At this point Russell says something I didn’t expect. “You know, looking back I’ve always thought of myself as second best, which is a good thing, I think it’s helped me achieve what I have.”
Bold as brass
Russell says the brass band and initial jazz playing period really set him up well. “I knew early that I wanted to be a trumpet player, so the Howick band was an ideal grounding. I worked up to solo cornet by age 15. I also played soprano cornet because I could get the high notes young. Although there was a guy called Marshall Hogg who I could never beat, but as I say, that was a good thing.”
He moved south at the end of the 1970s, joining Christchurch’s Skellerup Woolston (now Woolston Brass), one of the country’s top brass bands. He also joined the Wigram arm of the Royal New Zealand Air Force Band and took his first steps into the jazz world.
“In Christchurch I got my start on trumpet in Stu Buchanan’s Thursday Night Big Band,” he says. “I was then invited to join The Pete Rainey Big Band and played with them for a couple of years on lead trumpet. They were based at the university and there were some great players like his younger brother Tom. That’s where I learnt about playing for enjoyment and got my love of big band jazz, it was lots of fun. Pete went on to found the Smokefreerockquest and still runs it. Tom is a jazz legend in Christchurch and was the conductor and musical director for the Tiki Taane/Christchurch Symphony Orchestra show in 2023.”
Wellington and all that jazz
Russell moved to Wellington in 1982, playing in The Wellington Polytech Jazz Orchestra and The New Zealand Jazz Orchestra (four years running), both under the late Bud Jones. He also joined The Rodger Fox Big Band (he was a member until moving to Australia in 1989), while continuing with the Wellington unit of the Air Force Band under musical director Graham Hanify.
He also started his rock and pop career with local covers band UXB, playing alongside “the fabulous James Daniels on sax ... we used to do regular Friday nights at The Terminus on the corner of Courtenay Place and Taranaki Street.”
“That was an intense learning time with lots of live work and of recording sessions at Marmalade, where we later did ‘For Today’, and at RNZ. Mainly ads and work with local bands. The Rodger Fox band also made several albums during the 80s, they were always a treat.”
It’s here that Russell expands on the “second best” thing. “The Fox band was so good for my playing,” he says, “because again I was second best, alongside Michael Booth and Chris Nielson [father of Ruben and Kody Nielson – The Mint Chicks/Unknown Mortal Orchestra], the two best trumpet players in the country. Playing with people like that is what stretches and pushes you to improve. It was exactly what I needed.
“Two of my real career highlights were also with the Fox band, later gigs where I got to play with legendary LA session players Gary Grant and Chuck Findlay.”
The Newton Hoons
In 1983 Russell moved back to Auckland ambitious to ramp up his career. “To start with I lived in a dodgy, cheap hostel in the city and sat in on Friday nights at the London Bar with legendary trumpet player Kim Paterson. That was great experience. It was also where I met tenor sax player Chris Green.”
Meeting Chris would change everything. Green, a superb player, was fresh from the vibrant Wellington R&B scene where he’d been a member of The Rodents. “Chris and I just clicked,” says Russell. “There was a chemistry from the instant we started playing together. I think that was the x-factor that led onto us getting so much work. We joined the fledgling Big Sideways, quickly built ourselves a reputation and worked together for the next 11 years.”
One of the bands the duo gigged with through the 1980s was Rick Bryant and The Jive Bombers. “Rick called us ‘The Newton Hoons’ early on, referencing the flat Chris and I shared in Maidstone Street on the edge of Newton Gully. He would introduce the band during a show. On this particular night he introduced everyone but us. We looked at each other thinking maybe our time here is done. Then he laughed and said ... ‘and these two, The Newton Hoons’. Ha, we liked that, and the name stuck.”
Over the next decade The Newton Hoons were in everyone’s phone book. “We played live or recorded with so many people here and in Australia over that decade,” says Russell. In January 1984 they were asked to play with the Netherworld Dancing Toys (NDTs). “We flew to Dunedin to rehearse for the university orientation tour, taking Kim Willoughby and a 17-year-old Annie Crummer with us. As you remember, the band was learning ‘For Today’, one of your new songs.”
This writer does remember. At the end of the NDTs’ second day of rehearsals Chris Green, Michael Russell and I decamped to their motel. I belted the song out on an acoustic guitar and together we pieced together the horn lines. After some good-natured debate the result was a mixture of the more jazzy/funky licks the Hoons offered and the simpler, more strident lines I suggested which were more typically NDTs and Dexy’s Midnight Runners in style (or more “brass band” as Russell and I teased Chris Green).
“Working up that arrangement sticks in my mind, then touring the song and recording it for the Painted Years album. We added Rodger Fox for that session. It really helped put The Newton Hoons on the map.”
During the next few years it seemed that the “Hoons” played with everyone. Dave McArtney and the Pink Flamingos, Graham Brazier and the Legionnaires, Dave Dobbyn, Herbs, The Pelicans and Chris Thompson [Manfred Mann] among them. They also recorded with Don McGlashan. “Those sessions with Don were always great.”
TV Heroes
During 1984 The Newton Hoons played themselves in TVNZ’s Heroes, a two-season drama about a fictitious band trying to make it on the local scene. Heroes gave Jay Laga'aia his first major role and was an early showing for Michael Hurst (complete with blonde Billy Idol spikes). John Gibson, who played the keyboardist, co-wrote the series’ music and later became an award-winning film composer. It also featured Margaret Umbers (Shortland Street, Bridge to Nowhere).
