New Zealand music is as good as any music in the world, with such generous helpings of it available right now. There's all sorts of new sounds, and some terrific hip-hop, punk and pop artists that are absolutely nailing it.
It was a different story in the early eighties, where disco still ruled the radio, and the only Kiwi sounds on the wireless were endless Split Enz and the occasional burst of Ray Columbus and 'She's A Mod'. And then, when I saw my first locally made music video, it was the creepiest fucking thing I'd ever seen.
It was the Chills, wandering around some fucked-up and haunted forest, crooning in a Dunedin drone that didn't sound anything like the fucking Bee Gees. And I could not handle it. The rest of my childhood was spent convinced that all New Zealand music was dour, droning and downright depressing, in the kind of irrefutable belief that kids have.
I'm not a kid anymore, and Pink Frost is an absolute fucking banger of a tune, and sounds like a particularly southern alienation that I easily managed to identify with as an adult. And while that weird childhood fear gives the song some real menace, that just adds to the flavour.
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