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Pop CultureApril 24, 2025

An ode to Shihad’s Killjoy, the best album by the greatest band in the world

Guest writer
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National MP and diehard Shihad fan Chris Bishop sings the praises of his favourite band’s classic 1995 album. 

Last week I went to my first ever Taite Music Prize ceremony, the annual bash to honour independent music in New Zealand. I’d love to say I was invited, but I wasn’t – I nabbed the ticket from minister of arts and culture Paul Goldsmith.

The New Zealand arts scene, it would be fair to say, leans left. On the night, the MC welcomed “National MP Chris Bishop” then mercifully didn’t pause for too long before adding “and Green MP Chloe Swarbrick!” – the crowd erupted in applause.

So I was a bit nervous about going – who really likes going to places where you get a sense you’re not really welcome? But I wanted to be there to honour what I consider one of the most important and vital New Zealand albums ever produced: Killjoy by Shihad, which won the prize for “Classic Album”. I even wore my 1995-era Killjoy European tour T-shirt in tribute.

The Killjoy T-shirt (Photo: Supplied)

Killjoy is my favourite record. Not just by a Kiwi artist, but by any artist. It’s the record that unites genuine, hardcore Shihad fans. I’ve been in Shihad mosh pits since 1998, and there’s always a couple of people wearing a Killjoy T-shirt. They know its power, and when your sweaty eyes lock together in a mosh pit, there’s always a moment of recognition. Sometimes people realise I’m a politician and there’s often a look of surprise; sometimes they don’t. It really doesn’t matter. The music is what matters.

Killjoy is Shihad at their best. It’s intensely heavy. Wall of sound guitars, drenched in feedback. They just keep coming and coming, and when you think they’re over and you get a respite, they hit you again. But it’s almost hypnotically melodic as well. In their own unique Shihad way the songs are laden with hooks that stick in your head, that you hum for hours. 

And some of the chord changes just melt your guts. When I was 16, they used to make me tear up, they were so beautiful. These days these moments still give me a burst of energy, that hard-to-describe feeling you get when beautiful art moves you. The moment in ‘Bitter’ when it goes into overdrive (“Collect the poison as it spills from your mouth… when affection becomes affliction, let it go”). The final explosion in ‘You Again’ after the moody breakdown (“Why did I waste my time on you?”). The mid-point in ‘Get Up’ after the slow build and thrash opening (“See my face in the mirror…”).

Killjoy is the sound of a young band making their way, determined to put their best songs out into the world for all to hear.  I’ve heard drummer Tom Larkin talk about the time it was made. They’d just made Churn (a great record, but no Killjoy). They’d go to work, eat, write and rehearse, day after day. It’s taut, focused, tight. Not a note out of place. Everything is deliberate.

Killjoy is an album without weak songs. Sure, some are better than others. I will maintain until I die that ‘Bitter’ is Shihad’s greatest song (judging from the number of people who yell it out in mosh pits, this is a common view). ‘You Again’ has, as Jon always tells concert crowds, “the biggest riff in rock and roll.” ‘Envy’ is a fusillade of guitars, rolling in like a wave one after each other. ‘For What You Burn’ broods and seethes. ‘Get Up’ is a brilliant closer.

Killjoy is an album made to be performed and heard live, and loud. I was fortunate enough to hear it performed in its entirety at the Powerstation and then MeowNui on the final stanza of Shihad’s farewell tour last month. One song after the other, all merging into a glorious maelstrom of noise, sweat and – if I’m honest – tears. 

I still can’t believe Shihad have finished up for good.

There’s no feeling quite like waiting down the front at a Shihad gig before the band walks out to play. Anticipation, adrenaline, anxiety. Excitement.

But that’s nothing compared with what happens when they hit the stage. The crowd roars. Tom Larkin settles himself behind the drums. Karl Kippenberger normally grins at the crowd. Phil Knight slinks into his corner on the far left. And Jon Toogood, New Zealand’s best ever rock front man, gets ready.

And then those opening chords ring out. A burst of energy. A surge of happiness spreading throughout your body. Waiting is one thing. But listening is even better.

I first got into Shihad when I was an angry 14-year-old boy growing up in the Hutt Valley. It was the era of Channel Z, which used to deliberately play a ton of New Zealand music and support brilliant local Wellington acts like Fur Patrol, Breathe, Weta… and Shihad.

