"Dominion Road" is the debut single by New Zealand rock band The Mutton Birds. The song was released in 1992 as one of four singles to promote the band's debut self-titled album. Despite only spending ten weeks on the New Zealand singles charts and peaking at #31, the song has since become a New Zealand classic, being rated as the 23rd best New Zealand song of all time by the Australasian Performing Right Association in 2001. The song has resulted in the installation of a brass plaque in the footpath approximately half-way down the song's namesake street, in a reference to the song's lyrics.
Dominion Road (song)
Unofficial Plaque marking halfway point along Dominion Road
The Mutton Birds were a New Zealand rock music group formed in Auckland in 1991 by Ross Burge, David Long and Don McGlashan, with Alan Gregg joining a year later. Four of their albums reached the topĀ 10 on the New Zealand Albums Chart, The Mutton Birds (1992), Salty (1994), Envy of Angels (1996) and Rain, Steam and Speed (1999). They had a number-one hit with "The Heater" (1994), while their two other topĀ 10 singles were a cover of "Nature" by the Fourmyula (1992), and an original, "Anchor Me" (1994). From 1996 to 2000 the group were based in England; they returned to New Zealand and then disbanded in 2002.
The Mutton Birds performing at Bar Bodega, Wellington, 2012