Graham Reid | | 2 min read
Every year Auckland University hosts a showcase for their talented music students. This year in addition to the five finalists for songwriter of the year there are also categories for best vocalist, best lyricist, best instrumentalist, best arranger and best song.
It's a big night with judges from the top of the music industry and once again Elsewhere is pleased to introduce the finalists for the songwriter category.
Details on the the where/when of the event are below, but meantime let's introduce one of the third year students . . .
Jamie Moana combines an uncompromising Sixties influence with garage delta blues under the guise of The Holts. Forming his music in the secluded bedroom of a cheap back alley apartment where the sensibilities of the down and out sit high in the psyche, Jamie has slowly been brewing the moods of his music and direction of his visual art. The Holts writes about the effects of the American Dream…the weird controversies of the west.
The website for the Holts is here where you can hear his song Harold Time.
The first song which really affected
you was . . .
Micheal Jackson - Billie Jean or The Beatles - Come together
Your first (possibly embarrassing) role models in music were . . .
Micheal Jackson, Roxy Music
The one songwriter you will always listen to, even if they disappointed you previously, is?
Tom Waits
As songwriters: Lennon-McCartney or Jagger-Richards; kd lang or Katy Perry; Madonna or Michael Jackson; Prince or Pink?
Lennon - McCartney
The three songs (yours, or by others) you would love everyone to hear because they are well crafted are . . .
Captain Beefheart - So Glad , Daft Punk - Rollin n Scratchin, Tom Waits - Way down in the hole
Melody first? Words or phrase first? Simultaneous?
Simultaneous
The best book on music or musicians you have read is . . .
Jack Kerouac - On the Road
If you could co-write with anyone it would be . . .
Beck , Nick Cave
The three songs you'd insist anybody listen to because they might understand your songwriting style better are . . .
Tom Waits - Swordfish Trombones , The Velvet Underground - Pale Blue Eyes, Mulatu Astatke
The last CD or vinyl album you bought was . . . (And your most recent downloads include . . .)
Last vinyl was Captain Beefheart - Ice Cream for Crow, most recent download was Lounge Lizards - Voice of Chunk
One song, royalties for life, never have to work again. The song by anyone, yourself included, which wouldn't embarrass you would be . . .
Lou Reed - Perfect Day
One line (or couplet) from a song -- yours or someone else's -- which you think is just a stone cold winner is . . .
I'm bored and cheap and cheerful/I want expensive sadness - The kills
Songwriting: what's the ratio of inspiration/perspiration?
2 : 1
Ever had a song come to you fully-formed like it dropped into your lap?
Not yet, it forever evades me
And finally, in the nature of press conferences in Japan, “Can you tell me please why this is your best song ever?”
If it were a sculpture, it would be a cube
The University of Auckland’s Songwriter of the Year Award 2013
Thursday 3 October 2013 7pm (for 7.30pm start)
The Maidment Theatre 8 Alfred Street, Auckland.
Tickets $5-$15. Book at the Maidment Theatre 09 308 2383.
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