Music 101 for Saturday 10 October 2020

 

Waiata Māori Music Awards

The 2020 Waiata Māori Music Awards took place in Hastings last night with performances from Troy Kingi, Amba Holly, Seth Haapu and Valkyrie. Awards were presented actross 17 different categories.

Aotearoa’s favourite supergroup L.A.B took home an impressive four awards – Best Group, Best Songwriter, Best Single, and Best Pop album.

Northland musician Troy Kingi (Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Pikiao) won Best Male Artist, Best Roots Reggae Album, Best Video, and was part of Rob Ruha’s Mōhau collective, which took home the te reo Māori Radio Airplay Award for their song ‘Ka Mānu’.

• WATCH: Ria Hall performs live at The Surgery

Tauranga Moana singer-songwriter Ria Hall took home Best Female Artist for her album Manawa Wera, a powerful response to the global social and political climate that captures the essence and mana of Aotearoa roots reggae.

Click here for full list of winners

12:20 INTERVIEW: Brooke Fraser on ten years of Flags 

This week is the 10 year anniversary of Brooke Fraser’s iconic album Flags. Flags was written and released in 2010, and delivered some of Brooke's most well loved tracks including ‘Something in the Water’ and ‘Betty’. 

To celebrate 10 years of Flags, Brooke came into the studio and chatted with Charlotte Ryan about the success of Flags and what she's been up to the last ten years. 

12:30 808 40th Anniversary 

This year marks the 40th anniversary of the Roland TR-808, a piece of equipment that changed the sound of modern music forever, giving birth to entire genres along the way. Tony Stamp looks at the history of the device, and its impact on New Zealand music.

Even if you’re not sure what a TR-808 is, you’ve definitely heard it. In fact it’s probably in some of your favourite music.

Click here for full playlist, artist bios, videos and more.

1:10 INTERVIEW: CUT OFF YOUR HANDS

After almost 15 years together, multiple tours around the globe and two albums, Kiwi band Cut Offf Your Hands are saying goodbye. As a final farewell to fans, the band release their third and final album HLLH. Their new single ‘Blue Smoke Draft’ is about “the instability of memories and the magic of reconnection both thorough and to music”.

Charlotte Ryan was lucky enough to speak with the band, in what will be one of their very last interviews. 

Cut Off Your Hands played their final ever show at Whammy Bar in Auckland on 9 October and will perform their last Wellington gig at San Fran on 30 October with an eight-piece line-up which allows the full texture of the record to be realised in the live context.

Tickets are on sale now via Ticket Tailor.

1:30 The Sampler with Nick Bollinger

Nick Bollinger reviews dark reflections on modern America from Sufjian Stevens and a celebration of an old-time song-and-dance man from Joachim Cooder. 

Sufjian Stevens 

Sufjian Stevens is an American singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. His debut album, A Sun Came, was released through Asthmatic Kitty, a label Sufjian and his step-father started together. Though his music is mostly known for being acoustic, emotional, and somewhat sad, Sufjian has actually released albums of many varying styles. From electronica to lo-fi folk and even a Christmas album. 

More recently, he was nominated for an Oscar for his musical contribution to coming of age film “Call Me by Your Name’ with his song ‘Mystery of Love’. 

Nick Bollinger reviews Sufjians latest album The Ascension on this segment of The Sampler.

Songs played on this segment of The Sampler:

Sufjian Stevens - Lamentation    

Sufjian Stevens - Landslide        

Sufjian Stevens - Death Star

Sufjian Stevens - Make Me An Offer    

Sufjian Stevens - Video Game    

Sufjian Stevens - Ativan    

Sufjian Stevens - The Ascension    

Sufjian Stevens - America    

Joachim Cooner 

Joachim Cooder is a drummer and keyboardist best known for his collaborations with his father, Ry Cooder. His new album, Over That Road I’m Bound: The Songs of Uncle Dave Macon is Joachims reimaging of the plain-spoken songs of country musician and banjo player Uncle Dave Macon. 

Nick Bollinger reviews the new album on this segment of The Sampler.

Songs payed on this segment of The Sampler:

Joachim Cooder - Molly Married 

Joachim Cooder - Over That Road I’m Bound To Go 

Joachim Cooder - Backwater Blues 

Joachim Cooder - Heartaching Blues 

Joachim Cooder - Oh Lovin’ Babe 

Joachim Cooder - When The Train Comes Along 

Joachim Cooder - All In Down

2:00 LIVE: Sola Rosa 

Auckland producer Sola Rosa, real name Andrew Spraggon has just released his seventh studio album Chasing the Sun. He dropped into RNZ to chat to Charlotte Ryan, and to perform live with his all-star band.

• Click here to find out more about Chasing The Sun and Sola Rosa tour dates

Andrew Spraggon has been releasing music as Sola Rosa for 20 years, starting with his debut EP Entrance To Skyway. Since then he’s released six albums and been nominated for multiple NZ Music Awards.

