A 24-hour recording of RNZ National. The following rundown is sourced from the broadcaster’s website. Note some overseas/copyright restricted items may not appear in the supplied rundown:
12 April 2016
===12:04 AM. | All Night Programme===
=DESCRIPTION=
Including: 12:05 Music after Midnight; 12:30 Spectrum (RNZ); 1:05 From the World (RNZ); 2:05 New Jazz Archive (3 of 12, PRX) 3:05 The Dream of Nikau Jam by Peter Hawes (1 of 10, RNZ); 3:30 An Author's View (RNZ); 5:10 Witness (BBC)
===6:00 AM. | Morning Report===
=DESCRIPTION=
RNZ's three-hour breakfast news show with news and interviews, bulletins on the hour and half-hour, including: 6:16 and 6:50 Business News 6:18 Pacific News 6:26 Rural News 6:48 and 7:45 NZ Newspapers
=AUDIO=
06:00
Top Stories for Tuesday 12 April 2016
BODY:
The tax expert reviewing the trust laws says protecting New Zealand reputation is paramount - we'll talk to John Shewan shortly. A convicted baby killer is about to be freed on parole -- her victim's mother talks to us shortly and fancy finding out what life is like in Sweden? The Swedes launch a novel way to boost tourism
Topics:
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 28'25"
06:06
Sports News for 12 April 2016
BODY:
An update from the team at RNZ Sport.
Topics: sport
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 1'42"
06:10
Calls grow for resignation of Malta's PM
BODY:
Malta's Prime Minister has promised action against any ministers or staff implicated in the Panama Papers leaks.
Topics:
Regions:
Tags: Malta, Panama Papers
Duration: 3'42"
06:13
Rights abuses shade Indonesia's Pacific move
BODY:
Indonesia's government has been increasing efforts to strengthen diplomatic ties with Pacific Island countries.
Topics:
Regions:
Tags: Indonesia
Duration: 3'22"
06:19
Early Business News for 12 April 2016
BODY:
A brief update of movements in the financial sector.
Topics: business, economy
Regions:
Tags: markets
Duration: 2'20"
06:25
Morning Rural News for 12 April 2016
BODY:
News from the rural and farming sectors.
Topics: rural, farming
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 4'01"
06:38
Tax specialist has "open mind" about foreign trust review
BODY:
The Government's investigation into whether New Zealand is a tax haven for wealthy foreigners is being criticised as inadequate before it's even begun.
Topics: politics
Regions:
Tags: tax havens
Duration: 3'16"
06:42
Struggle to find forensic experts jeopardises trials
BODY:
Criminal trial defence lawyers are struggling to find forensic experts and it's poised to get worse as pathologist numbers drop.
Topics: law
Regions:
Tags: pathologist numbers
Duration: 2'47"
06:45
What goes on in Chicago's off-the-books interrogation site
BODY:
Documents released to the US edition of the Guardian show the extent of police force used at an off-the-books interrogation site in Chicago.
Topics:
Regions:
Tags: US
Duration: 4'00"
06:51
Worry over small companies
BODY:
Capital markets advisory firm CM Partners is worried that smaller companies are being overlooked by investors and broking houses, and this could be costly to the sharemarket in the long run.
Topics: business
Regions:
Tags: CM Partners
Duration: 1'53"
06:53
Nuplex says no other offer on the table
BODY:
The chair of the resins maker, Nuplex, says the billion dollar takeover offer for the company from Belgian producer Allnex is the best going and shareholders should vote yes.
Topics: business
Regions:
Tags: Nuplex
Duration: 1'40"
06:55
Kiwi savers oblivious to nest-egg amount
BODY:
Kiwi savers appear to be oblivious to how much they will have tucked away when they reach retirement age.
Topics: business
Regions:
Tags: Kiwi Saver
Duration: 1'11"
06:55
Businesses need to up game with disabled employment - CCS
BODY:
A disability rights group says businesses need to change their attitudes towards hiring people with disabilities.
Topics: business
Regions:
Tags: disability
Duration: 2'28"
06:55
Businesses need to up game with disabled employment - CCS
BODY:
A disability rights group says businesses need to change their attitudes towards hiring people with disabilities.
Topics: business
Regions:
Tags: disability
Duration: 2'28"
06:58
Morning markets for 12 April 2016
BODY:
American stocks are modestly higher, buoyed by higher commodity prices. Oil, metals, gold all higher and the risk aversion is weaker.
Topics: business, economy
Regions:
Tags: markets
Duration: 1'14"
06:59
Business briefs
BODY:
Singapore Airlines is increasing its flights into Christchurch next summer.
Topics: business
Regions:
Tags: Singapore Airlines
Duration: 12"
07:07
Sports News for 12 April 2016
BODY:
An update from the team at RNZ Sport.
Topics: sport
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 1'46"
07:10
Tax expert John Shewan to review foreign trust disclosure rules
BODY:
The tax expert John Shewan who's been appointed to investigate the foreign trust laws says the protection of the country's reputation is paramount.
Topics: politics
Regions:
Tags: tax havens
Duration: 5'37"
07:16
UK tightens its tax rules in the wake of the Panama Papers
BODY:
The UK government has announced it is tightening its tax rules.
Topics:
Regions:
Tags: UK, tax havens
Duration: 3'53"
07:20
Mother of murdered baby despairs at killer's release
BODY:
The convicted baby killer, Elizabeth Healy, will soon be freed on parole under electronic monitoring, but the mother of the child she murdered fears this may not stop her from killing again.
Topics: crime
Regions:
Tags: Elizabeth Healy
Duration: 4'52"
07:26
Swedish number allows callers to talk to random Swedes
BODY:
Do you have any burning questions about what life is like in Sweden? Or maybe you're just looking for a friendly stranger to talk to late at night?
Topics:
Regions:
Tags: Sweden
Duration: 4'59"
07:35
Peters: No confidence in government in-house review
BODY:
Opposition parties have expressed little confidence in the Government's appointment of the tax expert John Shewan to review foreign trust disclosure rules.
Topics: politics
Regions:
Tags: tax havens
Duration: 4'21"
07:39
Pathologist shortage sparks fears of unfair trials
BODY:
Defence lawyers say a looming drop in the number of forensic pathologists will throw further into doubt people's ability to get a fair trial.
Topics: crime
Regions:
Tags: pathologists
Duration: 4'05"
07:44
Jury considering fate of prominent man in sex case
BODY:
A Northland jury has begun the job of deciding who to believe - in the trial of a prominent man charged with indecent acts involving young girls.
Topics: crime
Regions: Northland
Tags: indecent acts
Duration: 3'23"
07:49
Barack Obama admits mistakes made in Libya
BODY:
The US President Barack Obama says failing to prepare for the aftermath of the ousting of Libyan leader Col Muammar Gaddafi was the worst mistake of his presidency.
Topics:
Regions:
Tags: Barack Obama, US, Libya
Duration: 3'36"
07:53
Massive icebergs threaten New Zealand science equipment
BODY:
NIWA scientists are nervously watching two massive icebergs which have broken off the Antarctic coastline, threatening underwater equipment being used to investigate climate change.
Topics: science
Regions:
Tags: NIWA
Duration: 3'55"
07:56
Call out for people to commit an hour to volunteering
BODY:
The Student Volunteer Army has launched a programme for people to volunteer an hour of their time on Anzac Day to help their local community.
Topics:
Regions:
Tags: student volunteer army
Duration: 2'13"
08:07
Sports News for 12 April 2016
BODY:
An update from the team at RNZ Sport.
Topics: sport
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 2'07"
08:10
Earthquake in Wairarapa
BODY:
A magnitude 5-point- two earthquake has shaken the lower North Island this morning.
