Good morning Mr Rock'n'Roll (Headband) (LP 2713 - 2714)

Headband  Happen Out (Vinyl and CD, Harvest Records, 1972) *****  

Headband  Rock Garden (Vinyl and CD, Key Records, 1975) *** 

Genre: NZ music, rock 

Places I remember: M

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Good Morning Mr Rock'n'Roll (Happen Out)

Gear costume: (I Get High) Olena (Rock Garden)

Active compensatory factors: I have great great memories of that first album and it often figures in my top 30 albums of all time. For me, it's the best NZ record ever!

You can read a summary of the band adventures here.

Happen Out has featured before on the blog but not in this countdown. You can read my earlier thoughts here and here.

Having just heard it again, I can attest that it still rocks like a mother trucker with Tommy Adderley at his peak. 

The band regrouped for Rock Garden, but without Ron Craig (guitar) and Billy Kristian (bass). It's a crucial change as the album isn't as inspired as the debut and there are a few dodgy moments - the cover is a mistake, even though Tommy liked it, and a few of the songs contain some dodgy misogynistic moments.

The other crucial missing ingredient was the brilliant producer Peter Dawkins, who was leading the line on Happen Out.

Where do they all belong? A search for Headband singles is a work in progress.

Get it on (T Rex) (LP 311)

Various 20 Solid Gold Hits Vol II (Vinyl - Music For Leisure, 1971) ***

Genre: Compilations, but really it is its own genre in New Zealand

Places I remember: Back in 1971 - I think I got this from Woolworths in Three Kings - it was a store next to the new foodmarket; 2019 copy from Hastings second hand record shop for $15. Finding a cleanish copy has been difficult over the last few months, as it was a party album in 1971 and so was manhandled mercilessly. This is the best copy I've been able to find (so it needs a clean, but is otherwise in very good shape). 

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Imagine - John Lennon




Gear costume: Meet Me On The Corner - Lindisfarne; Theme From "Shaft" - Isaac Hayes; Day After Day - Badfinger; Good Morning Mr Rock n' Roll - Headband. 

Active compensatory factors: This is the album that really kick started and confirmed my love for John Lennon, the solo artist. 

I'd seen him on The Ed Sullivan Show in the mid sixties, I'd gazed at his photo on the cover of Hey Jude in 1970 and I had loved this song and its affect on me beyond any other song I'd heard up to 1971. 

From here it was buying a copy of the Imagine album and then anything else he'd done.

The pleasure of this compilation was that it contained some other brilliant pop songs (see the 'Gear costume' section above), as well as a couple of good kiwi tracks from Headband and Suzanne (but also a Craig Scott song for balance).

Being a hits compilation and being the early seventies it has some bizarre people on it: for every John Lennon there is a Tom Jones, for every Badfinger and T Rex there is a Dawn and for every Isaac Hayes there is an Al Martino.

Where do they all belong? Remarkably, I didn't buy any other 20 Solid Gold Hits packages like this back in the early seventies - this volume came along at the exact right time - before I thought it was really uncool to own it and just as I needed a compilation that had on it all the songs I was listening to on the radio.

Come on in (The Blues Band) (LP 40)

The Blues Band Official Blues Band Bootleg (Vinyl - Arista, 1980) ****

Genre: Blues

Places I remember: Marbecks Records. The EMI rep came in to the shop raving about this, played it to me and Roger and we instantly went, "Oh Yeah, baby!"

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Talk To Me Baby kicks us off and Diddy Wah Diddy finishes us off brilliantly.




Gear costume: Come On In, Flatfoot Sam, Boom Boom (Out Go The Lights).

Active compensatory factors: In 1980, we needed The Blues Band.

Band members had a terrific pedigree that took in Manfred Mann (Paul Jones, former lead vocalist and harmonica player/ Gary Fletcher on bass/ guitarist Tom McGuinness); Howlin Wolf and John Lee Hooker (slide guitarist Dave Kelly). Drummer Hughie Flint (yes, of McGuinness Flint fame) completed the line up. 

They were fun! Their songs were well chosen, they were brilliant musicians and this album had a rough and raw vibe. Hence the bootleg tag.

Given the eighties production blight about to descend on the music world, this was a very great thing.

This was their debut album. For me, it's their best moment! Paul Jones is in great form and Kelly's slide guitar in particular is a thing of beauty. Yes - beauty!

