Che Fu on Supergroove: ‘We were like a nerdy club of sorts'
As the beloved Kiwi funk band reunites for a national tour, vocalists Che Fu and Karl Steven rewind to the 1990s.
Kiwis who can’t get enough of the mid-'90s nostalgia blast that is the songs of Supergroove are in luck this month.
With special guests Troy Kingi and Rubi Du, the beloved New Zealand band's original 1995 lineup is reuniting for The Phenomenon Tour.
With DJ King Kapisi spinning records, rocking the mic and hyping the crowd before Supergroove hits the stage, people coming along can "expect the real party vibe," vocalist Che Fu tells RNZ's Music 101.
This April, '90s funk band Supergroove reunite to play shows around NZ.
Supplied
Related stories:
Supergroove - originally known as the Low-Down Dirty Blues Band - formed on New Year's Eve 1989/1990 and were still in high school when they wrote hits like 'Can't Get Enough' and 'Scorpio Girls'.
The band were like “a club of sorts” who'd gather at each other’s houses to listen to the latest CDs when they weren’t rehearsing, Che Fu says.
“We'd all sit in a circle and check out the artwork, see what it looks like, check out where they produced it, check all the credits on the back... which to me is kind of nerdy in a way.”
Che Fu (aka Che Ness) is a successful solo artist, well-known for his 2002 hit 'Misty Frequencies' and the 1996 DLT track 'Chains'.
The Down Low Concept / RNZ
‘Nerdy’ is a word that definitely "floats around in the ether” whenever the members of Supergroove are together, Steven agrees.
And because the band initially sounded "the worst" that meant nerding out together a lot.
“All that practice made us sound like we were so good or something.”
To keep things interesting, the teen band borrowed a mini trampoline for the stage from their high school PE department, he says.
“We liked it so much, and we were so young, and we were such dorks that there’d be a queue at the back of the stage with all of us waiting to take our turn to leap."
Karl Steven is now an award-winning composer.
Paul Taylor
It didn't end so well when an audience member launched himself off the mini tramp and into a stage dive one night, Steven recalls.
“The audience saw him descending from on high and separated. He just went straight into the concrete and linoleum floor, and we had to end the show.
“It was real bad, and we had to mop up the blood and everything [but] he survived.”
For Che Fu, some of the most memorable Supergroove gigs were playing alongside hip hop outfit Urban Disturbance with DJ Manual Bundy (my “OG”) and the Rough Opinion - “possibly the illest rap to come out this place”.
Watching Rough Opinion (fronted by Kas Futialo, who is now known as Tha Freestyle) was like "going to university", Steven says.
“They broke stages, they wrote super controversial and intelligent lyrics, highly political. It was just a pleasure."
Supergroove in the mid-'90s.
Polly Walker
When Supergroove’s debut album Traction came out in 1994 it sounded so original because the band's influences were in such contrast to to the many grunge-inspired bands around at the time, Steven says.
Their "real heroes" were actually the funk-hip hop group Boo-Yaa T.R.I.B.E.
“They had these great MCs and an incredible bass player and super-tight, precise horns."
Traction sold over 70,000 copies and reached number one on the NZ album charts.
Supergroove
Listening back to Traction now, Steven is really proud of how the record holds up.
“We did the best we possibly could at the time, for better or worse, whatever its faults and limitations. I just know that we didn't have anything better in us to offer, musically speaking… for myself."
‘Sitting Inside My Head' - Steven's favorite Supergroove song - was "quite bad", he says, before Che Fu transformed it with a "beautiful melody".
“You were like looking into the future, seeing the song that should be and we were just like trying to catch up with your vision.”
Supergroove's Che Fu and Karl Steven with Kara Rickard
Nicky Jonas
Che Fu remembers how he felt in the recording session - "I was like 'Can I have a tune, guys, can I have a tune?' And I'm just so glad we got to run it."
For him, it's a “happy surprise" that Kiwis still have his first band's debut album in their hearts 31 years later.
“Making Traction set me up for the rest of my career, in terms of how I approach making music, how I write and rehearse and whatever. All those lessons and early learnings were to do with that album so yeah, very fond memories.”
And his favourite track from it? ‘Bugs & Critters’.
"I like the low end of it all and the creepiness of it.”
Supergroove’s line-up from 1995 is: saxophonist Nick Atkinson, vocalists Karl Steven and Che Fu, drummer Ian Jones, bassist Joe Lonie, guitarist Ben Sciascia and trumpeter Tim Stewart.
