Iva Lamkum is an up and coming street soul sister and recently was named #5 on USA MTV Iggy's Top 13 Real Divas from Around The World. You can catch her supporting Six60 at the Powerstation on Friday 13 April and Saturday 14 April.

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The Good Fun is Leroy Clampitt (Vocals/Guitar), Jimi Mataio (Drums/Vocals), Kam Chadderton (Guitar/Vocals) and Fraser Macdonald (Bass).

Born and raised under Pirongia Mountain, they formed in mid 2009 as a covers band before writing their own music and went on to win the 2010 “National Final” at the SmokeFreeRockQuest.

Since then The Good Fun have released 2 singles Naughty Little Sin and Karaoke and released a studio EP called Sharing.

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Hands down, and pants off, Punk Rock is an excellent, rough and clever piece of performance theatre. The plays title needs a re-phrase, so don’t let it fool you into making any green tipped, Mohawk assumptions. Instead ditch your weekly dose of Skins for an episode of real, and in-yer-face theatre.

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Music nerd Ian Wan aka iWan is an Auckland based DJ who took out the George FM mix factor competition last year and hosts a weekly radio show on George FM, Umami Radio every Saturday 10-Midnight. Catch him this Thursday at the Easter Weekender at The Studio, K Rd.

How did you get into DJing?

I got into DJing about 2-3 years ago after the Rock/Metal band I was drumming for disbanded (heh). Around that time I was just getting into the dance scene and a friend of mine who goes by the alias Captain Morgan had bought his first pair of decks and over a few drinks at his I had a go and was hooked. Being a drummer gave me good a understanding of song structures and phrasing, so I picked it up fairly easily.

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Ghastly weather aside, the play Ship Songs launched into the public eye last Wednesday at Q Theatre in Auckland. The season is all go until April 7th and ticket prices are reduced to an easy thirty-five dollars as part of a reel-you-in first week special. Ian Hughes takes the helm of a mammoth and personal true story, once told by his mother (as she chopped onions).

Ship Songs begins like a film, and proceeds like an off-the-wall Power Point presentation. The animated projections may be stylistically out of sorts, but they do the job and are at times extremely clever. The ‘first slide’ illuminates animated opening credits across a canvas screen, then comes an oddly familiar CGI curtain lift and out zips Ian Hughes from a porthole in the sail-like canvas. It’s been said Hughs is a master story teller, he is. The man can also sing while playing over 14 characters. Ahoy, mate!

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Shian Perawiti is the new Festival Director for Jambalaya Festival. Festival goers can expect 3 nights and 2 days of open-level music and dance workshops, performances, art trail, markets, bands, DJs, parties and more.

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Stage fright is a horrid ordeal. Vulnerable and exposed, there’s little you can do to get away from the expectant audience. It takes some guts to get on stage and just rock out.

At the 2012 Battle of the Bands at the University of Auckland’s student bar Shadows, six bands (stage fright included) performed to keen crowd of students and judges. And so, with free filter coffee and five other judges, sI spent an entertaining three hours hearing who’s got a handle on the beat these days.

Judging was determined on technical performance, professionalism, audience appeal (or number of friends in the audience) and stage presence. We all know how AV systems have a tendency to...

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Viewer beware: strange things are going down at the Maidment Theatre

The advertisements for Sarah Ruhl’s intriguingly titled In the Next Room (or the Vibrator Play) do contain a warning that there will be some nudity. But what’s most surprising about this gem of a play is that it’s rollicking good fun, whether...

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