Simon Grigg - How Bizarre: Pauly Fuemana and the Song That Stormed the World

I began writing this book shortly after Pauly died. It was never my intention to see it published. Rather, I thought of it as a private memoir and a way to somehow excise the pain I felt after Paulys far too early and, although I knew he was ill, unexpected death.

As perhaps the most complete witness to the phenomenon that was How Bizarre, having been there from the beginning and central to much of what went on day to day, I also felt there was a need to set the record straight. There had been, and continued to be, so many misplaced and erroneous statements and rumours about Pauly, How Bizarre and the other people involved in the records creation. I was in a privileged position. Not only had the record been released on my label but I had an almost complete set of documents from the period, including many internal PolyGram documents including financial records long lost by the company. This would allow me to present the first accurate account of this profoundly interesting event in New Zealand and international music history.

This book is not intended as a biography of Pauly Fuemana and should not be read that way. All the events surrounding both him and the journey of his song are seen from my personal perspective and experience.

In many ways this is a universal story. Hopes and dreams still fuel countless hours in recording studios, in home studios and on stages for people with the same sorts of aspirations that Pauly Fuemana, Alan Jansson and I had. And yet sometimes those dreams can go badly awry, even when you achieve what youve hoped for. So it was with How Bizarre. While I have sometimes held back on sensitive details, I have also tried to tell the truth, unpalatable though it may occasionally be.

I have Nick Bollinger to thank for the books ultimate publication. Nick read the manuscript as research for his profile of OMC on the AudioCulture website and suggested to publisher Mary Varnham that it would be of interest to a wide audience. I thank Mary and her colleagues Sarah Bennett, Kylie Sutcliffe and Emma Wolff at Awa Press for believing in me and in the power of the story.

I wish especially to thank Alan Jansson. It was Alans relentless belief, exceptional skill and musical genius in pulling together the disparate elements that he and Pauly penned over late-night coffee and drives that gave us the song we took around the world.

The people I respect most in the recording industry, Chris Caddick, Adam Holt and Brendan Smyth, have been very supportive and I thank them for their honest opinions and advice. These mean a lot. Adam was also a key player in the records international progress. Without him, Paul Dickson, Mark Phillips and Roger Grierson there would have been no global hit. There are many others to thank but I hope they will recognise their key input and support within the books pages.

Finally, there would, of course, have been no record without the unique talent of Pauly Fuemana. He and the Fuemana family have left an indelible impression on popular music and its ongoing life.

Simon Grigg

August 2015

First edition published in 2015 by Awa Press, Unit 1, Level 3, 11 Vivian Street, Wellington 6011, New Zealand.

Paperback ISBN 978-1-927249-22-2

Ebook formats

Epub 978-1-927249-23-9

Mobi 978-1-927249-24-6

Copyright Simon Grigg 2016

The right of Simon Grigg to be identified as the author of this work in terms of Section 96 of the Copyright Act 1994 is hereby asserted.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publishers prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of New Zealand.

Cover photograph by Carmen Kemmink

Cover design by Greg Simpson

Author photograph by Stuart Page

Ebook conversion by Emma Wolff

Find more great books at awapress.com.

Produced with the assistance of

Simon Grigg is a music industry professional and writer. His career has included artist management, music publishing, label ownership, clubs and radio appearances. Between 1977 and 2007 he released or was behind over 150 New Zealand-produced records, of which three-quarters entered the charts. How Bizarre and subsequent singles and albums by Pauly Fuemana were released on his Huh! label. In 2012 he became creative director of AudioCulture, a website that works with artists, historians and music industry people to tell the stories of New Zealand popular music culture, from the first vinyl recording in the 1920s to digital streaming today. He lives in Auckland and Bangkok. This is his first book.

For Brigid and Bella

It was a strange funeral service for someone so famous and so young, and seemed only to multiply the sadness. It started forty-five minutes late: the hearse had apparently got lost on its way in from South Auckland. The venue, a Pacific Islanders church near Karangahape Road in Aucklands inner-city underbelly, was in a backstreet known for its late-night hookers. I had assumed the church would be overflowing but it was only about half full. The family was there of course, and Paulys kids looked both proud and, for want of a better word, regal. The Fuemana clan was as close to South Auckland music royalty as it was possible to be. These young people were the heirs apparent to all that Pauly and his brother Philip had played a pivotal part in creating.

Paulys sister Christina stood and sang. The songs lyrics were a little too close for comfort to Luther Vandrosss heart-tugging swansong Dance With My Father but tears flowed across the aisles. I was close to crying myself as I remembered Pauly leaning on a railing by the Seine, somewhere near Notre Dame, on a stinking hot Paris day in July 1996, saying with a massive grin on his face, Were in Paris, bro. Paris!

We had looked at each other silently for a moment, reflecting for the first time where, after months of chaos, recent events had taken us. Going to Australia had been just doing what thousands of Kiwi musicians had done over the years, but having a huge hit there had been thrilling and given us an inkling of the possibilities that lay ahead. We had then found ourselves being feted in the United Kingdom. Now the song we had released so hopefully in New Zealand just seven months earlier had brought us to the famous left bank of Frances greatest river.

After the end of that year the grin would disappear as the demands of record companies overwhelmed us, lawyers circled us with stopwatches firmly in fee-charging mode, and Pauly took the missteps that would eventually destroy his career.

I stood in silence in the church, thinking in a scattershot way about what had been, but mostly about a man who had, despite all that had happened, been a mate. For all the big ups and huge downs the darkness, the violence, the mistakes I still had a strong affection for Pauly and hated that his life had ended with him penniless and with few friends. But I had not been surprised when I took the call that Sunday morning telling me he had gone.

The media would later say there were two hundred and forty people at the service. Realistically, the number was perhaps half that. As well as Paulys extended family, there were parishioners of the Newton Pacific Islanders Congregational Church, some of whom may have known Pauly as a kid from the years when his grandmother, who raised him as a boy, took him to services there.