Back and Forth

The crowd pushes. Ten thousand people surge collectively forwards, heaving like the lungs of one great monster. The air is pungent with beer and cigarettes, and sweat-soaked singlets rub together in one collective bath of perspiration. Excited whispers run like electric currents through the jostling mass- the people are waiting.

Quickly the whispers gather momentum. 

Impatiently a thousand feet stamp. 

In unison, a thousand more. 

Like dominoes they push forward, surge back. Five thousand stamping now. 

No one can move alone, but are carried with this teething tide of bodies. They are stamping louder, chanting now too. Everyone is yelling but individual voices are silent, lost amongst one deafening cry. Eyes fixed on the empty blackness in front, the crowd are calling.

Two words, ten thousand people, one voice, one great crescendo.

Then, just as they room feels like it may explode from sheer energy, out of the empty blackness wafts a thick, grey mist. From somewhere deep in the mist, a single guitar string sounds. A haunting, pulsing, rasping note builds, louder and louder, stronger and stronger. The crowd hush- this is what they have been waiting for.

And so began my first live experience with the Foo Fighters.

Perhaps there is something special and psychologically ingrained about your first real music love. No matter how my music tastes may change, mature, or broaden, I know this band will always, always have a special power over me. 

In Your Honour was the first album I ever bought and listened to for love of the music, not because it was the coolest new thing on the top-40. The Foo Fighters' concert at Wellington TSB arena was my first big, 'proper' concert- which also shortly preceded my first instance of getting absolutely blind drunk and spewing all over my friend's mother's friend's bathroom.

In the subsequent six years I have bought all their albums, gone to another of their concerts, listened to, and fallen in love with a great variety of other music and never again been a drunken disgrace...(cough, cough). 

Tonight, after watching their latest documentary, Back and Forth, though, I remembered how much I fucking love these guys. My admiration for them is unbounded. I can't say how much respect I have for Dave- a man who drummed in Nirvana, played with John Paul Jones, yet recorded his latest album on tape in a garage and interrupts his own recording sessions to take his seven year old daughter swimming.
Plus, he probably has the most amazing tattoos I have ever seen.

Wasting Light- It's all Rock n' Grohl

What do you do after playing at Wembley to 86,000 people?

You make a record in your garage of course. And do a fuckin’ good job of it.

After reaching this absolute pinnacle of rock n’  roll stardom- not to mention a performance with Paul McCartney at the 2009 Grammys and a side project with Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones- you might have been forgiven for thinking that the Foo Fighters had nothing left to give. Yet, out of Dave Grohl’s San Fernando Valley garage comes a refreshing step back to the band at their greatest and truest, and one of their best records yet.

Wasting Light, released in stores on April 12, heralds the fully-fledged return of stalwart guitarist Pat Smear and is overseen by Nevermind producer Butch Vig. Fortunately however, the record is far from Cobain-esque, nineties grunge nostalgia. Rather, as reflected in the Foo’s innovate decision to release the entire eleven tracks free online, Wasting Light seems a relevant, but grown-up product of fifteen years of Foo Fighters history.  From the moment Dave screams “These are my famous last words” in the very first line of the emphatic opener, “Broken Bridge,” the listener is treated to an aural smorgasboard of styles guaranteed to leave you simultaneously trembling and singing along.

From the Probot reminiscent metal riffs and dirty whiskey vocals of “White Limo” to the pure-pop groove of “Dear Rosemary,” the rock giants’ monumental seventh album contains enough variety to never let you quite settle in too comfortably. While Grohl ventures slightly toward lulling country ballad territory with “These Days,” the album’s more melodic moments are interjected with timely gravel gargling choruses for good rock n’ roll measure.

With the knee-tappingly catchy “Back and Forth” and feel-good finale in which Grohl sings of “learning to walk again” the gargantuan rock LP remains satisfyingly cohesive by always feeling fundamentally Foos at heart. Unlike its recent predecessors, Wasting Light is rocky enough to satisfy the die-hard elite of “I’ve liked them since forever” fans, but full of the catchy radio-hooks that may well lure in a new generation of followers.  After all, when a man can play the triangle at a rock concert (as I saw him do at Vector Arena in 2008) and make it look bad-ass, you know he is timeless.

