Bruce Russell, of the great DEAD C and very cool Xpressway label, has curated a compilation that came out on the legendary FLYING NUN RECORDS a number of months back. The comp, TIME TO GO: THE SOUTHERN PSYCHEDELIC MOMENT 1981-1986, is a collection of music born of the cities of Christchurch and Dunedin, on the South Island of New Zealand. It follows in the flood of music from down under, both new and old, that has been receiving wider attention, and deservedly so, in recent times. This is indie pop, post-punk, psych pop, drone rock, psych folk, and sometimes simply weird. Just plain quality underground pop, a particularly regional post-punk era take on psychedelia, and I for one am really thankful to be exposed to all this great music, some of which I knew(THE CLEAN, TALL DWARFS, LOOK BLUE GO PURPLE) but most of which I didn’t. Some of the folks who wound up in the TERMINALS played in a band called SCORCHED EARTH POLICY who have a bad trip of a track here called “Before the Accident” which seems to be recalling the famous tale of Phineas Gage. A queasy violin/guitar, jangle meets riff experiment that ends up awesomely sounding like a punk JEFFERSON AIRPLANE perhaps? Makes my head nearly explode. VICTOR DIMISICH BAND offer up a track called “It’s Cold Outside” one of those pretty sad songs; guitar lead, but with a cheap synth organ(that DESPERATE BICYCLES/YOUNG MARBLE GIANTS sound) trailing in the background, all coming together to make this a very memorable, if not magical song. TALL DWARFS contribute “Clover”, a seemingly British folk inspired track, guitars curling off all over, and as always great vocal harmonies. PLAYTHINGS have one of the more punk songs on this awesome compilation. It’s called “Sit Down”, and it’s a real lugie in the eye of the man, with an amazing ascending chord progression. That one really riles me up. This is one of “those comps”: so many great tracks, extremely well curated, so many jumping off points for lengthy voyages down the musical rabbit hole. A great trip to New Zealand.
-DS
