When Conversation is a Hand Grenade...and Laughter At Chaos! The Verlaines' Juvenilia

Long out of circulation but now readily available from the good people at Flying Nun Records, Juvenilia, a compilation of the early recordings of The Verlaines has been a Kiwi favorite of mine for years. Though Graeme Downes has made many recordings over the years, I still like this collection the best. The songs cut a fine balance between romanticism, tortured artiness and youthful energy. Until recently, you would expect to pay a premium to get this disc, even if you were a resident of their native country, New Zealand, much less the rest of the globe. Thankfully, that problem has been rectified, and this album and several others are available directly from the esteemed label, or from Smoke Cds, which is a good cyber outlet for Kiwi rock.

Life on a Knife's edge

One of the catchphrases of Downes' work are the poetic and classical music touches in his work, but I probably would never have noticed them unless some music critic said so. He did study classical music at Otago University after all. I just hear great inventive music here. This band, along with The Chills, and the Clean caught the attention of the Post-Nirvana music biz, when everyone was out seeking the next new music scene. The Verlaines spent time on Homestead and Slash records, but did not move enough product apparently. I managed to pick up the notorious Over The Moon album (back in the day I got an email from Flying Nun-a few must have fell off a truck), which was to be put out by Sony. The album completed, at the 11th hour the label decided to cut their losses and not release the album. They even began shredding the completed product! Seems a little strange, as the album is pretty good, though not their best.

Once I met a music critic at the WFMU record fair in New York who was a huge booster of music from New Zealand. And a Nice guy. Clued me into a hand painted copy of the Jono Lonie-Peter Jefferies "At Swim 2 Birds" that was floating around that day, and told me about Flying Nun finding a box of The Gordon's Second Album lying around. Thank you so much. He said he was at a music convention and was speaking to some people from Slash Records and at that point they simply said New Zealand is dead now. After touting album by The Verlaines and The Chills, they basically were writing the whole country off now. They probably got burned, people probably got canned from their positions. Music is a strange business.

That being said Juvenilia is some of the best New Zealand music of the era, part of the quintessential Dunedin music that is most associated with the Flying Nun label (though not a totally accurate assessment, just as Subpop is viewed as the "grunge" label). Their Hallelujah All The Way Home and Bird Dog (Slow Sad Love Song is like the NZ version of Day in the Life) albums are also pretty excellent. Juvenilia begins with the classic rollicking Death and The Maiden, whose opening lines "You're just too, too obscure for me" became the title of the Verlaines retrospective released on Flying Nun. If you have ever seen the charming low budget living room video from the Flying Nun dvd Very Short Films (not NTSC format), you will remember this one as video with the enormous bunny rabbit in it and the herky jerky waltz interlude.



Pyromaniac is another raucous number, though I'm not sure what shralak is in the lyric sheet. Maybe its supposed to be shellac? The number sounds almost like a jolly paean to arson, but I would guess that it is more of an analogy regarding living life. Downes' music can also be more quietly contemplative, as can be heard in the xylophone and oboe laden dirge Windsong. One of my favorites on this collection is in fact the blissful strummy ballad Joed Out. Downes is one remarkable songwriter.



But this just a very solid 15 song collection. The wonderful song Baud to Tears, is followed by the equally thrilling tune Crisis after Crisis. Angela alternates choppy  verses with a huge hooky chorus. "What am I supposed to do with you, When you get bored, there's no telling what you might do." You Cheat Yourself of Everything That Moves" is another monster of a song, as is the seven minute Clean-like, You Say You.



I actually did get to see Graeme Downes perform a few years ago, in-between the glory days of the 80's and the newest incarnation of the group who have released the well received Pot Boiler and the recent Corporate Moronic. It was just Graeme performing at Maxwell's in Hoboken solo. It wasn't such a good set, more of an afterthought. Apparently he was in New York on business I think, maybe trying to get signed. Unfortunately, he performed along to some pre-recorded music which I don't think worked too well. When he finally just strummed the guitar and sang, the set went much better. I was still glad that I went. I kind of felt like I was helping support a worthy artist.When these guys come from half way around the world to perform, you need to jump at the opportunity, because it may not happen again anytime soon.

In conclusion, this album is one of the essential New Zealand albums and one of my favorite Flying Nun albums of the era. This is cream of the crop stuff in my view. Don't deprive yourself, music fans.