October 2000

If you dont live in Christchurch you may have never heard of The Steffan Van Soest Hit Machine. Thats too bad you're missing out big time. They rock. Their songs have had quite a bit of airplay on Christchurchs' RdU student radio station. If you get lucky you may even hear The Hit Machine doing the drunken dj thing in the early hours of the morning.

If you live in Christchurch you'll be pleased to know that the Hit Machine will be back playing gigs again real soon. In fact by the time you read this they will have already played a gig at Castle Hill village.

The first thing you notice is the name. No doubt your wondering where the hell it comes from. Pretty simple really the name comes from vocalist/guitarist/keyboardist Mr Steffan Van Soest. The hit machine evolved from Steffans solo stuff and home recordings.

His hedonistic Hit Machine consists of Paul Glubb on bass and Simon Nunn on drums. Matt was originally on guitar but he has cruised overseas and his place has recently been taken by Chris.

Paul is a professional actor and can be seen everyday as a bumble bee at about 2:25 on TV2. Cool huh, he also does theatre sports and stuff like that.

Simon Nunn is a busy busy ChCh muso. Right now he's in more bands than anyone I know. He plays drums in the mighty Hi-Tone destroyers as well as fronting his own crazy metal band Sulu. Not to mention playing bass in The Palace of Wisdom as well as some covers band. Drums are just one of many instruments Simon plays. His solo work is really cool and covers an amazingly wide range of styles.

Then we get to Steffan. He not only gives the band its name but also much of its attitude when on stage. The first time I saw them I could tell they were gonna rule even before they started playing. They just looked like they really had something to say. You know not another bunch of people who learned to play so they could pay homage to their idols. Much of the sounds originality comes from Steffans voice. The songs and endearingly maniacal vocals conjure up some pretty crazy imagery thats for sure.

Steffan lyrics are I guess sometimes offensive (but not to me) but thats the world folks. A lot of different subject matter pops up in Steffans songs. From Golf to harness racing to phone romances to monkeys to food hygiene to anal sex. All these songs combine to make the Steffan Van Soest Hit Machines "Horse" album the top Kiwi release of the last 18 months. High praise indeed.

These guys need to get the hell out of this country and try their hand in the bigger indie world. They are definitely on to something. I think maybe its called Rock & Roll. See what they have got to say for themselves . . .

GONE: Where did the Steffan Van Soest Hit Machine come from? Obviously it's your name Steffan.

Simon: Well, Steffan did a couple of shows at Hustlers, by himself and then he thought it would be funny to have a band with him.

GONE: What sort of stuff were you doing back then?

Steffan: 'Do you know the way to San Pedro', 'Torso in a box' & 'prison love'. Thats when 'prison love' came around.

Simon: 'Prison loves' a great song.

GONE: Is that on one of your RdU CDs?

Steffan: Yeah on the first one.

Simon: Is it really?

GONE: Did you cats all know each other pre The Hit Machine?

Steffan: I didnt know Simon. I knew Matt & Paul, I'd known them from like 6th form from some primary school reunion.

Paul: Primary school? What primary school did we go to?

Steffan: I went to Thorrington.

Paul: I never went to Thorrington.

Steffan: No, I know you didn't, but there was a Thorrington reunion and Ricks old band played.

Paul: Oh yes, thats right!

Steffan: Yeah thats where I got to meet up with the Cashmere cats.

Simon: My band before I was in the Hit Machine and Matts shared the same practice room. Then Matt & Steffan just turned up one day while I was practising drums and we recorded a song just there & then like that! Having known each other for like 2 minutes.

Steffan: That was Mexican Man.

Simon: No it was roller skate girl. It was the drums from roller skate girl, like right after we met.

Steffan: Roller Skate Girl, yes yes thats right . . . cause me & Matt were writing it the night before.

GONE: I'm going to record some songs after this, how about playing some of those older ones?

Simon: Youve gotta understand Ox, we haven't played together since Matt left and thats like 7 months ago.

Steffan: No! thats not 7 months ago.

GONE: If you can record a song in 2 minutes I'm sure you'll be sweet.

Steffan: Oh my God it has been a long time. 3 months?

GONE: Yeah, we came down from Blenheim for that gig The party gladiators were round the oven that night.

Steffan: Thats a blow to my brains time line!

GONE: Whats he (Matt) upto over there?

Steffan: Mexico . . .um . . happiness.

GONE: Yeah? cool. San Pedro. . .

All: Yeah . Laughs

GONE: Sooo... when was it that you first hooked up at 'Hustlers'?

Steffan: Easter weekend 98 on good Friday was my last solo gig where I played for 'Seaworlds last gig. Yeah and thats when I decided I wanted to have a whole band again.

GONE: How much solo stuff had you been doing before that?

