Includes colour insert and booklet. 

Aotearoa, New Zealand, nineteen-seventy-something, the bottom of the South Pacific—the largest Maori and Polynesian population in the world and a nation wanting to groove. Approximately three million people, two islands, hot summers, muddy winters, one TV channel until 1975, and all radio was AM. A constant supply of international soul, funk, and disco releases were available, but things got really interesting when local artists found their soul on vinyl.

Heed The Call! collects the best New Zealand material from the afro-tastic days of 1973 to 1983. Artists include Mark Williams, whose “House For Sale” became a sought-after Northern Soul single, the (three) Yandall Sisters (two of whom are pictured behind Mark WiIlliams on the cover), a teenage Tina Cross, Dalvanius and Prince Tui Teka—all of these became household names in New Zealand. This collection mines some overlooked nuggets from their respective catalogs alongside lesser known acts like The Pink Family, with their non-secular floor sizzler “Don’t Give Your Life Away,” the gritty gospel soul of Sonia & Skee, and many others.

These are the songs that drove a country from black and white to technicolor, and, being a scene born in total isolation, it took turns that weren’t heard anywhere else. This is funk, soul and disco if Studio 54 had been set up within five minutes of a dairy farm, a rugby club and a marae, and it finally let people dance.