Haystack is coming back. But this time around _ 30 years after the Masterton pop rockers disbanded _ there's no need for a needle.
Wairarapa archivist and Haystack bass player Neil Frances says the band, which was a happening regional thing for seven years from 1972, will not reform but is
releasing a 14-track CD titled Home Is Where The Heart Is: 1979-1981 The Lost Tapes.
''This is about the songs. They're as they were and even though there was some discussion about reforming, the songs represent another life for us all, a life we left behind long ago.''
The original Haystack line-up comprised musician-songwriter Charlie Harter, who was at the time teaching mathematics at then-Makora College and is now living in Petone and teaching with The Correspondence School; Masterton woman and vocalist Merilyn Rigg, and Mr Frances.
Several drummers also played at different times with the band, which played live most often at the former Homestead Tavern, Solway Park Hotel and at school dances throughout Wairarapa.
Only 100 CDs have been pressed, Mr Frances said, and the remastered work was the second album from the band after As We Appear, which sold 200 copies in Wairarapa after its release in 1977. Mr Frances said the songs were recorded in Wellington and in England and have ''sat quietly'' on cassette tape for three decades and only ''occasionally played by their makers''.
Phil Riley of Life of Riley Studio in Wellington designed the album cover art and remastered the tapes, allowing ''this collection of pop, rock, ballad and folkish originals to see the light of day''.
Mr Frances said the CD was available at selected Masterton outlets for $25 or copies could also be bought from him for $20.
