Hi there Shoppers...

Hi there Shoppers...


We have put a few of our songs up on www.worldsings.com which is a music social site that is also running a competition to find the best band in the world.

Basically the twenty bands that receive the most votes for their song(s) will get to compete in a live competition in the US to find the World’s best band!

It’s really easy to vote, all you need to do is sign up for free and then cast your vote (hopefully for OPSHOP). It only takes a few minutes to register and vote so if you could help get us up onto the top 20 leaderboard it’d be sweet as it will give us a better shot at the title!

OPSHOP

We thought so : ) So do we !! To make that happen we're taking some time off playing live (... but not too long) to concentrate on putting together a new album.

We'll still be popping our heads out of the studio every now and then to check on our various cyberspace communications portals so be sure to post us a line, comment, invitation, marriage proposal, joke, recipe, poem, how to manual, links to people doing stupid s%#t on youtube, or whatever and we'll be sure to keep in touch.

Thanks for such a fantastic couple of years you lot. Seriously!! Let's do it all over again soon.

Love as always...

OPSHOP

More FM Winery Tour 2009
February 17th - Cooks Garden Wanganui
It struck me as odd that the signage for today's venue read "Cooks Garden". Only because we were listening to Jim Mora's National Radioshow on the way, More FM of course being our station of choice usually - hehe, and there is apparently some debate in the world of punctuation (that sounds like a nice place to take a holiday) about the use, or misuse of the apostrophe. In fact some punctuation anarchists are suggesting that the redundant apostrophe( ' )s use be stricken from the english language altogether. Does the name suggest that the garden belongs to Cook? Or is it some poetic description of a place where Garden's get cooked?

Don't let the name fool you, its not a garden, nor is it a winery. Its a sports stadium with a running track and is home to the local rugby team.
Sometimes you have to find ways to fill your time waiting around for dinner or soundcheck etc... Two members of the group have invented/discovered(?) a card game called Bum. They've been playing it seems most every night and agreed to bet on the outcome of a 21 game stretch, with the loser made to do a naked run through the venue of the victors choice. I'm told there was an overall draw after having made it to 10 all with one no contest. Which essentially means no-one won and so mutual agreement was reached that both should suffer the humiliation of defeat.

Did I mention Cooks Garden has a running track? I'll let your imagination do most of the work but to get you started, picture if you will 2 skinny pasty white musicians running the full 1,500 metre track, perhaps in slow motion to the Chariots of Fire theme. There is video footage but some editing will need to be done to remove their apostrophes for safe viewing.
Cheers

Bobby.

February 20th - Mystery Creek Winery Hamilton.

I woke up this morning to the rain absolutely pelting the roof to my hotel room. This was around 8am. Come 12:30pm nothing had changed and going by the weather update on t.v there looked to be no let up as the North Island was being hit by a weather bomb coming off the Tasman sea. It wasn't cold, in fact it was hot which made things worse as it became humid and sticky.
It wasn't looking good for show day and we were all waiting on the 2pm call from tour management as to whether the show would be cancelled or at least postponed. Frantic calls were going back and forth with one of the promoters ringing to ask Jason if we could play a show the night before his wedding in a couple of weeks.

I felt for the crew who had worked tirelessly to set up the huge stage as they were put on standby until further notice to start wiring the electrical gear. We were told soundcheck at the very least was cancelled.

Some of us decided to go in to town for lunch where anxious locals were asking us for status updates that we couldn't give them. Finally the call came at 2:30pm that the Met Service had predicted the rain to clear at 4pm and that show would go ahead starting an hour later than planned. Huge marquees where bought in from Auckland and Straw was laid down to soak up excess water.
Just as we took the stage the sun started to come out and the crowd that were expecting to be soaked through and to be dancing in mud were extra appreciative and I think the anxiousness of the day injected to show with a certain energy. What a fantastic night!!

Cheers

Bobby.

More FM Winery Tour - Day 5. Sacred Hill, Rifleman's Vineyard (Napier)

We started the day with a lunch at the Cellar Door at Sacred Hill. Two lucky young ladies had the pleasure of attending lunch with Opshop - courtesy of a competition run by New Idea Magazine. The band arrived at the restaurant just before the ladies, and were greeted by Tony Bish - the wine maker for Sacred Hill. Sarah and Susan (the prize winners) made their grand entrance, and after a quick hello, we all sat down to an amazing lunch, that was complimented by some outstanding wines - my favourite was the Sacred Hill Deerstalker's Syrah.... Delish!!!

Not too long after being plied with some great food, wine, and company, we had to headed off to sound check - the humidity was crazy!!!

6pm rolled around and it was show time for Opshop. We jumped around and had some fun with the audience - who, despite some annoying drizzle, jumped around and had a few laughs with us too. After our set we got to hang around and catch Anika Moa, and Dave Dobbyn's sets - AWESOME!!!

It was the first time Sacred Hill had participated in the More FM Winery Tour - I'm sure it won't be the last!!

Many thanks to Tony Bish, and the rest of the team at Sacred Hill for the hospitality, and laughs - good times!

More FM Winery Tour - Day 6. Transit Day

We had the day off to travel from Napier to Havelock North. We weren't too sure how we were going to manage the arduous pilgrimage. It was a daunting task, but with sheer grit and determination we made the epic 21.5km trip in about 25 minutes...SWEET!!

More FM Winery Tour - Day 7. Black Barn Vineyards, Havelock North

Another hot and humid day for Havelock North... Mmm... Sticky!!