The famous five-piece have, this year, reasserted themselves as the rock n’ roll nobility of our generation.  Somewhat ironically, for an album recorded in a garage, Wasting Light screams quintessential Foo Fighters arena rock. Dave Grohl and his band learnt to fly back in 1999, which is lucky, because in 2011 they’re jumping off a musical cliff with potentially their most audacious album thus far. Yet somehow, it seems more classic Foos than ever.

Daringly deemed by many their best album since The Colour and the Shape, Wasting Light is a must-buy, not just to play in the car, but to put into the stereo and blast the goddamned roof off. 

On repeat.

You can listen to the entire album online- here.


Also, they've released a documentary on the making of this album, titled Back and Forth. I'm not sure when (if) it'll be available in New Zealand but it looks pretty damn Grohltastic. You can check out the trailer here.


Also, kudos to Luke for his superb efforts in helping me edit this.

5.30am for Beethoven...

A sonata with a view-Only in Raglan would a bunch of hippies somehow manage to get a piano up and impossibly steep hill, much to my delight.

 In a uni lifestyle of frantic all-nighters to finish assignments, a constant tirade of compulsory readings, the drudgery of a part-time job, and not to mention countless nights of drunken oblivion, I've neglected those 'extra-curricular activities' that I was once so fond of. 

School for me was a whirlwind of sports trainings, choir practices and a bare minimum of three different meetings which I was supposed to simultaneously attend during any given "break time". Weekends could involve anything from piano performances, to debating competitions, or band practices that would inevitably turn into road-trips to Kai Iwi beach.

 In the months leading up to chamber music competitions our bleary eyed and pajama clad trio could be found trudging our way through the 5.30am frosts to the music wing for 'essential' practices every morning (such were the joys of boarding school). Indeed, between my guitar in the 'shack out the back' and the piano stool, I came to virtually live in the music wing throughout my last year of high-school.

With the exception of the unfathomably early starts, and the sheer dread of turning up to a weekly music lesson to explain that having a life and sometimes sheer lack of ability had got in the way of me perfecting a Beethoven piano sonata yet again, I miss music incredibly. Taxing though they were, all those hours of repeating bars over and over again, with fingers on the verge of RSI, were utterly worth it for the satisfying feeling of a good performance, or simply even the beauty of the music (or at least as beautiful as I could make it).

To play the piano is a wonderful thing; in playing Beethoven, or Mozart, or Bach, or Brahms you are immersing yourself in a piece of history, music that has been performed on the grand pianos of famous concert halls, or on rickety out-of-tune keys in thousands of living rooms; yet every performance is unique- it is not simply an objective regurgitation of the composer's intentions but each note an expression of the player's own ability (or sometimes lack thereof on my behalf), experience, and interpretation.

At uni we are no longer presented with opportunities on a platter, we have to seek them out. While at boarding school we had teachers constantly hampering us to do our piano practice, and had an 'extra-curricular' arsenal of sports facilities and musical instruments on our very doorstep. It takes much more initiative to 'fulfill your potential' in the real world. Or maybe I'm just lazy these days. Either way, my mission for summer is to find a piano and get back in touch with my musical self.

Here are just some of the pieces that had me awake all those mornings...

Beethoven Clarinet Trio in B flat major

It's no Auckland

Today, as I walked along the waterfront, I saw a gorgeous old man dressed entirely in yellow. Carrying a yellow pack ‘n’ save bag, and eating a banana, he struck up a conversation with a passing stranger. When the stranger commented that he was ‘wearing a lot of yellow today,’ the man simply pointed to the cloudless sky, “it’s sunny,” he said, with no need for further explanation.

This man, eccentric though he was, really tugged a heart-string, and, in my opinion, really encapsulated what Wellington is all about. I am fully aware that, in writing this, I am only adding to a plethora of praises song about the world’s southern-most capital. Ask any Wellingtonian their favourite aspect of the windy city, and they are quick to rattle off a long list of positives; its compactness, its music scene, the waterfront, or, on a good day, the sunshine. Indeed, I could write all day about Wellington’s many attributes.

