News: Iggy Pop’s Kiwi “broadband” band chosen

Iggy Pop’s one-off Kiwi “broad” band has been chosen and is fired up for tomorrow’s recording.

More than 200 New Zealand musicians auditioned for the chance to lay down Iggy’s legendary solo track ‘The Passenger’ online and under the direction of the Godfather of Punk.

It’s part of a promotion from telecommunications company Orcon for its next-generation broadband.

The band will hook up with Iggy in Miami live via Orcon Broadband. They’re spending the day under the maestro’s expert guidance lay down a new version of the iconic song.

Iggy’s new band comprises four musicians from Wellington, two from Auckland and one each from Warkworth in Rodney District and Paraparaumu.

The group comprises:
Tia Beaufort (Pukerua Bay, Wellington) & Stephanie Engelbrecht (Evans Bay, Wellington), drums
Charley Davenport (Paraparaumu), cello
Ben Jurisich (Warkworth) & Sam Logan (Karori, Wellington), guitars
Takumi Motokawa (Brooklyn, Wellington), xylophone
Daniel Tate (Onehunga, Auckland), bass
Miho Wada (Remuera, Auckland), flute

The recording session is being streamed live at www.facebook.com/Orcon <http://www.facebook.com/Orcon>  from around 1pm (NZST) and the finished track is being turned in to a television ad for the company. It will be available for viewing from November 17.

Orcon CEO Scott Bartlett says he’s amazed at the quality and number of musicians who jumped at the chance to audition for the band.

“Iggy obviously has huge pulling power in the global music community. We were expecting around 50 New Zealand musos to audition but in the end we had more than 200. It was a pretty tough job screening them down to eight but with Iggy’s help I think we have unearthed some awesome talent.”