and the wine glasses were topped up too, which was fantastic. Then we ate duck confit with mushroom and potato pie and muscatel jus, and a Pinot Noir. Oh my god, mouth orgasm! The dessert, really simple grilled pineapple and marscapone with a late harvest Sauvignon was like TRIPLE MOUTH EXPLOSION ORGASM YUM. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. For $85, this was bloody excellent value, and I’m looking forward to going to the Ata Rangi one. Oh yes.

In other news, because I am furious with the temporary editor of Pulp who was in place for one issue, I may very well put up the FULL text (which doesn’t make me look like some kind of retard who doesn’t know that the Spice Girls had a second album before their third album, plus with bonus witty subheadings) of my story tomorrow. Also, I am moving offices to be with the Hott Young Things where I can be better utlized. Two people told me on Friday that I was doing a good job, woo! Of course then I went and fucked up majorly. Nevermind, it’s all half fixed now.

Also, I am in love with the new wallpaper and chandeliers at Indigo, and I may very well marry them, as soon as I get a divorce from the pineapple and marscapone that I also plan on marrying. Oh! And Auckland: I’m coming baby, oh yeah I’m coming real good. Haha. Also I’m visiting Auckland on the 9th and 10th of September I believe, and I intend to have drinks in my suite, assuming I get a suite, or something, and it would be lovely to see you then okay? Choice.

As a follow up to the last entry, about which I received an email that said “I <3 the title of your most recent Hubris post - "Pavlova's Bear." It made me laugh heaps and I am still thinking about how clever you are. ", there were mini passionfruit pavlovas at my work drinks last night, and many canapes, to which I availed myself. That's rull bad England isn't it?

Right now I smell like old lipstick from sorting out my makeup, and I'm shifting uncomfortably because Sebastian or something else has happened to the long phone cord, and so I'm forced to sit on the other couch, and even though it's only half a seat shorter than what is generally viewed as my couch, it still feels wrong.

What’s fun is that I drove Ethel – Anji’s little blue car tonight. I haven’t driven in months, and Ethel’s a manual. She’s out somewhere, I’m procrastinating about tidying my room (my excuse is that I wanted to look up something on the Ezibuy website before I send back some of the things I ordered) and procrastinating about fetching another Gisbourne Gold beer. But at some stage I’m going to have to pee, and you can rest assured that I will be getting up to do that.

So, what have I been up to lately? Pretty much all same old same old. I finished a piece of writing at work that I’d been sitting on for months and months and months. I’d written it originally late, and then when I sent it to my umm mentor I guess you could say, he said lots of it was unnecessary and why did I write it and blah blah blah – all in a very nice and right way, and told me this other thing to write about, but I just was so not motivated to get it done, and weeks and weeks later I finally wrote something, and I thought it was too short but then I decided I didn’t care, so I sent it back to him and he said it was perfect. Haha. Funny. In non-day-job writing, I was asked if I wanted to interview Franz Ferdinand but I had to turn it down cos it would have just been too much of a hassle. But I just banked a $500 cheque, which is always nice.

I’ve had a bunch of horrible dreams lately that won’t be repeated here cos I hope I can forget them sometime soon. On Tuesday night Anji and I were cooking dinner together, and the front of one of the drawers broke off and she dropped it on my toe and I howled and howled and then I shook and bawled and bawled, and she was freaking out at me freaking out. It wasn’t the pain, it was the surprise – I guess it unleashed a flood of tension. My whole body ached right after that (and admittedly, it did split my toe nail). On Thursday after a couple of vodkas I was watching ‘Extreme Home Makeover’ – and yes, I did expect it to make me cry, like it does every single week, but I wasn’t quite prepared for quite how much. The girl whose house they were doing had some kind of mega allergies and cancer or something, so she was all bald and bloated, and reminded me a lot of how Emily looked after she had a brain tumour removed and came back to ASIJ. She died three days after her mother did.

Can we talk about something else right now, like maybe mad consumerism? I’m seriously considering buying a playstation, once Anji has paid off her credit card so I can use it to order from the Game Planet store. I’m going to get Singstar and an Eye Toy if I get one. Anyone have any thoughts and or tips or caveats to share with me?

Today we took back a lameass heater that didn’t heat to the warehouse, and I got my money back and proceeded to buy another non heating heater. Dumb. I also managed to spend another $100 on bathroom accessories (if you have seen the bad design of our bathroom, you will understand why they were necessary) and another zip up hoodie (fuck paying$200 for a Huffer), and Labyrinth, which y’all should come over and watch with me. I must have bought other things as well. Hmmm. Oh yes, casserole dishes and under-bed-storage boxes. And then we spent $162 at the supermarket. Money doesn’t grow on trees, you know. Sure would be great if it did.

I apologise for the blah blah blah of this entry. Maybe I should talk about politics instead. But no. Or the finale of ‘The O.C’? Made me weepy. But I’m almost at the stage where the Grainwaves ads have the potential to make me cry too. Ick. The noise in my head has stepped up to a roar most nights that I try to drown out with Hammer of the Gods. I wish I was a rockstar.