Two Lane Blacktop was a
hard rock
Hard rock or heavy rock is a loosely defined subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the garage, psychedelic and blues rock movements. Some of the earliest hard ...
band
Band or BAND may refer to:
Places
*Bánd, a village in Hungary
*Band, Iran, a village in Urmia County, West Azerbaijan Province, Iran
* Band, Mureș, a commune in Romania
*Band-e Majid Khan, a village in Bukan County, West Azerbaijan Province, I ...
from
Wellington
Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...
,
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
who formed in 2001 and disbanded in 2003. The band wrote all its songs about movies and was named after a 1971
film
A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...
directed by Monte Hellman. The members of the band were Matt Harrop on
vocals
Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or without ...
and
guitar
The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...
, Luke Hutching on
bass, Phil Smiley on
drum
The drum is a member of the percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel-Sachs classification system, it is a membranophone. Drums consist of at least one membrane, called a drumhead or drum skin, that is stretched over a she ...
s, and
Pip Brown
Phillipa Margaret "Pip" Brown (born 13 July 1979), better known by her stage name Ladyhawke, is a New Zealand singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. She took her stage name from Richard Donner's 1985 film '' Ladyhawke''.
Brown was part o ...
on
lead guitar
Lead guitar (also known as solo guitar) is a musical part for a guitar in which the guitarist plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs and chords within a song structure. The lead is the featur ...
and
background vocals
A backing vocalist is a singer who provides vocal harmony with the lead vocalist or other backing vocalists. A backing vocalist may also sing alone as a lead-in to the main vocalist's entry or to sing a counter-melody. Backing vocalists are used ...
.
The band was influenced by
protopunk
Proto-punk (or protopunk) is rock music played mostly by garage bands from the 1960s to mid-1970s that foreshadowed the punk rock movement. The phrase is a retrospective label; the musicians involved were generally not originally associated wi ...
groups such as
The Stooges
The Stooges, originally billed as the Psychedelic Stooges, also known as Iggy and the Stooges, was an American rock band formed in Ann Arbor, Michigan, in 1967 by singer Iggy Pop, guitarist Ron Asheton, drummer Scott Asheton, and bassist Dave ...
and The
MC5
MC5, also commonly called The MC5, is an American rock band formed in Lincoln Park, Michigan, in 1963. The original line-up consisted of Rob Tyner (vocals) Wayne Kramer (guitar), Fred "Sonic" Smith (guitar), Michael Davis (bass), and Dennis ...
, and were often compared with contemporary
hard rock
Hard rock or heavy rock is a loosely defined subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the garage, psychedelic and blues rock movements. Some of the earliest hard ...
bands such as fellow countrymen
The Datsuns
The Datsuns are a hard rock band from Cambridge, New Zealand, formed in 1998. Founding mainstays are Rudolf "Dolf" de Borst on vocals and bass guitar, and Christian Livingstone and Phil Somervell, both on guitar. They have released seven albu ...
.
History
The band formed in early 2001 when Harrop's then
hardcore
Hardcore, hard core or hard-core may refer to:
Arts and media Film
* ''Hardcore'' (1977 film), a British comedy film
* ''Hardcore'' (1979 film), an American crime drama film starring George C Scott
* ''Hardcore'' (2001 film), a British documen ...
band was looking for a second
guitarist
A guitarist (or a guitar player) is a person who plays the guitar. Guitarists may play a variety of guitar family instruments such as classical guitars, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and bass guitars. Some guitarists accompany themselv ...
. Harrop invited Brown to audition after meeting her in a
documentary film
A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...
class. Harrop and Brown's mutual interest in old cinema and 70s rock inspired them to form a new band and start writing songs. Smiley, a mutual acquaintance of Brown and Harrop, was asked to drum, introducing a darker feel to the sound, and another design school student, Ben Fraser, a trained
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...
musician, was called in to play bass. As a member of two other local bands, Fraser didn't have enough time for the increasing workload of Two Lane Blacktop and soon left the band. Nato Hickey, bass player in the band Paselode, temporarily filled in while the band looked for a replacement. Hickey introduced the band to their future manager Dave Benge, then manager of New Zealand bands
Fur Patrol
Fur Patrol is a rock band, originally from Wellington, New Zealand.