Topics:
Regions: Wellington Region
Tags: earthquake
Duration: 3'06"
08:14
Trusts for foreigners - thorough checks undertaken
BODY:
A law firm that sets up trusts for foreigners says it takes great care to ensure its wealthy clients are not criminal or corrupt.
Topics: law
Regions:
Tags: Foreign trusts
Duration: 4'29"
08:18
Labour: Foreign trusts review a charade
BODY:
The Labour Party leader, Andrew Little, is in our Wellington studio.
Topics: law, politics
Regions:
Tags: Foreign trusts
Duration: 6'07"
08:25
Qantas continues to eye New Zealand market
BODY:
The flight price wars in New Zealand have continued heating up.
Topics: transport
Regions:
Tags: Qantas Airways
Duration: 4'46"
08:29
Markets Update for 12 April 2016
BODY:
A brief update of movements in the financial sector.
Topics: business, economy
Regions:
Tags: markets
Duration: 1'05"
08:39
Government stands firm on Kermadec sanctuary
BODY:
The Environment Minister Nick Smith believes Maori leaders who claim they have the right to fish the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary are wrong.
Topics: environment, law, te ao Maori
Regions:
Tags: Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary
Duration: 4'33"
08:44
Police hope Pacific liaison roles will reduce offending
BODY:
New Zealand police are hoping recently established Pacific liaison roles around the country may help reduce the high number of Pacific offenders.
Topics: Pacific
Regions:
Tags: police
Duration: 3'15"
08:47
LSD drug may further psychological research - study
BODY:
Addictions and depression could in the future be treated by an A-class illegal drug.
Topics: health
Regions:
Tags: LSD
Duration: 3'51"
08:51
Record number of cruise ships for Dunedin next year
BODY:
A record 96 cruise liners are expected to visit Dunedin next summer.
Topics:
Regions: Otago
Tags: cruise liners
Duration: 3'15"
=SHOW NOTES=
===9:06 AM. | Nine To Noon===
=DESCRIPTION=
Current affairs and topics of interest, including: 10:45 The Reading: Where The Rekohu Bone Sings by Tina Makereti A spirit who exists in the 'no place' watches over his descendants living at the end of the 19th and 20th centuries (7 of 15, RNZ)
=AUDIO=
09:08
The extent of secret police violence at Homan Square
BODY:
Chicago police documents obtained by The Guardian have revealed how punches, baton blows and tasers were used by police at an off the books interregation site in the city. More than 7000 people, most of them African Americans have been detained and interrogated at the warehouse called Homan Square without access to lawyers or people knowning where they were. The Guardian has reported on allegations of torture and sexual assault made by several men who were held at the facility known as Homan Square. Ted Pearson is a member of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, which has been campaigning against Homan Square ever since its existence came to light.
Topics: crime, law
Regions:
Tags: secret detentions
Duration: 12'03"
09:23
Power of attorney law change doubles costs
BODY:
The number of people naming an enduring power of attorney has dropped by a third over the last eight years, which the Law Society blames on changes to the law in 2007, which have more than doubled the costs of the process. Enduring powers of attorney name the person who takes control of your finances and major decisions if you lose the capability to make those decisions yourself. Jonathan Orpin is a Wellington barrister and a member of the Society's reform committee.
EXTENDED BODY:
The cost of power of attorney has skyrocketed by as much as 250 percent, leading to fewer people signing the documents, the Law Society says.
An enduring power of attorney is a legal document that names the person who takes control of another's finances if they lose the capability to make those decisions themselves.
Parliament introduced changes in 2007 which meant an independent witness needed to be present when someone established an enduring power of attorney.
The Law Society said the change aimed to ensure people weren't signing the document without fully understanding what they were doing, but it had had other consequences.
Jonathan Orpin, a barrister and member of the Law Society's reform committee, said the rule had dramatically increased the cost.
Listen to Jonathan Orpin on Nine to Noon:
He said in most cases where someone was thinking about setting up a power of attorney, a couple would go to see a lawyer and would appoint each other to look after themselves.
But now that had become more costly and a couple could expect to pay between $400 and $1000 for a power of attorney, he said.
"So in the past one lawyer could have made and sorted out the enduring power of attorney for both members of the couple, but that independence requirement means that the lawyer can only act for one of the two parties to the couple, and the other one will have to go and see another lawyer - which effectively doubles the number of lawyers involved, and that of course adds cost," he said.
"But in provincial New Zealand, it also means that there may not be enough lawyers to go around to do it, so people have to drive across the country, so people are being put off making the decision about who will look after them when they're well enough to do it."
Mr Orpin said the Law Society estimated there had been a 250 percent increase in the cost of processing the documents since the law change.
"Lots of people legitimately make the decision that, as the costs continue to rise, they'll put it off for another day and then another day, and then it becomes one of those things that never gets done and it's too late to do it."
Topics: law
Regions:
Tags: Old Age, power of attorney
Duration: 9'50"
09:37
'Whittier: tight-knit town living in one building'
BODY:
Welcome to Whittier, Alaska. It has a funny sounding name and an even funnier living situation. Nearly all of its 200 residents live under the same roof. The town's Mayor, Daniel Blair on his interesting town.
EXTENDED BODY:
The remote Alaskan town of Whittier is only accessible by sea or a one-way tunnel which alternates directions.
But what makes it special is that nearly all of its 200 residents live under the same roof. To be precise, in one 14-storey building called Begich Towers. All that is about to change, however.
Kathryn Ryan talks to Daniel Blair the town's Mayor.
Topics: life and society
Regions:
Tags: Alaska, USA
Duration: 12'21"
09:49
US correspondent Susan Milligan
BODY:
Susan Milligan with the stories that are making the news stateside.
Topics:
Regions:
Tags: US correspondent, Susan Milligan
Duration: 9'00"
10:06
What makes you... you?
BODY:
It's quite something to get your head around, what makes us who we are and do we have free will ? And what does it mean for us to be human? British philosopher Julian Baggini joins us to ruminate on the nature of self.
EXTENDED BODY:
"We kind of have to accept the fact that each of us – each individual self – it's more like a jazz band or an orchestra, if you like, of different components" ~ Julian Baggini.
Do we really have free will – or do our genes drive our beliefs and actions? Poring over our Facebook and Tinder profiles, self-help books, personality tests and horoscopes... why are we so obsessed with the 'self'?
These questions have been around a lot longer than Facebook and Tinder, but modern science is affecting the philosophical approach, as well. British philosopher Julian Baggini has written widely about personal identity, and explores free will in his new book Freedom Regained.
Julian Baggini specialises in translating academic theories for a popular audience. He is the founding editor of The Philosophers' Magazine. He is also the author, co-author or editor of more than 20 books, including his bestsellers The Pig That Wants To Be Eaten and The Virtues of the Table.
He will participate in four events at The Auckland Writers Festival (10 - 15 May, 2016).
Watch Julian Baggini's 2015 TED Talk:
Topics: science, identity
Regions:
Tags: philosophy
Duration: 33'03"
10:39
Book review - A Dying Breed by Peter Hanington
BODY:
Reviewed by Gail Pittaway and published by Hachette.
Topics: books
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 5'02"
11:10
Business commentator Rod Oram
BODY:
Rod Oram discusses the proposal for the NZ Superannuation Fund and ACC to buy 25% and 20% respectively in Kiwibank from the Government, and the government's appointment of a one-man review of NZ's offshore trusts.
Topics: business, economy
Regions:
Tags: Rod Oram, business, economy
Duration: 17'54"
11:29
Vegan cattle rancher creates an animal sanctuary in Texas
BODY:
The tale of a texan cattle rancher who fell for a vegan.
