Bigwater is the sound and the translation of Wainui.
Wainui is the home of the Thursday night musical excursion sessions that have been taking place in Pete Stewart's living room for as long as anyone can remember and it is from that Wainui living room and many year's worth of Thursdays, that the Bigwater sound has come from.
Trevor Herk (Bass and vocals) and Pete Stewart (Guitar and lead vocals), a couple of the 'elder statesmen' of the Gisborne music scene have been playing together in various local bands for years. Lincoln Wright (drums and backing vocals) returned home to Gisborne from Wellington a few years ago looking for a funky break beat band to play in, until he accepted an invitation from Pete and Trev to play drums for their band Borderline Trio one Thursday. It took Linc some time to realise that many of the originals he thought he was playing were actually covers of bands like Eagles of Death Metal, Josh Rouse and Orange Juice etc. But it wasn't long before they had started down a slightly different path, with a whole lot of new original material and a new 'Bigwater' sound.
Linc claims responsibility for the early 90's grunge element in their music and the 'old boys' the modern day Neil Young and early Fleetwood Mac as described in a review in the NZ Musician magazine. The Bigwater sound is a grungy kind of surf pop rock, songs that are slow burners as well as faster ones veering closely to punk..all with a big fat bottom end thanks to Trev's bass.
Pete is the songwriter of the three, writing beautiful three minute love pop songs which he often finds late at night on his acoustic guitar and a bottle of red. The good ones he captures on cassette, later adding the chorus and the band version once Trev and Linc have given it the treatment and added their own parts. Pete also has the role of lead vocals in Bigwater and loves it. After playing in so many bands in which he'd be asked to do a third harmony on a song at practice only to turn up to the performance and find he didn't have a mike, he is clear that it is the support of the other two which allows him to enjoy the singing and songwriting as much as he does.
Bigwater play gigs around Gisborne, and have released a self titled CD. They are currently working on a second, refining material and getting ready to record.
