The Mutton Birds

Blimey, another gig? Yes, that’s right, and on consecutive nights too! Burning the candle at both ends for an old fart like me. I haven’t got round to writing about it because of the day job.

From international megastars to a band barely known in their own country. From Wellington’s largest gig space to one of its more intimate. From the sublime to the ridiculous.

The Mutton Birds were formed in the early nineties, and produced the sort of good songwriting and jangly guitars associated with other bands like REM and Crowded House. Maybe there just isn’t enough room for that many bands out there for people to like. They never really took off, having a few hits in New Zealand but hardly heard of outside. They made four “proper” albums, as well as a number of compilation and live releases. I have two of them. They broke up in the early noughties, but reformed in 2012 for a wineries tour of New Zealand, and have come back together on other occasions since then.

And this is one of those occasions. As soon as they came up on my regular gig emails, I snapped up tickets, as they’re likely to sell out really quickly. The San Fran only hold five hundred people – a far cry from the 34,000 who turned up for the Queen gig.

Due to the traffic problem, and the fact that the first band wouldn’t be on stage until 8:30, we decided to go in later and park in Marion Street. We walked up Cuba Street to Heaven Pizza for dinner, designed our own pizzas, washed them down with beer and orange juice (not mixed together!) then walked back to San Fran, which had only just opened.

The first band on were called Teeth. They played a short set of six songs. After the first song, the singer announced “We’re Teeth. This is David’s fault”. Naturally, I was expecting to hear a song called “David’s Fault”, but I couldn’t make that out from the lyrics.

After a short interval, The Mutton Birds took to the stage. With the same guitarist as in Teeth. He’s a chap called David Long, and Teeth is his new band, apparently. The lightbulb went on over my head! They played through their set of jangly guitar music. I sang along to the ones I knew, which was quite a few. Don McGlashan occasionally got out his trademark instrument, the euphonium, for a couple of tracks. Only in New Zealand! They also played a song new to me but clearly well-loved by this crowd, I Wish I Was In Wellington, which, unsurprisingly, celebrates all the great things about living in Welly!

Don McGlashan with euphonium. What, you thought I was kidding?

They finished up, played a rousing encore, and then we headed for home.