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Performing Arts and Cuba Street

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    • Slow Boat Christmas/ New Year 2025
      • Well, crikey - somehow, we have nearly made it to the end of another year at the proverbial rock'n'roll coalface - the 40th Anniversary of our founder, 'The Coach', Dennis O'Brien opening the store way back in 1985 (which we commemorated with some handsome bright yellow tee shirts and totes bearing his youthful mug!) Every year brings with it fresh challenges in seeking to keep the store relevant in a wildly changing entertainment and retail landscape, and we are, as ever, immensely grateful to you all for sticking with us, shopping with us, engaging with our Instagram and Facebook platforms, and sharing your energy and enthusiasm for music and movies, and for physical media, and for everything inbetween. We have seen your enthusiasm for vinyl remain undiminished, along with a soaring demand for CDs (hell, they are cheaper now than they were when they were introduced some 40 years ago, at the store's inception, when we thought they seemed like a bit of a fad...!) We have hosted some terrific in-store events, including Record Store Day 2025 (with instore performances from Warm Regards and Fazerdaze), The Phoenix Foundation's "Pegasus" vinyl release launch (a few dewy eyes at that one!), an impromptu instore performance from Evan Dando, plus listening parties for The Beths' "Straight Line Was A Lie" and most recently, Hayley Williams' "Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party" - all wonderful occasions that felt joyful, and like celebrations, so a great big SB shoutout to all who made those extraordinary events happen, and all who attended. Would also like to send big Slow Boat love to the friends and family of some dear people we lost this year - including the indomitable Ms Lorraine Barry, dear friend and much loved supporter of the store; you are sorely missed and hugely appreciated for all you have done for the NZ music landscape. So, without getting too sappy and sentimental, let's just conclude by saying - we are here for you, music lovers; Slow Boat will be open every day over the holiday period, with the exception of Christmas Day and New Years' Day - we will, however, be operating on a reduced hours schedule to give here everyone a chance to recover from a hectic Festive season; count on hours along the lines of 11am-4pm for the weeks immediately following Xmas... We are doing our best to make sure we have good stocks of hot ticket items in store ahead of Xmas, but there is always the sane and sensible option of the trusty Slow Boat Voucher if you can't decide, or SB branded tee shirts, totes and caps... So, all the best to you all for a safe, healthy and happy Silly Season, and hope to see you all soon!! With much aroha, respect and figgy pudding, your pals XX The Slow Boat Crew XX
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        • Slow Boat Records, Cuba Street, Te Aro, Wellington, Wellington City, Wellington, 6040, New Zealand (OpenStreetMap)


