Music from Elsewhere

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These pages - with sample tracks and videos posted - introduce and review new music which may otherwise go unheard and unnoticed. Music from Elsewhere reviews new albums (and some important reissues) you'll play more than once at home or in the car, and will want to tell friends about.

If you do, pass the word: you heard it first at Elsewhere.

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Various Artists: Memphis Boys; The Story of American Studios (Ace)

American Studios in Memphis -- founded by producer/musician Chips Moman -- might not be written as large in the popular imagination as the Sun and Stax studios in the same city, but a wealth of music came out of it. As this 24 song collection testifies . . . and sometimes really testifies at calls down the Southern soul spirit. The studio was (sometimes briefly) home to great names like... more >>

I'm Movin' On

Added: 14 May 2012

The Civil Wars: Barton Hollow (Sony)

Even the most cursory listen to this alt.folk duo (who err to the traditional side also) and you can hear why they picked up two Grammies (best folk and best country duo/group performance). They hit the genre right down the middle, even to the point of mentioning "praying for redemption" in the opener. So, old time religion, crystalline vocals from her (Joy Williams originally... more >>

Billie Jean

Added: 4 May 2012 4 Comments

Loudon Wainwright III: Older Than My Old Man Now (Proper)

On the second song here the venerable Wainwright names his "favourite protagonist. Me" and that song follows the autobiographical The Here and Now in which he counts down marriages, failures, kids and his career. And then there is the title track which is about his father, but equally about himself. If anyone can write this convincingly and often about himself/family/etc --... more >>

The Here and Now

Added: 2 May 2012

George Harrison: Early Takes Vol 1 (Universal)

George Harrison was perfectionist in the studio – 99 takes of Not Guilty and it still didn't make the Beatles' “White Album” – so there's something endearing, sincere and un-sculpted about these 10 demos, mostly of some of his early solo material (which was a disc included in the expanded Living in the Material World DVD/CD box set of last year). Folky,... more >>

Behind That Locked Door

Added: 30 Apr 2012

Sherpa: Lesser Flamingo (Little White)

While I have yet to hear the album, I found it very easy to walk away from Opposom at this year's Laneway Festival asking myself, "If it wasn't who we know it is up there, would we really care?" I found them dull and the songs incomplete . . . and anyway I wanted to see Auckland band Sherpa who drew a much smaller but more appreciative crowd -- and not just because singer-frontman... more >>

Lunar Bats

Added: 30 Apr 2012

Elvis Costello and the Imposters: The Return of the Spectacular Spinning Songbook (Universal)

Some albums you really just have to see, and this is one of those. Some background: Elvis Costello and the Imposters took to the road in the US last year with a few dozen of his song on a spinning wheel and with a quick turn and a dart . . . You get the picture. It's obviously a lot of fun on the night and no one is cruising. Costello and band play like their lives depend on it for... more >>

Watching the Detectives

Added: 27 Apr 2012

Skank Attack: Here On Out (Skank)

In theory something from this bold, wide and loud album could have appeared in our daily From the Vaults column, because these tracks date back to 1988 when this three-piece were -- by all accounts -- cutting a swathe through Wellington. That I cannot vouch for, but I can say if the band's name might suggest an alignment with the current reggae/dub scene in New Zealand's capital,... more >>

Limbs Akimbo

Added: 26 Apr 2012 2 Comments

Willis Earl Beal: Acousmatic Sorcery (XL)

Beal's story is as interesting as this often engrossing debut album. In 2007 at age 23 after being discharged from the US army, he went and lived in the New Mexico desert while suffering from depression, then returned to Chicago, lived with his grandma and stole from the supermarket. He put up posters saying if you called his number he'd sing you a song. (Over 300 did). If you... more >>

Take Me Away

Added: 23 Apr 2012

Dictaphone Blues: Beneath the Crystal Palace (EMI)

Like Marty McFly at the high school dance in Back to the Future, Ed Castelow of Dictaphone Blues has beamed himself back to crucial touchstones in pop-rock (classic Fifties chords, Beatles era choruses, Seventies power pop, American stadium rock from the Eighties) and distilled them into this shamelessly enjoyable collection which is smart enough to play spot-the-reference (Cheap Trick,... more >>

Cliche

Added: 23 Apr 2012

Paul Weller: Sonik Kicks (Island)

Aside from the excellent set list, when Paul Weller played the Powerstation in late 2010 what was so impressive and exciting was his impassioned delivery. You were left with the clear impression he was on that stage because he just had to sing those songs. That kind of visible, clenched-teeth commitment is rare -- and, if I'm honest, almost non-existent from so many New Zealand bands -- and... more >>

