Part 10: Wellington…Bulls…New Plymouth (well Inglewood…)!
As I’ve said, I like Wellington. I spent a coupla months living on couches and getting drunk with old mates of mine from AK that were living there as well as The Droogs, Aros and assorted critters. The other Wellington skins gave me the old “who the fuck are you?!” line a few times until they sussed out that I was alright (cheesy initiation bullshit).
I was on the piss with a skin mate, JB, one day on Cuba street when we decided to go to the pub. Drunkenly staggering down the street, JB, pointed out two Black Power females coming towards us. “Watch yourself man, BP….” We lurched to an upright position attempting to show a bit of staunchness as we walked past them. Suddenly, one of them punched me! “Don’t you recognise your own sister! Bro!!!” Oooooooppssss… LOL….”Sorry sis ” Apparently, she’d been in Wellington for awhile trying to meet some punks who might know me. But every time they pulled up to some, the punks would bail…I’d heard a few stories from my mates about being chased by BP. Hahahahaha…sorry people….I did hit her up for a loan and turned down her offer of a sawnoff… “nah Sis, boots and fists will do me”.
One day I ran into the skin girl I’d helped out. She just turned up at a place I was crashing on the floor at and walked in. “Hey! you’re that guy!”…”he’s that guy that helped me that night!”…Yayyy! Turned out they were mates of my mates from AK. We hung out in the same group for awhile and that’s when I met Lynn and Poodle. Poodle just turned up one day and asked if I wanted to go for a cruise out the Hutt with some other guy I didn’t know. The car fucked out on the M-way and we crashed the night in it….I remember thinking at the time…”Hmmmm, I’m in a fucked car with two guys I don’t know…..” The Skingirl, Kirsty, had an American flag they were gonna burn but using the fact I’d saved her ass, I demanded the flag as a reward…”Okay then, since you like that American crap you can have it”…I still have it..It’s WW2 (pre Alsaka/ Hawaii). I tell people my Grandad wiped out a nest of American soldiers to get it….but wasn’t he on the same side I hear you cry?!) Lynn is/ was and will always be cool..I’m glad I saw her at Punkfest.
I went to Bulls to visit some mates from Chch. We’d hang at the pub or go get drunk at parties and the rugger heads would hassle me about my haircut to impress their tarts. “D’oh! nearly spiked me in the eye!”…”get a haircut!”…nothing truly original. By now I was listening to Black Flag, Circle Jerks, Overkill, Husker Du, Day Glo Abortions as well as heaps of Brit-punk. It was a progression. I still loved the old stuff I listened to but the American HC stuff had more of an edge to it and was faster. My mohawk was reaching epic proportions and I mostly dressed in tartan bondage, black.
I was, however, on my way to NP. My old crew from the Big House were living there and they’d told me to come up. Shane had secured my stuff in CHCH so I was a free spirit. I guess it was late ‘86 maybe ‘87 and so with nothing better to do, I got a ride up to Inglewood.
Inglewood, is a blink-and-miss-it town. Its only claim to fame was the highest murder rate per capita in NZ back then (supposedly). Slug, Sid and assorted others had set up a house on Dudley Rd. They had a half-pipe (tho by now I’d given up falling off skateboards), a couple of Vespas and the animosity of the locals. Bron and I had been to NP once before to visit Brett (Singer for Dioxin OD and soon to be singer for the TOXIC AVENGERS!). We’d seen the early incarnation of Sticky Filth with Colin Long (pre-Snowden) while we’d visited. I built a loft in the lounge (it was a step thing…you start off in the lounge and if you were lucky someone moved out and you got a room…I was in the lounge for months) and set about making my mark.
I decided to organise a keg party so with the crew’s help I printed up tickets (10 bux) and sussed out some kegs from the local (which would let us buy kegs but wouldn’t let us in to drink…They didn’t like ‘individuals’. Quite a few people showed up at the first one so I started making them a weekly event. They went off! Soon all and sundry were making there way out to SRH House (Steakie Road Hogs…Oink Fucking Oink!!!! yes, that was our war cry…and my tattoo).
We’d cruise into NP on dole day for gigs (Sticky Filth, Casualty mainly. I had the hell night at a hall gig with Bygone Era, Casualty, Sticky Filth, The Warners where I showed my dominance on the dance floor by wiping out Slug with a leg sweep avoiding his crude attempt at a body slam!) and parties and IMA HITT record store. I met a girl and we went out for a while (Craig knows her..LOL…I give him shit about it…’Hey do you know I used to go out with her when you were 4?’). NP then had a reasonable scene going but better things were to come. Casualty would come out to jam at our place and I started doing my crap zine ‘BLIND ATTACK’ (using the name Kurtis had come up with. I’d have competitions every issue!
The mushrooms were great…We’d go out hunting for them, the first time we scored a bread bag full and showed a local punker….he tipped the lot out and gave us the handful that were actual magic mushies…ooops…thank fuck for that…
Casualty had a sXe guy who hung out with them, Greg Serious, he was the first actual edger I recall…I damned nice guy…for a straightie…but he did have access to really good American HC…Minor Threat, Youth Brigade, Agnostic Front, Corrosion of Conformity. We were listening to a lot of Suicidals as well (I met them years later…Mike Muirs a cock…)