Where do they all belong? I always link this to Nu Zild's great Headband with Tommy Adderley being the Paul Jones figure. That first Headband album is sublime!!

Long as I have you by my side there's a roof above and good walls all around (Billy Joel)

1. The Exponents – Like She Said (1994)/ Nameless Girl (1992)
2. Blerta - Dance All Around The World (1972)/ Joy Joy (1972)
3. Dragon – Young Years (1989)/ Rain (1984)
4. John Hanlon - Higher Trails (1975)/ Wind Songs (1975)
5. Crowded House - Private Universe (1994)/ Weather With You (1991)
6. Split Enz - Six Months In A Leaky Boat  (1982)/ Split Ends - One Two Nine (1973)
7. Max Merritt and The Meteors - Slippin’ Away (1976)/ Let it Slide (1976)
8. Headband - The Laws Must Change (1971)/ Good Morning Mr Rock N Roll (1971)

At number eight in the Wozza countdown of the 10 best Nu Zild bands and their two best songs is the mighty Headband (grooving).

I have Led Zeppelin to thank for introducing me to Headband. When they toured NZ in 1972 Robert Plant and Jimmy Page raved about a local band whose album they loved - Happen Out by Headband.

By 1972 I was a huge Led Zep fan so if they said it was a great album, then I had to have it. At the time I was only vaguely aware of a NZ rock music scene. I'd watched C'Mon and Happen Inn - two local TV shows - but they were largely made up of locals rehashing the hits of the day or singers with strange voices like Mr. Lee Grant or Bunny Walters. Not my cup of tea.

So Happen Out was a major wake up call for me. And the biggest wake up call of all was the lengthy wig out that was Headband's version of the John Mayall song, The Laws Must Change.

The sound is amazing. It still feels like the band have just walked into your living room, picked up their instruments and gone to work. Jimmy Hill, on drums, is in particularly awesome form and Billy Kristian's guitar work is great throughout. Then factor in the grizzled veteran Tommy Adderley on harp and vocals and you have the recipe for greatness.

Good Morning Mr Rock'n'Roll is a great call to arms (similar to Zep's Rock'n'Roll, also from 1971).

I know it's a cliche but they don't make bands like Headband any more, more's the pity.

Headband grooving our special today

29 Headband, ‘The Laws Must Change’; 30 Evermore, 'Light Surrounding me'

New Zealand music of the early seventies was a peculiar beast. In the 1960’s the aftermath of the English invasion meant New Zealand homegrown talent modelled themselves on English equivalents to compete and satisfy the local needs. As we are so far away from the rest of the universe this was vital when English bands weren’t touring. No Tommy Steele? Hello Ray Woolf. Quincy Conserve was our Blood Sweat and Tears, Mr Lee Grant was our P.J. Proby and Dinah Lee was our Sandy Shaw (one of my very first musical memories is her single Do The Blue Beat) and so on.

As the 1960s became the 70s, New Zealand bands became rockier, hairer, grungier and more and while they started to develop a local New Zealand flavour they were still in thrall to overseas influence. Space Waltz play their dues to Bowie and glam, John Hanlon was our Cat Stevens and so on.

One of the first albums that I fell in love with was Headband’s first album. I must confess though, that without the recommendation from the touring Jimmy Page and Robert Plant in 1971, I would not have found Headband so quickly. So as well as Led Zeppelin III, I bought Headband’s Happen Out album from a record shop in Onehunga.

I had no idea, at the time, that Tommy Adderley had already had a career as a singer or that Jimmy Hill (the drummer) and Billy Kristian (guitars) had been in Ray Columbus and The Invaders in the 1960s. The music is unbelievable as each of the musicians is playing at the top of their game, especially on The Laws Must Change - a John Mayall song (Headband were originally called The Bluesbreakers!). My father used this track to test his hi-fi equipment. He'd crank up the volume to 11 and the distorted guitars by Kristian really rocked.

It's one of those rare tracks that still sounds fresh in 2009. Most of the stuff I love from this period lives in the memory more than the now.

Speaking of 2009 - for me, Evermore carry the torch for New Zealand music at the moment. Zed looked like a bright prospect but then they fell apart after their second album. The early promise of the Datsuns has diminished over their last three albums but Evermore continue to innovate. Now into their third album they will go a long way before they better Light Surrounding Me from album number 2. When I heard it during the Olympics (TV One used it as part of a station promo) I was immediately hooked. I'm looking forward to what they do next.