Publication:
MaximumRockNRoll

Author:
Felix Von Havoc

MRR #214 code 13 tour diary
This month we follow the continuing adventures of Code 13 in the Pacific with the final chapter, New Zealand and Los Angeles. Last month we discussed Australia. If you are flying from the US to Australia definitely look into adding New Zealand to your trip. In our case by flying Malaysian and New Zealand airways we managed to stop in New Zealand for a few days on our way back to the West Coast for only about 50$ each more than it would've cost to fly from Australia. Check out my earlier article in this series where I discuss airfares in some detail. For those of you who are interested, missed an issue etc. all my MRR column are posted on the Havoc Records web site www.havocrex.com in the "and it was written" section.

I'd have to say that our promoter/tour organizer in New Zealand, Ross Gardiner was one of the most on the ball and organized guys I've ever met in years of touring. He had everything planned and organized in advance for us and our whole stay in New Zealand was free from the typical disorganization, hectic scrambles, and "hurry up and wait" that accompanies most punk tours. We got in touch with Ross from the Guys in Your Mother for whom he'd set up a tour a few years back. Surpassingly hardly any touring bands come to New Zealand. Recently only All You Can Eat, Varukers, Spitboy and Your Mother had come from Europe or America. And only a few Australian bands had come over. Despite the lack of touring bands or international attention New Zealand has a good scene and our shows went really well. Especially if you are touring Australia it would be foolish not to play New Zealand too. Quite a few people we met there complained that no foreign bands come and play there.

Personally, I 'd always wanted to visit New Zealand. I had sort of a romantic idea of it as a very progressive, laid-back country, less corrupted by industrial capitalism than other first world countries. In fact I think New Zealand lived up to a lot of my romantic idealizations, but not all. More on that later. One of the most remarkable things was that we actually entered the country legally as a band! This was in fact very easy to arrange. Ross got all the contact info together in New Zealand and I contacted the embassy in Washington. As we have seen before most punk tours are done clandestinely because musicians playing gigs in foreign countries is almost always prohibited without a work visa. These visas are hard to get and usually only apply to big time rock stars and classical musicians. New Zealand however, is very cool about letting smaller bands and independent musicians enter the country to play a few gigs. In fact the New Zealand embassy processed our visas and everything in just a few days. This was one of the very few positive experiences I've ever had with an official organization. However, upon entering New Zealand we were subjected to the most rigorous search for drugs of any country we'd ever visited, including Israel. They even wiped down our wallets, cameras and handles of our baggage with these little napkin things that they then analyzed in a computer for traces of drugs. None of us really use drugs but I was getting pretty nervous, I mean what if a drug user had helped carry some baggage for us and left a residue? Just a cautionary note to those visiting New Zealand, if you do use drugs keep it squeaky clean going through customs. Ross met us at the airport and took us to meet the guys whose gear we'd be playing on then over the house where we stayed in Auckland.

We were only in New Zealand for four days but played five gigs. This was the most efficient use of time on a tour I can remember. Our first gig was in Auckland the day we arrived, an 18 and over gig at a pub, we played an all ages gig in Auckland later. In Wellington we played two sets at the same club, an early all ages show and a later 18 and up gig, followed by an all ages hall show in Hamilton and finally the hall show in Auckland. We left for LA the next morning. New Zealand was much less Americanized than Australia. New Zealand is made up of numerous Islands but the majority of the population lives on the two main islands, simply the North and South Islands. We only played the North Island as time was short and most of the punk scene is on the North Island. Good Clean Fun toured the week after we played, and I heard that the scene on the South Island was better for SE Hardcore. New Zealand has a very small population, only 3.5 million living in a country slightly larger than the UK (which by comparison has close to 60 million). Of these 3.5 million only about 3/4 are Europeans, with the native Maori still making up a healthy 14% and the rest a mostly a mix of Asians and Polynesians. Of all the native peoples of the former British Empire the Maori got about the least raw of a deal from Whitey. That's not saying much, but compared to the social and economic status of native peoples in the USA, Canada, or Australia the Maori are miles ahead. Compared to many other groups they have maintained more of their rights and culture. New Zealand's economy is still primarily resource based. Agriculture, wool, fishing, dairy and timber are the main exports. I'd have to say New Zealand is the most natural resource and agriculture based first world country I can think of. New Zealand English is very proper and only slightly accented. It is not nearly as slangy as Australian English is. People from all over Asia come to learn English in Auckland.