The band formed in Wellington in 1996. Their debut EP, ''Starlifter'', was released on the independent Wellington label Wishbone in 1998. Their debut album ''Pet'' was produced ...
and
Cassette
Cassette may refer to:
Technology
* Cassette tape (or ''musicassette'', ''audio cassette'', ''cassette tape'', or ''tape''), a worldwide standard for analog audio recording and playback
** Cassette single (or "Cassingle"), a music single in the ...
, before Hutching, lead guitarist for the band Fore Arm of Fury, was brought in on bass about one month before their first scheduled shows in
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
.
The band enjoyed quick success in Australia, riding the wave of the popular
New Rock revival, and it wasn't long before the band was making frequent trips between the two countries.
In May 2003, the 7" single "The Rat" / "Hellhound" was released through Infidelity Records and distributed throughout New Zealand and Australia. It gained considerable air play in each country and was placed on rotation by
John Peel
John Robert Parker Ravenscroft (30 August 1939 – 25 October 2004), known professionally as John Peel, was an English disc jockey (DJ) and radio presenter. He was the longest-serving of the original BBC Radio 1 DJs, broadcasting regularly fr ...
on his
Radio 1 Radio 1 or Radio One most commonly refers to:
*BBC Radio 1, a music radio station from the BBC
** BBC Radio 1Xtra, a digital radio station broadcasting black music
*CBC Radio One, a talk radio station operated by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporatio ...
programme. The band was received well by the Australian
press
Press may refer to:
Media
* Print media or news media, commonly called "the press"
* Printing press, commonly called "the press"
* Press (newspaper), a list of newspapers
* Press TV, an Iranian television network
People
* Press (surname), a fam ...
, appearing in the 'ones to watch' issue of ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...
'' magazine in June 2003, as did their single "The Rat", which made it onto the CD which came with that issue. Back in New Zealand, the band gained nominations for 'Best new band' and 'Best unreleased song' in the New Zealand
BNet awards.
In mid-2003, the band made its first trip to America, playing 3 weeks of shows in Los Angeles and New York. On the band's return the first tracks of their new album were recorded at the
language of love studios in Wellington – these recordings have never been released.
In late 2003, one week before an East Coast Australian tour with American band
Modey Lemon
Modey Lemon is an American garage rock band from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The group formed in Pittsburgh's South Oakland neighborhood in 1999 as an informal side project of Dean Swagger, a rock trio that had spent the previous year mainly perf ...
, Two Lane Blacktop decided to split up. The reasons for the breakup have not been made clear, but personality conflicts have been rumoured to be the cause of it.
Group members
Core Members
* Matt Harrop –
rhythm guitar
In music performances, rhythm guitar is a technique and role that performs a combination of two functions: to provide all or part of the rhythmic pulse in conjunction with other instruments from the rhythm section (e.g., drum kit, bass guitar ...
,
vocals
Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or without ...
*
Pip Brown
Phillipa Margaret "Pip" Brown (born 13 July 1979), better known by her stage name Ladyhawke, is a New Zealand singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. She took her stage name from Richard Donner's 1985 film '' Ladyhawke''.
Brown was part o ...
–
lead guitar
Lead guitar (also known as solo guitar) is a musical part for a guitar in which the guitarist plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs and chords within a song structure. The lead is the featur ...
,
background vocals
A backing vocalist is a singer who provides vocal harmony with the lead vocalist or other backing vocalists. A backing vocalist may also sing alone as a lead-in to the main vocalist's entry or to sing a counter-melody. Backing vocalists are used ...
* Luke Hutching –
bass
* Phil Smiley –
drums
A drum kit (also called a drum set, trap set, or simply drums) is a collection of drums, cymbals, and other Percussion instrument, auxiliary percussion instruments set up to be played by one person. The player (drummer) typically holds a pair o ...
Previous
* Nato Hickey –
bass
* Ben Fraser –
bass
Discography
Albums
* ''The Girl'' (2003)
(unreleased)
EPs
* ''Live'' (2001)
* ''Mechanic Demo'' (2001)
* ''The Mechanic'' (2002)
Singles
* "The Rat/Hellhound" (2002)
After disbanding
Brown now fronts her own solo project called
Ladyhawke.
Hutching now plays bass in Wellington rock band The Accelerants.
Smiley now plays drums in Melbourne group The Rise and Demise.
References
External links
Two Lane Blacktopat amplifier.co.nz
Interview with Brown, under the alias Lux Curfewin ''NZ musician''
{{Authority control
Musical groups from Wellington