Shona Laing & The Sparrow Band "Pass The Whisper" 2007

How did you react when the punk explosion hit in 1976-77? “Well it was a bit of a shock, really! I was about to sign a publishing deal and had management, but it was really tough, because no one was the least bit interested. But I suppose it added an edge to my writing. I’d probably been writing pretty schmaltzy stuff up to then, and sort of realised, why not get back into basically complaining about society?”...
...Coming home to New Zealand for a holiday in 1983, Laing found it was difficult to leave: “England had got fairly dark, and the whole nuclear issue was really bothering me at that time. I felt at that point Europe didn’t have a lot longer left, and didn’t really want to die in a nuclear holocaust, and wanted to be at home.”
‘Soviet Snow’ off the new album relates to the fallout from the Chernobyl disaster in April 1986 – the worst in nuclear history.
“I think the Soviets got slagged something awful for that, as if the whole nuclear issue was entirely their responsibility, and it really bothered me. And I’d been reading a lot of Russian literature and listening to a lot of Russian music, and a book about Shostakovich. It was quite a sad book, about the Russians’ attitude to themselves post-Stalin. It just strikes me that they’ve got a hell of a lot to deal with, and that they need a bit more support from the rest of the world.”
The song ‘South’ was the last to be written for the album. It continues the Pacific theme, and much else besides:
“I was concerned about Antarctica, the talk of mining exploration. Western power seems to be moving south, and we’ve got to stop it somehow. It’s a difficult song, about spending time apart from Peter, and the possibility of things happening in music, whether I was going to dive in and try and make it in a big way again.
Like many expatriates overseas, Laing found New Zealand continually entering her work. “Forget about New Zealand!” her manager would say. “But I couldn’t because I was too much a New Zealander. I suppose I had this crazy juvenile attitude that was one of the reasons I stayed away so long: I didn’t want to go home until I’d actually achieved something. It’s like being a refugee.
“It’s ironic that it happened when I was back home. The year I lived in Wellington [after returning] I thought it was all over. It was once an ambition of mine to have a hit record somewhere. It still is, it’s like a point to prove.” - Chris Bourke and AudioCulture

trax:
01 Soviet Snow 02 Shoulda Bin for You 03 Caught 04 Taihoa 05 Waitakere Rain 06 Fact 07 Kennedy 08 My Love Be Still 09 Windmills 10 Duration 11 Comfort Song 12 Happy Song
…served by zigzagwanderer + Gaius…