EXTENDED BODY:
The tale of a texan cattle rancher who fell for a vegan...
It is a former beef cattle ranch that is now a sanctuary caring for farm animals. Quite a change of direction for Tommy Sonnen, who comes from a long line of farmers. But his wife Renee King-Sonnen became so attached to their cows that she gave up eating meat and embraced a vegan diet – and now Tommy is a convert, too.
Renee and Tommy have created the Rowdy Girl Sanctuary, where they now care for animals rather than raise them for slaughter.
Listen to Kathryn Ryan in conversation with Renee King-Sonnen.
Topics: farming
Regions:
Tags: Renee King-Sonnen, Tommy Sonnen, vegan, Texas cattle ranch, rowdy girl sanctuary
Duration: 11'47"
11:45
Media commentator Gavin Ellis
BODY:
Media Commentator, Gavin Ellis on the Paul Henry tv and radio show, one year on,. The RNZ Charter and what the amendment may mean for the future of the Public Service Broadcaster, and the Dominion Post is to be delivered as rural post and some in the provinces are far from happy.
Topics: media
Regions:
Tags: Gavin Ellis, media
Duration: 14'24"
=SHOW NOTES=
09:05 Homan Square: Claims of police brutality at off-the-books site in Chicago
Chicago police documents obtained by The Guardian have revealed how punches, baton blows and tasers were used by police at an off the books interregation site in the city.
More than 7000 people, most of them African Americans have been detained and interrogated at the warehouse called Homan Square without access to lawyers or people knowning where they were.
The Guardian has reported on allegations of torture and sexual assault made by several men who were held at the facility known as Homan Square.
Ted Pearson is a member of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, which has been campaigning against Homan Square ever since its existence came to light.
09:20 Changes to power of attorney legislation doubles costs for families
The number of people naming an enduring power of attorney has dropped by a third over the last eight years, which the Law Society blames on changes to the law in 2007, which have more than doubled the costs of the process.
Enduring powers of attorney name the person who takes control of your finances and major decisions if you lose the capability to make those decisions yourself.
Jonathan Orpin is a Wellington barrister and a member of the Society's reform committee.
09:30 Whittier, the tight-knit town that (almost) lives in one building
Welcome to Whittier, Alaska. It has a funny sounding name and an even funnier living situation. Nearly all of its 200 residents live under the same roof. The town's Mayor, Daniel Blair on his interesting town.
[gallery:1911]
09:45 US correspondent Susan Milligan
Susan Milligan with the stories that are making the news stateside.
10:05 What Makes You-You?
It's quite something to get your head around, what makes us who we are and do we have free will ? And what does it mean for us to be human? British philosopher Julian Baggini joins us to ruminate on the nature of self.
[image:64617:third] no metadata
Julian Baggini specializes in translating academic theories for a popular audience. He is the founding editor the Philosophers' Magazine. He is the author, co-author or editor, of more than 20 books including, his bestselling book, 'The Pig That Wants To Be Eaten' and 'the Virtues of the table'. His latest book, Freedom Regained, is an exploration of free will.
He comes to New Zealand next month as part of The Auckland Writers Festival which runs from the 10-15th May 2016, where he'll be participating in four events.
10:35 Book review
The book for review is A Dying Breed by Peter Hanington, reviewed by Gail Pittaway.
10:45 The Reading
11:05 Business commentator Rod Oram
Rod Oram discusses the proposal for the NZ Superannuation Fund and ACC to buy 25% and 20% respectively in Kiwibank from the Government, and the government's appointment of a one-man review of NZ's offshore trusts.
11:30 Vegan Texas cattle rancher creates an animal sanctuary
The tale of a texan cattle Rancher who fell for a vegan...
[image:64797:full] no metadata
Renee King-Sonnen has been instrumental in converting her husband's Texan cattle ranch to an animal sanctuary.
Her husband Tommy Sonnen comes from a long line of beef farmers, but the couple has embraced a vegan diet and created the Rowdy Girl Sanctuary on the property that was formerly a cattle raising ranch. They now care for animals on their holding outside of Houston rather than raise them for slaughter.
[image:64792:full] no metadata
11:45 Media commentator Gavin Ellis
Media Commentator, Gavin Ellis on the Paul Henry tv and radio show, one year on,. The RNZ Charter and what the amendment may mean for the future of the Public Service Broadcaster, and the Dominion Post is to be delivered as rural post and some in the provinces are far from happy.
=PLAYLIST=
Artist: Tami Neilson
Song: Loco Mama
Composer: Neilson
Album: Don't Be Afraid
Label: Neilson
Time: 09:21
Artist: Mel Parsons
Song: Alberta Sun
Composer: Parsons
Album: Drylands
Label: Private
Time: 09:33
Artist: Trinity Roots
Song: Little THings
Composer: Maxwell
Album: Home, land and sea
Time: 11:42
===Noon | Midday Report===
=DESCRIPTION=
RNZ news, followed by updates and reports until 1.00pm, including: 12:16 Business News 12:26 Sport 12:34 Rural News 12:43 Worldwatch
=AUDIO=
12:00
Midday News for 12 April 2016
BODY:
Christchurch caretaker Robert Burrett is sent to prison for sexually abusing a dozen girls; John Key hits back at critics of foreign trusts reviewer John Shewan.
Topics:
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 15'28"
12:17
House prices and sales gain in March - REINZ
BODY:
The housing market has got a new burst of life ahead of winter with prices and sales pushing higher.
Topics: business, economy
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 1'42"
12:19
Orion Healthcare shares sky rocket after UK contracts
BODY:
Shares in medical software developer Orion Healthcare have skyrocketed to a 10-month high this morning after news it has sold its patient record management packages to two hospitals in London and it will go ahead with a roll out of its technology in Scotland.
Topics: business, economy
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 46"
12:21
Foreign trust provider calls for greater regulation of trustees
BODY:
An Auckland-based foreign trust provider wants greater regulation of trustees in the wake of the Panama papers.
Topics: business, economy
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 56"
12:23
Public sector needs to speed up use of tech - NZTech
BODY:
NZTech represents the information and communication technology sector along with other high-end industries.
Topics: business, economy
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 1'21"
12:24
Midday Markets
BODY:
For the latest from the markets we're joined by Melika King at Craigs Investment Partners.
Topics: business, economy
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 2'14"
12:25
Business briefs
BODY:
In other business news, the tourism boom is filling all types of commercial accommodation.
Topics: business, economy
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 50"
12:26
Midday Sports News for 12 April 2016
BODY:
New Zealand basketball star Kirk Penney is heading home to the Breakers.
Topics: sport
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 1'57"
12:35
Midday Rural News for 12 April 2016
BODY:
News from the rural and farming sectors.
Topics: rural, farming
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 8'40"
=SHOW NOTES=
===1:06 PM. | Jesse Mulligan, 1–4pm===
=DESCRIPTION=
An upbeat mix of the curious and the compelling, ranging from the stories of the day to the great questions of our time (RNZ)
=AUDIO=
13:15
The refugee experience
BODY:
A Colombian refugee, Daniel Gamboa Salazar, wants Kiwis to get to know the truth behind stereotypes. Daniel became a refugee when he fled Colombia with his mother as a child, and is now an aspiring actor who lives in Lower Hutt and studies political science at Victoria University. He is also the president of the Refugee Youth Council.
EXTENDED BODY:
Daniel Gamboa Salazar wants Kiwis to get to know the truth behind stereotypes about refugees.
