Music at Elsewhere
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THE BEST OF ELSEWHERE 2014: THE EDITOR'S CHOICES
19 Dec 2014 | 10 min read | 1
At a very rough guess Elsewhere probably reviewed or wrote about more than 200 albums in the past year . . . and we certainly didn't get to many excellent ones simply by constraints of time. So what follows are simply the 30 most durable albums from the past year in our opinion. The ones that you could listen to repeatedly . . . as we've done. They aren't “the... > Read more
Dictaphone Blues: Mufti Day (bandcamp)
18 Dec 2014 | 1 min read
Ed Castelow aka Dictaphone Blues is, for Elsewhere's money, one of the most talented, smartest and best pop-rock songwriter/singers at work in this country right now. He's also very funny as he plunders doo-wop (here on the absurd intro to Lance's Tape), writes very witty lyrics and some highly moving ones, latches them to memorable tunes (Her Heart Breaks Like a Wave deserves to be pouring... > Read more
Prepaid Fare
SHORT CUTS: A round-up of recent New Zealand releases
11 Dec 2014 | 2 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. Comments will be brief. The Eastern; The Territory (RPR): Adam McGrath of the Eastern... > Read more
Talking Americana Cowboy Yeeha Blues
Nathan Haines: 5 A Day (Warners)
8 Dec 2014 | 1 min read
In a recent in-depth interview with Elsewhere, Nathan Haines spoke about how hard it was for him and his longtime producer Mike Patto to make this new album. In comments we didn't publish there he said, “we were running up against deadlines and it took a massive toll on our lives”. “I had to stop working because there were a lot of man hours in there. You read... > Read more
Hidden Fortress
ONE WE MISSED: Eyreton Hall: Featherstich (Aeroplane)
5 Dec 2014 | <1 min read | 1
Life, the need to make a living and a trip to Australia meant this exceptionally classy folk-rock and catchy-pop album by Eyreton Hall -- the antipodean duo of Andrew Keegan and Toni Randle slipped right by us when it was released a fornight ago. It is certainly not too late to discover this classy confection which was mostly written near Christchurch and was recorded Auckland by... > Read more
Parachutes
David Bowie: Nothing Has Changed (Parlophone)
5 Dec 2014 | 1 min read
The surprising resurrection of David Bowie with his extremely good The Next Day last year doubtless prompted this retrospective double CD chronological collection (which also comes as an impressively thorough four CD version). There's never been much shortage of Bowie compilations and doubtless the hopeful tipping point for this one is the new single Sue (Or in a Season of Crime) at the end... > Read more
Sue (Or in a Season of Crime)
FleaBITE: The Jungle is Jumping (Border)
5 Dec 2014 | <1 min read
Elsewhere rarely touches children's music (so please don't start sending them) but we have made an exception for Wellington's FleaBITE (Robin Nathan) because her songs are so quirky and when she was Fatcat and Fishface I swear I've referenced Spike Milligan, Yoko Ono, Mary Poppins and reggae when writing about this left-field stuff. This is another such outing with assistance from the... > Read more
Do the Woopsie
Curtis Harding; Soul Power (Warners)
1 Dec 2014 | 1 min read
Back in early June we posted a review of this album under our ONE WE MISSED banner because it had appeared through the indie distributor Southbound the previous month. Well, seems everyone is now playing catch-up because it is out again through Warners and suddenly the reviews are tumbling in. So we'll just re-post what we said five months back . . . This fascinating, genre-defying... > Read more
I Don't Wanna Go Home
Sylvie Simmons: Sylvie (Light in the Attic/Southbound)
1 Dec 2014 | <1 min read
Now in her early 60s, Simmons is acclaimed as one of the finest rock writers who has been a longtime contributor to Mojo (insightful articles, interviews and her Americana column), writing box-set liner notes (Johnny Cash, based on spending a week with him before his death) and for her most recent book, the thorough biography of Leonard Cohen, I'm Your Man. On her lengthy book tour... > Read more
Life Goes Bad
Erlend Oye: Legao (Bubbles)
21 Nov 2014 | <1 min read | 1
So here's how it goes in my Elsewhere world. A few months ago a friend was in Berlin somewhere, saw this guy Erlend Oye and his band, loved it, mentioned Elsewhere to the merchandising person after the gig and . . . Subsequently this CD showed up. "Clearly he seeks world domination," said my pal when I told him. I also told him . . . err, yes, Elsewhere was actually aware of... > Read more
