Photo: Heard and Seen
The NZ documentary series Still Here told stories about Pasifika people living in central Auckland, focusing on music, tatau, and the history of suburbs like Grey Lynn and Herne Bay.
Season 2 is now available to watch at renews.co.nz, with episodes on the Richmond Rovers rugby club, Karangahape Road’s Samoa House, and Grey Lynn’s last kava club.
The music to the show has been released as an album, and, taken on its own, is a deeply rewarding listen.
The duo behind the soundtrack to Still Here Season 2 call themselves Hanisi Garue, meaning "loving care & work" in Rotuman.
David Feauai-Afaese fronts the band LEAO, and Navakatoa Tekela-Pule co-founded Noa Records, an outlet for indigenous musicians. He also plays with Erny Belle, HINA, Romi Wrights and more.
The pair recorded these tracks in Tekela-Pule’s family home in Grey Lynn, and the sense and warmth and familiarity seeps into the music. They call themselves 'Moana-fi', or 'mo-fi' for short, an allusion to lo-fi or low fidelity. The location recording does sometimes add the feeling of music being piped in from an earlier generation.
The songs are often breezy, but these are serious musicians. The bio on their publishing site mentions Feauai-Afaese’s “deep studies of the Pacific”, and “emphasis on Pacific muso-historical references”. Tekela-Pule brings a knowledge of audio engineering and sound design, and anyone who’s explored Noa Records’ output will have some understanding of his artistic nous.
Being a documentary soundtrack, they’re often called on to add drama and tension.
There’s a rhythmic pulse to that one, part of the 'Richmond Rovers' section, achieved through log drumming, and a deep bass kick.
During the 'Saving Samoa House' section, the mood gets icier and more digital, adding synths and emotive, swelling drones.
The music on Still Here Season 2 runs over a whopping 28 tracks, and covers a lot of ground, not just in terms of mood, but instruments being played. Aside from some Hawaiian guitar on one track, everything else was performed by Hanisi Garue, not to mention engineered and mixed by Tekela-Pule.
It’s often comforting and nostalgic, sometimes unsettling and dramatic, and always delivered with the “loving care and work” they take their name from. The album stands alongside the series as a document of, and testament to, Tamaki Makaurau’s inner-city Pasifika community.