Daniel fled Colombia as a child. He is now an aspiring actor who lives in Lower Hutt and studies political science at Victoria University and is also the president of the New Zealand Refugee Youth Council.
Topics: refugees and migrants, politics, education
Regions:
Tags: refugees, stereotypes, Columbia, Victoria University, Refugee Youth Councils
Duration: 11'11"
13:27
Restaurant Award - Sid Sahrawat
BODY:
Auckland modern Indian restaurant Cassia has been named the Supreme Winner of this year's Metro Peugeot Restaurant of the Year Awards. It's one of two restaurants owned and run by Sid Sahrawat.
Topics: food
Regions: Auckland Region
Tags: restaurant awards
Duration: 10'46"
13:34
BREAKING NEWS - Alex Perrottet
BODY:
RNZ International reporter Alex Perrottet with breaking news from the Pacific.
Topics: Pacific
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 9'29"
13:40
Favourite Album - Little Girl Blue
BODY:
Little Girl Blue - Nina Simone
Topics: music
Regions:
Tags: Little Girl Blue
Duration: 13'19"
14:10
Feijoas expert June Allen
BODY:
It's that time of year when feijoas are ripening. June Allen has been working on a collection of feijoa recipes.
EXTENDED BODY:
It's the time of year when feijoas are ripening...
RNZ listener June Allen talks with Jesse Mulligan about her collection of feijoa recipes.
Topics: food
Regions:
Tags: feijoa recipes
Duration: 12'30"
14:35
Rebecca Traister - All the Single Ladies
BODY:
Women are choosing to stay single or marry later in life. It's a trend in New Zealand and in many parts of the world. Rebecca Traister investigates the reasons for the trend and its implications in her new book All the Single Ladies: Unmarried Women and the Rise of an Independent Nation.
EXTENDED BODY:
Women are choosing to stay single or marry later in life - in New Zealand and many other parts of the world.
The key is choice. Women won the right to vote in New Zealand before the rest of the world, but unmarried women had few other real choices. Social change and economic opportunity mean that has changed considerably.
Rebecca Traister investigates the trend in her new book All the Single Ladies: Unmarried Women and the Rise of an Independent Nation.
Read an edited snapshot of their conversation below:
In the introduction to the book you talk about how you always hated it when the heroines in the books you read as a child got married – books like Little House on the Prairie, Anne of Green Gables, Jane Eyre...
It's interesting, actually. When I first started writing the book – which is now about five years ago – that's how I knew I wanted to start the book, because I had such palpable memories from childhood of being so sad. Of course that book is a romance – the culmination is [Jane Eyre] marrying Mr Rochester. But it never felt like a happy ending to me. It felt like the end of the road for my favourite characters. Which of course it was because those books were coming-of-age books. And when you came of age, if you were a woman, that meant that you became a wife. You had to, you know, in most cases, because women were – as you said – economically, politically, socially, sexually dependant on their relationships with men and on being married in order to have economically stable and socially sanctioned adult lives. But I wasn’t sure, actually. It's so interesting because I wasn’t sure, as I started writing the book and I knew I wanted to kick off there – I couldn’t have told you how I knew to have that criticism as a young person. But in the years since then, I have a young daughter and I’ve been reading to her Little House on the Prairie books. And what I found as I read them out loud to her is there are several places were Laura Ingalls is directly critical of marriage and where she writes about being a young girl who dreaded it. I had no memory of that from my own childhood readings of those books, but surely that expression within the text had stayed with me in some way, and I knew that young women weren't necessarily looking forward to, because it wasn’t necessarily an institution that provided a happy ending for many women for many generations.
It's 80 years after Little House on the Prairie was written and marriage in some of our popular culture is still a kind of ultimate goal. Here in New Zealand we're in our second season of The Bachelor – a show where marriage is the prize. I know the show is huge in the US, too. What does that show say about where popular culture is in terms of marriage and where reality may be?
I think you look at both forward motion, progress, and resistance to that progress. So that's true in the United States, too. We also have many seasons of The Bachelor and The Bachelorette. We have a reality show called Say Yes to the Dress that's all about wedding shopping. The festishisation of weddings is this signal... Certainly on social media, where you have all kinds of Twitter and Facebook shots of engagement rings and wedding parties and everything. So the rise of that culture that fetishes, the rise of the wedding industrial complex has really been coterminous with the drop in marriage rates. And as more people have gotten married older and less frequently and it has become less the cornerstone institution of adult life, especially for women, culture has managed to fetishise it more and to sort of apply other kinds of pressure. And there are lots of complicated reasons for that. But it's very destabilising to be moving away from marriage as 'the norm' and as the defining institution and organising institution of adult life and of power, right? Marriage for many centuries has served as an institution that organises gender and power and organises us into ‘husband’ categories and ‘wife’ categories. And we're obviously mixing that up tremendously right now. Many people are not marrying. Same-sex marriage is now legal in the United States. People are marrying later and living outside of marriage for more years, having sex lives outside of marriage. Women are earners. And I count that as a move toward liberation and toward progress. But it's extremely destabilising. So there are all kind of reasons that people want to return, both for emotional nostalgic reasons – because they think of it as a time where the organisation was more in place, you knew what to expect of people, of power dynamics – and also because it was a very useful mode of controlling and making women subsidiary. Marriage was very useful in a lot of ways. And the shift in how we regard marriage and how we treat it in our lives provokes a lot of resistance and backlash.
Topics: author interview, books
Regions:
Tags: single women, All the Single Ladies: Unmarried Women and the Rise of an Independent Nation.
Duration: 24'34"
15:10
Autism Research - Dr Javier Javier Virues-Ortega
BODY:
There's no known cause ... and no cure. Autism remains one of the most complex disorders for researchers to tackle. But what if we could see inside the brains of sufferers to see if therapies are actually reshaping them? That's what a New Zealand team plans to do. It's a world-first study combining the latest behavioural science with cutting-edge functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology.
Topics: health, education, science, disability, technology
Regions:
Tags: autism, fMRI technology
Duration: 12'52"
15:45
The Panel Pre-Show for 12 April 2016
BODY:
What the world is talking about with Jesse Mulligan, Jim Mora and Zara Potts.
Topics:
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 15'30"
21:40
Yellow-eyed penguin numbers hit new low
BODY:
Yellow-eyed penguins have hit their lowest numbers on mainland New Zealand since the early 1990s, and it's the result of a number of issues in the marine environment
EXTENDED BODY:
“They’re not doing great at the moment.”
Over the past 25 years a concerted conservation effort on land had seen yellow-eyed penguin numbers in the South Island climb from just 140-or-so pairs to more than 500. But four years ago the penguin’s numbers began to crash, and this breeding season there were just 206 nests in Otago and the Catlins, and about 240 chicks successfully fledged.
The Yellow-eyed Penguin Trust’s conservation science advisor, Trudi Webster, says a whole suite of things have contributed to the population crash.
“They're not doing great at the moment," says Trudi. "We’ve had issues with avian diphtheria, there was a mass mortality of adults one year which is an unexplained potential toxin event … and there have been supposed barracouta attacks as well.”
Conservation efforts on land have focused on replanting trees and shrubs to provide safe nesting areas, and predator-trapping to prevent deaths caused by ferrets and stoats.
Now it seems many of the problems plaguing the penguins are coming from the sea – and Trudi has been tasked with pulling together research efforts to focus on what might be happening in the marine environment, and how that might change management of the birds.
The Yellow-eyed Penguin Trust’s Dave McFarlane says the Trust is moving away from managing the penguins at a population level to focusing on individual birds, and providing medical treatment and rehabilitation if needed.
