The Eversons - Harlot

Across rock music history there is a rich tradition of people writing songs about messy breakups. Imagine a world without Blondie's "One Way Or Another", Carly Simon's "You're So Vain" or even Alanis Morrisette's "You Oughta Know"? Sometimes, however, these songs can be a little too personal, and it seems that we've crossed the line with the release of The Eversons' digital b-side "Harlot" this week.

Lil' Chief Records unreservedly apologises to the person that the song has been interpreted as being a personal attack on, and to all others who were offended by the lyrical content of said song. Our initial impression of the song was that it was a love song to a sex worker, however we should have realised it's potential to hurt an individual and now recognise that it is both sexist and misogynistic and that we failed to screen it properly.

We understand that our handling of this affair may be seen as unsatisfactory by many, and for that we apologise too. This is new experience for us - in 10 years of business we have never experienced a strong negative response to a release, and within reason do not believe in censoring our artists. We will now certainly be more mindful of the possible impact that our future releases may have, whether they be A-sides or B-sides.

"Harlot" has been removed from Bandcamp at The Eversons' request, and will not be reissued in any other way in the future. (If it was a physical product, it'd now be as rare as one of those "butcher" cover Beatles albums.)

Songwriter Mark Turner issued an initial apology on Wednesday concerning the lyrical content, and the band and Mark have released a further apology today.

The core response to the song can be found here on the The Eversons Facebook page, while further discussion can be found on the Lil' Chief Facebook page and here. We've learnt a lot from these comments over the last few days, and so would encourage anyone that is interested in learning more to have a read or contribute.

On a side note, we have been dismayed at how nasty and threatening some of the comments have become, including threats of physical violence towards some comment makers. The song has clearly sparked an impassioned debate, but we ask that the small number of people using it as an excuse to air personal grievances and make physical threats, even when made in jest, refrain from doing so as this does nothing to help the cause but rather blurs the message.

The Eversons - Terminally Lame Single + Music Video

How exclusive are we!? Four weeks ago we celebrated this single and music video with an awesome release party in Auckland, yet we didn't actually release it. Obviously our intention is not to deprive the rest of the world the opportunity to actually experience this offering so today we are going to release it for free download and unleash the visual assault version as well.

"Terminally Lame" is a re-recording of the song as it appears on debut album Summer Feeling. 

The video was made by Trophy Wife Productions, the team behind the band’s first video for ‘Could It Ever Get Better?’

Sad News

Lil Chief Records has just received the tragic news that Voom founding member, Mac MacCaskill has passed away. He was an integral member of the group for over a decade and contributed to many of their well-known tracks. We are greatly saddened to hear of his passing. Here is his family's obituary from the NZ Herald:

"MACASKILL, Andrew Scott (Mac). Aged 49 yrs, passed away in the company of his darling Leisa on Thursday 13th September 2012 after a short illness. Most treasured son (Scamp) of Trish and Stuart and dearly loved brother of Grant and Helen and Ian and Sandie. Adored Dad of Sophie and Nic and the coolest Uncle Mac to Ella, Callum and Lewis. His loving nature and wonderful free spirit will be greatly missed by us all. A service will be held at 3:00pm Tuesday 18th September at the Purewa All Saints Crematorium Chapel, All Saints Rd, Meadow Bank, Auckland. Our sincere thanks to the Doctors and Nurses at the Mercy Hospice for their compassionate care of Mac and family. Donations please in lieu of flowers to the Mercy Hospice, Ponsonby, Auckland."

Here's a track from Voom's first album, Now I Am Me, with Mac on drums...

 

Princess Chelsea - Overseas Music Video + Single

Princess Chelsea has a new video out for her song 'Overseas'. 

The video is made by Jonathan Bree who made and starred in The Cigarette Duet music video.
Overseas features the vocal talents of James Milne aka Lawrence Arabia - he is somewhat of a New Zealand indie prince and is currently touring in the states and Europe with his wonderful band! His old band The Reduction Agents were one of the first Lil' Chief signings and are still an underground favourite amongst kool New Zealanders, often played at trendy parties or arty cafes.

Overseas has been released as a digital single and comes with the b-side 'Winston Crying On The Bathroom Floor' which features celebrity cat Winston, who is on the cover of Princess Chelsea's album Lil' Golden book and star in the Yulia music video.