“We played ourselves in the gigs that were part of the final of each series,” says Russell. “One was at Mainstreet, the other was at the Logan Concrete [Campbell] Centre. We laughed when they told us we’d been brought in to give them a bit of musical cred. Ha, they needed a bit more than that. [Heroes wasn’t very popular with the real working bands of the day.] Chris and I wore white singlets with the Newton Hoons logo printed on the front. Very 80s, you wouldn’t have let us get away with that in The NDTs!”
The Gotham City Express
Around this time Russell and Green also formed The Gotham City Express. “That was a real highlight with so much talent in one band,” says Russell. “It lasted until we went to Sydney in 89. I wanted to do a band that played Tower of Power songs. Chris and I literally sat down and wrote a list of the hottest young players in Auckland. It included Kim Willoughby and Annie Crummer, Lyn Buchanan, Larry Martinez, Peter Morgan, Gary Verberne, Max Stowers, and horn players Chris Nielson, Dave Callow, and Dave Woodbridge. The brief was for each to pick their favourite soul and funk songs. Chris Nielson did these amazing arrangements.
“Tommy Adderley loved us and booked us lots of gigs. The Mon Desir in Takapuna, the venue under the Civic and Stanley’s Nightclub. Touring international acts would come to Stanley’s post-gig. One night we were playing ‘The Monmouth College Fight Song’ by The Yellowjackets when Lionel Richie’s drummer Ricky Lawson and bass player Don Boyette walked in. It was Ricky’s song. Lyn our drummer almost fell off his stool. Ricky walked up and asked if he could sit in. We kept playing and he simply took over from Lyn. We ended up jamming until 3.30am.”
When The Cat’s Away
In 1987 the first nationwide tour by the hugely successful When The Cat’s Away took place. The Newton Hoons were along for the ride as crowds grew and the shows progressed from pubs to town halls.
“Chris and I had played with all of them before. Debbie [Harwood] in Big Sideways, Kim [Willoughby] and Annie [Crummer] with the NDTs, Margaret [Urlich] with Peking Man, as well some work with Dianne [Swann] and Wayne [Bell]’s band Everything That Flies. We were at the 1985 Music Awards with the NDTs when they started talking about the idea. It was a lot of fun and became successful very quickly. The shows this year [2024] were great too.”
Saying no to Midnight Oil
Michael Russell certainly wasn’t second best when it came to Midnight Oil but it nearly didn’t happen. “In early 1988 I was asked to play New Zealand with them,” he says. “Who would say no? Me, as it turned out.
“I’d been at home watching TV with my girlfriend. There was an ad for the tour with some live footage. I jokingly said we’re better than those horn players. A day or two later I got a call, and a guy said, ‘this is Jim Moginie from Midnight Oil, we were wondering if you’d be available for our New Zealand tour.’ I assumed it was a wind-up by one of my friends, said ‘yeah right’ and put the phone down. But the next day Michael Glading the head of CBS rang me and said ‘did you get a call from Midnight Oil’ ... whoops. He said leave it with me. When I called Jim back he just laughed.
“What was only going to be four gigs turned into a year touring the world. The first night was in Christchurch. We got to ‘Power and the Passion’ which has the horn line played up the octave and that really high sustained trumpet note. I played it and the band all turned around and looked at me. I think the last time anyone had done it that way was when Derek Watkins recorded it at Abbey Road for their 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 album in 1982. After the show they asked if I’d do the rest of the tour.
“A real highlight of that time was getting to know Bones Hillman,” says Russell. “We had some great times getting in and out of trouble. Nothing serious, just fun and funny. He was a legend.”
Across the Tasman
“Chris and I moved to Sydney in late 1989. Rightly or wrongly, probably wrongly, we felt we’d done all we could here. I said I’d give it two years and ended up staying for 14. We went from being big fish in a small pond to small fish in a very big lake, starting right at the bottom. But we ended up working with some of the great players over there.
“Early on we formed Gotham City Horns. That was a really fun show band, and we got a lot of work around Australia. We played with so many different bands and musos ... too many to list here. Recording with Marc Hunter from Dragon and playing with The Violent Femmes was a lot of fun. Another highlight was doing Dan Aykroyd’s Blues Brothers musical with some of Sydney’s top players, including the incredible sax player Andrew Oh.”
Still hitting the high notes
After 14 years in Australia Russell moved back to Christchurch in 2003. “It was the best thing I ever did. I love it here.”
Here, Russell has played with local cover bands including Sound Sensation and Cruise Control. Also with Pacific Underground and Ruia Aperahama and Brent Thompson of Southside of Bombay. More recently he joined Midnight Oil for the New Zealand leg of their 2022 worldwide farewell tour and teamed up with saxophonist Nick Atkinson for the When The Cat’s Away 2024 reunion shows.
It’s been a whistlestop chat through a long and varied career which is far from over. “It’s interesting testing the grey matter, thinking about the different bands and artists I’ve played with,” he says. “But in terms of highlights, gigging with those legendary LA session guys Gary Grant and Chuck Findlay is still right up there. I still use the gig bag Chuck sent me from LA 40 years ago and I have a trumpet I treasure that belonged to Gary.
“Also touring the world with The Oils and coming up with the horn lines for ‘For Today’. Those stand out. Looking back, I’ve had a fortunate life, surrounded by such amazing, talented and giving musicians who have all helped me be the musician I am. I’m a lucky guy. Currently, I’m finally trying to learn to play jazz properly. That’s probably the biggest challenge I’ve faced so far.”
One thing is for sure, we haven’t heard the last from Michael Russell. He can still hit those high notes. There aren’t many that can, and it’s certainly been a long time since he was second best to anyone on the bandstand.