This summer the Trust employed wildlife vet Lisa Argilla to provide veterinary care for sick and injured birds, which were then taken to one of two penguin hospitals to be cared for until they could be released.
Penguin Place’s Lisa King says that this has been a relatively quiet year at their penguin facility, but she worries that this might just reflect the yellow-eyed penguin’s shrinking population.
Lisa says Penguin Place, which runs penguin viewing tours, “didn’t really have a choice” about getting involved looking after sick and injured penguins back in the early 1990s.
“Over the last few years in particular the yellow-eyeds have had a very tough time, and we’ve had over 400 birds through this facility in the last three years.”
The worst year was 2013-14, when 187 yellow-eyed penguins came through the Penguin Place hospital; “this was a year when there were lots of starving chicks”. In 2012-13 there was a mass mortality event that affected adults, and over 70 birds were treated. 2014-15 saw 119 birds come through, and there was a mixture of starving chicks and adults with barracouta injuries.
“You can’t pinpoint one thing in particular, which is frustrating,” says Lisa. “If you could just say it’s ‘this’ and we can deal with this. It’s like every year you get hit with something else and it’s very frustrating.”
In this Our Changing World interview Alison Ballance discusses the history of the Yellow-eyed Penguin Trust and its work with Sue Murray and Dave McFarlane, and she also joins an expedition to the subantarctic Auckland Islands to count yellow-eyed penguins.
Topics: environment
Regions:
Tags: penguins, yellow-eyed penguins, Penguin Place, conservation, birds
Duration: 7'07"
=SHOW NOTES=
1:13 First Song
'Train To Nowhere' - Tomorrow People feat. Paua.
1:17 Colombian Refugee - Daniel Gamboa Salazar
A Colombian refugee, Daniel Gamboa Salazar, wants Kiwis to get to know the truth behind stereotypes. Daniel became a refugee when he fled Colombia with his mother as a child, and is now an aspiring actor who lives in Lower Hutt and studies political science at Victoria University. He is also the president of the Refugee Youth Council.
1:27 Restaurant Award - Sid Sahrawat
Auckland modern Indian restaurant Cassia has been named the Supreme Winner of this year's Metro Peugeot Restaurant of the Year Awards. It's one of two restaurants owned and run by Sid Sahrawat.
1:34 BREAKING NEWS - Alex Perrottet
The Papua New Guinea Prime Minister's lawyer has been arrested, in the latest development in a high-profile and long-running corruption case. Tiffany Twivey was arrested after landing at Jackson's Airport in Port Moresby in relation to legal proceedings against another client of hers - the Secretary of Treasury. Yesterday a Supreme Court judge was also arrested in relation to the same case - involving an alleged undercover government payment of $30 million US dollars to a PNG law firm - that has also implicated the Prime Minister himself.
1:40 Favourite Album
Little Girl Blue - Nina Simone.
2:10 Feijoas! - June Allen
It's that time of year when feijoas are ripening. June Allen has been working on a collection of feijoa recipes.
2:30 Feature interview - Rebecca Traister
Women are choosing to stay single or marry later in life. It's a trend in New Zealand and in many parts of the world. The key is the choice. Women won the right to vote in New Zealand before the rest of he world, but had few other real choices as unmarried women. Social change and economic opportunity mean marriage is not essential for a job and children like it once was and single women are not just spinsters or sad cat ladies. Author and writer at large for New York magazine Rebecca Traister investigates the reasons for the trend and its implications in her new book. All the Single Ladies: Unmarried Women and the Rise of an Independent Nation.
3:10 Autism Research - Dr Javier Javier Virues-Ortega
There's no known cause ... and no cure. Autism remains one of the most complex disorders for researchers to tackle. But what if we could see inside the brains of sufferers to see if therapies are actually reshaping them? That's what a New Zealand team plans to do. It's a world-first study combining the latest behavioural science with cutting-edge functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology.
3:20 BBC Witness - Romanian Orphans
Now we're going back to Romania in the spring of 1990 when after the fall of Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, news began to filter out of thousands of children living in terrible conditions in the country's orphanages. Lucy Burns of the BBC World Service history programme 'Witness' has been talking to Izidor Ruckel, who was one of them.
3:35 Our Changing World
Over the past 25 years a concerted conservation effort on land had seen yellow-eyed penguin numbers in the South Island climb from just 140-or-so pairs to more than 500. But as Alison Ballance finds out from the Yellow-eyed Penguin Trust's Trudi Webster and Penguin Place's Lisa King, the penguin's numbers have crashed in the last four years.
3:45 Pre-Panel Show
What the world is talking about with Jesse Mulligan, Jim Mora and Zara Potts.
=PLAYLIST=
JESSE'S SONG:
ARTIST: Tomorrow People feat. Paua
TITLE: Train To Nowhere
COMP: Avina Kelekolio, Tana Tupai
ALBUM: Bass & Bassinets
LIVE: iTunes
FEATURE ALBUM:
ARTIST: Nina Simone
TITLE: My Baby Just Care's For Me
COMP: Walter Donaldson, Gus Kahn
ALBUM: Little Girl Blue
LABEL: Bethlehem
ARTIST: Nina Simone
TITLE: Plain Gold Ring
COMP: George Stone
ALBUM: Little Girl Blue
LABEL: Bethlehem
ARTIST: Nina Simone
TITLE: Central Park Blues
COMP: Nina Simone
ALBUM: Little Girl Blue
LABEL: Bethlehem
ARTIST: Nina Simone
TITLE: Good Bait
COMP: Count Basie, Tadd Dameron
ALBUM: Little Girl Blue
LABEL: Bethlehem
ADDITIONAL MUSIC:
ARTIST: Kimbra
TITLE: Settle Down
COMP: Kimbra Johnson, François Tétaz
ALBUM: Vows
LABEL: Warner
THE PANEL: HALFTIME SONG
ARTIST: Bruno Mars
TITLE: Count On Me
COMP: Bruno Mars, Philip Lawrence, Ari Levine
ALBUM: Doo-Wops & Hooligans
LABEL: Elektra
===4:06 PM. | The Panel===
=DESCRIPTION=
An hour of discussion featuring a range of panellists from right along the opinion spectrum (RNZ)
=AUDIO=
15:45
The Panel Pre-Show for 12 April 2016
BODY:
What the world is talking about with Jesse Mulligan, Jim Mora and Zara Potts.
Topics:
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Duration: 15'30"
16:00
The Panel with Lisa Scott and Andrew Clay (Part 1)
BODY:
Panel intro;Panama papers;Methamphetamine scares;Across the ditch;Fake prince real debt.
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Duration: 23'41"
16:10
Panel Intro
BODY:
What the Panelists Lisa Scott and Andrew Clay have been up to.
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Duration: 2'28"
16:12
Panama Papers
BODY:
British MPs are releasing their tax records - should ours?
Topics:
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Duration: 4'40"
16:15
Methamphetamine scares
BODY:
The methamphetamine clean up industry. Dr Nick Kim talks about how dangerous P residue really is.
Topics:
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Duration: 11'38"
16:22
Across the ditch
BODY:
Is the phrase "across the ditch" a personal affront to Abel Tasman of the Tasman Sea?
Topics:
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Duration: 2'07"
16:27
Fake prince real debt
BODY:
New Zealand born Hohepa Morehu-Barlow has been imprisoned for the biggest embezzlement of public money in Queensland. Should his debt be suspended or the interest allowed to balloon?
Topics:
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Tags:
Duration: 2'21"
16:30
The Panel with Lisa Scott and Andrew Clay (Part 2)
BODY:
Connectivity; Panel says;Kicking smokers out of campsites;Wine on the move;Dangerous dogs;Choking;Listener feedback.
