March 9
Day 4: Wellington
Morning
After the very long and busy prior day, we decide to sleep in to fully recharge. After all, tonight is yet another show from one of my favorite bands: The Verlaines. And d only material recorded through 1986. Same venue, same time as last night. And same level of excitement (!!!) from me.xr
Wellington apparently has more restaurants, cafes and bars per capita than New York City, so it’s no wonder there was no shortage of potential places to grab breakfast. We wander over to a cafe on Cuba Street where we both get fish-n-eggs for breakfast: smoked salmon with an artful swirl of scrambled eggs on toast for Mike, and smoked trout with potatoes and poached egg for me.
And not for the first time, I have an encounter where the server is momentarily confused about the need for me to sign my receipt. Because in Australia, every retail establishment uses “chip and PIN”: stick your card in the reader, enter your PIN (as with a debit card), and you’re done. But my card uses the current U.S. standard of “chip and signature.” So it looks like a chip and PIN card, with the shiny metal chip in it. But nope, it’s not the same.
With that sorted, we exit and make a beeline for the cool-looking record store we passed — and resisted entering due to our grumbling tummies — on the way to the restaurant.
Slow Boat Records has a section on display right near the front window labeled “New Zealand” that’s calling my name. So of course we dive in immediately. When you’ve spent as many hours as I have scouring the used vinyl bins of record stores, it’s fun to flip through a bunch of records by bands I’d never even heard of.
Midway through, we notice that the store has a listening station with two turntables, so I go back and grab a few interesting-looking records — mainly releases on indie labels from the 1980s — I’d previously passed. We toss a few more on the pile to finish our browse of that section. But we found no Flying Nun releases. Hmm, curious.
The 7″ singles bins get the same thorough treatment. In fact, unless it’s pretty clear that a record bin holds nothing but dreck — think thrift store cannon fodder like Mantovani, Barbra Streisand and Poco — both Mike and I suffer from he same need to look at every. single. record.
At the listening station, two of the seven contenders pass and join the buy pile: Cement Garden, a kind of jangly new-wave thing, and a shoegazey 7″ by Aspidistra. It’s only when leaving the register with these purchases plus a reissue of the Embarrassment’s first single (weird I hadn’t seen it in the stores back home) and a 7″ by Electric Blood (early band w/Robert Scott of The Bats) that we notice the bin labeled “Flying Nun.” Ahhhh…! Except that, ironically, it’s most filled with classic releases that a) I already own, b) are the reissues anyway, and c) are on a U.S. label (Captured Tracks). So even if I did want a reissue of a record I already owned, I’d be paying import prices. No thanks!
Afternoon
At this point it’s time for a flat white pick-me-up at one of Wellington’s many excellent coffee bars, with some cool murals along the walk. The city has a lot of interesting street art, in fact, which I always love taking pictures of.
The coffee is going to help fuel the next part of the day’s adventures: a trip to the headquarters of Weta Workshop, a special effects and prop company most famous for having created all of the props for the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy. We’ll be taking one of the behind-the-scenes tours they offer to the public, and I expect to see a lot of puppets.
One short cab ride later, and we’re in the outskirts of Wellington at a building that is rather unassuming-looking… aside from the two large, metal weta bugs atop the entryway. Stepping into the building, we arrive into what is basically a gift shop. Want to buy a solid gold replica of that fabled ring? Well, you better find it precious indeed, at around NZ$5k. Or just get a hobbit feet fridge magnet for NZ$10.
Tour group: assemble! No picture-taking inside and no touching unless otherwise instructed. Among things we did get to touch: various kinds of chain mail, silicone arm and nose pieces, and a replica of a gun used in the movie District 9.
It was actually pretty cool to be able to look around and see recognizable props and models in every direction. Fun fact from our tour guide: Viggo Mortensen insisted on riding his horse to the set of the LotR movies every day instead of being flown in by helicopter like everyone else. Method acting, man.
The only other employee in the prop-filled warehouse area we toured through was this poor dude up on a stage, painting a model. Apparently employees take turns being the featured entertainment for the tour while trying to get actual work done. I could only think of how much I would hate that, and the guy seemed a little nonplussed (though polite) when asked to answer a few questions. Hello! Trying to concentrate on painting teeny-tiny details onto exceedingly intricate model here.
Tour over and back to the gift shop where some gifts were bought and we called a cab to take us back into town and to our Airbnb where we could drop our purchases and prepare for the evening.
Evening
We’d already decided where to eat earlier in the day when, on the way to breakfast, I happened to spot a sign down a side street that said “Dumpling House.” A quick scan of the posted menu was all it took for me to say: dumplings, get in mah belleh! (Just wait until dinner time.)
At $2 each, it was hard not to want to order ALL THE DUMPLINGS. But I decided to try 3 kinds: garlic prawn, shiitake mushroom and smoked mussel in squid ink pasta. Mike got the latter two plus a tofu one in spinach pasta. And we split a Vietnamese slaw that was fish sauce-and-peanutty goodness. Best dumpling? Me: smoked mussel. Mike: shiitake mushroom.