Band

David Wall - vocals

Bella Kalolo - vocals

Andrew Spraggon - keys / percussion

Peter Leupolu - keys

Dixon Nacey - guitar

Matt Short - bass

Matt Short - drums

3:10  Meet the rising stars of NZ hip-hop

Aotearoa hip hop celebrates its 32nd birthday this month. That's how long ago Upper Hutt Posse released their groundbreaking track 'E Tū', New Zealand's first ever hip hop single.

• RELATED: NZ Hip-Hop Stand Up - Episode 1: Upper Hutt Posse 'E Tū'

We're celebrating by introducing you to five new voices who're doing the genre proud: Ranuimarz, Wax Mustang, CHAII, ABRZY and Gino October.

Click here to check out full artist bios, music videos and more.

Ranuimarz

Ranuimarz hails from the West Auckland suburb of Ranui, one of the city’s most notorious. He started writing poetry and raps when he was 13 as a way of coping with his parents’ break up.

Although he's from a rough background, he's got nothing but hope for the place he grew up in.

Wax Mustang

Dunedin rapper Wax Mustang’s quick rise has seen him play big festivals like Rhythm and Vines, rub shoulders with All Blacks, and clock nearly 200,000 You Tube views. He was booked to perform in Australia too, before Covid got in the way.

The 24-year-old recently signed to Sony, quitting his day job as a carpet salesman to rap full time.

CHAII

CHAII moved to New Zealand from Iran as an 8-year-old and learned to speak English by rapping to Eminem. Her debut single 'Digebasse (Enough)', with lyrics in both English and Farsi, reached one million views in its first week of release.

• RELATED: Chaii chats at Roundhead

Her debut EP Lightswitch, which came out in July, has earned her a Best Producer nod at this year's Aotearoa Music Awards, and tracks from hit have been featured on the FIFA21 soundtrack, a global campaign by fashion brand FENDI, and on the soundtrack of the Charlize Theron film The Old Guard.

ABRZY

Abid Rahman is a 27-year old hip hop artist from Wellington. Originally from Dhaka, Bangladesh he goes by the stage name ABRZY.

By day, Abid works as an accountant at XERO: "Eevery musician in New Zealand has some sort of job," Abid says, "Whether it's hospo or the barbershop, I don’t see myself in any different scope just because I'm an accountant.

At school Abid wasn’t very good at sport, or very academic, but when he found rap, he thought, "This is me!"

Gino October

Gino October has just released his first single on a major label. It’s a big deal for Gino who left Capetown, South Africa when he was 12 years old.

"I don’t think I did very well at fitting in. I went from being somebody that looked like everybody else to being the smallest kid with the biggest backpack and afro at school.

Want more like this? Click here for full outliers episodes

3:30 Songcrush 

This week Tony is joined by RNZ Music contributor Waveney Russ, and RNZ Christchurch studio operator Alex Harmer, to review new tunes by Gorillaz, Harper Finn, Auckland punks Coffin Club, and more.

Songs played on this episode of Songcrush:

Gorillaz ft Elton John & 6LACK - The Pink Phantom                        

Sweet Whirl - Sweetness                                      

Harper Finn - Dance Away These Days               

Machinedrum - Ur2yung                                          

Coffin Club - Going Down                                   

Chris William - Don’t Forget

4:00 The Mixtape: Julia Deans (Fur Patrol)

Julia Deans is one of Aotearoa’s most beloved musicians. The Cantabrian started her career in the early 90s with Celtic band Banshee Reel, then went on to form highly successful rock band Fur Patrol.

Since Fur Patrol, Julia has released two solo albums: Modern Fables (2010) and We Light Fire (2018); she’s collaborated with the likes of Shihad frontman Jon Toogood; she’s starred in Jesus Christ Superstar; and she’s toured, gigged and recorded all over New Zealand and the world. 

• RELATED: Julia Deans announced as music director for the 2020 Silver Scrolls

Julia talks with Charlotte Ryan about life and picks her favourite songs on this episode of The Mixtape:

Check out this brilliant live session we recorded of Julia earlier this year. 

Songs played on this episode of The Mixtape:

Big Thief - Mythological Beauty

Roisin murphy - Narcissus

Anna Meredith - Calion

Gang of Four - Anthrax

Weta - Calling on

Songs played on today's show:

12-1

Cave Circles – Benzo 

John Lennon - Instant Karma 

Leisure - Got  it Bad

Johnny Nash - I Can See Clearly Now

Trio Da Kali -  Garaba Mama

1-2

Stevie Nicks - Show Them the Way

Van Halen - Jump

The Subliminals - The Crystal Chain

2-3

Sola Rosa - Don't Leave Home 

Muroki - Light Me Up 

Ria Hall - Walk

Pacific Heights & Steve Spacek -The Weight Of It

Troy Kingi  - Babylon Grows

3-4

Sheep Dog and Wolf - Glare

Kruder and Dorfmeister - King Size