Music at Elsewhere
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Nikki Lane: Denim and Diamonds (New West)
8 Oct 2022 | 1 min read
If the title doesn't tell you this is a country album then you haven't been paying attention. But 38-year old Nikki Lane out of South Carolina is one of those singer-songwriters a few generations removed from even the outlaw movement. She was born the year that Toto won album of the year at the Grammys and Men At Work were hailed as the best new artist. Yes, a lot has happened in her... > Read more
First High
The Beths: Expert in a Dying Field (digital outlets)
2 Oct 2022 | 1 min read
When the Beths played to a capacity crowd at the Auckland Town Hall in November 2020 an excitable group of late-teen girls waited outside an hour before doors opened. However, despite the band's standing with that demographic, they were in the minority. A large proportion of the crowd were in their late 30s and a considerable number unquestionably fortysomething. But many knew every word... > Read more
TWO FROM THOKEI TAPES (2022): George and Roy at home
2 Oct 2022 | 1 min read
Elsewhere has frequently acknowledged the idiosyncratic releases of New Zealand artists on cassette from Thokei Tapes out of Hamburg, Germany. And still they come . . . Fortunately you can hear and buy the music at bandcamp here where a purchase of a tape gets you a free download. So here are the two latest offerings . The GDH Smoke Machine: Booklovers A solo... > Read more
Lou Reed: Words and Music 1965 (digital outlets)
21 Sep 2022 | 2 min read
Anyone who has heard the audition tape the Beatles did for Decca Records on January 1, 1962 isn't surprised at the label's Dick Rowe turning them down. He might not have said “groups of guitarists are on their way out” as the band's manager Brian Epstein would later say. Rowe signed Brian Poole and the Tremeloes at the time. But the Beatles' tapes, a ramshackle selection of... > Read more
RECOMMENDED RECORD: Te Kaahu: Te Kaahu O Rangi (digital outlets)
19 Sep 2022 | 1 min read
From time to time Elsewhere will single out a recent release we recommend on vinyl, like this one which comes in a beautiful and framable cover (as we said in the following review). The album was released in May but the vinyl has just arrived. Check out Elsewhere's other Recommended Record picks . . . . Amidst the landslide of local albums released in the current New... > Read more
Rangirara
Module: The Best of Module 2003-2022 (Loop/digital outlets)
19 Sep 2022 | 1 min read | 1
Wellington's Jeremiah Ross (aka Module) has released some of the most soulful, downtempo electronica across – by our loose count – half a dozen critically acclaimed studio albums (including the live Pattern.Dot.Life and singles) in addition to touring with Rhian Sheehan and Fly My Pretties, collaborating with the likes of Paul McLaney (on among other things the superb... > Read more
Marlon Williams: My Boy (digital outlets)
18 Sep 2022 | 1 min read
In a recent interview with Moana Maniapoto on Māori Television's award-winning Te Ao programme, singer-songwriter Marlon Williams observed, “All songwriting is posturing in way. Acting, I guess.” Given Williams (Ngāi Tahu, Ngāi Tahu) was named for Brando, has had a parallel screen career — most recently A Star is Born, True History of the Kelly Gang and the Netflix... > Read more
RECOMMENDED RECORD: Mel Parsons: Slow Burn (Cape Road Recordings/digital outlets)
17 Sep 2022 | 1 min read
From time to time Elsewhere will single out a recent release we recommend on vinyl, like this which comes in a gatefold sleeve with lyrics. Check out Elsewhere's other Recommended Record picks . . . . It's tempting to impute meanings onto the title of this fifth album by the much-travelled local artist and Elsewhere favourite Mel Parsons who has moved from country music to the... > Read more
Headland
Julian Lennon: Jude (digital outlets)
16 Sep 2022 | 1 min read
Few would chose Julian Lennon's life: an absent or indifferent famous father whose murder severed any further possible contact when he was 17; his own musical career always inviting a comparison he couldn't win or, worse maybe, the expectation of his father's slavish loyalists expecting him to be something he never could . . . Then there was the money, Yoko, step-brother Sean ascendant . . .... > Read more
Julia Jacklin: PRE PLEASURE (digital outlets)
11 Sep 2022 | 2 min read
One of the most important and interesting Australian talents of the past decade, on her two previous albums -- Don't Let the Kids Win and Crushing -- Julia Jacklin proved herself a writer of poignant ballads, self-analytical but never self-indulgent lyrics and sometimes offering skeletons of narratives for the listener to fill in the details. On Iushing of 2019, the then-28 year old... > Read more
RECOMMENDED RECORD: Motte: Cold + Liquid (Ba Da Bing/digital outlets)
7 Sep 2022 | 1 min read
From time to time Elsewhere will single out a recent release we recommend on vinyl, like this one which comes with a brief insert essay by Bruce Russell on the back of a 12'' photo which echoes the lovely cover art (both photos by Oliver Briggs). Check out Elsewhere's other Recommended Record picks . . . . In the dark waters west of atmospheric ambient music, where... > Read more
Cass McCombs: Heartmind (bandcamp)
5 Sep 2022 | 2 min read
Although the name might not be familiar, if we judge people by the company they keep we'd be impressed by Californian singer-songwriter Cass McCombs' pals: singer-guitarist Steve Gunn (playing Auckland, Wellington and Hastings in October), Arizona's psyche-desert rockers Meat Puppets, Angel Olsen, acclaimed pedal steel player Greg Leisz (touring with Jackson Browne next year) . . . And... > Read more
Karaoke
ONE WE MISSED: Picky Hippers, Full Flavour Behaviour (bandcamp)
30 Aug 2022 | <1 min read | 1
We forgive ourselves for not knowing about this album which came out in May. Not a lot from Kaikoura comes to our attention, and it was only last month that a friend of the band got in touch but somewhat undersold it: “Would love you to take a listen of this and perhaps critique it. Picky Hippers are Kaikoura based and rocking our piece of paradise”. In the great tradition of jam... > Read more
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Joseph Petric: Seen (Redshift Records/digital outlets)
20 Aug 2022 | 1 min read
The accordion is a much maligned instrument, the punchline to many jokes by musicians. Probably a hangover from relentlessly cheerful polka bands (although not this one!). Yet in the right hands the accordion – and its cousin the bandoneon – is not only capable of great expression (think of the tango music of the late bandoneon masters Dino Saluzzi and Astor Piazzolla) but in... > Read more
Spirit Cloud
Rusty: The Resurrection of Rust (EMI/digital outlets)
15 Aug 2022 | <1 min read
Well, if it was good enough for Tom Petty to resurrect his pre-Heartbreakers band Mudcrutch, then why not Declan McManus getting back with Allan Mayes with whom he'd played clubs around Liverpool and The Wirral in the years before he lit out under the name Elvis Costello? The McManus/Mayes duo was called Rusty and half a century on they got back together to record a bunch of songs to... > Read more
Gramsci: In Formation1: A Shift in Prospects (bandcamp)
13 Aug 2022 | <1 min read
About 8 months ago Gramsci – Paul McLaney, Greg Haver and Marika Hodgson – released The Hinterlands, an album we described as existential rock, cinematic yet personal. It joined a long line of albums by McLaney – some as Gramsci, some as his more ambient persona Impending Adorations, a few under his own name – which have found considerable favour at Elsewhere. So... > Read more
Intrepid
Spiral Stairs: Medley Attack!!! (Amazing Grease/bandcamp)
7 Aug 2022 | <1 min read
Spiral Stairs is Scott Kannberg – co-founder of Pavement but now in semi-retirement – and his solo albums have always had an easy charm and, as we noted previously, sounding closer to the Saints/Chris Bailey in rock ballad mode. They can sound undemanding in the best way – the sound is familiar, tight and melodic – but there have always been layers of meaning.... > Read more
Jack White: Entering Heaven Alive (Third Man/bandcamp)
7 Aug 2022 | 1 min read
When considering Jack White's often demanding album Fear of the Dawn in April we noted it was the first installment of a paired release, Entering Heaven Alive completing what could be seen as a double album. But where Fear of the Dawn was a tumultuous and disruptive collection of heavy rock, hip-hop and dubby funk-rock, Entering Heaven Alive is a much more muted affair from the newly... > Read more
Cookie Brooklyn and the Crumbs: Singles 2013 – 2019 (Burning Log/bandcamp)
6 Aug 2022 | <1 min read
The members of this Wellington-based trio have some prior form and have appeared at Elsewhere in the past: singer/guitarist Mark Williams has been in Marineville and Erika Grant (bass) and drummer Nell Thomas were in Orchestra of Spheres. So, left-field pedigrees where nonsense lyrics and avant-poetry are woven into slightly bent pop-rock. Is There Logic in Pop? here sounds like a... > Read more
Puff of Air
RECOMMENDED RECORD: The Finn Brothers, Finn (Lester)
1 Aug 2022 | 3 min read | 1
From time to time Elsewhere will single out a recent release we recommend on vinyl, like this reissue which comes in a gatefold sleeve as a double album with an extra record of demos. Check out Elsewhere's other Recommended Record picks . . . . Had it not been for Chris Bourke's thorough 1997 biography of Crowded House, Something So Strong, most people would not have been aware of... > Read more