The Verlaines


It’s no surprise to find the song playing as the central characters in Scarfies – Robert and Duncan Sarkies’ smart evocation of Dunedin 80s student life – knit themselves together in their new home is ‘Death and The Maiden’. The Verlaines’ single could well be the ultimate 1980s student anthem.

The words and The Verlaines’ name itself have enough pretension and mystique to provoke the air of difference that keen young minds seek. And they fit the infectious and similarly appropriate, clangorous rush of trebly, reverberated guitar with locked-in rhythm, broken up only by a woozy, off-kilter middle, perfectly. Flip that July 1983 single and you get ‘CD, Jimmy Jazz And Me’, where The Verlaines’ Graeme Downes imagines himself in bohemian Paris with Claude Debussy and James Joyce.

Death And The Maiden
C.D. Jimmy Jazz and Me - bFM In Session
Hanging By Strands
Robbie Yeats, The Verlaines.
Death And The Maiden (live on National Anthem, May 2004)
The Verlaines.
Pyromaniac
The Funniest Thing
The poster for The Verlaines' Hallelujah - All The Way Home, 1985
Photo credit: Graeme Hill collection
Graeme Downes and Jane Dodd, The Verlaines, at the 2014 reunion gig at the Kings Arms, Auckland. 
Juvenilia, 1993
David Mitchell poster for The 3Ds and The Verlaines. NYE 1991
Photo credit: Design by David Mitchell
Robbie Yeats, Graeme Downes and Jane Dodd, probably early 1984
Graeme Downes on stage with the Verlaines performing 'Way Out Where', the title song of their 1993 album. The drummer to his left is Darren Stedman. 
The Verlaines, Hallellujah - All the Way Home (Flying Nun, 1985). 
The Verlaines, The Chant and The R.I.P. at the Dunedin Music Centre, 28th January, 1983
Photo credit: Graeme Hill Collection
Jane Dodd and Robbie Yeats
Photo credit: Photo by Jonathan Ganley
Graeme Downes, The Verlaines.
Graeme Downes and (right) Jane Dodd of The Verlaines, performing at the Kings Arms, Auckland, 2014.
Joed Out bFM In Session
The Verlaines reviewed in Book of BiFim, 1986.
Zippy's Last Tour, February 1985
Graeme Downes performing with The Verlaines
The Verlaines outside Graeme Downes's home at 101 Dundas St, Dunedin, c. 1986, just before Bird Dog was released. From left: Jane Dodd, Robbie Yeats, Graeme Downes. 
1984 poster for The Captain Cook
Photo credit: Design by Sarah Caselberg
Interview with Graeme Downes from The Verlaines, 30 June 1994. Directed by Ross Cunningham.
Robbie Yeats, The Verlaines.
Wind Song
The poster for the 1986 12-inch Doomsday single
Photo credit: Ian Dalziel collection
It Was Raining
The Verlaines at Auckland's Windsor Castle probably in 1984
The Verlaines in the Californian desert, during the sessions for the 1993 album Way Out Where at NRG Recording Studios in North Hollywood, Los Angeles. From left: Darren Stedman, Mike Stoodley, Graeme Downes, and Paul Winders. 
Photo credit: Jeff Bender
Graeme Downes, The Verlaines.
Graeme Downes.
Bird Dog
The Verlaines.
The Verlaines in 1982 - Graeme Downes, Jane Dodd, Greg Kerr
Photo credit: Photo by Terry Moore
Doomsday
Death and The Maiden (1983)
Untimely Meditations, 2012
Photo credit: Design by Todd Narbey
1985 poster for Bird Dog by John Collie
Photo credit: Design John Collie
Where Do You Think You're Going - Live at Avalon Studios for Radio With Pictures (1987)
1985 Verlaines, Rip and Weeds poster
Photo credit: Design by Robert Scott
Baud To Tears - Live at Avalon Studios for Radio With Pictures (1987)
Come Sunday - Live at Avalon Studios for Radio With Pictures (1987)
Anniversary
Jane Dodd, The Verlaines.
The Verlaines on the cover of Rip It Up, December 1985; original B&W photo by Jeremy Freeman
The Verlaines, The Stones and The Clean. This was The Verlaines first gig as a three piece, 1981. They only played three songs before it was shut down
The Verlaines at The Windsor Castle, Auckland, December 1985
Photo credit: Graeme Hill collection
Labels:

Flying Nun


Slash


Homestead


Columbia


Matador

Trivia:

Flying Nun reissued Hallelujah - All The Way Home and Juvenilia in December 2013.

Members:

Graeme Downes - vocals, guitar

Jane Dodd - bass

Alan Haig - drums

Phillip Higham - bass

Craig Easton - guitar, vocals

Greg Kerr - drums

Anita Pillai - keyboards

Robbie Yeats - drums

Caroline Easther - drums

Mike Stoodley - bass

Gregg Cairns - drums

Paul Winders - guitar

Darren Stedman - drums

Russell Fleming - bass

Stephen Small - keyboards

Tom Healy - guitar

Rob Burns - bass

Chris Miller - bass

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