A number of people asked me if it was hard to get on the dole in Minnesota. It's hard to make people understand that unless you have kids or are disabled there really is no dole in America. A lot of the punks were totally surprised that we had regular jobs and trades. Meanwhile, I’m amazed that people can live for years and years without a full time job sapping their energy and do more with their time. You would expect really great bands, gig spaces, zines, labels, radical political groups, etc. Most of the people I know who are active in the scene are working "real jobs" 40-50 hours a week and doing punk activities on the side. If you took the drain of that "real job" away the punk scene in this town would blow up.

Speaking of the punk scene in this town at the Auckland gig I noticed lots of people wearing Misery, State of Fear, Assrash and Destroy patches and shirts. Once again the worldwide influence of Profane Existence zine and the global popularity of Minneapolis punk scene impressed me. Seeing this made my think back to 1987-88 when we honestly thought punk was dying out and wanted to start a new international zine to try and re-direct and tie together the global anarcho punk scene. Instead of just liking up the surviving strongholds of a dying scene Profane Existence helped a growing punk scene expand and reach out to every continent except Antarctica. The fact that a dozen or so dedicated individuals in Minneapolis could have such a global influence still blows my mind. However, as PE columnist Yahoo pointed out, in 1988-89 it was hard to see what direction the anarcho punk scene was going to take. Many felt that it become the "threat" PE hoped. That is to say a serious movement for radical social change. Instead the international DIY scene became a really efficient network of distributing records, patches and T-shirts. Perhaps the significance of the slogans on those patches is lost of many of the wearers. However, isn't the mere existence of a global DIY punk subculture pretty fucking radical in itself? That a network exists to take a band of four normal guys from Minneapolis to play in Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, France, Holland, Belgium, Great Britain, Norway, Sweden, Poland, Czech, Israel, Japan, Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, and New Zealand pretty fucking revolutionary? Think about all the dedicated people in all those countries who are devoting their time and energy to this form of music and what it stands for. Good Clean Fun who I mentioned above played all these countries and more, add South America to the mix. That young people whose governments want to hate each other can find common ground outside of nationalism and corporate "culture" and come together is I think more inherently revolutionary than spray painting slogans or throwing bricks. I don't think its time yet to write off punk as a radical social movement. While punk may have failed to bring about a revolution in the streets it has had a broad affect on a discontented segment of a whole generation. That is something that is hard to measure but may go deeper that we have thought. Anyway, back to punk rock in New Zealand.

The first Auckland gig was with Rolling Red Knuckles and Malevolent. The Auckland kids were very punk looking studded leather, bondage pants, big mohawks etc. it looked like Minneapolis in 92. All the charged hair and leather mini-skirts made me feel old and square in my jeans, T-shirt and crew cut. Auckland is the major city of New Zealand with some one million of the nations 3.5 million people. It is a lively and multi-cultural city that seemed quite livable.

This tour convinced me of the merits of a multi-cultural environment. I vastly prefer a diverse environment like the USA, Australia, or Malaysia to the more Monocultural countries like Japan, the Philippines or Poland. I know people from places where different cultures co-exist have a hard time understanding the deeply rooted nationalist hatred of the Balkans, the Middle East or Northern Ireland. Even the US which has a lot of problems with racism at least has large groups of tolerant people and whole communities with several ethnic groups living in peace every day. All that xenophobia, racism and nationalism is such a load of bullshit. Everyday I look at the newspaper and wonder, when are these fucking people going to get along.

