With all the missing music videos, it’s nice to find a band whose singles are consistently on YouTube. The Mutton Birds third single is noteworthy for several reasons:
1. Throughout the song, there are guitar chord charts along the bottom of the screen so you can play along at home. It’s very satisfying to watch the chord changes correspond with the song.
2. It contains the first instance of a sexy lady in a NZ On Air music video. At one point we see a woman in a yellow swimsuit tied up bed. But because it’s the Mutton Birds, it’s all subversive and she’s kicking the bed apart.
3. Don is wearing a red military jacket with a blue sash, not unlike what Prince William wore at his wedding.
The sexy lady turns out to be the giant friend, called into action to come and keep a small boy company. They play some games, she impresses him with her ball-crushing ability (a squishy toy ball, that is), and generally keeps him company. The video ends with the boy standing alone, outside. Has Don run off with the giant friend?
Best bit: the Alan vs Don game of Paper Scissors Rock (Alan wins).
Director: Fane Flaws
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision
Next… spark it up
From the backwards hair flip, through the mailslot peekaboo, and right up to the kid with the globe (making him a super giant), this one is the best yet by far. Sounds best too, IMHO. So good.
Early ’90s Mutton Birds always appeared terribly grown-up to me when I was a high school student and I went through a certain amount of angst when they moved to London: it seemed to deny my hope that I would be able to find locally a boyfriend in the vein of what Don McGlashan represented: musical, wry, inventive, ginger.
There’s something about liking terribly grown-up bands when you’re young. I first saw the M-Birds when I was 17, at the Founders Theatre in Hamilton, playing support for Crowded House. Don introduced their very first single “Dominion Road”, suggesting that perhaps they should have renamed it Anglesea Street for the Hamilton audience.