Wounded Weta crawl to a halt

Speaking for the first time about the break-up of
the band Weta, frontman Aaron Tokona tells
AIDAN RASMUSSEN that despite the plaudits and the response from fans, his heart wasn't in it.

There was no fanfare, hugs, bouquets or teary goodbyes when Weta walked off the stage for the last time.

After six months of vainly trying to go against his increasing unease about being in the band, singer-guitarist Aaron Tokona finally called it quits. He made the decision just before the dynamic quartet embarked on last year's rollickingly successful national tour with fellow Wellingtonian-turned-Melbournian rock outfits Shihad and Fur Patrol. Weta's last show was at Nelson's Trafalgar Centre on November 25.

Since then, Tokona and fellow band members - his bass-playing younger brother Clinton, drummer Clinton den Heyer and guitarist Gabriel Atkinson - have kept silent about the split which has turned into the worst-kept secret in local music circles. After being told by several people that Tokona sen was unwilling to discuss the break-up, it was surprising to find him at the end of the phone, being talkative and honest to the point of brutal.

His explanation for wanting to dissolve the band is simple: "I stopped believing that I was doing what I really wanted to do. I'm not talking about playing music because I think I'll always do music. I'm talking about playing music in the sense of being in a band or being in public."

But you sense that Tokona's decision was motivated by something deeper, something more crucial to his state of mind. If you read between the lines, it becomes apparent this decision was also motivated by a desire to achieve some sense of normality and peace of mind lost while chasing the rock'n'roll dream. And that's why you'll now find him stripping and painting houses in Wellington.

"I've been doing that for a couple of months. It's crazy, I turn up to work and put paint on a wall," he says, sounding enormously proud of himself.

It's not hard to imagine the beaming smile on Tokona's 25-year-old face as he carries on: "I seem to just have a normal life now. Maybe I'll get bored with it, but at the moment, it's just like cool; this is simple, this is routine," he laughs in that Gatling-gun way of his.

The discontent Tokona felt within the band eventually escalated to the point where he started to subconsciously sabotage the band's affairs. Consequently the relationships within the group suffered.

"I stopped going to sound checks, I stopped caring and it was evident in my attitude - I had a really, really foul attitude towards touring. It was like any job one does: if you really love it, if that Previa or Tarago turns up for you to go on tour, you're meant to go, 'Cool, time to go to work'. With me it was like, 'I don't want to do this. I don't want to sit in this car with these people. I don't want to go.' I started resenting being here and I think that attitude started the process and things started to fall apart."

The irony of that is, while internally the band were moving further away from each other, their collective goal was getting closer. After five years of hard graft, Weta were slowly emerging from the shadow cast by their mentors - Shihad. They were becoming a unique rock band and a very good one at that.

This was most evident on their terrific debut album, Geographica, which was rated as the best local rock release of 2000 by Herald critics.

You could say that Tokona threw a spanner in the works of the dreams of his bandmates. But, saddest of all, he relinquished an opportunity he had dreamed about ever since he belted out the opening chords to AC/DC's Highway to Hell.

Den Heyer, who is working in a vodka bar in St Kilda, Melbourne, living with Tom Larkin and Jon Toogood from Shihad and looking into joining a "stoner rock band," insists there is no resentment by band members towards Tokona. He realises that Weta fans may be disappointed and apologises for not informing them and the press of the break-up, but says, "The Weta thing actually surpassed my wildest rock'n'roll fantasies at numerous points throughout our short-lived career. To be a full-time musician in a rock'n'roll band for a year and a half is no mean feat, but one that took its toll. I didn't really know what to say [about the break-up]. Also, it's just another rock band and it doesn't really matter at the end of the day, does it?"

But if you were the record company who spent between $300,000 and $400,000 on their Australian-recorded debut album, which was only released in New Zealand, it might. Apparently not, according to den Heyer. He says he is still on excellent terms and in regular contact with their management, their Warners Australia A&R man Dan Hennessy and their booking agent.

All parties are adamant Weta won't be getting back together. Although, says Tokona, displaying that irrepressible cheeky charm he is renowned for, "I might wake and go, 'Oh, what a dick,' and regret what I've done. I doubt it but who knows?"

Tokona is grateful for his shot at stardom: "It was a good thing musically and creatively. I loved it, I loved performing."

But he's loath to abandon the simple, some might say mundane, life he now lives.

"I feel so much happier, and I know I made the right decision," he says.

"And I know that. It's really funny, I'm not just saying that. I really, really mean it."

And you do believe him when he says, "This was the right thing to do for me."

But what about the fans, does he have anything to say to them?

"The fans?"

He pauses, momentarily lost for words: "For all the people who really loved our music and bought the record and really connected with the songs and the music, I'm glad that we were able to be in a position to be able to communicate. I don't think I apologise for the band breaking up, but I'm very, very sorry."