VIDEO
More video
BLOG - full RSS feed
March 2
We're touring New Zealand this week. Go here for the dates
February 25
February 9
PRE-ORDER MINT CHICKS usb EP 'BAD BUZZ'HERE.
Taking pre-orders for the new EP right now over at musichype. Extremely limited numbers. Order now because they might sell out before release day.
February 3
The first musichype competition is going up today! It will be the cover/remix Crazy? Yes! Dumb? No! comp. You'll be able to get your hands on the stems, lyrics, chords, bass and guitar tabs and there will be a garageband tutorial for the noobs as well. It'll all be happening at musichype.com.
Coming up this month will be two more competitions as well: a competition to make the new official Mint Chicks video and a competition to design the new Mint Chicks t-shirt. Our tour is coming up this month too. Dates will be up soon! R
January 20
We've been working with a new website called musichype and we have some news coming up about a new release and also some competitions and New Zealand tour in February. We've got stems for Crazy? Yes! Dumb? No! which you'll be able to get your hands on pretty soon and we'll be giving you the chance to make the new official Mint Chicks video. Musichype is in beta right now so you can go [HERE] and see how you can be rewarded for stuff you're already doing. R
January 19
Hi, we played a show at the Devonport bunker on Thursday with Bandicoot, Nevernudes and Rifles and it was really great. Thanks for everyone who came. It was supposed to be a 'secret' show but there were hundreds of people there! Our good friend Simon Kay got some cool photos [HERE] and Nevernudes posted some video from the show [HERE]. The best part was that the cops showed up but didn't shut down the show. Thanks Fuzz. Ruban
January 10
Hello! Hard at work finishing a new EP which will be out soon. Played a new song called 'Bad Buzz' on the rock n roll wire on bfm yesterday. Secret Mint Chicks show this week. here's a cryptic clue: Always clothed. Always armed.R
December 2
I was told by a few different people that I should pick up a copy of the new Real Groove magazine because it was the end of decade issue and we'd been included. Was pretty blown away to see they'd made the following calls:
*Fuck the Golden Youth (single) - no. 16, NZ singles of the decade
*Opium of the People - no. 4, NZ singles of the decade
*Crazy? Yes! Dumb? No!(single) - no. 1, NZ singles of the decade
*Walking Off a Cliff Again (video) - no. 4, NZ music videos of the decade (dir: Sam Peacocke)
*Crazy? Yes! Dumb? No! - no. 30, top 100 singles of the decade
*Crazy? Yes! Dumb? No! - no. 1, album cover
*Crazy? Yes! Dumb? No! - no. 4, top 100 albums of the decade
*Fuck the Golden Youth (album) - no. 16, top 50 NZ albums of the decade
*Screens (album) - no. 3, top 50 NZ albums of the decade
*Crazy? Yes! Dumb? No! (album) - no. 1, top 50 NZ albums of the decade
To be judged so generously by a magazine I respect actually means something. It feels as though we haven't really come up for air in this decade and to be recognised as relevent by a panel of peers feels cool. Thanks for your support in the 00's Real Groove. Ruban
November 12
On Thursday morning 11th of June 2009 Chris Knox suffered a life altering stroke at his home in Grey Lynn, Auckland. 'Stroke' is a celebration of Chris and his music - it's a bunch of his friends and fans playing his songs.
The artists and musicians involved have donated their time and talent so that all proceeds can go towards assisting Chris with his recovery. The Mint Chicks have contributed a new version of the Tall Dwarfs' Crush and are joined by the Verlaines, the Bats, David Kilgour, the Chills, Shayne Carter, Don McGlashan, Yo La Tengo, Will Oldham, Jordan Luck, the Mountain Goats, the Finn family, Lou Barlow, Lambchop, Jay Reatard, Stephin Merritt and many more.
We ask that you buy this rather than download it because Chris and his family will recieve the money from this compilation. It's money well spent! Click here to see the tracklisting and listen to the one-minute samples available at chrisknox.co.nz and there is a link to buy the album too. Thanks! Ruban.
October 11
DOWNLOAD "SHE'S A MOD"
The Mint Chicks have recorded the legendary 1964 New Zealand and Australian number one hit 'She's a Mod' in honour of Ray and the Invaders and the legacy award they recieved on Thursday night at the New Zealand Music Awards. The Mint Chicks version of this song is available HERE with all proceeds going to the Raukatauri Music Therapy Trust, which is the official charity of the New Zealand Music Awards.
