Based on a running disagreement emil.y and I have been having in outloud recently: who is the best Flying Nun band? (Okay, out of these two, at least)
ftr
The Clean = drugs
The Chills = Illia Rump
The Chills = better songs
The Clean = better sounds
Someone recently put the Clean’s “Stars” on a mix-CD for me—excellent. (First couple of times I thought I was listening to Stars, which was confusing because I didn’t like the one CD of theirs that I’d listened to at all.) I’ve got *Submarine Bells* but don’t remember it.
The Clean = better
Kaleidoscope World is great tho.
The Clean, but both are great.
The Clean (sorry em)
I’ve never heard the Clean. Maybe one song.
Off of this list, I will fight you for the Bats.
The Clean
Pink Frost is such a great song, tho
Bats and Clean feel a lot more similar to me. Laurel you never told me if “Getting Older” was played at that Flying Nun night you went to and I demand answers.
I am assuming that’s you?
It is me! And it was! And I said to the people at my table, “This is my friend La Lechera’s favorite song right now!” and they agreed that it was superb.
I don’t know if it’s my favorite song of all SONGS — just my favorite song of theirs and of its type within their types of songs.
Still :D
submarine bells is the best album either of them made, but the clean are probably better overall.
i’m sure i could intellectually enjoy the chills in the same way, but it wouldn’t have that listen to it for a week straight mesmerizing appeal.
I think the only song I know by the Chills is their “Satin Doll”.
If the Clean have written a better song than that, I’d like to hear it
i feel like i kinda missed out on the chills, although i remember their name and submarine bells being played on my local radio station a lot, but for some reason they never caught on with me at the time, presumably because they were not nearly noisy enough.
i will give them a chance now that i have calmed down a little!
“Submarine Bells” is not their best work
The Chills
la lechera—start with kaleidoscope world!
If the Clean have written a better song than that, I’d like to hear it
^godhead
ok i only made it 2 min into that video before i had to pause to say that the chills camp has a point — not only is that a great song, but the video is also SO creepy and beautiful.
i will start, thank you!
also henrietta otm
I like both bands. Can’t I like both bands?
If pressed, I pick The Chills.
yeah Pink Frost totally rules
pink frost is the only song spotify will let me listen to
:) because i know now that it is a good song, but ultimately :(
:(
The Clean, but both are awesome.
Can I use this opportunity to say that David Kilgour’s new one from this year is really really great?
FWIW no other Chills song resonates with me like “Pink Frost.”
I’d never seen that video before posting it, it is gorgeous.
the clean are impressive for their longevity. haven’t heard the new kilgour, but the last two clean albums were good fun.
yeah the David Kilgour album, Left by Soft, is great
oops xp henrietta made me listen to the new david kilgour album and i agree—it is good. i listened to some of the older ones after that, but they weren’t quite as pretty.
dr advance johnson needs to weigh in on this.
Kilgour’s Here Come the Cars is a treat, too. Lots of jangly, strummy pop bits.
Definitely the Chills, as stated upthread. But I do like the Clean! And the Bats. In fact I did a mini NZ/Aus section last time I DJed where all three of them were played.
I always used to put ‘Doledrums’ on before I had to go sign on. Ahh, those were the days.
The Chills have meant more to me, at various times, then the Clean ever did, but right now I definitely listen to the latter a lot more.
I think The Chills were perfect late adolescent music for me.
a video!
saw the Chills play 3x or so (’86–93?) in NYC, that “Pink Frost” video got quite a few alt plays on MTV.
was always trying to get my old band to cover this, but we could never get it together :/
Eurgh, the vids people keep posting as arguments for both bands having the opp effect on me.
looooove
what about this?!
whats wrong with At the Bottom?!
Driving me into the arms of the Verlaines tbh.
xp Except for “Anything Could Happen”, obv!!
whats wrong with At the Bottom?!
seriously
Oh it’s just too aimless for me, that’s all.
also this song has the same things i generally like about the best clean songs
o yeah that Weeds song is killer
I like the Clean but “Part Past Part Fiction” jumps into my head at least once a week.
tbh I think the Verlaines in their prime were way better than either
also this youtube channel has too much awesome kiwipop stuffhttp://www.youtube.com/user/chillblue:
Verlaines all day, every day.
during the first week I was at college I used to sit outside late at night near the closed law library and listen to this song over and over again on my walkman.
