The Black Seeds’ Barnaby Weir recalls the October/November 2009 New Zealand tour that saw the Seeds link with US reggae outfit John Brown’s Body for a run of shows.
When Solid Ground was released in in the US, we followed it up with a US tour with a reggae band from Boston called John Brown's Body. We got signed to their label Easy Star, so it made sense for us to connect with them. We'd been to the States before but we hadn't played many shows, so that was the biggest dent we'd made there. A lot of the music the Seeds draw on - soul and funk - comes from America. We were playing in the home of some of our influences and the response we got was really good.
We didn't know John Brown's Body personally or know much of their music before we went over, but they are a really good band and we got to know them over the course of these great US shows we played with them.
We had planned a New Zealand show for when we got back and we asked them to join us, and they were really keen. It was a country they'd never been to before so it was a big experience for them, and it really felt like a cultural exchange because we got to introduce them to our fans. It was a big mission for them to come down to New Zealand and there was no guarantee they were going to sell any albums - it's a small part of the world - but they did it for the musical camaraderie and for the experience.
We felt like ambassadors for the country, in a sense. The John Brown's Body guys got to see the country from the road and we got them pretty much all the way from the bottom to the top of the country. Along the way we played to some decent crowds - we played a sold-out show at the Wellington Town Hall, The Powerstation in Auckland, and, considering they didn't have a local fan base when they came here, they sure made a few fans.
