Man on The Verge of A Nervous Breakdown - by Roger Shepherd — Roger Shepherd

While it was easy to dismiss The Stones as rough and ready, they were a musical venture serious about developing their own style distinct from their Dunedin contemporaries. They had big musical ideas that didn't need too many details, they had the big personalities to make it work. And despite everything they had a strange kind of hypnotic star power.

"I first met Doug at an Enemy gig at the Old Beneficiaries Hall in Dunedin in 1978. Chris Knox abused me for wearing a skinny tie (I still have it, but that was the last time I wore it), but I felt his friend Doug, who was the singer in the support band, The Clean, was committing a far greater sartorially sin that evening by wearing a stripped, “Oxbridge” style blazer."

This Sporting Life were the necessary disrupting outsiders that helped mix and mess things up. They made Show Me to the Bellrope and helped to make Flying Nun a more interesting musical place.

The Able Tasmans debut release, The Tired Sun 12” was considered a bit of an oddity at the time with its keyboard led quirky full sound. And with the term “oddity” comes the unspoken implication that this is a one-off novelty.