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Duration: 27'00"
16:33
Connectivity
BODY:
Is being widely socially connected all it's cracked up to be?
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Duration: 4'48"
16:35
Panel Says
BODY:
What the Panelists Lisa Scott and Andrew Clay have been thinking about.
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Duration: 4'49"
16:45
Kicking smokers out of campsites
BODY:
More places are becoming smoke free including campgrounds. Queenstown campground owner Duncan Ridd talks about whether going smoke-free is good or bad for business.
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Duration: 6'54"
16:50
Wine on the move
BODY:
A new mobile wine tasting service is awaiting approval in Queenstown.
Topics:
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Duration: 2'06"
16:53
Dangerous dogs
BODY:
Listener reaction to the latest dog attack on a child.
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Duration: 4'47"
16:57
Choking
BODY:
Golfer Jordan Spieth faltered at the Masters on the final day. Why does this happen?
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Duration: 2'53"
16:59
Listener feedback
BODY:
Some feed back from panel listeners.
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Duration: 3'18"
=SHOW NOTES=
===5:00 PM. | Checkpoint===
=DESCRIPTION=
RNZ's weekday drive-time news and current affairs programme
=AUDIO=
17:00
RNZ Checkpoint with John Campbell, Tuesday 12th April 2016
BODY:
Watch Tuesday's full programme here.
Topics:
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Duration: 00"
17:07
Court hears about ongoing impact of sex abuse
BODY:
The Education Minister Hekia Parata has asked the Education Council to work with the Ministry of Education to investigate extending its powers to all people who work with children in schools following the sentencing today of child rapist Robert Burrett.
Topics: education, crime, politics
Regions:
Tags: Education Council, child rapists
Duration: 3'54"
17:12
More on Robert Burrett
BODY:
Robert Burrett taught for more than 40 years in schools across the country as a Principal and Deputy Principal, before working as a tutor, relief teacher and bus driver.
Topics: education, crime, politics
Regions:
Tags: child sexual abuse
Duration: 5'44"
17:17
Little tables details of personal tax arrangements
BODY:
It's just been revealed that the Prime Minister John Key has a short term deposit with a company specialising in foreign trusts.
Topics: politics
Regions:
Tags: Foreign trusts
Duration: 3'52"
17:22
Fluoride responsibility shifts to DHBs
BODY:
The Government is taking the highly contentious decision about fluoridation of local water supplies away from local authorities.
Topics: health, politics, environment
Regions:
Tags: fluoridation, water supplies
Duration: 3'16"
17:25
Prominent man asks for permanent name suppression
BODY:
The well-known man at the centre of a Northland indecency trial has applied for permanent name suppression.
Topics: law
Regions:
Tags: name suppression
Duration: 2'31"
17:33
Evening business for 12 April 2016
BODY:
News from the business sector, including a market report.
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Duration: 1'49"
17:42
Compass meets with Southern DHB over meals
BODY:
For weeks now, we've been covering the food a company called Compass is providing to Dunedin Hospital, Southland Hospital and meals on wheels recipients in the Otago-Soutland area.
Topics: health, food, politics
Regions: Southland, Otago
Tags: Dunedin hospital, Southland Hospital, Meals On Wheels, Compass, Hospital Food
Duration: 5'03"
17:45
Cladding failing on Auckland Council building
BODY:
The high rise office tower that Auckland Council bought just a few years ago is failing, and any one of the large granite slabs that make up its exterior could fall at any time.
Topics: housing
Regions:
Tags: Leaky Buildings
Duration: 4'08"
17:50
Māori Party may withdraw Kermadec support
BODY:
The Labour and Maori Parties say they may withdraw their support for a law change to create a massive ocean sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands.
Topics: te ao Maori, politics, law, environment
Regions:
Tags: Kermadec Islands, ocean sanctuaries
Duration: 3'06"
17:53
Murder-accused was sexually assaulted, says defence
BODY:
Leonard Nattrass-Berquist is one of only two people who know what happened inside unit one at Ascot Epsom motel where a man was fatally bashed.
Topics: crime
Regions:
Tags: Auckland High Court trial
Duration: 4'36"
17:55
Kirk Penney returns to the Breakers
BODY:
The New Zealand Breakers will welcome home a high-flying Kiwi for the twilight of his basketball career.
Topics: sport
Regions:
Tags:
Duration: 1'44"
17:58
Abortion clinics in the US closing fast
BODY:
A few weeks ago, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump came under fire for his comments that women who have abortions should be punished.
Topics: health, politics
Regions:
Tags: US abortion clinics
Duration: 2'30"
17:59
Inky the Octopus' great escape
BODY:
A popular octopus has pulled off a great escape from the National Aquarium.
Topics: environment
Regions:
Tags: octopus escapes
Duration: 1'34"
18:10
Government wants mandatory reporting of all school staff
BODY:
The Government wants mandatory reporting for all school support staff, not just teachers and principals.
Topics: education, politics
Regions:
Tags: mandatory reporting
Duration: 3'05"
18:15
DHBs, not local councils, to decide on fluoridation
BODY:
The often contentious decision on fluoridating water supplies is to be taken away from local councils.
Topics: health, politics, environment
Regions:
Tags: water fluoridation
Duration: 5'47"
18:18
Is Ashburton's water worth bottling?
BODY:
As Ashburton, and surrounds, comes to grips with the fact that some of its water is so poor health warnings are periodically issued against it, and some of its water is so good, it's worth commercially bottling, confusion seems to be reigning over the purchase of the right to extract 40 billion litres of pure, artesian water in Ashburton itself.
Topics: environment, politics
Regions: Canterbury
Tags: Ashburton, bottled water
Duration: 5'57"
18:25
Inquiry launched into handling of tupapaku
BODY:
A Parihaka woman who uses Maori traditions to bury the dead wants a law change, which she says will let Maori deal with death in their own way.
Topics: te ao Maori
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Tags:
Duration: 3'03"
18:55
Today In Parliament for 12 April 2016
BODY:
The prime minister, John Key, faces more questions about tax havens. Opposition leader, Andrew Little, tables his tax records but his move not matched by the PM. John Shewan's appointment to head inquiry into the law surrounding foreign trusts is questioned by Winston Peters. Request for a snap debate on the decision to hold an inquiry into foreign trust law is declined by the Speaker, David Carter.
Topics: politics
Regions:
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Duration: 5'01"
=SHOW NOTES=
===6:30 PM. | Worldwatch===
=DESCRIPTION=
The stories behind the international headlines
===6:55 PM. | In Parliament===
=DESCRIPTION=
===7:06 PM. | Nights===
=DESCRIPTION=
RNZ's weeknight programme of entertainment and information
=AUDIO=
19:12
Our Own Odysseys -Sailing Home
BODY:
Dave Lawton left the UK in 1999 on a 12 metre sail boat called Beacon and cruised around the world with various crew before making it home to New Zealand in 2001.
Topics: life and society
Regions:
Tags: travel, sailing, Haiti
Duration: 20'05"
20:12
Nights' Pundit - Right Thinking
BODY:
The rationales of individual freedom and personal responsibility with Eric Crampton, head of research at The New Zealand Initiative. This week he tackles the sticky topic of sugar tax.
Topics: politics, economy, life and society, spiritual practices
Regions:
Tags: individual freedom, personal responsibility
Duration: 20'54"
=SHOW NOTES=
7:12 Our Own Odysseys -Sailing Home
Dave Lawton left the UK in 1999 on a 12 metre sail boat called Beacon and cruised around the world with various crew before making it home to New Zealand in 2001.