I can remember sitting in my room in 1998 listening to ‘Interconnector’ and ‘Wait and See’, from the Blue Light Disco EP. It was loud. It had serrated guitars. It was catchy as shit. I loved it. When Channel Z advertised that Shihad were playing at the James Cabaret in Wellington at the end of the year, I had to go. It was my first ever concert (as an aside, we need more all-ages shows).

My friends and I paid a dude to get us a bottle of vodka from the liquor store on Kent Terrace, drank it around the back, and went in. Jon came out about 10pm and told us it’d be another hour before they played (which is exactly when my long-suffering dad was meant to pick me up). And then Shihad absolutely blew me – and everyone else in the crowd – away. I’ve never felt anything like it. I wanted to bottle it. After that, I was theirs.

Chris Bishop (right) with Tom and Jon from Shihad in 2003 (Photo: Supplied)

I won’t bore you with the rest of my bona fides. I’ve been to every Shihad concert in Wellington since 1998 and my wife Jenna and I have seen them in Auckland and Sydney. I own one of the original pressings of Killjoy on vinyl (only 500 ever made!) plus every other record they’ve ever produced before and since. I could make a list of “top 10 Shihad b-sides from the 1990s” and debate it with other diehards for hours.

Here are some Shihad facts which I consider to be beyond dispute. As noted, their best album is Killjoy. Their worst album is Beautiful Machine (but it’s all relative). The best deep cut they never play live is ‘Saddest Song in the World’ from Love is the New Hate (the record they made when they changed their name back). Their old stuff is their best stuff (but ‘Feel the Fire’ is a banger). Their setlists have always played the obvious hits too much at the expense of arcana super-fans like me would get into. 

I’ve been thinking a lot about Shihad in the few weeks since their final shows. Those first concerts when I was just 15. Dancing around at my school after-ball to ‘The General Electric’ and ‘A Day Away’. Being stuck at parliament for post-Budget urgency years ago and missing out on seeing them in Auckland. Moshing with my wife. The James Cabaret. Starlight Ballroom. The Wellington Town Hall. Talking about them constantly to my late father, who wanted them to succeed in the States, just like me. The name change. Pacifier arriving via CD from New Zealand when I was in the UK and me playing it over and over.

How unusual it is that a band that I loved when I was 15 I love even more, if that’s possible, at 41. 

And now it’s all over. But I’ll always have their records. I’ll always have the memories. And I’ll always have Killjoy.

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Image: The Spinoff
Image: The Spinoff

Pop CultureApril 24, 2025

How Letterboxd’s ‘Four Favourites’ took over the internet

Senior writer
Image: The Spinoff
Image: The Spinoff

Alex Casey talks to Aaron Yap, the New Zealander behind the viral interview format adored by movie fans worldwide. 

For the last few years, the showbiz publicity circuit has become dominated by novelty interview formats. Celebrities now answer questions while eating increasingly spicy chicken wings, or playing with puppies, or in the middle of a lie detector test. They are emptying out their handbags, finishing Google autocomplete questions, going on chicken shop dates. All these elaborate setups, and yet one simple question asked by Letterboxd can often reveal more than all of them combined: what are your four favourite movies? 

Some are filled with fear (“nothing could prepare me for this,” says a flummoxed Scarlett Johansson) whereas others breeze through without hesitation (“John Borman’s Deliverance, John Carpenter’s The Thing, Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho and Henri-Georges Clouzot’s The Wages of Fear,” says Bong Joon-Ho). Putting the question to everyone from Snoop Dogg to Paul Mescal, Olivia Rodrigo to Peter Jackson, Four Favourites provides a welcome breath of fresh air on social media feeds thanks to its relaxed style and often insightful answers. 

Celebrities mulling over their Four Favourites

Aucklander Aaron Yap is the head of social media for Letterboxd, the New Zealand-founded website where movie fans can log, review and share what they have been watching. He was an early adopter of the platform in 2013, less than a year after it launched. “As someone who watches a lot of films, it really filled that gap for me in terms of tracking my movie watching and being able to discover new films,” Yap says. During the pandemic, when the platform exploded globally, he got his “dream job” when the opportunity arose to run their Instagram account. 

“In the early days, I always looked at it like a bit of a scrapbook,” he says. “I’d been a Tumblr baby and loved that curation of things you love and things you want to share with your followers. It was a very open playground for me to be creative and just test things out.” 

