Musician Roy Montgomery Returns to the Fold

Following a decade long hiatus, Christchurch-based musician Roy Montgomery is about to release a new album – a four LP box set titled RMHQ. Featured in the latest issue of The Wire, Montgomery explains to Noel Meek how he returned to music following the two major earthquakes that struck Christchurch in 2010 and 2011.

As a volunteer firefighter in Lyttelton, Montgomery was involved in the “rescue work at a building with many fatalities and entrapments,” he explains. “Even though I was not physically injured and nor were my family, I was exposed to what you could call harrowing scenes.”

“Oddly,” he says, “I thought about it most when training with the fire brigade … Working with firefighting equipment is physically demanding and minor injuries are not uncommon. Any time that I injured a hand or fingers I thought that any greater mishap might mean the end of even rudimentary guitar playing. The earthquakes prompted me to stop taking for granted always being able to return casually to composition and recording.”

New Zealand-born photographer Derek Henderson filmed a short video during the photoshoot for the article. The track featured is an excerpt of “Five Bears At Two Guns Arizona” from Bender, one part of RMHQ. Locations featured include beach and cottages at Birdling’s Flat (originally named Te Mata Hapuka) in Canterbury; the city of Christchurch; and Godley Head based just outside the city.

Montgomery is head of the Department of Environmental Management at Lincoln University.

Original article by Noel Meek, The Wire, October 2016.