    • How Did I Get Hear? #17 - Alan Gregg on Ed Cake's "Downtown Puff"
      • Behold the Golden Man! Some time in the mid-1990s I was sitting on a sofa in Auckland watching a Saturday morning kids’ TV show called What Now? A band came on and played a song which featured the lyric “If I go to hospital / Will you administer my pill?” I had no idea who they were, but the song was brilliant, and one of the band members appeared to have springs attached to the soles of his shoes. A few weeks later I met two members of that band, Edmund McWilliams and Geoff Maddock, at a Supergroove show at Auckland University. We talked about our shared enthusiasm for the music of Jonathan Richman, and they gave me a cassette(!) of some songs they were working on. When I got home and played the cassette it was a revelation. It contained intensely melodic songs with absurd lyrics and unusual arrangements. I felt like I’d stumbled upon some kind of secret treasure. They were pop songs, but not like anything I’d heard before. The songs on that cassette later turned into the eponymous Bressa Creeting Cake album (Flying Nun Records 1997), which is still spoken of in reverential tones in certain circles. The three piece Bressa Creeting Cake band, with Joel Wilton on drums, came on tour around New Zealand with The Mutton Birds (who I played bass with), and it felt like a privilege to watch them play these amazing songs to baffled audiences each night. By that time Edmund McWilliams was becoming better known under the moniker Edmund Cake. In 1999 Edmund and I played together in Bic Runga’s band, when she supported Paul Kelly on a tour of Australia. On that trip I saw first hand how Ed’s approach was not like other musicians I knew. At one show Bic’s band was invited to join Paul Kelly and his band onstage for their encore, and during the song Ed played Paul Kelly’s acoustic guitar with such intensity that his hand bled all over the body of the guitar. At soundcheck the next day Paul Kelly’s unimpressed guitar technician greeted Ed with the guitar and a cleaning cloth. Ed set to work making it spotless, and we weren’t invited onstage for the encore again. Bressa Creeting Cake split up around that time, and Geoff Maddock formed the band Goldenhorse, which went on to become hugely popular in New Zealand. All of this is a very longwinded way of getting to the point that after the demise of Bressa Creeting Cake, Edmund Cake made a solo album called Downtown Puff (Lil’ Chief Records 2004), which I consider to be a masterpiece. Around the time Bressa Creeting Cake ended, an A&R man from the Dreamworks record label in LA came to visit Ed in New Zealand and gave him an advance to make some demos. Ed recorded three songs and sent them to the label. After not hearing from the A&R guy for a while, Ed called him in LA to ask what he thought of the songs. He replied that they were “Quite great”. Dreamworks did not sign Edmund Cake to the label in the end, but they did sign a little-known artist named Nelly Furtado. In the meantime, Tim Finn had become a supporter of Ed’s music and lent him some recording equipment for a studio Ed had assembled in a building in Gore Street in Auckland. Neil Finn had also become a fan and gave Ed time to complete Downtown Puff in his own studio. Edmund Cake is an unusually talented songwriter. He has a gift for composing melodies and chord changes which are both surprising and breathtakingly beautiful. He’s also able to write lyrics which can be funny and strangely affecting at the same time. And he doesn’t sound like anyone else. On Downtown Puff Ed played most of the instruments, and he engineered and produced the songs himself. It’s an album that constantly treads the line between the sublime and the ridiculous, and sometimes does both at the same time. "You’re Watching Me” and “Beautiful Sleep” are ballads as melodic and effortless as any I can think of. The song "Gunga" sounds like Captain Beefheart jamming with Devo on the set of Sesame Street. “My Son the Harpist” tells the story, over an Omnichord drum beat, of a young harp player who meets a tragic end. Ed was improvising the lyrics the first time he ever recorded the vocal on that song and he never changed them. As a result, there are some spontaneous words in that song that you won’t find in any dictionary. The song “Oh Baby Bear” is the catchiest song you’ll ever hear about the Auckland Public Transport system. Ed sings “She’s got a cuppa tea and sandwich, she’s feeling fine / She just crossed the Pukapuka line,” all delivered in a fair dinkum Kiwi accent. Perhaps Downtown Puff’ s master stroke is the track “Golden Man”, which sounds a bit like a 1970s psychedelic folk band singing a gospel song. The poetic lyrics, swooping melodies and Ed’s trademark falsetto vocals all contribute to the song’s eerie beauty. “He commands the cats to claw / He commands the boats to shore / He commands the gulls to fly / He commands the crops to die”. Sometimes Edmund’s music can evoke the genius of Brian Wilson in the way he can take really unusual chord changes and make them seem completely natural in a pop song. But this music doesn’t sound like Brian Wilson. Ed often adopts different character voices for the songs. One moment he’s singing in a sweet falsetto, and in the next he’s growling like Tom Waits. Each song has a distinct vocal identity, almost reminiscent of the way Prince used completely different voices for some of his songs. But this music sounds nothing like Prince. Sometimes I wonder why the Downtown Puff album isn’t better known than it is. It certainly has some devoted fans, but I can’t help thinking more people would like it if they knew about it. For me it’s the work of a visionary musical artist, and it's a collection of songs that contains just the right balance of beauty, mystery, playfulness and outrageously good tunes. It’s also worth mentioning that Edmund Cake released another album under the name Pie Warmer a few years later called The Fearsome Feeling (2009 Lil’Chief Records), which is every bit as great as Downtown Puff. Alan Gregg last year released a superb album under the name Polite Company, entitled "Please Go Wild" - first single "Circulation" is here, we have copies on LP and CD, and his website is here
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        • Slow Boat Records, Cuba Street, Te Aro, Wellington, Wellington City, Wellington, 6040, New Zealand (OpenStreetMap)


    • Merch, baby - MERCH!!!
      • Well, lordy, lordy me - what have we here, then?! After running an (entirely unscientific) Insta poll, we here at Slow Boat have listened to the voice of the people, and have bowed to popular consensus, and had manufactured a limited quantity of marvellous looking Slow Boat hoodies, alongside the regular tee shirts, a new style of (very robust!) tote bags (shall we refer to them as Boat Totes? Yes, I think we shall!) and, for the first time ever - two (count 'em!) varieties of SB trucker caps!! These are available for purchase instore now (my advice - get in quick while we still have a good range of sizes and colours!) so you can be fashion forward, and the envy of your pals. Tees are now $39.50, caps $30, totes $25 and the deluxe hoodies are a still perfectly reasonable $75 - I mean, what price happiness? What price... fashion... Feel free to drop us a line or call (04 385 1330) if you'd like to secure yours, and we'll be seein' ya soon - will have some Record Store Day 2025 related news to share in the upcoming weeks... Peace and love, THE SLOW BOAT CREW XX
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        • Slow Boat Records, Cuba Street, Te Aro, Wellington, Wellington City, Wellington, 6040, New Zealand (OpenStreetMap)


