Chris Knox's creative force remains despite life-changing stroke

The idea for a book about music legend Chris Knox had been kicking around in Craig Robertson’s head for years.

But when the author attended his famous politician brother Grant Robertson’s civil union in Wellington in 2009 and met the man himself, the idea solidified.

The former Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance is famously a Dunedin sound fanatic and had formed a friendship with Knox, Robertson says.

“Grant set up a conversation for me with Chris. And so suddenly, this odd pipe dream has become a potential reality, a book. And Chris seemed to kind of like the idea as I explained it to him,” Robertson told RNZ's Nine to Noon.

But five months later, Knox had a life-altering stroke, leaving him paralysed on his right side and mostly unable to speak. The project was put on ice and not picked up again until 2016.

In the 1970s and early 80s, Knox formed influential Dunedin bands The Enemy, Toy Love and the Tall Dwarfs.

His fierce creativity found a home, like many of his generation, in the emerging punk movement, says Robertson, a professor of media studies at Northeastern University in Boston.

“Musically, Dunedin wasn't offering anything for him until punk comes along. And like many, many New Zealanders of that age, he sees the Sex Pistols on Dylan Taite's TV short documentary and that changes his life.

“He sees people behaving like him, as talentless musically as him, and people following them around. And Chris, who always liked to be the centre of attention, was like, 'Okay this is something, I can do music now, I don't have to just listen to it'."

From the early days, Knox was a provocateur, Robertson says.

“He became famous for cutting himself, on the top of his forearm. He used to say it didn't hurt until the next morning when he had to peel the sheets off after they’d stuck to the blood overnight.

"He performed in that way, he wanted to provoke, he wanted to challenge.”

Robertson’s biography of Knox, Not Given Lightly, traces his multifaceted career from music to satirical cartoons to journalism and commentary. Knox saw no barriers to his own creativity, he says.

“He absolutely followed what he wanted to do. In one interview, he refers to expressions, not professions. He had a very low bar of what was good enough and acceptable enough to go out into the world.”

Knox saw strength in his own lack of proficiency, Robertson says.

“He had no desire to learn how to play the guitar better, he had no desire to learn how to draw better, he had no desire to be told how to make a video or film.

“He knew what he wanted to do. And for him, creativity is based in honest, direct expression… he didn't want that expression distorted by skill.”

By the '90s, Knox was describing his music as a hobby and had a burgeoning career as a freelance cartoonist and columnist, Robertson says.

“In the 1990s, he became the mainstream media's go-to alternative person, alternative point of view.”

After suffering a stroke, Knox's creative force still burns strong, Robertson says, and the 73-year-old even taught himself to draw again with his left hand.

“It just shows what the creative force is and just Chris's intense need to create, to get stuff out.”

Robertson's book title Not Given Lightly refers to Knox’s most famous song, which, despite failing to chart when it was released in 1989, has since become a New Zealand classic used in film, television and even an ad for Vogels bread.

"You have this person who defines his entire creative practice as being outside of commercial culture, and suddenly his most famous song becomes famous because it's on a bread ad.”