NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Herald NOW
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
  • Herald NOW
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Politics
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Herald NOW
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / Lifestyle

Paselode goes on the offensive

6 May, 2004 01:58 PM4 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

By REBECCA BARRY

Paselode bass player Nathan Hickey is a mellow guy. But a few years ago he spotted frontman Gerome Mills hauling an armload of dirty glasses up the stairs, saw red and tripped him up.

"Something came over me. The guy's got an effect on people," he says, recalling how
funny it was to see the singer roll to the floor while the glass shattered. Funny, until he biffed a heavy glass ashtray at him in retaliation.

It was their last fight. Since then the Wellington five-piece have focused their visceral tendencies on their music, replacing soaring household objects with equally dangerous sludge-riffs, analogue synths and sleazy vocals, recapturing a form of rock'n'roll not seen in this country since Head Like a Hole.

"HLAH and Shihad are pretty much the reason why the majority of the band actually wanted to be in a kick-ass rock'n'roll band," he says of his Welly neighbours. "The level of their music and their shows is just a massive inspiration."

Hickey, who'd grown up in Paekakariki playing guitar in "angsty teenage bands", marvelled at the professionalism of Shihad's first album, which he bought when he was about 13. He went to school with bassist Karl Kippenberger's sister, so one day wagged school to hang out with him. Kippenberger later let him stand next to his bass rig at a packed-out Shihad gig, a night he remembers as the "turning point".

"I don't think I said more than three words to him because I was so starstruck," he says. "But what I learnt a lot from Shihad is how nice they are and how much difference it makes if you're friendly to people rather than having a cocky sort of rock star attitude."

With that in mind he formed Paselode in 1999, recruiting Mills and his guitarist brother Elan Mills, drummer Rhys Telford and keyboardist Luke Benge.

"We've quietly lost our angst," he says of their noisy growth throughout the country's student radio network. For the past two years they have been nominated for the best unreleased song category at the b.Net awards, testament to a time when life in Paselode was not so rosy.

In late 2001 their first attempt at an album - The Arch Enemy Ray Garlton - backfired. Rumours sprouted the band were on the verge of a break-up. Hickey maintains the talk was a product of the band's own "cheap hype" but admits they went through a rough patch around the time of the glass-throwing incident.

The experience forced them to pull together and write a slew of new material. They signed with Wildside two years later, the independent label that launched Shihad, and released The Taming of the Wasps, named because Mills was stung by a nest of the critters as a toddler and has been freaked out by bugs since.

"We'll be driving around in a van to a gig or something and there'll be some sort of creepy-crawly flying around the window and he'll just go nuts and almost be paralysed with fear and be screaming at us to get rid of it," says Hickey. "At the start his brother used to help him out but now we just laugh at him. He's got to get over his fear."

Over the next eight months they endured a "Karate Kid experience", converting a century-old gutted church on Island Bay into a studio with their producer friend and "sense" Nic McGowan.

"We just wanted somewhere really big," he says of the soundproofed room that measures 220 sq m.

"We wanted to go for this huge live massive drum sound and make everything sound as big as possible but still sound like a band playing together, not a band that's been in a studio that's used Pro Tools as much as they can to fix every tiny nuance."

The album was recorded during the height of the garage rock revival, reason enough for them to remove all guitar solos, leaning more towards the flamboyance of Faith No More and the swampy blues of JJ Cale.

"We thought if this is what everyone's doing then we're going to do the complete opposite. We've never tried to follow any trends in the past. If you follow fashion you're just going to get left behind."

Audio recorded during studio downtime is being used for an animated documentary of the band, a six-part series that promises to be a cross between The Osbournes, South Park and Monty Python.

"I've been watching lots of The Young Ones recently," says Hickey. "After not seeing them for so many years and then seeing our animation, it's pretty much on that level. We've all got such different personalities that at the end we're just as funny and offensive."

Performance

* Who: Paselode

* Where: Kings Arms, Newton

* When: Tomorrow night with Fanatics, Larry Normans

* Also: Album The Taming of the Wasps out today

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Save

    Share this article

Latest from Lifestyle

New Zealand

NZ actress accuses Australian policeman of using CCTV to spy on her

06 Jul 12:48 AM
Premium
Lifestyle

Weighted vests trend: Fitness experts weigh in on benefits and myths

05 Jul 11:00 PM
New Zealand

Noel Edmonds to marry again: British TV star proposes in hot tub in NZ

05 Jul 09:00 PM

Sponsored: Get your kids involved in your reno

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from Lifestyle

NZ actress accuses Australian policeman of using CCTV to spy on her

NZ actress accuses Australian policeman of using CCTV to spy on her

06 Jul 12:48 AM

Lewis ran for mayor in Hamilton and Auckland. Earlier, she streaked at All Blacks game.

Premium
Weighted vests trend: Fitness experts weigh in on benefits and myths

Weighted vests trend: Fitness experts weigh in on benefits and myths

05 Jul 11:00 PM
Noel Edmonds to marry again: British TV star proposes in hot tub in NZ

Noel Edmonds to marry again: British TV star proposes in hot tub in NZ

05 Jul 09:00 PM
Why fatherhood is Joseph Parker's secret weapon in the ring

Why fatherhood is Joseph Parker's secret weapon in the ring

05 Jul 09:00 PM
Sponsored: Why heat pumps make winter cheaper
sponsored

Sponsored: Why heat pumps make winter cheaper

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP