Music at Elsewhere
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Aberfeldy: Somewhere to Jump From (Tenement)
11 Oct 2010 | <1 min read
This Scottish band -- about whom the words delightful, charming, witty and sensitive come to hand -- deliver a lightly embellished and perfectly enunciated form of folk-pop which at times recalls a less self-centred Morrissey as sung by a young Paul Simon, or a less anxious Belle and Sebastian as sung by Graham Nash (of Crosby Stills and Nash). In fact Nash gets an amusing name-check on the... > Read more
Aberfeldy: Malcolm
Coolies: Master (Chapter)
11 Oct 2010 | <1 min read
Coolies -- originally out of South Auckland -- hit a wall about five years ago and despite building a small, very small, local reputation and playing SxSW, their trash/distortion/pop sound which was almost alarming retro (think 1980 alt.indie post-punk) it seemed like it might be all over. But from the ashes . . . With two of the original three-piece (Tina and Sjionel, now joined by... > Read more
Coolies: Searching
Ash and the Matadors: The Mansion Tapes (Ash)
11 Oct 2010 | <1 min read
This six-track EP by a Dunedin four-piece fronted by singer-songwriter, guitarist and keyboard player Ash Officer came out in June but has only just landed in Elsewhere -- which means some of the reviews have been done of it down south. Although none that I recall in northern climes. Ash/Matadors have a keen supporter in Southland Times writer Chris Chilton who also had an astute... > Read more
Ash and the Matadors: The Ballad of Cobh
Marc Cohn: Listening Booth; 1970 (Sony)
10 Oct 2010 | <1 min read
The way singer-songwriter Cohn remembers it, 1970 was when the Beatles, and Simon and Garfunkel, broke up. It was classic singles, the dawn of the singer-songwriter era (James Taylor, Neil Young and others), great albums by various solo Beatles, Van Morrison, Cat Stevens, Creedence . . . So he goes back to that year for this collection of covers of those influences, but turns some of... > Read more
Marc Cohn: No Matter What (with Aimee Mann)
Frazey Ford: Obadiah (Nettwerk/Shock)
4 Oct 2010 | 1 min read
Ford was one of the key voices in the Be Good Tanyas, but since they have disbanded she is now out on her own with this debut solo album -- and quite some quiet piece of work it is. Things really start to grip a few tracks in when you identify the idiom: despite the banjo on the lead-off track Firecracker, this is no recreation of backwoods "authenticity" and the warm trumpet on... > Read more
Frazey Ford: If You Gonna Go
The Roulettes: Unread Books (Roulettes)
4 Oct 2010 | <1 min read
The openers here by this Auckland trio don't initially seem stray too far from the template of fizzing and slightly fuzzy power pop-rock, but when the spirit of Marc Bolan and early Bowie walk through The Green Lantern things really start to perk up -- and have the effect of making you listen again to those openers (the title track with massive bass line and slightly snearing vocals, Call with... > Read more
The Roulettes: The Green Lantern
Jerry Lee Lewis: Mean Old Man (Verve Forecast)
4 Oct 2010 | 1 min read
In a You Tube comment someone said Jerry Lee looked a little rough for someone only 74 years old. In his defense -- he's actually 75 now -- they were pretty full years, especially in the late Fifties, and he wasn't called the Killer for nothing, the man gave it all on the night. And of course there were the tragic (and slightly mysterious, in one case) deaths of two wives. He's had six,... > Read more
Jerry Lee Lewis: Man Old Man (with Ronnie Wood)
Phil Selway: Familial (Shock)
4 Oct 2010 | 1 min read
Despite the careers of Phil Collins and Dave Grohl – and Ringo's country music record after the Beatles' break-up – no one expects much of solo albums by drummers: Peter Criss' was the worst seller of the Kiss solo releases in 78. Pussycat whiskers didn't help. But Radiohead's Selway – one of Neil Finn's 7 Worlds Collide project – confounds expectation, as his... > Read more
Phil Selway: Don't Look Down
The Black Dahlias: Ladies and Gentlemen (Cruel)
3 Oct 2010 | <1 min read
With a pure blast of angry guitars, a disciplined rhythm section, throat shredding vocals and a terrific sense of pop smarts driving their metal-edged rock'n'roll this New Zealand industrial strength five-piece grab attention immediately on this six-track EP, which feels far too short. Taking large dollops of classic metal but delivering with that post-punk energy which has been the hallmark... > Read more
The Black Dahlias: Ready to Roll
Turtle Island String Quartet: Have You Ever Been . . . (Telarc/Ode)
3 Oct 2010 | 1 min read
Classical artists playing the music of Jimi Hendrix is hardly a new idea: the Kronos Quartet had a crowd-pleasing built-in encore of Purple Haze when they first started out, and of course Nigel Kennedy finally made good on his threat/promise to do an album of Hendrix. Before them however in the mid Seventies Gil Evans arranged some Hendrix material for his orchestra and a subsequent album.... > Read more
Turtle Island String Quartet: House Burning Down
Patty Larkin: 25 (Signature)
3 Oct 2010 | <1 min read
Celebrating 25 years in music usually means a greatest hits, box set or some kind of attention-grabbing project. It is typical and a measure of Larkin's generous nature that rather than go that whole route she collected 25 of her favourite self-penned love songs and invites in 25 of her favourite singers and people she had admired to accompany her. And in the credits to each song she puts... > Read more
Patty Larkin with Erin McKeown: Beautiful
Various Artists: Late Night Tales; At the Movies (101/Southbound)
3 Oct 2010 | <1 min read
On paper the idea of a collection of movie themes segueing seamlessly into each other is undeniably appealing: you can imagine what a film noir compilation might sound like, same with westerns, horror, thriller and so on. But this catch-all -- a whopping 39 snippets, which averages about two minutes a slice -- moves from the sublime to the cor-blimey! It's an odd collection that shifts... > Read more
Deodata: Also Sprach Zarathustra
Pine: Books and Magazines (Arch Hill)
1 Oct 2010 | <1 min read
In that great Kiwi tradition, Pine recorded this low-key charmer in a sitting room in Christchurch (the house since severely damaged by the quake apparently) and the trio here once again deliver intimate, spare but not skeletal-sounding pop. Actually, there is little needs to be said here because the Arch Hill label has an interesting initiative-cum-incentive: you can download the album free... > Read more
Pine: Brand New Heart
Surf City: Kudos (Arch Hill)
28 Sep 2010 | <1 min read | 1
Possibly because this young Auckland four-piece have all that rolling energy of early Flying Nun acts (the Chills and the Clean especially) but turn it up to 11 and make it fat, it has hijacked my stereos (home and car, I take it for drives). They deliver such a thrilling racket it's hardly surprising they've been picked up by college radio in the States, and played shows at the... > Read more
Surf City: Icy Lakes
John Mellencamp: No Better Than This (Rounder)
27 Sep 2010 | 1 min read | 1
The man they call "the poet laureate of the Interstate" (although he always sounds a backroads man to me) ha been on such a roll lately with Freedom's Road and Life Death Love Freedom) that the idea of him recording in mono with T Bone Burnett in Sun Studio, the Gunter Hotel in San Antonio (where Robert Johnson was committed to tape) and the First African Baptist Church in Savannah... > Read more
John Mellencamp: Easter Eve
Luke Jackson: . . . And Then Some (Popsicle)
27 Sep 2010 | 1 min read
After a mention of the late Robert Kirby's string arrangements in a review of the Magic Numbers' The Runaway, this Canadian singer-songwriter with a well-stamped passport got in touch: he too had benefited from Kirby's smart touch. And he sent on a copy of this album which opens with a classic blast of power-pop (Come Tomorrow, the title even sounds like Badfinger/Raspberries/Big Star) . . .... > Read more
Luke Jackson: Come Tomorrow
Jah Wobble: Welcome to My World (30 Hertz/Southbound)
27 Sep 2010 | 1 min read
Jah Wobble has been one of the most interesting and innovative musical explorers of the past few decades but, as I discovered in '96 at the time of this interview – he does it mostly without leaving home. Travel is for the middle-classes he said and a working-class geezer like himself, well . . . Anyway he'd done the touring thing, so . . . Fascinating man whose music... > Read more
Jah Wobble: London
Eric Clapton: Clapton (Reprise)
27 Sep 2010 | 2 min read | 1
It's fair to say Eric Clapton at 20, while playing with John Mayall's Blues Breakers, never gave much thought to a “career”. Yet with this new album he can reflect on more than 40 years in the game, of highs and lows, successes and mis-steps (most of the 80s). Inevitably Clapton at 65 doesn't have the fire which propelled the late 60s power-trio Cream or gave his desperate... > Read more
Eric Clapton: River Runs Deep
Justin Townes Earle: Harlem River Blues (Bloodshot/Southbound)
27 Sep 2010 | 1 min read
Over three previous albums this son of Steve (and named for Townes Van Zandt) has cut an increasingly confident path with originals which are nominally country-Americana but refer to alt.rock, bluegrass, honky-tonk, ragtime and Hank Williams-styled truck-stop rock. His shows here have been popular and on this album he slips in the aching Christchurch Woman (with guitarist Jason... > Read more
Justin Townes Earle: Rogers Park
Yes: Keys to Ascension (CD/DVD, Proper/Southbound)
26 Sep 2010 | 1 min read | 1
San Luis Obispo isn't a name you readily associate with rock music. The picturesque coastal town in northern California -- near Hearst's castle -- still isn't on the radar despite it being the place where Yes -- the original line-up -- relaunched their career in '95. Well, "relaunched" might be overstating it, but they certainly re-formed in their San Luis Obispo studio (world... > Read more