Bad Guy Now
Foxygen: . . . and Star Power (Jagjaguwar)
20 Nov 2014 | 1 min read
There are such a lot of borrowed clothes being donned by this LA duo of Jonathan Rado and Sam France -- plus the various star power pals from Of Montreal, Flaming Lips and others -- that you either laugh at the sheer psychedelic gall of it all. Or play Spot the Source Material. Across two mostly groovy, tripped-out and casually delivered discs Foxygen -- who construct this as a... > Read more
Talk
Miho Wada: Miho's Jazz Orchestra, Live at the Lab (Aeroplane)
19 Nov 2014 | 1 min read | 1
On the occasion of her debut album Postcards to Your Bed in 2010, I expressed considerable reservations about this young flute player who billed her style as "Japanese punk jazz". That seemed a description so wide as to be meaningless, and nothing on the album suggested punk or jazz as I understand them. I also noted her bio made some striking claims: being... > Read more
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Dudley Benson: Deforestation (Golden Retriever)
17 Nov 2014 | 3 min read
Dudley Benson – who recently received a $25,000 New Generation Artist award from Westpac – has a small, and some might say, perfectly formed catalogue. But it is small. By my reckoning there have been just a couple of EPs (see here and here). And just two albums (this and this), some of which included EP material. Then there was the live album... > Read more
Pipiwharauroa (Iso12 remix
Various Artists: A Day in My Mind's Mind; The Kiwi Psychedelic Scene (Frenzy/Real Groovy)
17 Nov 2014 | 2 min read | 1
A few months ago a friend and I were discussing prog-rock -- it had been a long lunch, this topic doesn't come up often -- and I observed there had been very few great prog statements by Kiwi artists in the late Sixties/early Seventies. I suggested prog by its very nature was expensive music to create and perform. He demurred and I bowed to his greater knowledge. For a couple of... > Read more
Bellyboard Beat
Pink Floyd: The Endless River (Sony)
10 Nov 2014 | 2 min read | 1
Because Pink Floyd have been around so long and went through various phases and stages, it's probably helpful for any reviewer of this album – identified by guitarist/prime mover David Gilmour as their farewell – to say clearly which era was their Floyd-of-Preference. I was there for their first singles and although I can't say I heard every song or album at the time since,... > Read more
Things Left Unsaid
Ry Cooder: Soundtracks (Warners)
10 Nov 2014 | 4 min read | 1
A couple of years ago when Ry Cooder was coming to New Zealand with the charming Nick Lowe, Elsewhere did an interview with him. It didn't go well. Actually, that's not entirely true. It didn't go well until – after some cursory answers to what I thought were decent questions – I realised here was man who needed to be provoked. If you look at... > Read more
Goose and Lucky
RECOMMENDED REISSUE: Corben Simpson; Get Up With the Sun
10 Nov 2014 | 1 min read | 3
Although not a classic New Zealand album -- one which starts with a weird one minute kazoo solo perhaps precludes itself from consideration immediately -- this '73 release on the Harvest label by singer-songwriter Corben Simpson is frequently too good, or at least "interesting", to ignore. In another time that kazoo solo might have been replaced by putorino to better effect as a... > Read more
I Beg Your Pardon
Neil Young: Storytone (Warners)
9 Nov 2014 | 2 min read
We've mentioned this before so at the risk of being predictable . . . the problem with “unpredictable” Neil Young these days is that he has become predictable. So after Le Noise (true to what it said on the box) it was Americana (as it says) then Psychedelic Pill (and again). And recently while he's been banging on about some special high-quality sound reproduction... > Read more
When I Watch You Sleeping (solo)
Various Artists: Lost on the River; The New Basement Tapes (Sony)
9 Nov 2014 | 2 min read
The provenance of these hitherto unknown lyrics by Bob Dylan is discussed in our interview with the album's producer T Bone Burnett, but briefly the story is this: Dylan's publishers approached Burnett saying Bob had discovered a box of lyrics from '67 and would he (Burnett) like to do something with them. To hear Burnett tell it, at that point Dylan dropped out of the picture and even at... > Read more
Lost on the River
SHORT CUTS: A round-up of recent New Zealand releases
7 Nov 2014 | 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. Comments will be brief. Jakob; Sines (Shoot the Freak/Border): The sound of this Napier... > Read more