Chris BourkeChris Bourke

Chris Bourke is the author of Good-Bye Māoriland, and Blue Smoke, which won the New Zealand Post Book of the Year award in 2011. He has worked as arts & books editor at the Listener, editor of Rip It Up and Real Groove, and producer of Radio New Zealand’s Saturday Morning with Kim Hill. He is now the contents editor at Audioculture.

Neon Picnic: New Zealand’s very own Fyre Festival

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With 30 years’ hindsight, the failed Neon Picnic festival of January 1988 can be seen as the Fyre festival of its day, writes Chris Bourke. This piece was originally published on Audioculture. It was a flawed concept that captured the spirit of the times. The organisers envisaged something more evolved than the contemporary rock bands and … Read more

Book of the Week: A brief history of the power and glory of Māori popular music

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One of the stand-out chapters in Chris Bourke’s new best-selling history of New Zealand music in World War One is about the contribution and legacy of Māori music. He expands on the subject for the Spinoff. Māori popular music is the most crucial gap in the expanding bookshelf of New Zealand music histories. When researching Blue Smoke, my … Read more