    • Record store day 2024 at slow boat!!!
      • Slow Boat is again thrilled to share with you our plans for Record Store Day 2024!! After the success of last year’s event, we have again agreed to co-ordinate with our dear neighbours at 173 Cuba Street, the venerable Flying Nun Records, so that there won’t be any clashes for our respective instore performances, which we are thrilled to announce thus; Flying Nun; 1pm – Living Clipboards – featuring Marineville’s Mark Williams, along with Ghost Club’s Denise Roughan and Jim Abbot – their “All Over Tawa” album is released on the day! Slow Boat; 2pm – Bleeding Star – fresh from the previous weekend’s Otisfest event at San Fran, the excellent Poneke/ Wellington indie guitar band will present their songs in a stripped back, largely acoustic fashion. Flying Nun; 3pm – Cruelly – grungy, punky, shoegazy? Who can say – what it is is life affirming, melodic noise from this young Wellington band – come check it out! Slow Boat; 4pm – Erny Belle (duo) - after the success of her superb second album (on the Flying Nun label), the Tamaki Makaurau/ Auckland based singer songwriter will perform in a duo setting – can’t wait!! We will also be opening at the earlier time of 9am (to give the eager beaver/ early bird RSD queuers an hour less to wait!), and will be bringing you an array of limited RSD vinyl exclusives for your delectation – you know the drill; no holds, no reserves - first in, best fed!! Thoroughly looking forward to what has become a real highlight of the record shop calendar, and to a day where we celebrate vinyl, music, and the culture of the independent record store!! See you all here!!! Xx Team Slow Boat X Team Flying Nun xX
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        • Slow Boat Records, Cuba Street, Te Aro, Wellington, Wellington City, Wellington, 6040, New Zealand (OpenStreetMap)


    • 2024!!
      • Bloody hell, it's another year, already!! Welcome to it, everyone, and let us start by offering our sincerest thanks to you all for helping make it a busy and memorable one for us all here at The Boat - so many people must have gotten vinyl, and CDs, and vouchers, and tee shirts, and posters and all manner of Slow Boat goodies for Christmas, and that means more people listening to and loving music, and that can only be a good thing, right?! Thanks, also, for your patience in bearing with us with reduced hours and staff in the Xmas/ New Year period - all pretty much back to normal now (just as the Summer really arrives - typical, huh?!) ANYWAY - enjoying meeting folks from around the motu, and indeed around the globe, and helping people find the music they connect with - redeeming those vouchers seems like a swell time to me...! So - all the very best to you, your friends and whanau for 2024, looking forward to continuing to serve you up the platters that matter (have just topped up a HEAP of new vinyl that we sold out of over Xmas!), and to bringing the joy - a few things in the pipeline (not least of which being Record Store Day '24!), will let you know when plans firm up... Take care of yerselves - eat yer greens, keep cool, stay sun smart, and don't leave yer vinyl in the sun!! Peace and love, The Slow Boat Crew XX
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        • Slow Boat Records, Cuba Street, Te Aro, Wellington, Wellington City, Wellington, 6040, New Zealand (OpenStreetMap)


Latest Newsitems

The latest newslog items.

    • Start of Year information for 2026
      • Kia ora koutou, The following information, regarding the start of year in 2026, was sent to parents and caregivers of all enrolled students on Friday 12 December 2025. New Year 9 students New Year 10-13 students Returning Year 10-13 students Please ensure you check your spam folder and add no-reply@whs.school.nz to your safe email address […]
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        • Wellington High School, Taranaki Street, Mount Cook, Wellington, Wellington City, Wellington, 6011, New Zealand (OpenStreetMap)


    • Awards 2025
      • Visit our photo galleries for memories from Whakanuia, end of year celebration assemblies, Senior Celebration Evening and Sports Awards Award winner lists: Whakanuia Junior award winners Senior award winners and Senior special awards Sports awards Gateway certificates
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        • Wellington High School, Taranaki Street, Mount Cook, Wellington, Wellington City, Wellington, 6011, New Zealand (OpenStreetMap)


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