I also listen to Verlaines the most. I am quite fond of Tall Dwarfs, as well.
ok well that gives me permission to post this then
check out the crowd when the drums (finally) kick in
voted clean tho
Chills, but not by much.
chills! way ahead of the clean imo. brave words is a solid album.
Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.
3ds tho
Oh, come on. Only FN band that the future will remember:
<3 <3 <3 the Axemen
I love the 3Ds freakouts; their polite songs are ok but kinda forgettable.
once I made a tape of only David Mitchell 3Ds songs (or at least the ones he sang)(+ a couple of denise numbers)(+ some other David Mitchell stuff) and it confirmed my theory that he was the reason the 3Ds were good.
can’t decide; see you in 19 hours
Clean
after listening to most of what i have by both, i’ve changed my mind and prefer the chills, but i think i already voted for the clean.
I don’t think I can vote in this...they seem like such different bands, despite being associated with the same scene. They were both, in their primes, trying for such different things, and I think they both succeeded.
always the diplomat
now put your vote into the hat
This would be a much harder call for me if it was down to their early output, but Kaleidoscope World clinches it for The Chills.
if I had to vote I guess it’d be for the clean, because I can’t see there being a point in my life when I’m going to be listening to the chills a lot again.
Automatic thread bump. This poll’s results are now in.
nice.
Wow that’s p close.
This would be a much harder call for me if it was down to their early output, but Kaleidoscope World clinches it for The Chills.
er.. I meant Submarine Bells.
I think the results are exactly correct btw
dang
the verlaines were robbed
We can agree this is a draw, right?
No. WE WON, GUYS, WE WON.
i forgot to vote for the clean ;_;
so it’s all YOUR fault
my poll votes have been far more decisive than my ballots in our fake democracy.
I still consider this a tie.
I blame myself. I got confused about how many days were in November and gave this poll only one day instead of the two I had originally planned.
Bah, finally got my new system up and running and look what I missed? This is sort of a classic career-breadth vs career high-points, and in my view The Clean wins the former and The Chills win the latter. I would’ve voted Chills regardless.
oh god so close.
new bats record sounds great btw.
haven’t heard any bats apart from daddy’s highway (block of wood!!!)—maybe i should
most underrated flying nun band are the gordons but they’re a totally different kettle of kakapos i guess
iirc gordons begat bailter space & that is certainly a good thing indeed!
Wow y’know all this time I thought Bailter Space was formed by Hamish Kilgour or that he was a prominent member, but reading their wiki it seems he was only in the band for a couple of years and yes the line up for most of the time was in fact the same as the Gordons! (who were fucking awesome, you can still get the CD of their first album pretty cheaply iirc)
TheMoreYouKnow.jpg
Also where is Daddy’s Highway reissue formed?
one band that never seems to get mentioned when NZ bands are discussed are Snapper, started by Peter Gutteridge who was an ex-member of ... The Clean and The Chills!
never seen that first snapper video before, such a neat band!
Snapper is awesome! Bailter Space too!
Different kettle of fish, but I really like Dadamah as well...
someone talk to me about guns in flying nun songs
iirc there are guns in “anything could happen”, “wheatfields”, “pink frost” and probably a bunch of songs i don’t know/don’t remember
don’t point that thing at me
what’s up with the gun imagery?
you’ll only end up like Rimbaud/get shot by Verlaine
God, that’s what he’s saying? Good to know.
i thought about wheatfields the other day because a student gave her final speech about van gogh/wheat fields/absinthe/potassium bromide... ok it was a little confusing, but long story short it made me think about flying nun gun imagery.
why dont you do yourself in?
that’s what i’m saying ^^
is there some nz cultural or political thing i’m missing here?
didn’t snapper have an album called ‘shotgun blossom’ or something?
^yeah, they did/do.
excellent record
has anyone read this? Positively George Street: A Personal History of the Sneaky Feelings and the Dunedin Sound
well surely SOMEONE has, i meant anyone who reads the above post
um also since i am reading the flying nun wiki
tracklist on this sdtk is O_O
WHAT is this MOVIE?!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topless_Women_Talk_About_Their_Lives_%28soundtrack%29
somebody plz give me that sdtrk for my birthday!
xp no I haven’t read that! I should!
how can I get it?
