THE MAGAZINE FOR CURIOUS PEOPLE
Elsewhere is a concept and a place, and for many years Graham Reid has been going there for his wide angle travels, writing, music review columns and interviews with writers, musicians and artists.
Elsewhere is an ever-expanding on-line magazine for people curious about new music, different travel, interesting arts and much more. This site is dedicated to the diversity and possibilities of Elsewhere. It is an equal opportunity enjoyer. Subscribe here (it's free) for a weekly newsletter. Welcome . . .
Latest posts
Omar Sosa/Seckou Keita: Suba (Bendigedig/digital outlets)
25 Oct 2021 | <1 min read
Regular visitors to Elsewhere will know of our affection for the multi-stringed kora out of West Africa, and the player here Seckou Keita. On their second album together Keita and Cuban keyboard/marimba player Omar Sosa (with Cuban percussionist Gustavo Ovalles, others on flutes and modular effects) bridge the Atlantic with a series of mostly reflective and understated... > Read more
2020 Visions
THE BEATLES. LET IT BE, THE EXPANDED REMIXED DELUXE EDITION, CONSIDERED (2021): You and I have memories . . .
25 Oct 2021 | 4 min read
There are two ways of considering the Beatles recording sessions in January 1969 when, very much nudged by Paul McCartney, they convened – just months after The White Album had been released and two days into the new year – in a bleak Twickenham film studio to ostensibly rehearse, record and then perform an album of all new material. As an idea it was... > Read more
All Things Must Pass rehearsal
Elsewhere Art . . . free jazz #2
25 Oct 2021 | <1 min read
This deliberately fractured and crowded collage was created to accompany a piece entitled 10 Rare Free Jazz Albums I'm Proud To Own, one my many recent columns where I look at what is on the shelves and -- sometimes with shame -- decide to write about them as a block. And try to explain why I have them, and sometimes why I shouldn't. As I recall most of the... > Read more
Bob Dylan: Clean Cut Kid (1983)
25 Oct 2021 | 1 min read
When he was recording the Infidels album with Mark Knopfler and Mick Taylor on guitars, Sly'n'Robbie (drums and bass) and Dire Straits keyboard player, Bob Dylan recorded this embittered rocker which has elements of a flip on Chuck Berry's celebration of American youth. Here the all-American boy is warped by his culture. “He's on the baseball... > Read more
JOHN PSATHAS, COMPOSER. IN CONVERSATION (2021): From Wellington to the world
24 Oct 2021 | 11 min read
John Psathas is one of this country's most prolific and diverse composers, and the most internationally acclaimed. The New Zealand-Greek composer came to global attention when his music was heard during the Opening Ceremony of the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens. Since then his work has been commissioned by international and local artists, he is a NZ Arts Foundation... > Read more
SEX vs SENSUALITY (2021): What's love got to do with it?
24 Oct 2021 | 11 min read | 1
"you gotta sin to get saved" -- old saying . Aside from love -- falling in love, falling out of love, moping around afterwards and writing bad poetry -- there are other great themes to explore in song. It goes without saying, surely, that death, redemption and the Devil have alwys been big ideas. And sex and sensuality have preoccupied writers ever... > Read more
SHIHAD AND ALIEN WEAPONRY ALBUMS, REVIEWED (2021): Significant sound and fury?
23 Oct 2021 | 3 min read
It has been more than 15 years since Dave Dobbyn sang Welcome Home, a song that spoke to our better selves as a people prepared to make a space for new migrants, many of whom had come from dire situations and had been confronted by racism here. As he noted, “out here on the edge, the empire is fading by the day” and that erosion of loyalty to Britain and the... > Read more
The Famous Elsewhere Questionnaire
THE FAMOUS ELSEWHERE HIGHLY PERSONAL QUESTIONNAIRE . . . Luke Buda
22 Oct 2021 | 4 min read
To describe Luke Buda as “of the Phoenix Foundation” – which we have doubtless done in the past – is to diminish him. He gets up to much other musical mischief. He has another band Teeth, there have been film soundtracks (among them Hunt for the Wilderpeople with other Foundation members), production work (notably Dave Dobbyn's Harmony House on... > Read more
Private Message
Le Ren: Leftovers (Secretly Canadian/bandcamp)
20 Oct 2021 | <1 min read
Le Ren is Canadian singer-songwriter Lauren Spear whose elegant but assured vocals sit easily within soft folk-country with an ethereal lightness, even as she addresses loss and damaged love on this debut which cleverly undersells itself with the title. Some have mentioned the late Karen Dalton with regard to her style but she has little of Dalton's resonant power... > Read more
THE BEATLES' GET BACK BOOK (2021): The words around the music
18 Oct 2021 | 5 min read