Steffan: No I'd only done it one other time man ! Just people said 'come on man do it' but I had a seven moon. Laughs . I mean a seven inch called 'spots on the moon' and its got a picture of this guys face. Its just like solid black solid white silhouette kind of face sticking out of this space kind of nothing Laughs. Its got like kind of Pink Floyd like like pyramid triangle bullshit happening on it . . . but yeah it's like 4 songs. Its just all done on a 4 track.

GONE: Four tracks fucken rule!!

Steffan: Yeah they're excellent.

Simon: We only like to use four tracks pretty much.

GONE: I mean most studio stuff sounds shit!

Steffan: Yeah but thats because the people behind it are usually shit.

Paul: They should set it up like a playground . . . that would be cool

Steffan: They should have playground studios where its like a hands on experience, Sort of like a science fair but you make your own music. That would be real good. You hire the studio & tell those fuckers to fuck off and plug things in wherever you want. Oh no we don't need it, just unplug it . . . and put a bar in . Laughs.

Paul: There was a bar in the studio.

Simon: But there wasn't any beer in it.

All: Nah

GONE: Was that the studio you recorded your 'horse' album in?

Steffan: That was a practice room that got turned into a recording studio that we ended up using . . . they used the wrong room. . .the room we used for drums that's perfect for drums . . . thats old days . . . Mexican man days

GONE: That HERE COMES album just rules. I've probably taped around 10 copies for people around the country!!Laughs I'd like you to know that I paid $29 ninety five at Galaxy for mine.

Simon: Really.

GONE: Yeah the one with the bonus track . . . 1999 its the end of the world.

Steffan: Nah thats not the bonus track its the original here comes . . . You've got the album with the horse on the cover yeah?

GONE: Yeah your right its a different version of the first track (on the album)

Steffan: The bonus track is an original recording rather than a studio one. It was done in this very cool house in Le Bons bay .

All: Yeah.

Paul: Good for loud music, that house.

Steffan: Yeah yeah the whole house rocks . . like swaying. When you play loud music shit falls from the roof Ha Ha its a good place though eh . . . just the wind sound is amazing just amazing.

GONE: Is that earlier stuff still available?

Steffan: It's there if people want it yeah. We've got all the original stuff . . . Nobodys got spots on the moon apart from me.

All: Laughs

GONE: Have you got another 499 in the cupboard?

Steffan: Nah I've got the recording just ready to be pressed.

Simon: Have I listened to that?

Steffan: Youve heard most of it. It's got I know where I'm going.

Simon: I know where I'm going . . Jesus wept?

Steffan: Je . . . The original Jesus wept.

Simon: Is that the nice one with the birdie bit? Yeah I like that.

Steffan: Yeah yeah its just got this bird sample. Where the hell did I get that from? . . . I think I got that out of like a game or something . Just a bird game with a bullshit bird sample eh ... heaps & heaps of reverb on it with this bass drum just going boorm boorm . Yeah but it just had nice little keyboards in it so it was a nice track .... What else is on there?

Paul: Maybe we should go have a jam.

GONE: Soo . .. . you guys just started gigging as The Steffan Van Soest Hit Machine after Easter '98 and then just played steadily through last year, heaps of RdU air time . . .

Simon: We had a gig organized within 2 days of being together. Headlining at Hustlers

Paul: Players & Hustlers with The Cossack Knights (a Matt Alien band).

Simon: They were great. They rocked.

Steffan: We made money. We actually pulled enough people in to the gig.

GONE: Its been all downhill since? laughs

Paul: Ah no. We've had a lot of up times really.

GONE: Cash?

Simon: We made a bit here and there . . . we saved it up but cause Matt was going we split it up . . . I spent it all real fast.

Steffan: I was saving as well but I spent it all. I don't know what I brought with it eh? Jack shit ?

GONE: Is that from the Here Comes album?

Steffan: Nah it was mostly from gigs.

GONE: So your all from Christchurch except your from Wanganui Simon?

Simon: Yeah, I'm from Wanganui. I came down here in 1996 and I've been here ever since.

GONE: What did you come down for?

Simon: I was in this band and this other guy said . . . apparently the trees are better here. I don't know all I can remember is being here. Trees? yeah and apparently the clouds in Christchurch are the best in the world. . . Hey were going to have a Black Sabbath evening up here some time soon.

Paul: What shall we play? . . .We can play Iron Man.

Simon: Thats right we used to play that.



Paul: Wasn't there another one we had?

Simon: Umm . . . Caravan.

Steffan: I know how to play that.

Simon: It's easy eh?

Steffan: I just dont know what the words are. I can't hear what he's saying. I know how to sing it I just don't know what he's saying

GONE: How was your tour? Was that last year?

Simon: Oh yeah we went down south. We went to Invercargill and Dunedin.

Steffan: That was nuts.

All: Laughs.

Steffan: It took me 8 hours. We had 4 gigs in 3 days.

GONE: Where did you play?

