The backstory to How Bizarre is even stranger than the song

If you grew up in the 1990s, chances are you can still hear it instantly.

“Ooh baby… it’s making me crazy…”

Nearly thirty years later, OMC’s How Bizarre remains one of those songs that seems permanently lodged in the collective memory. The trumpet hook, the laid-back groove and Pauly Fuemana’s unmistakable voice somehow sounded unlike anything else on the radio in 1996.

But the biggest surprise wasn’t the song.

It was the name.

OMC stood for Otara Millionaires Club — a tongue-in-cheek reference to the Auckland suburb of Ōtara, where frontman Pauly Fuemana grew up. The joke was that there were no millionaires there. In reality, Ōtara was one of New Zealand’s toughest and poorest communities, making the name a cheeky piece of local humour that somehow travelled all the way around the world.

Listen to the Backstory from HOT 1027’s Classic Countdown below:

Source: uDiscover Music 

The man behind the music, Pauly Fuemana, was every bit as unique as the song itself. Friends and family described him as endlessly creative, constantly filling notebooks with lyrics, ideas and observations about the world around him. His partner Kirsten Fuemana would later describe his mindset as being “way bigger” than the environment he came from.

Producer Alan Jansson recognised that uniqueness immediately. Pauly’s voice, with its distinctive rhythm and phrasing, felt entirely new — “almost like he was rapping through a trumpet”, as one friend famously described it.

The result was How Bizarre, a song that defied almost every rule of pop music. It mixed mariachi trumpets, hip-hop beats, acoustic guitars and Polynesian influences into something that shouldn’t have worked — but somehow absolutely did.

The song went to number one in countries including Australia, Canada, Ireland and New Zealand, reached the UK Top Five and became one of the most successful songs ever recorded by a New Zealand artist. Remarkably, Pauly had never even been on an aeroplane before flying overseas to sign his first international record deal.

Today, How Bizarre remains more than just a one-hit wonder. It stands as proof that great songs can come from anywhere — even from a “Millionaires Club” that was never really about money at all.

Check out the official music video of “How Bizarre” below:

References

• • https://nzhistory.govt.nz/page/omc-release-%E2%80%98how-bizarre%E2%80%99
  • https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/mar/25/one-of-new-zealands-great-moments-how-omcs-how-bizarre-became-and-remained-a-hit
  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OMC_(band)
  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauly_Fuemana
  • https://www.nzonscreen.com/videos/how-bizarre-story-of-otara-millionare-2014