nz singles

Rip It Up, Issue 165, 1 April 1991, Page 26

nz singles

DRIBBLING DARTS OF LOVE Shoot EP

(Flying Nun) The debut EP from the three-piece Dribbling Darts of Love: five songs, small but near-perfectly formed, sort of folk music with teeth. Matthew

Bannister on guitar, Alan Gregg on bass and Alice Bulmer on violin. No drums, but with Matthew’s vocals mixed to the fore, the lead Dribbler’s startling lyrical insights work like a fourth instrument.

Here they weave a sparkling mesh of jaunty rhythms and biting insights, over-scored with Alice’s sweet and

lively violin — definitely the icing on the rich and occasionally heavy lyrical cake baked by M. Bannister. Sometimes his clever insights can be a little bit too intrusive, especially when the musical flurry begs you to kick up your heels and dance (a jig?). His songs glimmer with delicate keyboard and rhythm embellishments — a dash of - congo here, a brief guitar riff there — although any album that credits a

tambourine machine is bound to be more about rhythm and roll than rock. Polished and finely crafted, the listener is torn between enjoying the artfully simple melodies or the words. Asin ‘Love and Friendship:Love and friendship, I'm frying to understand/But | am a stranger in a strange land/You have your customs, you take me by the hand/I'm going fo get in trouble if | stay as | am. We look forward to hearing the next installment. DONNA YUZWALK RENDERERS Bigger Than Texas (Flying Nun) This song flickers delicate as a candle flame, a ghost of a country and western song, a mysterious emanation from the outer limits of a genre. Although the Renderers hail from . Christchurch, Maryrose Crook sings with.an authentic American hick glitch in her voice, her words underscored by the merest breath of guitar, elusive as a train whistle dying on the breeze. Eery and exquisite, a visitation from planet Country. STRANGELOVES Turn Your LightsOn . (Flying Nun) ot Something about one of the guitar lines hints at Throw Your Arms Around Me’ only on a much more modest, Dunedin scale. A winsome, touching jingle-jangle guitar riff wrapped

around fetching lyrical imagery Baby’ got a black dress, she wears it every day/ its not a colour that | like but |

never say. References to Galway Bay and whiskey anchor this song firmly in the southern school of pop angst, and it’s no less charming for that. DONNA YUZWALK