As some wag noted on Facebook recently about the title of this large format hardback: “Did we ever leave?” We did not . . . Because the period these transcripts cover – January 1969 when the Beatles came together with the vague idea of being filmed recording an album and then performing it live somewhere – is replete with unfinished business.... > Read more
Across the Universal, rehearsal and jamming
VARIOUS ARTISTS. ART FOR CHART SAKE, CONSIDERED (1986): Straight outta right-field Dunedin
18 Oct 2021 | 3 min read
For many New Zealand artists the Eighties was the decade of EPs, cassettes and compilations. EPs were manageable if you only had a few songs you'd polished up, while tapes allowed more free range. But compilations could be pulled together quickly by someone else and getting your song on one meant you were sometimes rubbing shoulders with fellow travelers or even those... > Read more
Love in Vein by Armalite Hour (recorded from vinyl)
Elsewhere Art . . . Sun Ra
18 Oct 2021 | <1 min read
The article this collage accompanied was about a Sun Ra album which ran counter to how many had heard and embraced him, as the spaced out jazz musician heading off to the stars and beyond. Sun Ra had also lead big bands and knew how to write charts which were blues-based and swinging. In that, he was closer to Ellington (hence his cameo here) than some prog-rock... > Read more
Ray Charles: You Don't Know Me (1962)
18 Oct 2021 | 1 min read
The world is awash with sad songs, but most along the lines of “I love you/I miss you/come back” are very obvious and mostly only affect the listener going through something similar. The more subtle sad songs are those which invite empathy and take you to a place in outside of the obvious sentimentality. In Janis Ian's beautiful At Seventeen and the... > Read more
Luke Buda: Buda (bandcamp)
17 Oct 2021 | 2 min read
When some artists go on a journey of self-discovery it can come off as indulgent, especially if the artist in question has just gone through a break-up and spent weeks in the bedroom writing bad poetry then putting the whining or accusatory “I/you” words to baleful music. Others however can use their experiences to connect with an audience. Although... > Read more
Beef and Carrots
Bridget Douglas and Al Fraser: SilverStoneWoodBone (Rattle/bandcamp)
17 Oct 2021 | 1 min read
Elsewhere recently added a new chapter to our many already in the “magazine”, it is Further Out Elsewhere and this is where we are placing “sounds beyond songs, ideas outside the obvious, possibilities far from pop”. It's the kind of place you hear sonic experiments, collaborations between seemingly disparate people, unexpected electronic art and... > Read more
Tihei Mauri Ora (by Josiah Carr)
The Beatles: Let It Be. Remixed double CD edition (Apple/Universal/digital outlets)
17 Oct 2021 | 2 min read
The Beatles' Let It Be was always considered the runt of the litter. The circumstances of it creation – a cold, soulless London film studio in January, Harrison quitting, into a new location, aimless boredom – didn't bode well. And after the polish of Abbey Road (and appearing much later as the band broke up), Let It Be took the gloss off the glittering... > Read more
One After 909 with Billy Preston (studio, take three)
Various Artists: Keepin' Secrets, A Failsafe Records Sampler (Failsafe/bandcamp)
16 Oct 2021 | 1 min read
Subtitled “best kept secrets in NZ alternative music”, this always good and sometimes excellent collection from Rob Mayes' Failsafe vaults gathers tracks by the well-known (Jay Clarkson's Breathing Cage, Throw, Springloader, Dolphin) alongside blinked'n'missed 'em (Eskimo, Astro 64, Hooster and many others). But a check in the margins uncovers some familiar... > Read more
All Gone Now, by Deluxe Boy
Johnny Campbell and the Detours: Overtime, The Essential Recordings (Frenzy)
16 Oct 2021 | 1 min read
Archivist and Frenzy Record's Grant Gillanders draws attention to the older man standing behind the band, photographed in the early Sixties. “That's Max Merritt's father,” he says. And that's because this Christchurch band around guitarist Johnny Campbell played at Max's famous Teenagers Club which was managed by his parents. This stacked collection... > Read more
My Girl (1964)
Lake South: The Light You Throw (bandcamp)
15 Oct 2021 | 1 min read
Lake South is a Wellington-based multi-media artist: this album of a kind of folk-poetry pop-electronica comes as an insert in a 55 page A5-sized book of thoughts, lyrics, photos, talks and conversations. He's an interesting observational writer who both celebrates and critiques (Townbelt and New Bourgoizealand which open this 12 song collection). But at heart he has... > Read more
You Were A Part Of It
Favourite Five Recent Releases
Jay Clarkson: Kindle (Rose Hobart/Flying Out)
15 Oct 2021 | 1 min read
The Rheineck Rock Award – which gave a generous wedge of money to emerging artists to record – wasn't without its controversies in the late Eighties: after Ardijah's popular win in the inaugural event the following year the judges picked Headless Chickens which outraged many (notably radio jocks and the sponsors) and the year after that it went to Breathing Cage... > Read more