Feeling Sentimental

Rip It Up, Issue 113, 1 December 1986, Page 16

Feeling Sentimental

Dunedin Mon Amour

It was bad timing. The absence of the Dunedin’s student population and a clash with the Jean-Paul Sartre Experience playing at Chippendale House meant that Sneaky Feelings didn’t get the numbers through the door that they’d hoped for at their recent Oriental two-nighter. Disappointing for a band who’ve just spent SIO,OOO on a new album, Sentimental Education, and are moving to Auckland in the new year.

“Going to Auckland is no big deal,” says drummer Martin Durrant, “but we’ll be near the studios and so we’ll be able to work there more often.” Southern Comfort The move north is necessary if the band's ability in the studio is to catch and capture their ideas and songs. All four members — David Pine ; (guitar, vocals), Martin Durrant (drums, vocals), Matthew Bannister (guitar, vocals) and John Kelcher •' (bass, vocals) — have .: ' developed as songwriters and need the facilities to enhance their songs. “Our biggest strength is our diversity and all four people work and nobody dominates and everybody’s influence reaches to every instrument,” says Dave Pine. “And we’ve managed to have various influences b without being eclectic — it still sounds like us.” “Most of the bands in New Zealand started because of punk,” says ' - Matthew Bannister. "Although we started in the aftermath we were all interested in music before

that and so it wasn't a motivating force and that reflects in our music.” This move to Auckland and the band’s increasing sophistication, as evidenced from ‘Husband House’ to Sentimental Education, means that they could be leaving some hard-core fans behind. “That’s the crunch,” says Martin Durrant. “We’ll lose our hard-core garage fans, but they’ve never really taken us to their hearts. There’ll always be another group like the Clean which they’ll like more. What we need is a wider audience. We’re in the ludicrous situation that because the words ‘Flying Nun’ appear on our records we haven’t a hope of being played on radio.” Do you want to be played on radio? The answer’s unanimous. “You bet.” Pine: “We’ve never regarded the Flying Nun audience as superior, that’s just the one we’ve had. Our music’s aimed at anyone who wants to listen to it, and every single we released we hoped it would go up the charts. It pisses me off that it doesn’t happen.” Has the band met any resistance from other bands in Dunedin who’ve felt that you’re straying away from the garage ideology? “No, except for one band who’ll remain nameless,” says Pine. “But bands like the Verlaines and the Chills have been interested and genuine in their criticisms.” “Audiences are a step behind,” adds Bannister. “They expect a certain sound when they go to the pub. And when we don’t play open chords with a stomping beat, that’s when we’ve struck the most

resistance.” Durrant takes up the point. “When we started we sounded like a garage band because we couldn’t play very well, but we haven’t any ideological committment to a primitive sound. There’s a lot of sentimentality about pure, primitive garage < . sounds being closer to the real thing.” That sentimentality, coupled with journalistic laziness, have been < ;< responsible for coining and creating the “Dunedin ; Sound” myth: . Pine: “People have gone overboard on Dunedin. It’s not New Orleans and it’s not a musical centre of the world. Two or three good bands happened at once, ' but it’s nothing to lose your head over. But living in Dunedin has made me play harder and a little less effete than I might’ve been. “I’ve got the Clean records at home but they’re certainly not what motivated me to play music, and although I’ve got a lot of time for Chris Knox’s music, I was never a Toy Love fan. None of us were it’s not where our hearts lie. We all have a certain respect for them but we don’t feel kindred to them in a musical sense.” “Because they’re all puritans,” adds Durrant, “and they’re keeping this sort of flame alive.” Primary Education It’s been three years since Send You, the band’s first album, which anticipated (by accident) the whole guitar resurgence of the last few years that used the Byrds as a reference point. “That was a coincidence,” says Durrant. “That music seems timeless to me, and we felt a sort of inspiration

at the time, especially in contrast to what other bands were being influenced by, things like Joy Division and general English droopiness. We’re romantics in a sense; we like rock and roll for its generousness.” Send You was carried by Pine’s songs and Bannister’s guitar. ‘Throwing Stones’ remains as a 6/8 masterstroke, manipulating classic Dylan/Byrds cliches; Durrant’s 'Strangers Again’ was nicely clipped and understated, while Kat Tyrie’s keyboards added class to Pine’s breakneck ‘Won’t Change,’ a compensation for the sluggishness of the previous ‘P.I.T.’ song and an ideal intro to the fine traditional echoes of ‘Everything I Want.’ Energy compensated for experience: “It was the sound of us all playing together and not sticking on much afterwards,” says Bannister. “Whereas on the new album we thought about every song and built them up from a basic backing track. So every song had the sound that suited it, whereas Send You was very continuous.” Pine: "Send You was done very much as live recording, we had no idea how it would turn out. The bulk of the backing tracks were recorded on the first day.” The album had songs that big budgets couldn’t have saved. ‘Waiting for Touchdown,’ ‘Not to Take Sides’ and the over-long ‘P.I.T. Song’ still don’t sound too hot, but ‘Throwing Stones’ forgave a lot. Pine: “I don’t like the lyric and I don’t like that 6/8 thing. Just about every Flying Nun band puts out a 6/8 song. But it came out well on the album.” Why were there so many

