If you’ve ever lost an item while flying through Sydney Airport, now might be the time to look for it. The airport is selling unclaimed stuff from its lost and found vaults at auction, and Crikey has already been able to match one set of items with its owner.
Among the thousands of items going under the hammer — mostly laptops, headphones, sunglasses and jewellery — are two boxes of records by New Zealand indie rock legends The Chills.
Crikey got in touch with a friend of The Chills’ founder Martin Phillipps after spotting the CDs and vinyl records on the auction website. The friend, Bruce Mahalski, confirmed the boxes had been lost during a Chills tour of Australia in February 2023.
“I wasn’t on that tour, but I do remember the story of this lost merch and how it screwed things up at some of those gigs,” Mahalski said.
“It’d be great to get it back. You know, obviously while The Chills is a famous band, playing in New Zealand and Australasia doesn’t equate to being rich.”
One of the items for sale, described as “a collection of CD’s, The Chills”, has so far fetched eight bids, the highest of which is $50. A picture of the box indicates it contains more than 50 CDs. The other item is a box of 13 copies of The Chills’ 2016 EP Pyramid/When the Poor Can Reach the Moon, one of which is autographed by the band. The highest bid at the time of writing, out of five bids, is $35.
James Badgery, managing director at the auction house Theodore Bruce which is selling the Sydney Airport items, said the auction was an annual affair and it wasn’t the first time someone had discovered one of their lost possessions for sale.
“If they get in contact with us, we’ll get them in touch with the correct people at Sydney Airport, and then the airport will talk to them and then ask us to withdraw the item from sale and return it to its rightful owner,” Badgery told Crikey. “We’ll try to get it sorted out as quickly as possible.”
Coincidentally, the same weekend the Sydney Airport auction kicked off, Phillipps began a music collection sale of his own. In an auction managed by Mahalski, Phillipps’ huge collection of rare CDs, posters and vinyl is being put up for sale in order to collect money to restore Phillipps’ house.
In a story by Radio New Zealand, Mahalski described Phillipps as a “mad collector”, especially of records associated with the New Zealand indie record label Flying Nun, which published many of The Chills’ early releases.
“There isn’t much that Martin hasn’t collected at one time or another … he’s a completionist,” Mahalski told RNZ.
