The seventh volume in Frezy’s ongoing series of year by year compilations of New Zealand music.
53 tracks and a thousand stories
Representing 65% of all local 45rpm releases.
Throughout the 60s, New Zealand had always been three to six months behind overseas music and fashion. By 1970 we were virtually on a par with the overseas scene. There was now a wider musical gap as the rock became heavier and the pop became poppier. The teens that had grown up and lived through the sixties were now young adults and were generally looking for something else, there was a lot to pick from as Rock fused itself with everything from Country to Jazz. Meanwhile the next generation, that had grown up in the shadows of their older brothers and sisters hadn’t finished with Pop music just yet while Mum’s and Dad’s were were still lapping up anything that could be sung along to.
The industry was changing fast with hair getting longer, music getting louder and albums now out selling 45s. It was a good year for local albums albeit the four most notable releases Human Instinct’s ‘Burning Up Years’, and ‘Stoned Guitar’ Gray Bartlett’s ‘Fijian Girl’ and The Underdogs ’Wasting Our Time’ were all released as $1.99 budget albums at a time when the retail album price was $4.99, which lead to many people buying because of price and not content, but at least it gave local groups a higher profile and an outlet for their music.
It was a year when many of the top local groups from the previous years split-up as the winds of change enveloped the music scene, including The Chicks, The Dedikation, The Challenge, The Revival, Tom Thumb and The Rebels, while a new crop of Rock groups rose from the ashes including Farmyard, Highway, Rebirth which left one journalist to comment on the new groups as ‘NEW NAMES-SAME FACES’. After several years of being Wellington’s best kept secret, Quincy Conserve finally stepped out from the shadows on the back of one of the best local singles of the year ‘Ride The Rain’ a song written by Bruno Lawrence. Bruno is inextricably linked to the group but he only joined in April and was gone by Christmas.
There had been a drop in new local releases (for various reasons) from the previous years prominent labels, Zodiac, Impact, Viking, and Allied International etc. Several smaller independent labels sprung up throughout the year Ventura, Climax, Odessa and Pink but like Bruno with Quincy Conserve they were also gone by Christmas. HMV was the only label to regularly release local records throughout the year and beyond and were responsible for nearly half of all local Pop and Rock releases during 1970 (36 approx).
Kiwis embraced the overseas revival of fifties Rock n Roll culminating in our very own ‘King Of Rock & Roll”, Johnny Devlin re recording his 1958 smash ‘Lawdy Miss Clawdy’ (inc) while The Dizzy Limit recorded a pulsating version of Little Richards ‘Good Golly Miss Molly’ and the Big-O kept the music alive with ‘Hot Rod’ (inc).
So over all a good year for local music but also the END OF AN ERA!