Aaron Yap (right) with the Letterboxd crew at The Oscars earlier this year (Image: Supplied)

As TikTok and shortform video started to take over and Yap was promoted to the head of social media for the rapidly-growing company, he began to think about new formats that could work for Letterboxd on social media. Since the beginning, users of the platform had been invited to pick their own four favourite films when building their profile, and Yap says it had quickly become a “massive feature” of the site. “It almost encapsulates who you are as a Letterboxd member and who you are as someone who loves film,” he says. 

There was also something about the number four that struck a fruitful balance between freedom and restriction. “If you get five picks, it’s much easier to choose, because the fifth one is like a lifeboat,” laughs Yap. “People get really riled up because, for some reason, it’s not as easy as three and it’s not as open as five. It’s not life or death, but there’s still some stake to it.” And whether you prefer Godard or Die Hard, the answers always reveal something about you. “There’s definitely a part of you that you are sharing with the world by making those decisions.” 

Previously trialled as a podcast, one of the earliest outings for Four Favourites on camera was during the 2022 virtual junket for Fresh, a rom-com starring Daisy Edgar Jones and Sebastian Stan. “We were still finding the footing of the format and we hadn’t quite settled on if it was going to be four posters in the graphics or just a single poster, but the concept of talking about four favourite films was definitely there,” says Yap. “Then it was just about playing around, tweaking it, and trying to nail it in a way that would start to gain traction.”

In its infancy, Yap says Four Favourites was a much harder sell to the junket-sphere. “Publicists didn’t quite understand it – why are you talking about your favourite films and not the film that you’re there to promote?” Despite initial confusion, they soon hit their stride with early standouts, with Yap singling out Paul Mescal at the Toronto Film Festival in particular. “He was just kind of hanging around and we pulled him in,” he says. “The vibe of that was what I had envisioned – just casually chatting to your friend who is talking about films they love.” 

While there have since been mega-viral instalments such as Tom Hanks, Cillian Murphy and Emma Stone, Yap has his own four favourite Four Favourites. There’s Pamela Anderson waxing lyrical about Gena Rowland’s performance in A Woman Under the Influence, and her love of French Wave. “It was just such a relaxed interview, but from someone who clearly loves movies and cinema and knows how to communicate that to an audience,” says Yap. “I think people watching are receptive to that sort of level of passion.”

He also shouts out the Four Favourites with the cast of Companion, who gave “100% with every interview” on the red carpet, before dropping two “deep cuts” that hold a special place in his heart. “One is with musician mxmtoon, she’s a Letterboxd member and loves movies, but also knew how to talk about the platform.” The final favourite was a special edition they did at the Berlin Film Festival starring real life Letterboxd users. “Sometimes they just feel like a breath of fresh air, it is refreshing to have our actual members being able to have that space.” 

And it wouldn’t be an interview about Four Favourites if we didn’t ask Yap to share his own four favourite films. Like the most seasoned of pros, he’s ready to go with Seconds (“very ahead of its time, black and white film, striking cinematography”), Umbrellas of Cherbourg (“I had never really gone to musicals, but this one changed my perception in a big way”), The Passenger (“existential road movie about this man who assumes the identity of an arms dealer”) and Hanabi (“a gangster film that balances brutality with a more introspective, tranquil side”).

While film discovery remains at the heart of Four Favourites – “we just want people to watch more movies and find films they haven’t heard of” – a surprising byproduct is the way that Four Favourites has since taken on a life of its own. “We’ve seen people in Russia having costume parties and doing four favourites, the London School of Economics doing Four Favourites, and even FedEx did their own twist on Four Favourites,” laughs Yap. “People that you wouldn’t normally expect to take part in this have found some value in using the format too.” 

Though there’s still many stars on the Four Favourites wish list, including everyone from Christopher Nolan to Carrie Coon, Yap is continuing to take the format outside of movie stars – with interviewers now stationed in LA, New York, London and Australia, there’s now plenty of opportunity to diversify. “Beyond film talent, we really want to get Four Favourites from different areas of society,” he says. More recently they have been interviewing more musicians and sports teams, including a particularly charming episode with the Brooklyn Nets. 

“Being able to reach even more people with this would be pretty exciting,” he says. “Because, at the end of the day, everyone has a favourite movie.” 

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