“New Zealand’s fourth-most popular guitar-based digi-bongo acapella-rap-funk-comedy folk duo” Flight Of The Conchords take centre stage this week (presumably with only two bored-looking punters and Mel, their biggest fan, in the audience).
Flight of The Conchords the band, comprising Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clements, are the stars of Flights of The Conchords the HBO TV show, which completed its second, probably final, season earlier this year.
The quirky show follows the day to day trials and tribulations of the duo, playing fictionalised versions of themselves, as they chase women and try to hit the big time as a novelty folk band in New York.
The first season of the show, in 2007, was outstanding, with great writing, great performances (Rhys Darby as Murray, their useless manager – and Deputy Cultural Attaché at the New Zealand consulate – was a real scene stealer) and some of the best comedy songs I’ve ever heard.
Here are the suitably surreal opening theme and titles from season one:
Season two aired earlier this year and though the scripts and performances were still excellent, for me, it never quite hit the heights of season one, mainly because the songs, on the whole, were not up to the standard they had set first time around.
It’s probably not so surprising – the pair had been writing and performing together for years before the first season, and so had plenty of time to write and hone their music, but having used up most of their musical material, then had to write a lot more songs from scratch in a relatively short space of time.
What was more surprising was that the producers also tinkered with the fantastic opening titles. The theme tune remained the same but some of the visuals were changed, and not for the better, in my opinion. See what you think:
The Cathode Ray Choob 