Bic Runga: a worthy Kiwi export

There are quite a few Australian and New Zealand artists who have made across the oceans and there are few that are currently being hyped to stardom. The Vines and Jets get all the media attention while Bic Runga is not that lucky. Still, the injustice should be rectified pronto if this show is anything to go by.

The 26-year-old from Christchurch is mega-star in her native islands but has taken five years to come up with her second album, ‘Beautiful Collision’. [There were few false starts, the pressure of the initial success, expectations and abandoned explorations in sound.] Runga is a singer-songwriter who spreads her creative arms freely…

From the single ‘Get Some Sleep’, a sublime pop that is as catchy as a flu-bug that makes you feel good with all the musical subtlety and backing vocals that are out of Mamas and Papas songbook. Runda has been greatly helped on the supplant to ‘Drive’ (1999) by one Neil Finn (harmonies, additional guitar and piano) and some of Crowded House main main’s band members also guested on the recordings.

Runga’s other reference point, on a song like ‘Listening For Weather’, is The Carpenters, while Bjork comes to mind on during the title track. With a voice as clear as a mountain dew that is let fully out on ‘Precious Things’ that a dance-ambient act as Massive Attack may want to book her for their next album [when, or if, it comes to it].

Standing in the middle of a stage she easily projects vulnerability as much as awareness and soul fullness and it is no surprise that she includes songs by Bob Dylan and Nina Simone in her set. Runga’s music may not storm the barriers but she certainly can engage and enrich one’s well-being with fine songwriting and an impassioned show.

And Runga, half-Chinese, half-Maori, is so good looking, it is indecent that may require an amendment to the proposed immigration bill!