Off to battle it out

MURRAY WILSON/Manawatu Standard

DON'T GO OUT IN THE RAIN: (clockwise from bottom left) Shorty Galuszka (bass guitar), Jono Galuszka (drums), Abby Parker (keyboard), Grant McBride (guitar) and Tashee Smith (vocals), of alternative pop rock band Ruski, shelter from the Palmerston North weather.

Relevant offers

Arts on Friday

Pair happy to be strung out Sounds of youth in cafes Questions for the viewers Music groups in youth festival Old sketches bring 1970s Feilding to life Selections of a private collection And the winner is... Planet Earth The shape of things Step, pivot and kick...

From Mount Maunganui to Christchurch, Hamilton to Papakura, more than 120 bands around New Zealand have been rocking out for the title of the nation's best band.

MICHELLE DUFF caught up with Palmerston North's Ruski and Urban Ersha, who will hit Wellington for the Battle of the Bands regional final this Saturday night.

Ruski is Tashee Smith on vocals, Grant McBride on guitar, Jono Galuszka on drums, Rochelle (Shorty) Galuszka on bass guitar and Abby Parker on keyboard.

It wasn't quite American Idol, but when vocalist Tashee Smith showed interest in joining Ruski, the selection process was brutal.

It began in a Palmerston North cafe, where founding members Jono Galuszka and Grant McBride quizzed her on everything from her musical tastes to preferences in alcoholic beverages. When they asked her if she wanted a beer she said no. Was this a good or a bad sign? They couldn't decide. So, for the next test.

"We recorded this really rough, shitty demo on our laptops, and we were like, `OK, if you're going to be a singer in our band, record something over this'," says guitarist McBride.

So she did, and that's where the pair's scepticism ended.

"I was like, `I wonder what this will sound like?' and she sang and it was awesome, " Galuszka says.

Listen to Ruski's single Feathers to Leather, which was voted best song on Massey University radio station Radio Control earlier this year, and you will begin to understand their excitement. Smith's voice is unique and powerful.

Since forming in 2007, Ruski has brought its version of alternative rock to Massey orientation balls, gigs at The Stomach and The Royal Tavern, and the stage at music festival Parachute.

In 2008, with the help of The Stomach, the band produced a seven-track EP, and with a sound that's alternative, but "brutal," enough for the moshers in the audience and sedate enough for the grandmas. They've formed quite a following.

When Smith joined, however, things weren't going too smoothly.

Keyboardist Abby Parker, who met McBride and Galuszka during a creative writing paper at Massey University, had grown up to a melody of Trinity music piano examinations and classical sounds.

When the band got together for the first time, along with Galuszka's sister, Shorty, on bass guitar, Parker had no idea what to play.

"Abby brought her theory books to practice and tried to play Beethoven to us, and we were like `no'," McBride says.

"It was weird," Parker admits. "I didn't know how to jam and I wasn't very good at improvising. Classical music is really structured."

With no real knowledge of each other's strengths, the band played to their own tune for a while. Practices took place in a tiny flat.

"We thought we were really cool, because we were in a band, but we were just a terrible band playing in a lounge," Galuszka says.

It wasn't until this year, when the band began to record its first LP at The Stomach, that the members have begun to feel happy with their music.

It is officially the first band to record in the Stomach's new studio, and hope to have the record released by the beginning of next year.

How have they developed as a band?

"We all know what our job is," McBride says. "And because we are a five-piece group, there's a lot going on in the songs. The thing that is quite unique is that we have female vocalists and a classical pianist over a guitar line that is quite heavy, and people don't expect it."

Four of the band members have recently moved to Wellington, with only Galuszka still in Palmerston North. The plan is for him to move too, so Ruski can start "repping it hard", in Wellington, Smith says.

The set for tomorrow night's Battle of the Bands finals will be hard and fast, leaving the crowd at Bar Bodega with no mistake as to who they are. "We're just going to punch them in the face," Smith says.

Urban Ersha is Davis Sione and Fiti Fata on vocals, Christian Praat on vocals and guitar, Evan Richmond on bass guitar and Ben Jamison on drums.

They have played at most of the pubs in Palmerston North, so why doesn't anyone know their music? Chances are, if you've been to The Celtic, Murphys Bar, The Grand, High Flyers or the Brewers Apprentice on a Friday or Saturday night in the past few years, you will have heard Urban Ersha.

The five-piece, all-guy band has a slick show, with the vocal harmonies of Davis Sione, Fiti Fata and Christian Praat forming a smooth, live sound. But since forming in 2005, the group has had hardly any chance to play their own tunes.

They began as a covers band, after Praat and Sione discovered a mutual love for music at Horowhenua College. Richmond was recommended by a guitar-playing friend, while Fata was recruited by Sione when the pair went head to head in a karaoke competition at the Soul Bar.

The band's first gig was at The Celtic Inn. Four years later, they're keen to play their own songs, but the covers circuit has been a hard one to break.

"Obviously, being a musician you want to play original music," says guitarist Evan Richmond.

"Covers are easy to do. Someone else has already done the hard work and written the songs for you.

"But being on the covers circuit is sort of like a part-time job."

It quickly became frustrating, Praat says, especially when the band became so popular that people would come up after their gigs and ask where they could buy an album.

"They would be like, `Do you guys have a CD?' and you're like, `You don't even know what our music sounds like'."

For the record, the band's sound is pop rock. They sing about love, girls and sex, with songs like Blinded and My Love, combining harmonies reminiscent of the Backstreet Boys with the rock element of Opshop. "One key to our sound is we have three-part vocal harmonies. At the Battle of the Bands [heats] we destroyed everyone in the vocal department," Richmond says. "It's an afterthought for a lot of bands, but it's in the forefront for us."

The band has been writing its own music since the beginning, releasing EP Four Shades of Black in 2008. But the heats of the Battle of the Bands was one of the first times they played it in public.

"It's been a rush," Jamison says. "It's like a break for us, being able to share the original ideas in a public way."

Taking their music out of the garage has made them more confident, Richmond says.

"You spend a lot of time in the shed, and we think it's good, but when you actually take it out there and there are people cheering and dancing, and you are like, `Oh, it's actually good'. It's kind of an art form writing a song. You've got to try not to make it complicated and listen to your own ego too much."

Their dream is to make it big on the festival scene, similar to Kiwi rockers Kora, beginning with smaller gigs before playing at the Big Day Out and making a living from music.

They are not sure what songs will come out during their 20-minute set tomorrow night, but they can't wait to get down there, Richmond says.

"I feel excited but nervous. I guess it's good to have a bit of nervousness for adrenaline."

Ruski can be found at myspace.com/ruskimusic, and Urban Ersha at urbanersha.com.

- © Fairfax NZ News