7:30 The Sampler
=SHOW NOTES=
=AUDIO=
19:30
The Sampler for 12 April 2016
BODY:
In The Sampler this week Nick Bollinger talks to rodeo rider-turned-country rocker Ryan Bingham, and confronts the 48-year history of prog-rock originals King Crimson.
EXTENDED BODY:
In The Sampler this week Nick Bollinger talks to rodeo rider-turned-country rocker Ryan Bingham, and confronts the 48-year history of prog-rock originals King Crimson.
Topics: music
Regions:
Tags: Ryan Bingham, King Crimson
Duration: 29'02"
19:31
Fear and Saturday Night by Ryan Bingham
BODY:
Nick Bollinger talks to rodeo rider-turned-country rocker Ryan Bingham.
EXTENDED BODY:
Nick Bollinger talks to rodeo rider-turned-country rocker Ryan Bingham.
There are plenty of singer-songwriters whose personal roots are a long way from those of the music they make. Your writer of dark Southern death ballads might have grown up middle-class in sunny Southern California, and that’s okay - writing songs is an imaginative act. But Ryan Bingham, who plays one show in Auckland later this month, is a songwriter and singer whose real life seems to have provided him with enough material that he’s never really had to make stuff up.
The New Mexico-born, Texas-raised singer was only 26 at the time of his debut album nine years ago, though he already had the voice you hear in his latest recording: a voice that sounds like whiskey and cigarettes and a dozen different kinds of hard living.
His parents were both alcoholics, and died young. By the time he was nineteen, the young Ryan was bullriding on the rodeo circuit.
It was his lived-in lyrics, as much as that weatherworn voice, that drew the music producer T-Bone Burnett to Bingham, who he hired to write ‘The Weary Kind’: the title song for the 2009 Jeff Bridges’ film Crazy Heart, for which Bingham won a Grammy. But the Hollywood glamour doesn’t seem to have distracted Bingham too much, as the earthy material on his latest record shows. The album is called Fear and Saturday Night, subjects he sings about like someone who has knows them intimately.
Nick Bollinger spoke to Ryan Bingham about the transition from rodeo rider to country-rocker.
Ryan Bingham plays at The Tuning Fork in Auckland on April 20.
Songs featured: Nobody Knows My Trouble, Gun Fighting Man, Adventures of You and Me, Diamond Is Too Rough, Fear and Saturday Night, Broken Heart Tattoos.
Fear and Saturday Night is available on Universal Records.
Topics: music
Regions:
Tags: Ryan Bingham, music, music review
Duration: 13'45"
19:32
Live in Toronto by King Crimson
BODY:
Nick Bollinger confronts the 48-year history of prog-rock originals King Crimson.
EXTENDED BODY:
Nick Bollinger confronts the 48-year history of prog-rock originals King Crimson.
It may seem like a cliche, but the late sixties was a time of ferment – in music as much as anywhere. Records like Sgt. Pepper and Hendrix’s Are You Experienced had shown that pop didn’t have to be simple in order to hold an audience; that the possibilities were as wide as your imagination. It was out of that moment that the music that came to be known as prog-rock was born. And chief among its architects was King Crimson.
King Crimson was the brainchild of an eccentric and technically accomplished guitarist from Dorset called Robert Fripp, who had played in jazz and rock’n’roll bands right through the 60s but - inspired by Hendrix and the Beatles - decided towards the decade’s end to create something of his own.
You could now hold up King Crimson’s 1969 debut In The Court Of The Crimson King as a kind of prog-rock primer. Does it rely on a high level of musical mastery? Check. Are the songs long? Do they employ elements of classical composition? Check, check. Is it difficult to play? Unusual time-signatures? Indeed. And when it comes to optional extras – florid lyrics, mellotrons, flute solos – it ticks those boxes as well.
For Fripp, though, that was just the starting point. And through various incarnations of King Crimson, along with numerous other projects - he’s remained a creative and individual force for five decades. In late 2014, after a long layoff, the now 69-year-old Fripp put the latest version of King Crimson together and took it out on the road. And in many ways it is an invitation to look back on all those years of work.
I’ll be honest: I’ve never been a big fan of prog-rock. It often reminds me of a remark supposedly made by George Bernard Shaw when he was told that the violin piece he was listening to was ‘very difficult to play.’ ‘Difficult?’ he said. ‘I wish it were impossible’. Still it’s hard not to be moved by this.
The double-CD set catches the current King Crimson in concert in Toronto last November and as a capsule of what this band is all about, it serves pretty well. It starts off, somewhat preciously, with the voice of Fripp himself asking us to put our cellphones away and refrain from photography; requests I’m sympathetic to in the context of a live concert, but which seem somewhat unnecessary listening in ones living room. But once the show gets going I can at least understand why the musicians wouldn’t want any distractions. This is a workout.
In a way, it seems Fripp has finally assembled the musical arsenal to realise his original ambitions. The latest version of the band has three drummers, no less – including former Ministry and Nine Imnch Nails drummer Bill Rieflin. Fripp once talked about the idea of ‘rock gamelan’: rock with the polyrhythmic complexity of Balinese gamelan music. Always obsessed with ways of shifting rock music off its traditional 4/4 axis, that’s undoubtedly what he achieves in thunderous tracks like the 43-year-old ‘Larks Tongues In Aspic’ or the recent ‘Level Five’.
The band is a hybrid of several previous line-ups and along with the more recent recruits, there’s bass player Tony Levin – a Crimson stalwart since the late 70s – and sax and flute player Mel Collins, who first played with the band as early as 1972. And it is like more than just uncharacteristic crowd-pleasing that leads Fripp to close the set with a trio of their best-loved – though rarely performed – tunes. ‘Starless’, in particular, always stood out as more than just a vehicle for virtuosity but as a fine piece of songwriting. Not all of King Crimson’s songs stand such scrutiny; especially those purple-piper Pete Sinfield lyrics on the first few albums. Perhaps Fripp saw all that lyrical stuff as a sweetener for listeners, something he could never really wait to get out of the way so he could break out the rock gamelan. Yet on Live In Toronto he embraces it all, from proto-metal to mind-bending polyrhythms; fey sixties poesy to furious funk. It’s a life’s work, singular, eccentric and generously shared.
Songs featured: 21st Century Schizoid Man, In the Court of the Crimson King, Red, Larks’ Tongues In Aspic Pt. 1, Level Five, Easy Money, The Construction of Light, Starless.
Live In Toronto is available on DGM/King Crimson Club.
Topics: music
Regions:
Tags: King Crimson, music, music review
Duration: 15'20"
7:30 The Sampler
Nick Bollinger talks to rodeo rider-turned-country rocker Ryan Bingham, and confronts the 48-year history of prog-rock originals King Crimson.
8:12 Nights' Pundit - Right Thinking
The rationales of individual freedom and personal responsibility with Eric Crampton, head of research at The New Zealand Initiative. This week he tackles the sticky topic of sugar tax.
8:30 Window on the World
Over the last decade, Korea has become known for a lot more than the manufactured consumer items that fuelled its economic success. Since the late 1990s, the 'Korean Wave' of popular culture has won great prominence and popularity across East Asia. And in our Window on the World tonight, British historian Rana Mitter is visiting South Korean pop producers, noise musicians and TV directors, to find out what has been driving the Korean Wave.
9:07 Tuesday Feature
David Baker travels to Silicon Valley to find out what shapes those who are shaping the way we live.