And the homemade garlic-ginger-soy dipping sauce was so good, I’d have bought one of the bottles for sale by the register if I felt like transporting something that is both a food and a liquid across foreign country borders and… let’s say no more because I like my travel to be uncomplicated and pat-down-search-free whenever possible.
Food had, it was time to hit a few local secondhand shops, all on or near the Cuba Street retail strip. First, a bookshop where, after doing a $$-to-transport weigh calculation, I narrowly avoid buying a cool-looking book about Public Image Ltd. (I will probably regret this.) Then a vintage store where, for once, I get to ogle all the cool old furniture without having to entertain any ideas about actually buying any of it. And I see a cool, flowered cotton dress much like those filling my closet and lean in to take a look before I recoil at the price tag: NZ$225. Jeez, maybe I need to get insurance on my collection. Or an Etsy store?
The shops are starting to close, even though it’s not yet 6, so we go back to the less-cool-looking record store we’d passed earlier in the day. It’s open for another 30 minutes so we first check out the new local vinyl bin… nothing. Then the local CDs… jackpot! Specifically, a CD copy of my #2 album of 2015, the self-titled debut by Auckland band The Moonlight. And it had been hard to find because apparently they only made 50 (!) copies. I also grab the 2007 album by The Verlaines (tonight’s entertainment!) and a Shifting Sands CD.
It’s getting close to showtime, so walk towards the waterfront, resolving to once more get some liquid refreshment at Cuckoo. Sharing a worn velvet loveseat and two sidecars in the bar’s outdoor seating area, Mike and I agree: Wellington is way cool, and we could easily spend more time here.
Fortified and ready for what I hope will be another amazing show, we head to the venue. This time, my spare tickets end up in the hands of an actual ticket-needing person when I go to hand them to the (again, confused) person at the ticket counter. And we take our seats: the same ones, front row, stage left.
Not surprisingly, our seatmates to my left are the same couple who were there last night for The Chiils, and they recognize us straightaway and strike up a conversation. They are Wellington locals and also big fans of not just Flying Nun bands, but indiepop in general. In fact, upon hearing we’re from Seattle, the gentleman name drops local band Math & Physics Club. Do we know of them? Uh, yeah! This fellow also saw them play live in Olympia, WA a number of years ago. Small fucking world, indeed.
Time for The Verlaines to take the stage and I am again on the edge of my seat. As the band walks out, I see a familiar-looking woman grab the bass. Is that Jane Dodd? Oh hell, I think that is! And Robbie Yeats on drums. It’s the classic 1986 lineup performing all their 1986 and earlier material tonight!
The band kicks off with “Pyromaniac,” a rip-roaring favorite of mine from their very first EP.
The next song is a total surprise.
I’d mentioned to Mike earlier that The Chills didn’t play my favorite song of theirs (“Rain”), and I thought it even less likely to hear my favorite song from The Verlaines, as it’s not that well-known and isn’t on any of their releases proper.
Graeme Downes begins with an introduction indicating this isn’t one that’s been played in a very long time (if at all), but that is was the “Dunedin Double” show, after all… then plays he chugging initial chords of “Crisis After Crisis,” one of the band’s tracks from that double EP comp.
The rest of the set is a dizzy blur of tuneful guitar cacophony, ever-shifting rhythms and delicate beauty, all ebbing and flowing in fits and starts and flourishes as Verlaines songs are wont to do.
I know their early catalog by heart, so my only moment of confusion came when they started to play a song I simply couldn’t ID. What was it!? I started scribbling down lyrics to Google later. But at the end, Graeme said it was one they played live but never recorded. Aha!
The dancing by audience members in the side aisles, as at the Chills show, grew as the show went along. Turns out, Verlaines fans are a raucous bunch, and by midway through the set the dancers had increased in number and spread to directly in front of the stage. Hoots and hollers of encouragement and ever-more-frenetic dancing followed.
But even though my view was now partially obstructed, it was cool. We were all caught up in the same, transitory giddiness, transported to the first time we’d heard those songs.
At the end of the set, I lurked around once more in hopes of snagging a set list. I saw two others catch the stage tech’s attention before I did, handing lists to them before wandering off. I asked to take a picture of one person’s list after seeing someone else make that request, and just then another fan by the stage said Jane’s set list was still on stage, suggesting I ask for that.
With the loudest polite “excuse me?” I could muster, I was indeed able to get the tech’s attention and that last list. Thanks, dude! And thanks to the fellow fan who, wouldn’t you know, also traveled a long way for the show. And he had us beat: he’s from Toronto. At least I was able to help return his kindness by letting him know that The Chills would be in NYC in May, something of which he was totally unaware. See you at NYC Popfest?
Another windy walk back along the waterfront, with echoes of well-loved songs ringing in my head. And time for a few hours of sleep before heading to the airport to fly to our next stop: Melbourne.