Spare Room Be our guest…

HLAH, reforming for shows in March

By David Skipwith

After an eight year absence from the stage, New Zealand rock legends Head Like a Hole are about to reform for a quick-fire run of shows this week in Auckland and Wellington. These shows preface their much anticipated spot at the Wellington Vodafone Homegrown music festival on March 14 and give local audiences a chance to further reacquaint themselves with an alternative band of unforgettable substance and style.

Along with Shihad, Head like a Hole — later renamed HLAH — dominated the local rock scene of the 1990s. Their medicine show brand of rock ’n’ roll fused elements of country and other styles with a nakedly wild stage presence and energy that saw them shine as one of the leading lights of the evolving New Zealand rock/alternative scene.

The group belted through four albums over a decade with hits including “Comfortably Shagged”, “Wet Rubber”, “Hootenanny” and “Juicy Lucy” and a range of popular covers and equally shocking videos that displayed their bent sense of humour and confrontational style. The band received much notoriety both here and abroad in Australia and Europe for a stage show as wild as any you’re likely to see, with a combination of nudity, mud or body paint often featuring.

I spoke with frontman Nigel Beazley ahead of this week’s shows to get his thoughts on the band’s reformation, their disharmonious break-up, his take on the modern music scene, and the years in between their time on the stage.

Beazley is as forthright and straight talking as ever when I ask his take on the current state of New Zealand music, surprising me with the revelation that he considers himself “Quite out of touch with a lot of what is going on these days, to be honest.” Not that he sounds bothered at all. “I mean I am aware of the likes of Anika Moa and Op Shop etc. but I’m not really going to any shows and am not too aware of what is really going on out there, of what is underneath.”

I urge him that audiences today seem to prefer their indie or alternative rock a little nicer, prettier and a little more marketable than the raucous appeal of a band like HLAH, of which he is accepting. “Looks like that scenario is worldwide though, not just locally. It’s not so much down to a band’s talent or ability anymore, anyone can write the right music for the right looking person, you know?”

Beazley gains momentum in dissecting the problems of contemporary music, recalling gruffly that “Back in the day to become a well known musician you had to be bloody good at what you did. It’s just so evident that the marketing team is the one factor that makes people famous. Like look at Kelly Clarkson and they can do that with any woman. It’s crazy. So much of the crap music that is around is what we’ve been conditioned to expect and accept. Polished turds baking away in the hot sun!”

There are always exceptions of course Beazley acknowledges, citing the Mint Chicks as a local example of a quality act. “The Mint Chicks are a brilliant band who bring a lot of attack in their performance, which reminds me of when we were together. They are great songwriters and performers. I’ve seen them twice at the San Francisco Bathhouse in Wellington and they weren’t leaping about — every movement was very subtle and didn’t look planned or contrived — very smart and controlled.” Beazley continues laughing: “I was so impressed — and I don’t normally do this — but afterwards I actually went backstage and just said ‘thanks guys that was great’ but they kind of ignored me!”

Well known for their excesses on and off the stage I ask about the time in 2000 when HLAH decided to end their run and the circumstances surrounding the break-up, and if reforming was ever considered a possibility at that point. “No I didn’t really think of that (reforming) at all at the time. I’ve got some great memories of some good gigs and stuff we got up to travelling around the world but at the time I just wanted to get out of this situation that was not healthy and I needed to break out of it.”

Beazley admits that in the years following the break up he was able to see what HLAH had achieved. He realised he missed the thrill of performance and the opportunity to create the music they loved. “It hit me two or three years later. I realised that I wouldn’t get the thrill of playing and engaging with a live audience anymore and I came to miss it. Even though we were not as big as some acts are, the adoration of fans in live shows and connecting with those who really appreciated our band…I took it for granted a lot of the time while we were together. I realised that I wanted it back but had to move on.”

Moving on for Beazley involved taking time to study graphic design, which he now works in together with his partner, while also taking on the responsibilities of caring for his parents and starting a family of his own. “I moved home to my parent’s house to help care for my father who had a neurological disorder (before passing in 2006 from cancer) and I lived on afterwards with my mum who was also suffering with Parkinson’s disease”.

This bad spell was countered in the same year of his dad’s passing with the arrival of his two children, twins Jet and Ivy, who Beazley proudly reports were born on the sixth of the sixth, 2006, “bang on the date I was hoping for!”. “Making it even funnier,” he recalls, “on the day of their birth I was jumping out of the car at the hospital about to rush and get into my scrubs for their arrival when I bumped the car radio and it changed to another rock station that was just starting into Iron Maiden’s ‘Number of the Beast”!”

Beazley speaks of how much the group is looking forward to the forthcoming shows and reconnecting with their fans. He also hints at the possibility of a release in the near future. “We are all feeling excited and ready to go again and the songs are sounding fresh to us. Nigel Regan and Andrew Durno have been listening to a lot of the old demo songs that we used to do, which sound really great and really true to how we originally wrote the songs. It’s possible we might collect some of those along with some DVD footage and the music videos, and put a package together.”

Head Like A Hole takes the stage this at the Montecristo Room in Auckland this Thursday and Friday 5 & 6 March (Friday has sold out!) before playing Wellington on Friday 13 March. The Napier show originally scheduled for Thursday has been postponed until further notice. Catch them while you can!

Video: HLAH — “Comfortably Shagged”