10:17 Late Edition
A round up of today's RNZ News and feature interviews as well as Date Line Pacific from RNZ International
11:07 At the Eleventh Hour
This week Global Village pays tribute to eclectic and adventurous Brazilian percussionist Naná Vasconcelos. The critically acclaimed artist released a series of recordings under his own name and as part of the Codona trio with Don Cherry and Colin Walcott. He was a longstanding partner with both Egberto Gismonti and Pat Metheny, and a much in-demand guest artist with such diverse performers as Laurie Anderson, the Talking Heads, the Gipsy Kings, Trilok Gurtu, Gato Barbieri, Paul Simon and more.
... nights' time is the right time...
===7:35 PM. | The Sampler===
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A weekly review and analysis of new CD releases
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19:30
The Sampler for 12 April 2016
BODY:
In The Sampler this week Nick Bollinger talks to rodeo rider-turned-country rocker Ryan Bingham, and confronts the 48-year history of prog-rock originals King Crimson.
EXTENDED BODY:
In The Sampler this week Nick Bollinger talks to rodeo rider-turned-country rocker Ryan Bingham, and confronts the 48-year history of prog-rock originals King Crimson.
Topics: music
Regions:
Tags: Ryan Bingham, King Crimson
Duration: 29'02"
19:31
Fear and Saturday Night by Ryan Bingham
BODY:
Nick Bollinger talks to rodeo rider-turned-country rocker Ryan Bingham.
EXTENDED BODY:
Nick Bollinger talks to rodeo rider-turned-country rocker Ryan Bingham.
There are plenty of singer-songwriters whose personal roots are a long way from those of the music they make. Your writer of dark Southern death ballads might have grown up middle-class in sunny Southern California, and that’s okay - writing songs is an imaginative act. But Ryan Bingham, who plays one show in Auckland later this month, is a songwriter and singer whose real life seems to have provided him with enough material that he’s never really had to make stuff up.
The New Mexico-born, Texas-raised singer was only 26 at the time of his debut album nine years ago, though he already had the voice you hear in his latest recording: a voice that sounds like whiskey and cigarettes and a dozen different kinds of hard living.
His parents were both alcoholics, and died young. By the time he was nineteen, the young Ryan was bullriding on the rodeo circuit.
It was his lived-in lyrics, as much as that weatherworn voice, that drew the music producer T-Bone Burnett to Bingham, who he hired to write ‘The Weary Kind’: the title song for the 2009 Jeff Bridges’ film Crazy Heart, for which Bingham won a Grammy. But the Hollywood glamour doesn’t seem to have distracted Bingham too much, as the earthy material on his latest record shows. The album is called Fear and Saturday Night, subjects he sings about like someone who has knows them intimately.
Nick Bollinger spoke to Ryan Bingham about the transition from rodeo rider to country-rocker.
Ryan Bingham plays at The Tuning Fork in Auckland on April 20.
Songs featured: Nobody Knows My Trouble, Gun Fighting Man, Adventures of You and Me, Diamond Is Too Rough, Fear and Saturday Night, Broken Heart Tattoos.
Fear and Saturday Night is available on Universal Records.
Topics: music
Regions:
Tags: Ryan Bingham, music, music review
Duration: 13'45"
19:32
Live in Toronto by King Crimson
BODY:
Nick Bollinger confronts the 48-year history of prog-rock originals King Crimson.
EXTENDED BODY:
Nick Bollinger confronts the 48-year history of prog-rock originals King Crimson.
It may seem like a cliche, but the late sixties was a time of ferment – in music as much as anywhere. Records like Sgt. Pepper and Hendrix’s Are You Experienced had shown that pop didn’t have to be simple in order to hold an audience; that the possibilities were as wide as your imagination. It was out of that moment that the music that came to be known as prog-rock was born. And chief among its architects was King Crimson.
King Crimson was the brainchild of an eccentric and technically accomplished guitarist from Dorset called Robert Fripp, who had played in jazz and rock’n’roll bands right through the 60s but - inspired by Hendrix and the Beatles - decided towards the decade’s end to create something of his own.
You could now hold up King Crimson’s 1969 debut In The Court Of The Crimson King as a kind of prog-rock primer. Does it rely on a high level of musical mastery? Check. Are the songs long? Do they employ elements of classical composition? Check, check. Is it difficult to play? Unusual time-signatures? Indeed. And when it comes to optional extras – florid lyrics, mellotrons, flute solos – it ticks those boxes as well.
For Fripp, though, that was just the starting point. And through various incarnations of King Crimson, along with numerous other projects - he’s remained a creative and individual force for five decades. In late 2014, after a long layoff, the now 69-year-old Fripp put the latest version of King Crimson together and took it out on the road. And in many ways it is an invitation to look back on all those years of work.
I’ll be honest: I’ve never been a big fan of prog-rock. It often reminds me of a remark supposedly made by George Bernard Shaw when he was told that the violin piece he was listening to was ‘very difficult to play.’ ‘Difficult?’ he said. ‘I wish it were impossible’. Still it’s hard not to be moved by this.
The double-CD set catches the current King Crimson in concert in Toronto last November and as a capsule of what this band is all about, it serves pretty well. It starts off, somewhat preciously, with the voice of Fripp himself asking us to put our cellphones away and refrain from photography; requests I’m sympathetic to in the context of a live concert, but which seem somewhat unnecessary listening in ones living room. But once the show gets going I can at least understand why the musicians wouldn’t want any distractions. This is a workout.
In a way, it seems Fripp has finally assembled the musical arsenal to realise his original ambitions. The latest version of the band has three drummers, no less – including former Ministry and Nine Imnch Nails drummer Bill Rieflin. Fripp once talked about the idea of ‘rock gamelan’: rock with the polyrhythmic complexity of Balinese gamelan music. Always obsessed with ways of shifting rock music off its traditional 4/4 axis, that’s undoubtedly what he achieves in thunderous tracks like the 43-year-old ‘Larks Tongues In Aspic’ or the recent ‘Level Five’.
The band is a hybrid of several previous line-ups and along with the more recent recruits, there’s bass player Tony Levin – a Crimson stalwart since the late 70s – and sax and flute player Mel Collins, who first played with the band as early as 1972. And it is like more than just uncharacteristic crowd-pleasing that leads Fripp to close the set with a trio of their best-loved – though rarely performed – tunes. ‘Starless’, in particular, always stood out as more than just a vehicle for virtuosity but as a fine piece of songwriting. Not all of King Crimson’s songs stand such scrutiny; especially those purple-piper Pete Sinfield lyrics on the first few albums. Perhaps Fripp saw all that lyrical stuff as a sweetener for listeners, something he could never really wait to get out of the way so he could break out the rock gamelan. Yet on Live In Toronto he embraces it all, from proto-metal to mind-bending polyrhythms; fey sixties poesy to furious funk. It’s a life’s work, singular, eccentric and generously shared.
Songs featured: 21st Century Schizoid Man, In the Court of the Crimson King, Red, Larks’ Tongues In Aspic Pt. 1, Level Five, Easy Money, The Construction of Light, Starless.
Live In Toronto is available on DGM/King Crimson Club.
Topics: music
Regions:
Tags: King Crimson, music, music review
Duration: 15'20"
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===8:30 PM. | Windows On The World===
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International public radio features and documentaries
===9:06 PM. | None (National)===
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Default World
How are the ethics, philosophy and lifestyles of the internet pioneers determining the way we all live? David Baker travels to Silicon Valley to find out what shapes those who are shaping the way we live. (BBCWS)
===10:00 PM. | Late Edition===
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RNZ news, including Dateline Pacific and the day's best interviews from RNZ National
===11:06 PM. | None (National)===
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A selection world music, along with jazz, rock, folk and other styles, artists and songs with world and roots influences chosen and presented by Wichita radio host Chris Heim (4 of 12, KMUW)