Music at Elsewhere
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Brian Wilson; Brian Wilson and Friends (BMG CD/DVD)
20 Jul 2016 | 1 min read
There is certainly no shortage of Brian Wilson music about these days. We've had a couple of versions of SMiLE (including the excellent box set) and more recently the 50th anniversary reissue of Pet Sounds (again in an impressive expanded edition). Then of course he has released solo albums like No Pier Pressure (none of which have done much in the way of recapturing the old magic).... > Read more
Don't Talk (ft Mark Isham)
Various Artists: Late Night Tales, Olafur Arnalds (latenighttales/Southbound)
18 Jul 2016 | 1 min read
Elsewhere has always had an affection for compilations in the Late Night Tales series (as it did with the not dissimilar Back to Mine) because it is a triple opportunity: You can be introduced to a compiler you'd not previously encountered; it is highly likely you wouldn't know half the artists included so it's a doorway into new music and the albums segue from one piece into another so... > Read more
Orgoned by Kiasmos
SHORT CUTS: A round-up of recent New Zealand releases
13 Jul 2016 | 3 min read
Facing down an avalanche of releases, requests for coverage, the occasional demand that we be interested in their new album (sometimes with that absurd comment "but don't write about it if you don't like it") and so on, Elsewhere will every now and again do a quick sweep like this, in the same way it does IN BRIEF about international releases. Comments will be brief.... > Read more
IN BRIEF: A quick overview of some recent international releases
11 Jul 2016 | 2 min read
With so many CDs commanding and demanding attention Elsewhere will run this occasional column which scoops up releases by international artists, in much the same way as our SHORT CUTS column picks up New Zealand artists. Comments will be brief. Soren Juul; This Moment (4AD): Denmark's Juul is one of the more interesting artists around, on the basis of the 2013 album Somewhere... > Read more
Julianna Barwick, Will (Dead Oceans):
11 Jul 2016 | <1 min read
Using layers of her own vocals over electronica, piano, cello and percussion, this New Yorker bridges the worlds of experimental, ambience, liturgical and art music. In a lineage which includes Popol Vuh, David Hykes and the Harmonic Choir, Brian Eno's Music for Films/Airports and with a smidgen of Meredith Monk, this collection falls readily into that much vaunted category of... > Read more
Heading Home
Helen Henderson: London (Ranui/Aeroplane)
8 Jul 2016 | 1 min read
The name of this expat might not be familiar but six years ago Elsewhere wrote favourably about her second album Twisting Wind which we said was a collection “tough, earthy blues rock/alt.country” (and had some stellar guests). A longtime LA resident, she has an interesting backstory which is worth retelling because it places these songs into the context of her life.... > Read more
River
Chris Knox: KnoxTraxFine (thokeitapes cassette/download)
4 Jul 2016 | 2 min read | 2
At the time of this writing it has been just over seven years (June 2009) since Chris Knox had his massive and debilitating stroke. In that period he has largely been a man of good cheer despite not being able to speak beyond a few words (he understands visitors and friends reasonably well) and -- being afflicted down his right-hand side -- has taught himself to paint with his left hand.... > Read more
MarineVille: Penguins Ate My Chips (bandcamp)
4 Jul 2016 | 1 min read
For the most part it's usually better to hear the debut album by a rock band than their fourth outing. On their debut they are young, hungry and working things out, by their fourth or fifth they've probably run out of puff and/or have codified their sound into something acceptable to whatever audience has supported them. Few rock bands surprise as their career progresses and you'd have... > Read more
Semiotic Rock
IN BRIEF: A quick overview of some recent international releases
27 Jun 2016 | 2 min read
With so many CDs commanding and demanding attention Elsewhere will run this occasional column which scoops up releases by international artists, in much the same way as our SHORT CUTS column picks up New Zealand artists. Comments will be brief. Sam Beam and Jesca Hoop; Love Letter for Fire (SubPop): Yes he's beardy Beam (Iron and Wine) and she wears a Patsy Cline dress on the cover... > Read more
The Rolling Stones: Totally Stripped (Universal CD and DVD)
21 Jun 2016 | 2 min read
So here's a question Elsewhere asked last year: Whatever happened to the Rolling Stones' bassist Bill Wyman? He appears to have been written out of recent photos of the band in their various reissue projects . . . but let's ask another question. Why doesn't his replacement Darryl Jones -- who has been an on-stage and in-studio Stone for 21 years -- yes twenty-one years -- not appear as an... > Read more