Drifters

Added: 23 Apr 2012 1 Comment

Tono and the Finance Company: Up Here for Dancing (Tono)

In one of the most engaging, seemingly simple but quietly resonant and loaded covers on any local album in recent years, comes this delightful collection by Anthonie Tonnon (aka Tono) and the flexible line-up of the Finance Company. Tono impressed hugely with his artful and observant EP Fragile Things in 2010, and those gifts for a memorable melody hitched to fascinating, often almost... more >>

Timing

Added: 16 Apr 2012

Bonnie Raitt: Slipstream (Proper)

Everyone's favourite slide-playing redhead hasn't had an album since 2005, but from the opener here – a restlessly funky dump on proud snobs who Used to Rule the World – show she's wasting no time staking her claim again. Produced in part by Joe Henry – whose co-write with Loudon Wainwright You Can't Fail Me Now sounds tailor-made and a yearning partner to her... more >>

You Can't Fail Me

Added: 16 Apr 2012 1 Comment

The Dead Leaves: Cities on the Sea (LIberation)

Three years ago with his name out front, Matt Joe Gow – formerly of Dunedin, longtime Australian resident – delivered the promising debut The Messenger which walked a line between alt.country and country-rock with some fine lyrics. Here – his name subsumed into the band – there's a smart shift to a kind of alt.pop-rock. Songs like the quietly dramatic Ordinary... more >>

Harm

Added: 16 Apr 2012

Gemma Ray: Island Fire (Shock)

At a time when many young bands and singers seem nostalgic for an Eighties pop they never knew, it's refreshing in a weird way this British singer -- here on her third album -- is prepared to trawl rather more widely. Gemma Ray effortlessly notches up references to an oddball take on Fifties pop ( the delightful shoop-shoop ballad sound of "you should, should" Put Your Brain in... more >>

Flood and a Fire

Added: 13 Apr 2012

Michael Chapman: Rainmaker (Light in the Attic)

British folk singer and rather special guitarist Michael Chapman has rarely had his dues outside of his native land, but his edgy style (sometimes with a band so nudging into rock-folk), and fierce intelligence are always worth rediscovering. You can hardly go wrong by starting here if the name is new to you. This is his exciting debut album from '69 reissued with a fine essay and half... more >>

Thank You PK 1944

Added: 11 Apr 2012

Black Seeds: Dust and Dirt (Black Seeds)

Driving away from the recent Womad I said to my wife I hoped there might be a two year moratorium on reggae rhythms, it is just such an easy default position for so many bands and guaranteed to get people up having a good time. Nothing wrong with a good time of course, but the loping rhythm sometimes seem all bands need to do . . . and it gets kinda dull and obvious when one band after... more >>

Loose Cartilage

Added: 10 Apr 2012

The Mars Volta: Noctourniquet (Warners)

Cards on the table. Much as I loved the first Mars Volta album Deloused in the Comatorium and parts of Frances the Mute, much of what they have done since -- this demanding and often annoying album especially -- has left me rather cold. There's a willfullness about their being "different" which infects almost every ADHD track here, where ideas start but rarely reach any completion... more >>

Molochwalker

Added: 9 Apr 2012

The Bombay Royale: You Me Bullets Love (Hope Street)

Much as I enjoyed the theatrical conceit of this faux-Bollywood outfit from Melbourne at the recent Womad in New Zealand, I could also see immediately why this album of a faux-soundtrack (with a great title, admittedly) would appeal to the Arts Victoria funding agency which supported it. The Bombay Royale have exactly the right balance of irony and authenticity which arts funding people... more >>

Bobbywood

Added: 8 Apr 2012

Various Artists: John Cale, Conflict and Catalysis (Big Beat/Border)

Although his former comrade in the Velvet Underground, Lou Reed, gets the column inches and slavish devotion, a serious career consideration would say John Cale has made the more interesting music and, as a producer, certainly had his fingerprints on some of the most exceptional and/or interesting albums of the rock era. This non-chronological 20 track collection of some his Cale's... more >>

Needles for Teeth

Added: 2 Apr 2012

Various Artists: Fender; The Golden Age 1950-1970 (Ace/Border)

Any album which is dedicated to a brand of guitar -- no matter how legendary, as Fender is -- will always be uneven, depending on what kind of music you like. So right at the end in the ad for Fender guitars when country singer Jan Howard hails the brand for being perfect for country pickers, that hardly sits with material like Dale Hawkins' Susie-Q, the Ventures' Walk Don't Run, Booker T... more >>

I Fought the Law