Steffan: We played at The Provincial (chch). Then we decided . . .Hey lets leave town tonight so we'd get there in the morning and shit . . . so we wouldn't be so tired and get some sleep but no no. What time did we leave Simon? 2:30 like 1:30. Yeah and I got a flat tyre on the way down there . . and it was raining . . . it was blowing . . .and when I say it was raining I mean like . . . fuck God wants vengeance or something. I dont know. Laughs. I'd just got my car, I didn't know where the jack was. I looked all through it and shit like that but Japanese cars have secret fucken compartments eh? Secret fucken compartments that I didn't know about. So I wound up flagging down a 4wd to use their jack. Finally got the wheel changed. It took 8 hours to get there (Dunedin).

Paul: We had no sleep at all that whole night.Then we played at the Loaded Goblin.

Simon: I didn't know where we were staying cause I got there first.Yeah yeah it was our mate Chris Tait's and it was like 6 in the morning and I was knocking on all these peoples doors. Pissing people off.

Steffan: We played at 1 oclock too. To one person. Laughs. A couple of people. It was at the University. It must have been like the holidays or something like that cause nobody was there.

GONE: How did Invercargil go?

Simon: Oh it was great.

GONE: Yeah, where did you play?

Steffan: What the fucks it called?

Simon: Tillimans.

Steffan: There was a dog on the street .

All: Laughs.

Simon: We watched outside and all we saw was a police car and yeah .

Steffan: Okay, by was it 10:30? We were sposed to play at 9:30. By 10:30 we hadn't started and the only thing we had seen outside was a police car and a dog. That was it oh and the person who helped us break into Nicks car. He'd locked his keys in there. One dodgy person and that was it. Fucken mad. Then by 11 o'clock people started to come and by like 12 o'clock heaps more people came.

Simon: That was actually quite a good gig. Yeah it was wicked !!

Steffan: They were cunts at first but then they really enjoyed us . . . it was kinda cool.

Simon: And I found a wallet. Full of money . . . but I handed it in . . .ahhh.

Steffan: Yeah as soon as we had enough money to get petrol for the trip back we just stopped the gig and left eh.

Paul: It was enough to buy us a bottle of whiskey as well wasn't it?

Simon: Yeah we had a bottle of whiskey.

Paul: We went and stayed in the country . . . big country wrecked house.

Simon: Laughs . . . Cows came into the house.

All: Laughs

Steffan: The cows were wicked man . . . In the fire . . .ha ha ha trippy.

GONE: What sort of influences have you got? I know Simon is a keen metaller going by his other band Sulu.

Simon: Ah. no thats just a style thing really. . .cause metals really in at the moment and everyone loves it. I guess I just like to rock and stuff. Basically I love all music even pop music.

Paul: Youve got your soft tendencies in there though Simon.

Simon: I think collectively we like hard rock you know.

GONE: What about you Steffan?

Steffan: Umm . . . (thinks) . . . Slyfox.

All: Laughs.

GONE: Who the ?

Steffan: It's this song thats influenced me since I was a kid man. It's my . . It was my dream to find that song and I found it last night at RdU. It was great.

Paul: Who is Slyfox?

Simon: Thats the best name ever.

Steffan: Slyfox is the band and its called lets go all the way. It's like I mean American but it sounds kind of European. Kind of industrial . . . kind of bleep blop pop kind of . . . Crazy samples and stuff like that.

GONE: Whens it from?

Steffan: 1985 so its 15 years old.

Simon: I'm a big fan of Herb Allpit. The guy who signed the Carpenters to his label. He's a real good trumpet player dude. He used to be in The Tijuana Brass. Then he went through a sort of easy listening phase in the 80's. He's got some great albums. Ones called 'Blow your own horn' and ones called 'Beyond'. Beyond is great.

GONE: What about you Paul?

Paul: Umm . . as in my musical tastes. I like it all really I think.

GONE: Even electronic music.

Paul: No.

GONE: Good to hear.

Steffan: You know what I heard when I left your room Paul?

Paul: What?

Steffan: Electronic music.

Paul: No it wasn't. That wasn't me.

All: Laughs.

Steffan: Ambient music man . . . this baarrrh do dahh . . . sounded like the power of the mind extended remix.

Paul: It was Concert FM Steffan . . . and I think you might find that they have techno hour on Sundays.

All: Laughs.

Steffan: If you like classical music you must like techno its just classical music with beats . . . and synthesisers and lots of drugs.

Paul: Nigel Kennedy.

Simon: Jessica Simpson.

Paul: Tania Paige.

GONE: Jessica Simpson, is that like Bart & Lisas retarded sister?

Steffan: Thats whats under the stairs man.

Simon: Yeah.

GONE: All right lets wrap this up. Where to with the Hit Machine. This is your first practice for awhile. Any plans?

Simon: Weve never had any plans.

Steffan: Just more gigs I guess.

Paul: I'm quite keen to go to space.

GONE: Thanks guys.

Steffan Van Soest


Simon Nunn


Paul Glubb


Matt Hatt