To me, Wellington is like the man dressed all in yellow; quirky, a little bit crazy, and inherently optimistic. From my current vantage point overlooking the lagoon, the view is testament to the incredible diversity of this city. The waterfront is a hive of activity, with a hip-hop dance crew rehearsing outside Macs brewery; a couple snapping artistically away on their SLR; two guys leaping and tumbling over walls as they practice pakour; and a constant stream of people soaking up the spring sunshine with a fervour that only Wellingtonians possess. As people sip champagne on the balcony during a black tie event at the boat club, a pair of stubbie-wearing students laze about drinking Tui directly below.

The sun is shining, but there’s a slight breeze, as though the city doesn’t want you to get quite too comfortable.  And I love that about Wellington. In the words of Patricia Grace that are boldly exposed to the roaring winds and the sea spray, “There’s always an edge here that one must walk which sharp and precarious, requiring vigilance...” Having lived in Wellington for three years now, I am constantly discovering new elements of this beautiful city. There are countless treasure troves of op-shops in Newtown to be discovered, or hidden gems of bars, such as Hooch, hiding behind inconspicuous doors on Courtenay Place. Every stroll down Cuba Street is a new experience, as it is the buskers, the fashions of passers-by, or which way you have to walk to dodge the temperamental bucket fountain that make this city truly unique.  What Raiko Shareef loves about Wellington is that, in just a few minutes radius of the city centre “you can enjoy a top-class gelato, bask in sunshine, and listen to a Japanese man in a vest play “My Heart Will Go On” out of a conch shell.”

Wellington is far from your typical idyllic coastal paradise. For much of the year it rains, and it’s always windy, and to be honest, often quite miserable. Its list of tourist attractions encompasses little more than the Cable Car and Te Papa, while the sand of its most central beach is shipped in from Nelson. Yet, as is never more evident than on a sunny day like today, Wellington’s wild weather, and unpredicatability, endows its inhabitants with an optimistic outlook and sense of pride in their city. Where else would you see people stripping off and leaping into the harbour on an early October day, with temperatures barely pushing 16 degrees?  

Nothing embodies this more than the revitalisation of previously ailing New Zealand football in the form of the Wellington Phoenix. The hope and loyalty of the fans, who themselves often battle the elements inside the ‘yellow stadium’ are largely to credit for the Phoenix’s proverbial rise from the ashes. Lauris Edmond eloquently surmised this spirit in writing; "This is the city of action, the world headquarters of the verb."

One of the things that strikes me most about Wellington is that it is not simply a collection of suburbs, but truly one city. It is small enough that people are not confined to their suburbs, and thus, while there are certainly upper middle-class women who live in Karori and send their daughters to Marsden, there is very little sense of Ponsonby-type ponce, or Parnell pretentiousness. I think it speaks volumes about this city that the world famous Brett McKenzie chooses to live side-by-side with the financially frugal Aro Valley student population.

I am proud to be a Wellingtonian. A good friend told me that what she loves about Wellington is that you can feel like you are walking through a sprawling British estate in the botanical gardens, yet just five hundred metres away the city is thriving with an energetic magnetism. Wellington is not comfortable. It is not perfect. It blows with a wild wind that emboldens you, and on a sunny day Wellingtonians soak up the wonders of life with reckless abandon. Wellington may have the wind, the rain and the Phoenix, but more importantly it has spirit. Perhaps though, the best thing about Wellington, is simply that "it's not Auckland.”

(I realise I am at risk of sounding like a broken record for this city, so I promise that this is my last dig about Wellington for a while!)

Pretty love songs...

A large, Maori man, in stubbies and complete with facial tattoos is not normally the image you would conjure up when you think of love songs. But, in Wellington, anything goes. I encountered this man busking on the waterfront the other day, and I thought he had some very valid things to say. Songs about love and peace may be a little bit cliche, and his message about Tuhoe controversial, but this man, having spent the last twenty years "up the coast" was absolutely genuine. 

The olive branch he had tattooed on his face was striking, and I thought very symbolic, considering we so frequently, and perhaps wrongly, associate facial tattoos with gangs and violence. And after all, if you have the commitment to tattoo the quintessential symbol of peace, right across your face, how can you not be genuinely committed to the cause? 

I sat and watched him for quite some time, but here's just a snippet...