For those of you from Auckland - Princess Chelsea is playing her last show for quite a while tonight (Friday 14th September) at The Kings Arms with The Eversons alongside local comedian Joseph Harper.

$10 on the door, starts at 9pm - see you there!

THE EVERSONS - Terminally Lame RELEASE SHOW

To celebrate the release of their brand new single ‘Terminally Lame’,
The Eversons will be joined by a few of their most attractive friends
for a night of playing and partying at Auckland's King's Arms.

‘Terminally Lame’ is taken from The Eversons’ debut LP, Summer
Feeling, which has received high critical praise since it was released
earlier in the year. The Sunday Star Times reckons it, “brings the
warmth,” while and the Dominion Post awarded it four stars, “You can’t
help getting caught up in their summery harmonies”. The album has also
received praise from crazy famous celebrities like Alex Kapranos of
Franz Ferdinand, who “love[s] the lyrics,” and Sam Scott of the
Phoenix Foundation, “Yeah he was really, really intense. He made quite
an impression because he made me a bit scared. But then I went and
checked out their music a bit more and realised, 'No they're really
good'".

The show will also feature fellow Lil Chief artist and internet
meme-queen Princess Chelsea. She’s just returned from a tour of the UK
and Europe, and her video for 'the Cigarette Duet' has garnered over 5
million views on YouTube. Rounding out the bill will be Joseph Harper,
award winning comedian (Best Newcomer at Fringe Festival 2012), and
Pikachunes, who will keep the party going well into the night with his
DJ antics.

Don’t miss out on a good time now. The Eversons have been celebrated
for their live show, with Lawrence Arabia saying he has never seen
them make a mistake. Not even the one.


King’s Arms, Auckland
Friday 14th September
Tickets: $10 on the door

The ‘Terminally Lame’ single will be released in September. The single
is a re-recording of the song as it appears on Summer Feeling, and
will be accompanied by a video created by the team behind the band’s
first video for ‘Could It Ever Get Better?’, Trophy Wife Productions.
'Terminally Lame', and its accompanying B-side, 'Harlot', are
currently receiving exclusive airplay on bNet stations nationwide.

Cool Rainbows - Reality And A Clue

Cool Rainbows have just released a brand new music video and single from their debut album Whale Rocket. The track is "Reality and A Clue" and the video was made by Newfoundland Tack.

The digital single is also available here with an exclusive b-side "Lights"

Lil Chief Alumni Video Director Releases Film

This month sees the launch of the film "How Far is Heaven" by the director, Chris Pryor. We here at Lil Chief wanted to pass on our congratulations to Chris since he was one of the earliest directors to work with some of the bands on Lil Chief Records and was especially helpful in the days when we absolutely zero budget for music videos.
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His first effort was the video for "Bedroom Exotica" by the Tokey Tones. It was a fairly crazy track to choose as a single, but the music was a perfect accompaniment to his super-eight images of the Warkworth rodeo. Warkworth certainly isn't Texas, but this small-town in New Zealand certainly does it's best to get it's cowboy on ... at least, during rodeo season. Amazingly the video was shown on television repeated times and gained the Tokey Tones a reputation for being a band who valued artistic merit over pop stardom...



Chris was also a great help during the creation of the first video for the Ruby Suns, "Sleep In The Garden". Now he shouldn't take the blame for the crazy idea behind the video - it was my own foolish idea to film all of us in the band throwing vegetables at lead singer, Ryan McPhun, while he tried to mime his way through the song. And I think we can firmly blame the little dance routines on James Milne, who was caught up in the bizarreness of the concept and decided we should take it even further. Of course, it was too much for Ryan, who kept breaking into laughter as tomatoes continually hit him in the face. The footage ended up being fairly unusable, so I had the bright idea that we could dump the whole lot on Chris and see what he could come up with. His odd editing choices turned our craziness into something that's actually pretty entertaining to watch.

Things to note - the guitar that Ryan is playing was signed by two members of Bon Jovi. It was later painted black and smashed in half during a show by the Conjurors. And doesn't this song sound great, even after five years have passed since its first release...





Chris's movie is a beautifully shot documentary that looks at a group of nuns that live in small town New Zealand. They continue to live in a traditional fashion, whilst also having to deal with the impositions of the outside world and the wildly varying culture of the largely Maori population that lives nearby. To find out where Chris's film is showing then follow this link.