As monsters of rock go, Shihad are an unlikely bunch, being almost entirely devoid of the machismo that normally fuels the genre. Drummer Tom Larkin was an academic achiever who was bullied at school; instead of striking back he channelled his fury into music. Frontman Jon Toogood is skinny and sensitive; in song he pours scorn on such male institutions as violence and sport. Lead guitarist Phil Knight seems almost pathologically shy, while bassist Karl Kippenberger radiates gentle charm.
Toogood and Larkin met and formed the group at Wellington High School. Toogood, a budding strummer, was introduced by Larkin to the music of Metallica and Megadeth and persuaded to swap his acoustic guitar for an electric.
Their name was inspired by the holy war in David Lynch’s movie of the classic Frank Herbert sci-fi novel, Dune. Having never seen the word in print, they misspelt "jihad" as "Shihad". It didn’t matter; to these fledgling metallers it simply spelt awesome.
Several bass players came and went before Hamish Laing joined in 1989. Lead guitarist Phil Knight was found through a note posted on a music shop noticeboard.
By the time the four had finished school they were getting supports around Wellington, blowing more mature bands off the stage with their explosive covers of Motorhead and Metallica.
The same year they recorded their debut EP Devolve, featuring three furious originals and a Black Sabbath cover.
No one was more impressed than Gerald Dwyer, the charismatic former frontman of Wellington post-punk hardcore band Flesh D-Vice, who became their manager. With Gerald’s enthusiasm and industry connections, the band’s profile rose rapidly. In 1990 they toured New Zealand as support act for Faith No More. The same year they recorded their debut EP Devolve, featuring three furious originals and a Black Sabbath cover.
By the time of its release in early 1991 the group had already moved beyond its thrash/metal roots. Hearing and befriending members of local alternative bands such as Bailter Space and the Skeptics inspired them to experiment with their sounds and songwriting. As Jon Toogood said at the time: “Speed metal is such an American form. We want to be a New Zealand band.”
This spirit of experimentation led Toogood and Larkin to a collaboration with Nigel Regan, guitarist for fellow Wellington band Head Like A Hole, also managed by Dwyer. These recordings were eventually released in 1995 as the album Is That It? under the name SML.
In 1993 Shihad recorded their first album. By this time the band had undergone its final line-up change. Hamish Laing had left after the release of Devolve, replaced by Karl Kippenberger, an early follower of the band.
Churn was produced by Jaz Coleman, the classically trained, apocalyptically-minded founder of UK post-punks Killing Joke, who had recently taken up residence in New Zealand. Coleman’s influence can be felt in the music’s dark industrial textures, while the lyrics find Toogood moving away from sci-fi themes towards more personal expressions.
Co-produced by the band and Malcolm Welsford, Killjoy expanded on the innovative mix of heavy rock, pop, industrial and electronica Churn had hinted at.
After Churn was recorded, they signed to Auckland indie Wildside and Tom Larkin was enlisted to play on Killing Joke’s 1994 album Pandemonium, but he turned down a subsequent offer to tour with the group. The same year, Shihad returned to the studio – this time without Coleman – to make their second album. Co-produced by the band and Malcolm Welsford, Killjoy expanded on the innovative mix of heavy rock, pop, industrial and electronica Churn had hinted at. Before the album’s release they completed a headlining tour of New Zealand, and toured Europe with Faith No More. They also signed to the German-based Noise Records, increasing their access to European audiences. On Killjoy’s release in 1995, Billboard declared them “New Zealand’s most exciting rock prospect.”
1995 saw Shihad playing large European festivals, including Roskilde in Denmark and Phoenix in the UK, and in January 1996 they played a main stage set at Auckland’s Big Day Out. But onstage triumph was overshadowed by offstage tragedy. Returning to their hotel after the gig, they found manager Dwyer, dead from a drug overdose. The band cancelled their Queensland Big Day Out appearance to attend their manager’s tangi. They re-joined the Australian tour later that week in Sydney.