We arrived at the venue for sound check - what a great place! Black Barn Vineyards have carved a small amphitheatre out of the side of a hill for shows etc - it's great. We finished our sound check and made our way (by golf cart) up to our green room. Now, Opshop has recently finished a pub tour of New Zealand, and to be honest, some of the green rooms we had on that tour were pretty rough - not so with Black Barn Vineyards. The green room that was shared by us, Anika, Dave & co. was a house near the top of the hill that over looks the venue, with wide sweeping views of Hawkes Bay - Stunning!... Oh... Did I mention the heated swimming pool? Needless to say, the pool was utilised by all and sundry - especially with the humidity of the day.

Showtime... Opshop hit the stage running, and we, once gain had a blast belting out some tunes. Even a few showers couldn't keep the locals from kicking their shoes off and getting their groove on in the mud... Nice work Havelock North!

After the show, a few of us decided it would be best to cool off in the afore mentioned pool - good times! I'm pretty sure I saw Matt Treacy from Opshop jump into the pool in his undies. When do undies become togs?... undies, undies, undies...Togs... togs... Hmm?

More FM Winery Tour - Day 8. Black Barn Vineyards, Havelock North

We, once again had the pleasure of Havelock North's company at Black Barn Vineyard.

This time around, the weather wasn't quite as good as the previous night... It drizzled - hard!! But we knuckled down and put on an Opshop show - with a twist. We played through our set, and had a great time doing so to a sold out venue. When it came to us playing the last song of our set, "One Day", we had a small surprise. Earlier, a young fella had contacted us and asked if we could do something for he and his partner. "One Day" was their favourite song, and he wanted to dedicate it to her for Valentines Day. We agreed and he got up on stage just before we played it to dedicate it to her... then he dropped down on bended knee and asked her to marry him. She excitedly accepted his proposal amidst a cheering crowd, and then punched him in the shoulder for embarrassing her. We played the song, and ended our set on an amazing note.

Thanks so much Havelock North for having the traveling side show that is the More FM Winery Tour come visit... Oh... and thanks to the lovely lady who let me drive her 1976 Corvette Stingray - NICE!!

Stay tuned...

Clint

Hey there fellow Shoppers...

Day 1 - Ascension Vineyard (Matakana)

We cruised up to Matakana from Auckland... a nice, leisurely drive - until we got off the new toll road that bypasses Orewa... then the traffic gods decided it would be fun to play with us. It took around 45mins to drive 7kms - CRAZY!!!

Once we actually made it to the venue the drive seemed worthwhile. We had amazing weather, and the vineyard looked great!

We went on stage and had some fun! The crowd was great, and we got to have a few laughs with a few peeps at the merch tent afterwards.

We decided to stay around for a wee bit to catch Anika Moa, and Dave Dobbyn - they were amazing!!!

Day 2 - Travel to Gisborne

Bobby and I drove with Joseph (Opshop Monitor Engineer/TM) for around 7 hours from Auckland to Gisborne. It was a great trip - weather was awesome, as was the scenery. We stopped just out of Ohope for a bit of a play in the waves at a random beach... good times!!

Day 3 - Brunton Road Winery (Gisborne)

Ok... So... we were told that it was going to be a warm day - it was!! We arrived a few hours early as we had to pick up Jase & Matt from Gisborne airport. It wasn't long before the 'Back yard cricket' set came out, and a friendly game of 'Opshop Bat Down' ensued... SWEET!!

The show went well and once again we had a great time with the locals!!

Day 4 - Travel to Napier

Once again, the weather was great, so we decided to hit the beach in Gisborne before driving to Napier. We went to Wainui Beach - beautiful!... then we stated the road trip.

We play tomorrow at Sacred Hill, Rifleman's Vineyard - really looking forward to it!!... Hopefully we'll see some of y'all there!!

Clint

Hey there fellow OPSHOP-pers!

We head out on the road for 'MORE' fun and frivolity shortly on the More FM Winery Tour 2009.

Opshop - along with buddies Anika Moa, and the amazing Dave Dobbyn will be hitting some of the best vineyards in New Zealand for some good wine, good food and good times over the month of February 2009.

Below are the dates and a few details for the tour - for more info, go to www.ticketmaster.co.nz or visit www.thewinerytour.co.nz

See y'all there!!

Ascension Wine Estate
Matakana, NZ
Fri 06/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Brunton Road
Gisborne, NZ
Sun 08/02/09
03:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Sacred Hill, Rifleman's Vineyard
Napier, NZ
Tue 10/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Black Barn Vineyards
Havelock North, NZ
Thu 12/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Black Barn Vineyards
Havelock North, NZ
Fri 13/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Alana Estate
Martinborough, NZ
Sun 15/02/09
03:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Cooks Gardens
Wanganui, NZ
Tue 17/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Sentry Hill Estate
New Plymouth, NZ
Wed 18/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Mystery Creek Winery
Hamilton, NZ
Fri 20/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Wharepai Domain
Tauranga, NZ
Sat 21/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Villa Maria Estate Winery
Mangere, NZ
Sun 22/02/09
03:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Neudorf Vineyards
Nelson, NZ
Wed 25/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Neudorf Vineyards
Nelson, NZ
Thu 26/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Villa Maria Marlborough Winery
Blenheim, NZ
Fri 27/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Mud House Winery
Waipara, NZ
Sat 28/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Mud House Winery
Waipara, NZ
Sat 28/02/09
05:00 PM

MORE FM Winery Tour '09
Millbrook Resort
Queenstown, NZ
Sun 01/03/09
03:00 PM