Heavenly Pop Hits—The Chills Albums Ranked

When Martin Phillipps passed away in 2024, the world lost a terrific, yet overlooked, songwriter. Phillipps, the son of a Methodist minister, formed The Chills in 1980. They signed to the Flying Nun label but were more sophisticated than most labelmates. Phillipps enjoyed critical acclaim for his jangly songs but never enjoyed mainstream success outside New Zealand.

Phillipps was the group’s only constant member. More than twenty other musicians passed through The Chills’ ranks. The band was largely inactive between 1996 and 2015. Phillipps boyish voice and melodic gifts were undiminished when The Chills reemerged with Silver Bullets in 2015.

The Chills recently released the posthumous Springboard: Early Unrecorded Songs. Springboard features newly recorded versions of the band’s early songs. On the week his former house was advertised for sale, it’s a good time to revisit Phillipps’ discography.

I’ve included Kaleidoscope World, a compilation of their early singles, since it doesn’t duplicate songs from their studio albums.

The Chills Albums Ranked

#9 Sunburnt

1996
Sunburnt feels like a Martin Phillipps solo album. The other band members were denied visas to record in the UK, so Phillipps recorded Sunburnt with a couple of ring-ins. Dave Gregory from XTC plays bass, while Fairport Convention’s Dave Mattacks drums.

Often dour, Sunburnt is less melodically exuberant than Phillipps’ best work. But Phillipps’ songwriting oozes quality. Even The Chills’ weakest album has worthwhile songs like ‘As Far As I Can See’ and ‘Come Home’.

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#8 Brave Words

1988
Oddly, The Chills’debut ranks low on the list. Strong songs like ‘Brave’ and ‘Wet Blanket’ shine through. However, the weaker songs are buried under Mayo Thompson’s limp production.

Phillipps remixed the album in 2023 as Spoken Bravely, matching the SB initials of every other Chills album.

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#7 Spring Board: The Early Unrecorded Songs

2025
It’s pleasing that Phillipps made Spring Board before his passing. Like the other late-period Chills albums, it’s nicely produced and lovingly played.

Springboard overstays its welcome without the stylistic variety to compensate. Phillipps’ best early songs were presented on Kaleidoscope World, leaving Spring Board as a pleasant batch of leftovers. Despite the length, great songs like ‘If This World Was Meant For Me’ and ‘I’ll Protect You’ shine.

Finishing The Chills’ career with ‘I Don’t Want To Live Forever’ is indescribably poignant.

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#6 Soft Bomb

1992
Soft Bomb was The Chills’ shot at the big time. They recorded for six months at Burbank Studios, while Van Dyke Parks provided string arrangements on the ambitious ‘Water Wolves’. Hoping for a REM-style crossover to the mainstream, the record didn’t fit with the post-Nevermind musical landscape.

It’s messy, with the short link tracks and the ambition of ‘Water Wolves’. But there are perhaps more great songs than any other Chills album, with jangly treasures like ‘Male Monster from the Id’ and ‘Halo Fading’.

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#5 Snow Bound

2018
The most impressive part of The Chills’ discography is the strength of their comeback albums. I can’t think of another band that returned from a twenty-year hiatus and picked up where they left off.

Snow Bound features strong material like the rocker ‘Scarred’ and the jangly ‘Lord of All I Survey’.

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#4 Scatterbrain

2020
Like their other late-career near masterpieces, the Chills’ final album of new material is satisfying. Age made Phillipps more eccentric (‘Monolith’) and sentimental (‘Caught in my Eye’).

But he’s lost little of his melodic zing. For example, songs like ‘Little Alien’ and ‘The Walls Beyond Abandon’ are earworms, power pop with memorable hooks. Phillipps often contemplates his own mortality, on songs like ‘Destiny’.

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#3 Silver Bullets

2015
My favourite of The Chills’ comeback albums is the first. Silver Bullets presented songs Phillipps wrote during his twenty-year absence from the spotlight.

The resurgent Phillipps is more political than before, on songs like ‘America Says Hello’ and ‘Underwater Wasteland’. The multipart ‘Pyramid / When the Poor Can Reach the Moon’ is the longest song in The Chills catalogue, but one of the finest.

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#2 Submarine Bells

1990
The Chills’ second album topped the New Zealand chart. The irresistible #2 pop confection ‘Heavenly Pop Hit’ spearheaded Submarine Bells. The haunting title track is another classic. Unfortunately, Submarine Bells barely dented the charts anywhere else in the world.

Music critic Scott Miller called Submarine Bells “a dynamite whole album”, and “the international star and culmination of” the Dunedin sound.

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#1 Kaleidoscope World

1987
The Chills’ best record is a compilation, released before their debut album. Kaleidoscope World collects the band’s early singles. It features classics like ‘Rolling Moon’, ‘Doledrums’, and the haunting ‘Pink Frost’.

The original LP version housed only eight tracks, but later CD versions are more comprehensive. It’s the only way to hear ‘I Love My Leather Jacket’, one of The Chills’ poppiest tunes with its Velvet Underground-derived stomp.

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