October 9
Last night we played the Ray and the Invaders 1964 australasian hit 'She's a Mod' live at the New Zealand Music Awards to honour the Invaders as part of the Legacy Award they recieved. We still haven't seen the video that everyone saw live on tv last night but a vid is being edited today with footage from the performance as well as some footage of us preparing for the performance yesterday. We'll post it as soon as it becomes available, which will probably be early next week. We'll also be posting a link for the single very soon. R
September 22
Screens is now available in the US on itunes!
In other news, we're heading back to New Zealand for the NZ Music Awards where we'll be performing and are nominated for four awards. We'll also be playing some shows in October. The dates will be up soon!
Buddyhead.com is back! We're super happy because music blogs have been humourless for years. They interviewed me recently and the questions were good. R
September 14
I asked Everett True if I could commission a "tweet" (hate that word) explaining to me how my generation managed to destroy art (originally I joked about commissioning a novel). I was joking but to be honest I really want to know what's going on and often I'm optimistic enough to think that if someone's not part of the problem, maybe they could be part of the solution! Anyway he sent back the following twitter entry:
everetttrue @the_mint_chicks START everyone thinks the internet increased choice. It didn't. It just reaffirmed cultural xenophobia. So art died. THE END
Damn. Anyway, I owe him 15 bucks. R
September 9
If you have a Mac you can go down this little rabbit hole.
September 2 - Awards
Last night the New Zealand technical awards were announced (Best producer, engineer, and album cover) and I won best album cover! Sweet. Also nominees for the awards proper were also announced and Mint Chicks have been nominated for Best Album, Best Group, Best Rock Group and Sam Peacocke has been nominated for his video for 'I Can't Stop Being Foolish.We'll be back in October for the awards and we're working on a New Zealand tour and will announce the dates as soon as we have them locked in. R
August 24
I'm (Ruban) contributing a video installation to this group show in Auckland. Go along and check it out! In other news, R.I.P. Kashin and also, possibly the most glowing review we've ever recieved. R
view the poster for Insight Garage Artists
August 19
view poster for Doug Fir show August 28
I'm going to do another bunch of songs on the new band page so if you're in a band you can still send me stuff to themintchicks@gmail.com. It's not too late. It went really well and the bands/artists seem to be thankful so why not keep doing it? Have been super busy with animating the new video for 'Don't Sell Your Brain Out, Baby' and also animating for an art show in New Zealand. Also working on a Liam Finn remix and a secret project for the NZ music awards and also the artwork for the New Zealand bands @CMJ this year. Also my friend Matt Reekie wants me to do the cover for the next issue of his excellent magazine Unbelievably Bad. Matt wouldn't like me to call it excellent, he would prefer that I call it Australia's shittiest music mag. Anyway, keep an eye out for all of this stuff because it's coming pretty soon.R
August 14 - 3:17am
Came back from our show at Backspace and discovered that my little page of music from New Zealand has gone nuts with traffic and continues to rack up viewers even as I write this. It's been mentioned on the radio today and on the Real Groove blog. All within hours of going up. It's really cool when the people who love interesting music (admittedly the usual suspects) mobilise to keep the kiwi scene (which is notorious for overlooking many of it's brightest lights) coated with fresh blood. I'm not trying to hype the artists included, just trying to put them on a more visible platform since there is so much over-produced formulaic garbage constantly assaulting everybody from all sides. I think I'll try to keep it going as I have plenty more interesting stuff I've been sent and still keenly await your own obscure bedroom recordings. As always: no promises! R
August 13
Remember how I said I was going to do a new part of the site with young/ new/ unsigned bands or whatever? Well I've finished the first instalment. I don't know how this thing will roll out in the future but for the first lot of bands I wanted to show you some stuff I like from New Zealand. Most of it is by really young people (the youngest being Eddie from State of the Sleepy who is 12) and I have been listening to this stuff a lot. I decided to make it pretty minimal because nobody really needs to hear me dancing about architecture. I guess I'm just doing this because I genuinely like this music better than most music out there and it's made by a bunch of kids at home. There are a few things I wanted to include but haven't so far but that's what the future's for. OK, here's the page. Have fun. P.S. we're playing an all-ages show tonight at Backspace in Portland.R
July 23 - silver scroll
'I Can't Stop Being Foolish', which was the first New Zealand single from our latest album Screens, has been nominated for an APRA Silver Scroll, Australasia's most prestigious songwriting award. We're very proud to be nominated. The video for this song is the third one down in the video column on the left. Apra members can vote for our song here.