“I Love My Leather Jacket”. But not that much, eh ladies?
i guess this answers my question
Liz has missed an appointment to have an abortion. She has to keep her child, and neither her boyfriend Geoff nor child’s father Neil are too happy about it. She can not decide which partner is better for her, and Neil makes a proposal to her when they attend the wedding of her best friend Prue and Mike. She probably prefers Geoff, but he is preoccupied with his girlfriend Bryony, who returned from abroad. Another friend, Ant, has written a script for documentary film, which is directed by a German and in which topless women, well, talk about their lives.
apparently copies of the soundtrack can be had for less than $10, or it could be assembled — probably without too much trouble too.
_____________________________
back to guns
why are there so many guns?!
movie sounds pretty boring tbh
idk i kinda like slice of life indie when its done well
anyways an undertone of mordant dark humor I think helps offset the chipper cheerful guitar pop that Kiwis specialize in. They are punk rockers after all
slice of life and a cup of ammo
what is there to do in dunedin but watch scorsese movies?
pomplamau5 on fire today
mordant dark humor doesn’t really explain the tons of guns enough for me
check out the prices on this book!!
Woah at prices! Glad I bought it when it came out. So yes, I read it a few years back. Good stuff. Nice personal take on the histories of loads of bands and people whose lives/tours crossed paths.
To this day I don’t think I’ve knowingly heard a Sneaky Feelings song though.
here’s one
That book looks amazing! Too bad it’s so expensive and it doesn’t appear to be in any north american libraries either.
No idea about the gun thing — I’ve never pictured NZ as a place with lots of guns, but, then again, a lot of it is rural....
Do you really think the gun imagery is disproportionate, though?
I mean, have we considered the number of gun songs during roughly the same period elsewhere in the world?
Somebody should do some research and then write a book about it
i nominate nabisco
apparently copies of the soundtrack can be had for less than $10, or it could be assembled — probably without too much trouble too.
I have that CD, is there a Sandbox Leonardo or such like?
goooood question — why don’t you make one
you guys i have to tell you something
i bought a copy of that book for $24 this morning and i have confirmation that it is on its way from dunedin
(willing to loan within the midwest, mrs advance and henriettalinita)
still would like to discuss the gun imagery
I mean, have we considered the number of gun songs during roughly the same period elsewhere in the world?
is there a way to search this? any librarians know the answer to this question?
I think that would be complicated. I mean, I do feel like in a period/scene where the archetypal band is the sex pistols, gun imagery might not be too rare?
I will definitely take you up on the offer to borrow that book at some point!
Only database I can think of with searchable song titles is Spotify. I don’t know if you can combine with searching by year.
Ah ha http://www.spotify.com/us/blog/archives/2008/01/22/searching-spotify/
you can search by song title on allmusic, but I’m not sure how far that’d get you
i mean none of the songs i noticed containing gun imagery have titles that would suggest heavy artillery
except for one, and even that is debatable (point that thing)
Just off the top of my head: That’s when I reach for my revolver, Machine gun (slowdive), uh...
well there’s this
copacabana
hahaha oh geez
maybe this is a red herring, who knows. i just heard like 3 in one day and it seemed unusual.
am I missing the gun reference in pink frost?
isn’t there a gun? i’m not super familiar with that song! you would know better than i would.
I don’t think so...she’s dying but I always thought that song was about gaia and I don’t think you can kill gaia with a gun
also i would not put “the man who shot liberty valance” and “copacabana” within the same musical framework, whereas these flying nun songs are at least somewhat related
like i said, there may be nothing there and i am letting my imagination go (too) nuts
it would not be the first time
anyway i am looking forward to reading this book
fake eyeball, that’s quite a rattle you’ve got. hope you feel better ;)
Book arrived from Dunedin today in the following wrapping: (from the outside in, all taped shut elaborately)
Brown mailing paper covered in stamps
Cardboard sleeve for book about stamps of indigenous people
plastic bag
brown paper
Lots of photos, not long, no idea how anyone would pay $384 for it but w/e. Looking forward to reading this evening!