Faraway Eyes (live Brixton Academy, July '95)
IN BRIEF: A quick overview of some recent international releases
20 Jun 2016 | 2 min read
With so many CDs commanding and demanding attention Elsewhere will run this occasional column which scoops up releases by international artists, in much the same way as our SHORT CUTS column picks up New Zealand artists. Comments will be brief. Billie Ray Martin; The Soul Tapes (Sonnenstahl) Although this German-born singer – who has spent decades in Britain and the... > Read more
Gareth Thomas: Fizzy Milk (gareththomastunes.com)
20 Jun 2016 | 1 min read
In a cover so good you want it album-size to frame, this second solo album by Auckland songwriter Gareth Thomas – formerly of Goodshirt – really does fizz with addictive pop which exists at a very comfortable and happy midpoint between canny synth-pop and mainstream guitar pop-rock. And it's telling that the word “pop” appears there twice because Thomas and... > Read more
So Unbelievable
Venetic: Black Boxcars (WSM Recordings)
20 Jun 2016 | 1 min read
Despite a cover which suggests something akin to John Cale at his most manic, it's the acoustic guitar whch undercuts the image and gives a clearer picture to this, the eighth (eighth?) album in 10 years by Wellington's Venetic. Venetic is Wayne Stuart McCallum who maintains a fascinating website (unusual psychedelic albums, snippets of music writing, travel photos from Europe, the US and... > Read more
Come Out Michelle
RECOMMENDED REISSUE: Terry Allen, Juarez (PoB/Southbound)
20 Jun 2016 | <1 min read
Part Tex-Mex short story about murder, desperation and consequences, and part song-cycle in a spare style, this '75 debut album by the artist/musician and Lubbock-born cult figure Allen was years ahead of its time in in its broad conception. The storyline reaches back across time from the contemporary world to the Aztecs and the Catholic colonialist Cortez ("he crossed all that water... > Read more
The Radio . . . and Real Life
Paul McCartney; Pure McCartney (Universal)
18 Jun 2016 | 1 min read | 1
This big but perhaps unnecessary retrospective of a living legend is available in double disc, four-CD or four-LP formats. Enough product for you? So here's a non-chronological, self-chosen overview of Macca's vast post-Beatles career. And yes, we get the picture . . . At 73, Sir James Paul McCartney is -- for some reason -- still trying to ensure his legacy as one of the... > Read more
IN BRIEF: A quick overview of some recent international releases
12 Jun 2016 | 3 min read
With so many CDs commanding and demanding attention Elsewhere will run this occasional column which scoops up releases by international artists, in much the same way as our SHORT CUTS column picks up New Zealand artists. Comments will be brief. Whitney; Light Upon the Lake (Secretly Canadian): It's forward into the past for this Chicago six-piece who reach back to the folk-pop... > Read more
IN BRIEF: A quick overview of some recent international releases
10 Jun 2016 | 2 min read
With so many CDs commanding and demanding attention Elsewhere will run this occasional column which scoops up releases by international artists, in much the same way as our SHORT CUTS column picks up New Zealand artists. Comments will be brief. Michael Daves; Orchids and Violence (Nonesuch): Here's one for real bluegrass fans, and those with a taste its energy but gone... > Read more
Orchestra of Spheres: Brothers and Sisters of the Black Lagoon (Fire)
8 Jun 2016 | <1 min read
This quirky Wellington ensemble have been prolific on the recording front, toured extensively (China, Scandinavia, Europe and the US) and now find themselves on the estimable Fire Records out of the UK, the people behind excellent reissues like the Pere Ubu box sets and the complete JPSE, as well as the excellent new Chills album Silver Bullets. Let it be said there are no planetary... > Read more
Rocket #9
SHORT CUTS: A round-up of recent New Zealand releases
7 Jun 2016 | 3 min read | 1
Facing down an avalanche of releases, requests for coverage, the occasional demand that we be interested in their new album (sometimes with that absurd comment "but don't write about it if you don't like it") and so on, Elsewhere will every now and again do a quick sweep like this, in the same way it does IN BRIEF about international releases. Comments will be brief. Into... > Read more
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RECOMMENDED REISSUE: Funkadelic; Maggot Brain (Border)
7 Jun 2016 | 1 min read
Okay, this will be blurry: Sometime in New York City, early Nineties maybe, somewhere in a club where the line outside was almost exclusively black . . . and there was me. Because -- and this is where it gets really unfocused -- Parliament/Funkadelic were going to play and somehow I had a ticket. I remember thinking that with decent shoes I'm pretty close to 6 feet but on the night I... > Read more