Thanks to everyone who sent me get well wishes, I'm back to normal now and looking forward to playing PDX pop tomorrow night and the East End this Saturday.R
July 19 - Acute Renal Colic
Ok so we didn't play Dave Allen's free show at Mississippi Studio last night. We're so sorry, but it was due to me having acute renal colic which was brought on by a kidney stone. Yesterday the Mint Chicks had their second encounter with the ridiculous U.S. medical system. The first was when Paul needed five stitches in his chin and was charged US$2,500 dollars for it. The second was me being taken in agony to a clinic nearby where I was asked a bunch of questions and was made to discuss the payment and told I would be discounted 25% if I paid that day (I don't know if you are aware of what acute renal colic is but many sources will tell you it's worse than labour pain).I was told to sit in a room and wait for a doctor. When the doctor finally came in to see me and saw how much pain I was in HE LOOKED SCARED. This in itself is unacceptable and I've never seen it before. So anyway, after giving me no reassurance of what they were going to do to help me he simply walked out of the room and left me to my agony. The next half an hour was a ridiculous display of inneptitude involving the staff of the clinic being uncomfortable helping me unless I could prove I was actually suffering from a kidney stone. After trying to pee into a bottle for fifteen minutes and knowing for certain this wasn't going to happen I finally just pleaded for some pain relief to which the staff told me they didn't have anything in the clinic to give me.
In terms of your basic clinic visit, the only thing it seems a doctor can do in the case of renal colic is administer pain relief. That's it. The only other thing they can do is x-ray and talk about what kind of surgery they want to do, so the idea that they left me in that room when they couldn't help me is laughable (and I would've laughed but I was in way too much pain). Why didn't they tell me at the beginning that they couldn't help me? I'm guessing the fee. It was pretty clear to me that the staff didn't even seem to believe that there was anything wrong with me and instead wanted to diagnose me as a drug addict looking for a very expensive morphine injection. I've had this pain once before and ended up in an emergency room in the middle of the night. Luckily for me it was a New Zealand emergency room where they quickly diagnosed me, gave me some morphine and sent me home free of charge.
Anyway I would have rather been soundchecking for the show last night. Hope it went well. R
16 July - artwork and ritual
I've started to realise that the internet hasn't really given those with a fetishistic DIY approach what they wanted. We've got some things we're going to try out soon. I think the idea of giving something away for free is great, but I'm like you, I'd prefer some cool artwork and some ritual in my life. When you think about it though, the idea of a band becoming a cottage industry is not depressing. Maybe the concept of the music industry is dead, but that's not a bad thing. People always want something for free. If people had their way they'd get everything for free, they're like the fool who eats the last apple instead of planting it. they don't care how much time and resource goes into something, they just want to get it for free so they can consume. The key is that dreams of Ziggy Stardust/Led Zeppelin stardom and decadence need to give way to brand new dreams that we're inventing every day. R
14 July
view animation of Kody surfing Dunedin crowd
This is Kody surfing the Dunedin crowd from a series of photos sent to me by Liam Finn from our tour with him in New Zealand earlier this year. To see some more of his photos (including one of him playing drums on the Clean song Beatnik with us) go here.
12 July - Experiments in inefficiency and community
Kody and I went walking through the streets early this dark morning (as we often do) and started talking about the way that music has suffered over the decades due to a constant quest for efficiency. In some way we vowed to invest in some new form of inefficient richness in our music.
Later this morning I decided that I would start to discuss the music of young or unsigned bands on here in some way. I was thinking about how important gatekeepers had been to me in art and music, and how the role of gatekeeper had receded because of the online mob mentality of upvotes, tweets, and bulletins. We get quite a lot of traffic through this website and I thought it might be cool to build some kind of bigger network. You can send me stuff to listen to at themintchicks@gmail.com and then I can figure out what to do with it. No promises. R
10 July
Hope you enjoyed our new song. Right now the only way to hear the song in it's full form will be to play all four videos at once, but we've got plans for a new release coming up. I also cleaned up the site so I hope you like it o.k.
Below is a poster I did for the next show we're doing. I recently started a blog about my art stuff called Mister This and I'm going to try and do a lot more artwork this year.
We're just finishing the mix on a track we're doing for the Chris Knox compilation. Chris recently had a massive stroke and has been working hard on his recovery. The latest news of Chris' recovery can be found here. R
More soon...
MUSIC - RSS feed for shows only
Contact us at themintchicks@gmail.com
NEW ALBUM: 'SCREENS' OUT NOW
Buy here:
itunes (NZ, Aus, USA)
smoke CDs
Mighty Ape
digiRAMA
Real Groovy
Big Pond
Read the reviews:
real groove
stuff.co.nz
cheeseontoast
new zealand herald
pitchfork
the listener
polaroids of androids
obscuresound
undertheradar
pulpmagazine.co.uk
bullet magazine
thedwarf.com.au
ravemagazine.com.au
timeoff.com.au
Mintunes is a mini album of chiptune versions of some of our songs. We started giving it away last christmas and offer it here for free.
Past releases:
