Singer-songwriter Mel Parsons makes a mixtape of favourites and talks about her roots in the shearing sheds of Westport.
Mel Parsons Photo: Hannah Herchenbach
Mel Parsons, Amelia Dunbar from Sons Of A Bitch, and Horse Truck. Photo: Mel Parsons
Mel Parsons is feeling a little dishevelled, on the morning we record her mixtape. It was her first night sleeping on the 'pimped out' horsetruck she's sharing for the next few weeks with comedy duo Sons Of A Bitch, and her "driver and social liaison officer" father.
It's a big truck, and there has already been a close call with the sides of a bridge near Blenheim on the way up. They got off the ferry in the wee hours of the morning, parked under an overpass in Wellington, where the wind whistled through the float, keeping them awake for the rest of the night. Luckily no one is snoring.
It seems a fitting way to travel for a woman brought up in shearing sheds, stomping down the freshly shorn wool. It's that familiar smell of lanolin mixed with sheep poo that brings back memories every time she performs one of these gigs with Sons Of A Bitch in woolsheds.
Her entrance song for the gigs on this North Island tour is Dire Straits, 'Walk Of Life' - it's a song she associates with her youth, the tape was stuck in the farm truck stereo. It's also the song kicking off this mixtape.
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Music Details
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