Former bass player of The Plague (1978-1979), The Whizz Kids (1979-1980), and Blam Blam Blam (1980-1982), Tim Mahon has been an integral part of these highly influential Aotearoa bands.
And now Mahon and his band The Great Kerfuffle are on the road to promote the new album ‘The Great Kerfuffle’, playing Taupō’s Rosemary’s on Friday, June 12.
The bassist has a track record in multiple areas of Aotearoa music and somehow has also found the time to keep writing his own music.
Behind the scenes, Mahon has also been involved with several initiatives which have had a long-lasting impact. He became the project manager at the Otara Music Arts Centre (OMAC) in 1987, where he got local band Bamboo signed to PolyGram, and to open the BB King/U2 show at Western Springs.
(In a nice piece of timing, Bamboo founding member Teina Beniono will be supporting Tim Mahon and The Great Kerfuffle on their tour).
While at OMAC, another enterprise of Mahon's was setting up a Performing Arts Award (now known as Stand Up Stand Out or “Suso”) while making the connections that would lead to the release of the groundbreaking compilation Proud: An Urban Pacific Streetsoul Compilation, and its follow-up national tour.
The Great Kerfuffle band features members of Ardijah and Bamboo, O.M.C., Newmatics and Blam Blam Blam.
From plucking the bass harmonics on the seminal Blam Blam Blam track 'There is No Depression in New Zealand', Mahon's new songs are in keeping with the anarchistic revolutionary themes he has long espoused. The lyrics will challenge, but the music will hug you, like an old friend.
Subject matter on the 10-track album ranges far and wide. 'The Ballad of William' is an ode to one of the original Radio Hauraki pirates; 'Happy Go Lucky' is a lament for our current times; 'Fresh Northerly' is a climate anthem.
'Quite Nice' came from a Plague rehearsal for the 2021 Punk It Up festival, and features John Murray on drums, Mark Bell on guitar, with Syd Pasley (Newmatics) later adding harmony guitar.
