LOST SONGS
Jan Hellriegel
(Rhythmethod)
Acting spots in Xena and Shortland St, backing vocals for The Muttonbirds, Facebook posts about making hot chocolates with Dave Dobbyn – you simply can’t get more Kiwi than Jan Hellriegel’s resume.
That she also produced a couple of damned fine 90s albums in It’s My Sin and Tremble and trod the same boards as Jeff Buckley, puts her at the forefront of a period of Kiwiana which doesn’t get much replay these days.
But, happily, happenstance allowed her to stumble across a spidery and be-bugged box of old recordings made between 1993 and 2000 which she’d buried in fear of being “written off as a rock chick”.
The results are varied (even she says she’d have culled “at least seven” if releasing a “standard album”) but are unashamedly built on raw checked-shirt guitars and Hellriegel’s beautiful-grunge voice – none would sound out of place backed by a moody black and white video on one of the retro music TV channels.
And it’s a crying shame that a few (Your mind is Amaze and Decline the Offer are real standouts) missed their chance at 90s stardom.
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