The drive from Auckland to Wellington was spectacularly scenic and made me wish we had a lot more time to explore New Zealand. The long drive and lack of a language barrier gave us a great chance to learn about New Zealand's culture and environment with Ross as tour guide. The large quantity of sheep we passed led to endless sheep shagging jokes that would've made any Scotsman proud. The scene in New Zealand has sort of fallen off the radar internationally as there are very few punk recordings made. Despite a strong scene in the late 70's and early 80's (check out the Hate Your Neighbors comp LP) that was vinyl documented, no one puts out CDs or records today. There hasn't been a pressing plant in New Zealand for over ten years and the Australian plants are unreliable. Unlike the US there aren't lots of places to do small pressings of CDs cheaply. This is one place where the scene is small enough that I think a band could do an entire release just by burning CDs on a home computer. However, as far as I could see most of the bands just played live and didn't bother to record at all. In fact, in a country this small you could probably play live for every punk in the country several times a year.

In Wellington we played two gigs in one night at the same pub. The earlier all ages gig featured an impromptu dance contest where the kids did all 16 dances and were judged for Style and Form. The later drunk show was pretty packed. Promotional wizard Ross had passed out thousands of handbills, put up hundreds of posters and gotten us a write up as "pick of the week" in a local weekly paper. I think a lot of people showed up at this gig just because of the curiosity of a punk band from the USA playing at a local pub. Between the gigs I did and interview and walked around for a while. Walking through downtown made me realize that despite all the work of the people in the punk scene a punk show with 1 or 200 people is still a pretty small event, even in a city of only 300,000. The rest of the world goes on its weekly ritual of getting wasted in bars, watching television and sporting events unaware of the scene that simmers below the surface. Back to the gig, Pedal Faster, Backyard Burial and Fatal Error opened. The drunk show was a little strange, as we rarely seem to play in bars at home and never play 21 and over gigs. The shows in Australia and New Zealand were a throwback to the good old days in the US before the 21 drinking age. Remember 18 and over shows?

The next day there was a long drive to Hamilton which is a mid sized city pretty close to Auckland. I realized here that mid sized cities look the same all over the world. They posses none of the charm of a rural village or the cultural distinction of a major city. Just the same utilitarian layout and endless repetition of chain stores fast food franchises and other services. (Not disrespecting Hamilton in particular, you could say this about most of the Midwest) A town like this isn't geographically or architecturally significant enough to be "someplace" it just becomes "anyplace." I think this is one of the real dangers of global corporate culture, a global homogeneity based around maximum profit. The Hamilton gig was in a very clean youth center. The scene here seemed more influenced by US Hardcore and straight edge. There was a trendy looking boutique here called "havoc" they were closed though. Hard drugs didn't seem to be as big a problem in New Zealand as in other punk scenes, there was a lot of pot smoking but from what I gathered you have to move to Australia to be a serious junkie. There were some pretty serious mayday demos here and the anarchist movement in New Zealand seemed pretty organized compared the USA and Australia.

One of the big differences you notice between drunk shows and all ages shows is how little merch you sell at a drunk show. As I've said before a few records and t-shirts sold each night can mean the difference between a meal and a tank of gas for band or total deprivation. The all ages gigs people usually are there for music and pick up records and such. The drunk gigs people are there more for lifestyle and the loot all goes to the bar. I remember one gig in Switzerland where they didn't charge a cover but charged an extra franc on each drink sold then gave the extra franc from all the drinks to the bands at the end of the night. That was one of the best paying shows we played in Europe!

At most of the gigs we played on this tour the local bands all played for free and gave all their share of the door money to us as we had come from abroad. I thank everyone, everywhere that helped us out in this fashion. I know here in Minneapolis every band I've ever played in did 90% of their gigs for free and gave all the loot to the out of town bands. I really question places that pay out of town bands the same as local bands, I think its your duty in the DIY scene to help out the touring band. I saw Good Clean Fun flyers all over here, and I have to wonder how much better a more accessible band like them will do in this country. As I said before, this scene is eager for outside bands to play.