David Pine songs? Bannister: “He had more, and he was much more prominent in the band. Dave stopped writing songs for a while and I started and became more confident, and so on the new record I’ve got a bigger percentage. I was prepared to let David go ahead and do Send You, as I was scared as hell in the studio.” ' " ' 4 Compulsory Education Bannister's 'Husband House’ really ushered in a second phase for the band. A good song (a great song live) that required more than the custom-made guitar treatment, it hovered between success and failure on record. Its importance lay in the fact that it was emotionally and instrumentally subtle and ambitious — qualities that are hard for novices to convey in the studio. And the singing? “I’m still developing as a singer,” defends Matthew. “All I can do is my best. I’ve only paid attention to my singing in the last couple of years.” Pine: “I still like that recording a lot. Even counting the new album, it’s still my favourite.” From there it’s a short

step to ‘Better than Before,’ folk-with-a-mission, another Bannister song that should’ve stolen airplay. Yet it was John Kelcher’s slowburning ‘Here’s to the Other Six’ that stole the EP. “I didn’t get what I was after,” confides Kelcher. ‘‘The piano and the sax were the last minute.” Bannister: “But that’s been the only track we’ve recorded where we’ve been completely relaxed. We sat there mixing it in Mike Pearce’s Strawberry Fields Studio in Dunedin and took as long as we wanted, and so we just got it right.” And right means near perfect; Durrant’s piano and percussion are intuitively flawless and Mark Allan’s sax sounds like the song’s next of kin. No higher s praise. And so to Sentimental Education, the end result of the lessons of the last three years. The band’s growing confidence in the studio can be heard through the widespread inclusion of backing harmonies on the album, Don McGlashan’s percussion on David Pine’s ‘Now,’ the piano and horn arrangement on Bannister’s ‘A Letter to You’ and the cello additives on his ‘Backroom,’ the piano and vibes on Martin Durrant’s

‘Coming True,’ and the organ on John Kelcher’s ‘Walk to the Square.’ And as ‘Husband House’ proved, Matthew Bannister is discovering the knack of grafting understated guitar lines onto main ideas as in ‘l’m Not Gonna Let Her Bring Me Down’ and ‘Broken Man.’ In other words ability is catching up with ambition. “What we do now is take production ideas we like and scale them down to our resources and have them work,” says Bannister. “Just little things like percussion that you can do yourself and actually find that they work. We do the best we can within the limits of time and money.” Pine: “And if you had to choose between the two it’s better for the songwriting to drag the playing along.” Dave Pine’s point is reinforced by the fact that on Sentimental Education two previously released songs have been renovated. ‘Backroom,’ from the Dunedin EP, glistens this time, and ‘Amnesia,’ their first single, has a clearer sense of purpose. “ ‘Backroom’ was inherently a good song but we just couldn’t do it, but we caught up with it,” explains Durrant. Bannister: “That was my

first vocal, and it shows. It’s embarrassing. I did one take and I thought ‘Am I finished now?’ And Doug [Hood] said I could do it again.” Pine: “On the new ‘Amnesia’ we’re pleased with the vocal and guitar arrangement. On the original single it’s pathetic, it makes me cringe.” Durrant: “On ‘Amnesia’ we stumbled upon a, noise that was ahead of its time, then. We pre-dated the > . Jesus and Mary Chain.” . Mind you, so did Phil • Spector. ” \ - Like ‘Strangers Again’ on Send You, Martin Durrant’s ‘Coming True’ is a sleeper, a song that makes its point politely and with class. "It comes from Philly ' soul,” says Durrant, “it’s, way beyond me, but after years of listening to this music which I love, the song just came through somehow.” Sneakin’ Suspicions . “You slice your bit out of someone else’s pie. You don’t know what you’re gonna do with it, but it doesn’t mean you’re gonna be less than them” — Dave Pine. “Without records from America there’s no such thing as New Zealand pop music, it would sound like brass bands” — Martin . . Durrant. J . Sneaky Feelings are doing their best to carve out their own particular, peculiar niche in international rock and roll. It sounds all too familiar, but unlike all recent local contenders, Sneaky Feelings’ shambling old world fussiness and almost obsessive sincerity to progress and succeed give them more than a head start. Durrant: “To quote Tom Waits, we’re new, improved and old-fashioned.” Far from perfect, but improving. George Kay