Still getting over their loss, they recorded their third album. Simply titled Shihad, it is sometimes referred to as "the fish album" on account of its cover graphic. Though arguably not as sonically rich than the earlier sets, Shihad showed a growing accessibility in their songwriting, with lyricist Toogood wearing his heart increasingly on his sleeve. At least one song from the record, ‘Home Again’, has become a recognised classic, joining Tim Finn’s ‘Six Months In A Leaky Boat’ and Dave Dobbyn’s ‘Whaling’ in a category of peculiarly New Zealand songs bemoaning what Finn called “the tyranny of distance.”
That year Shihad cleaned up at the New Zealand Music Awards, winning the categories for Best Group, Best Album and Top International Recording Artist, with Toogood taking the gong for Best Male Vocalist.
By 1998 the group had shifted their base to Melbourne, and signed to Warner Music Australia. In 1999 they made their fourth album, which they recorded in Vancouver, Canada with Canadian producer Garth (‘Gggarth’) Richardson, known for his engineering and production work on albums like Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Mother’s Milk and Rage Against The Machine’s self-titled debut.
Titled The General Electric, the set re-established Shihad as sonic giants, while further developing their credentials as writers of slamming hooks and riffs. “A jet engine you like listening to” was how Toogood described the sound of the band at the time, while his social commentary was shown in songs like ‘My Mind’s Sedate’ and ‘Sport and Religion’ to be more acute than ever.
Now solidly established in Australasia, and with a foothold in Europe, America was the next frontier. Yet it almost proved to be their undoing.
Now solidly established in Australasia, and with a foothold in Europe, America was the next frontier. Yet it almost proved to be their undoing.
In 2001 they signed to an American management company and began work on an album under the aegis of USA producer Josh Abraham. With American radio in mind, Abraham worked at streamlining the Shihad sound, grooming Toogood for stardom and augmenting the band with session players. Recording guests included Stone Temple Pilots’ singer Scott Weiland.
But before recording was complete, the September 11 attacks on the Twin Towers brought America to a standstill. When the smoke began to clear, there was a new word in the American vocabulary: Jihad.
It was about this time that it occurred to Shihad’s American management that the name of their new Antipodean signing might be a red rag to a scared and angry nation. Faced with the alternative of losing what seemed like a once-in-lifetime opportunity to break into the massive American market, the group – with much reluctance - agreed to change their name. Rebranding themselves after a popular song from The General Electric, they became Pacifier.
While fans at home cried “sellout!” the band completed the slick new album, signed with USA label Arista, and embarked on a major American tour. In fact, Pacifier were feeling just as conflicted as their Australasian fans. Playing at American festivals where the prevailing mood was one of fierce nationalism and random xenophobia, the band began to question their own ambitions.
Eventually they returned to the Antipodes, America unconquered. In 2004 they reverted to being Shihad and emerged from a period of soul-searching with the cathartically heavy Love Is The New Hate. The album was a return to form, purging the band of its American experience with juggernaut riffs and scathing observations of mindless materialism and nationalism gone mad.
Over the next few years the group would regularly tour Australia and New Zealand as a headline act, releasing further albums Beautiful Machine in 2008 and Ignite in 2010. At the 2010 New Zealand Music Awards Shihad were honoured with a Legacy Award and inducted into the New Zealand Music Hall Of Fame. The same year they supported AC/DC in New Zealand.
In 2011, they released their first compilation, The Meanest Hits. The mood of retrospection continued the following year with the cinema release of the movie Beautiful Machine, a documentary chronicling the group’s history.
In 2013 Shihad opened concerts for a reunited Black Sabbath in New Zealand and Australia, and in their intensely energetic sets demonstrated yet again why they are New Zealand’s most loved and enduring rock group.
In August 2014, Shihad released their 7th album. Entitled FVEY, a reference to the "Five Eyes" survelliance system, it was produced at Auckland's York Street Studios by Jaz Coleman. It was the last album recorded at that studio before it closed. It entered the New Zealand Top 40 at No.1 on the 18th of August.
