Just re-released on Flying Nun, ’Kaleidoscope World’ is the Chills album that just keeps on expanding.
Originally an 8 track compilation of some of the best of their earliest releases ‘Kaleidoscope World’ more than doubled in length for its first CD release with a whopping additional 9 tracks drawing together everything else from those releases.
At which point you might have imagined that the early Chills catalogue would have been comprehensively mined. Yet this version improbably proves that not to be the case as it adds another half a dozen worthy cuts.
We’ll come to those additions shortly but it’s worth reflecting on what makes this an important record.
‘Kaleidoscope World’ was never the Chills debut LP – that honour is reserved for ‘Brave Words’. But it undeniably contains a significant number of key tracks, many of which survive in the live set today.
The relative isolation of New Zealand in the early to mid 80s really makes ‘Kaleidoscope World’ unique. Instead of being influenced by what was happening in the wider rock world, the coterie of like-minded Dunedin bands such as the Verlaines and the Clean were far more important to the Chills development.
Accordingly it’s a record brimming with vitality which showcases how versatile this band could be.
The exemplar of this is the eerie, much covered, ‘Pink Frost’ which still today sounds like nothing else. The Chills could also be more straightforward – the rocking ‘I Love My Leather Jacket’ is one such tune but it’s upbeat nature conceals the fact that it concerns the tragic early death of drummer Martyn Bull.
But it’s a staggeringly varied set ranging from the experimental ‘Whole Weird World’ through to the throwaway ‘Bee Bah Bee Bah Bee Boe’ via the punk-ish ‘Bite’ (which owes more than a little to the Buzzcocks) and surf (near) instrumental ‘Purple Girl’.
And unlikely, as it seems the six extra tracks, a mixture of studio tunes and live recordings (including early version of The Oncoming Day’ and ‘Dan Destiny and the Silver Dollar’), are of a high standard and contribute to making this release worthwhile.
As the Chills were assimilated into and buffeted by the commercial pressures of the music business their sound inevitably changed. Accordingly ‘Kaleidoscope World’ stands alone as a pure, undiluted testament to Martin Phillipp’s singular musical vision.
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