Here are books I enjoyed reading that cover two important underground music scenes that may have escaped some folks’ notice. Needles and Plastic, subtitled Flying Nun Records, 1981-1988, is an exhaustive tome by Matthew Goody. It discusses every record released by the New Zealand label Flying Nun over those eight years. Artists like The Chills [Tape Op #4], Tall Dwarfs [#22], The Verlaines, The Clean [#22], Alastair Galbraith [#3], and many of my favorites are here.
A Really Strange and Wonderful Time, subtitled The Chapel Hill Music Scene: 1989-1999, is by Tom Maxwell, a former member of Squirrel Nut Zippers. Tom covers a more personal history of this North Carolina region, drawing in a bit of oral history as well as his own perspectives. Artists such as his band, Archers of Loaf [Tape Op #166], Superchunk [#76], Metal Flake Mother, Polvo [#78], Southern Culture on the Skids [#122], The Veldt, and many others show up here.
As I finished both books, what struck me most was the amount of discussion about where and how to record. In both scenes, it comes up over and over. Where can they make the album? Did they like the results? Did the recording people help or hinder the process? Was there enough money or time?