Seeing Maori walking down the street with traditional facial makes me think crusty facial tatt's are a corny expropriation of indigenous culture about as cool as wearing a Sioux war bonnet on Franklin Avenue.

The Second Auckland gig was in a really nice, clean community center just a few blocks from where we were staying. After being to similar gigs in Europe I wonder why more people in the states don't try to do gigs in community centers. I guess other countries have more of recognition of the fact that young people are part of society and actually are willing to spend money on youth centers and activities. This is in opposition to the USA where no one cares about young people unless they are buying something or doing something that you can put them in jail for. I guess it depends on whether you view youth as a liability or an asset. The opening bands were the Mc Donalds and Toxic Shock Syndrome. The McDonalds were a hilarious "joke band" doing covers of GBH, Disorder and other UK punk favorites. Toxic Shock Syndrome was an all girl punk rock band. These guys were a breath of fresh air as so many "girl bands" in the US play such predictable indie rock post-riot girl stuff. It was cool to see a scene where punk women were involved and on pretty equal footing with men as opposed to splitting off into a somewhat separate riot girl type scene. That said, girls go really crazy when a female fronted band plays. In a music scene dominated so much by men it must be a welcome break. With all the guaranteed attention and enthusiasm it surprises me that more women don't start bands. I mean, you have the almost guaranteed loyalty of half the scene right from the start. Somerset played a more modern melodic HC like Boy Sets Fire or Avail or something like that. Its cool they played because a lot of people from outside the more traditional punk rock scene showed up the see them, and therefore, us.

In the final reckoning we made about 900$ in New Zealand from gigs and merchandise. This was better than I expected. As I said before Ross and his mob were totally organized and our New Zealand tour was a model of efficiency and organization while still enjoyable and fun. We had a blast here and the New Zealand punks were all super friendly and fun to hang out with. If your band is touring Australia it is definitely worth it to play New Zealand as well.

After two months in the Pacific we were more than ready to head back to the USA. After layovers in Samoa and Hawaii we flew into LA. Chris and Alan from Long Beach totally hooked us up and our first stop was Taco Bell for burritos and Mountain Dew, I love this country! Our LA gig was totally packed easily 200 kids packed into the PCH in Wilmington. Kontra Klasse, FYP, The Count and Minnesota's own Callused opened. This gig was a ripper except that so many people were standing on the stage. I know its cool to stand on the stage but this show was out of hand. Trevor's guitar kept getting knocked out of tune and people kept stepping on the pedals turning off the distortion. (Code 13 unplugged?) To make it worse there were these girls leaning on the guitar amp totally blocking the speakers so it had this really muffled sound. Oh well, I guess I have no right to complain about an over enthusiastic crowd. And just because you have a camera doesn't mean you have special privileges over the other 50 people on stage.

The next day it was back to LAX and off to Minnesota. After all that mileage I was glad to be home again, although I left just two weeks later to take DS 13 on their tour of the USA. In the end we made back about 8,500$ of the 11,000$ invested in this tour, which I think is pretty good for a DIY tour going to a lot of out of the way places. But I touched on all this stuff in an earlier column.

Being in a van with the same 4 guys day in and day out for months can be a strain. Especially if you don't hang out much at home. I'd like to say we debated philosophy and discussed literature. However, the constant travel, sleep and sex deprivation leads inevitably to endless locker room humor, sheep shagging jokes and practical jokes. I wonder about what people think who have to ride for a while with a band on tour who they had made out to be some intellectual social commentators only to suffer through hours of bad jokes and farting. I'm lucky to have gone on such an adventure as this tour and its only possible because of the network of dedicated people who really believe in hardcore music. There are those who say hardcore is entering a new golden age as the 21st century dawns. I for one am ready to roll up my sleeves and make that golden age happen.

Publication Date:
January 1, 2000

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