Music at Elsewhere

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The Black Dahlias: Ladies and Gentlemen (Cruel)

With a pure blast of angry guitars, a disciplined rhythm section, throat shredding vocals and a terrific sense of pop smarts driving their metal-edged rock'n'roll this New Zealand industrial strength five-piece grab attention immediately on this six-track EP, which feels far too short. Taking large dollops of classic metal but delivering with that post-punk energy which has been the hallmark... more >>

The Black Dahlias: Ready to Roll

Added: 3 Oct 2010

Patty Larkin: 25 (Signature)

Celebrating 25 years in music usually means a greatest hits, box set or some kind of attention-grabbing project. It is typical and a measure of Larkin's generous nature that rather than go that whole route she collected 25 of her favourite self-penned love songs and invites in 25 of her favourite singers and people she had admired to accompany her. And in the credits to each song she puts... more >>

Patty Larkin with Erin McKeown: Beautiful

Added: 3 Oct 2010

Turtle Island String Quartet: Have You Ever Been . . . (Telarc/Ode)

Classical artists playing the music of Jimi Hendrix is hardly a new idea: the Kronos Quartet had a crowd-pleasing built-in encore of Purple Haze when they first started out, and of course Nigel Kennedy finally made good on his threat/promise to do an album of Hendrix. Before them however in the mid Seventies Gil Evans arranged some Hendrix material for his orchestra and a subsequent album.... more >>

Turtle Island String Quartet: House Burning Down

Added: 3 Oct 2010

Various Artists: Late Night Tales; At the Movies (101/Southbound)

On paper the idea of a collection of movie themes segueing seamlessly into each other is undeniably appealing: you can imagine what a film noir compilation might sound like, same with westerns, horror, thriller and so on. But this catch-all -- a whopping 39 snippets, which averages about two minutes a slice -- moves from the sublime to the cor-blimey! It's an odd collection that shifts... more >>

Deodata: Also Sprach Zarathustra

Added: 3 Oct 2010

Pine: Books and Magazines (Arch Hill)

In that great Kiwi tradition, Pine recorded this low-key charmer in a sitting room in Christchurch (the house since severely damaged by the quake apparently) and the trio here once again deliver intimate, spare but not skeletal-sounding pop. Actually, there is little needs to be said here because the Arch Hill label has an interesting initiative-cum-incentive: you can download the album free... more >>

Pine: Brand New Heart

Added: 1 Oct 2010

Surf City: Kudos (Arch Hill)

Possibly because this young Auckland four-piece have all that rolling energy of early Flying Nun acts (the Chills and the Clean especially) but turn it up to 11 and make it fat, it has hijacked my stereos (home and car, I take it for drives). They deliver such a thrilling racket it's hardly surprising they've been picked up by college radio in the States, and played shows at the... more >>

Surf City: Icy Lakes

Added: 28 Sep 2010 1 Comment

Luke Jackson: . . . And Then Some (Popsicle)

After a mention of the late Robert Kirby's string arrangements in a review of the Magic Numbers' The Runaway, this Canadian singer-songwriter with a well-stamped passport got in touch: he too had benefited from Kirby's smart touch. And he sent on a copy of this album which opens with a classic blast of power-pop (Come Tomorrow, the title even sounds like Badfinger/Raspberries/Big Star) . . .... more >>

Luke Jackson: Come Tomorrow

Added: 27 Sep 2010

Eric Clapton: Clapton (Reprise)

It's fair to say Eric Clapton at 20, while playing with John Mayall's Blues Breakers, never gave much thought to a “career”. Yet with this new album he can reflect on more than 40 years in the game, of highs and lows, successes and mis-steps (most of the 80s). Inevitably Clapton at 65 doesn't have the fire which propelled the late 60s power-trio Cream or gave his desperate... more >>

Eric Clapton: River Runs Deep

Added: 27 Sep 2010 1 Comment

John Mellencamp: No Better Than This (Rounder)

The man they call "the poet laureate of the Interstate" (although he always sounds a backroads man to me) ha been on such a roll lately with Freedom's Road and Life Death Love Freedom) that the idea of him recording in mono with T Bone Burnett in Sun Studio, the Gunter Hotel in San Antonio (where Robert Johnson was committed to tape) and the First African Baptist Church in Savannah... more >>

John Mellencamp: Easter Eve

Added: 27 Sep 2010 1 Comment

Justin Townes Earle: Harlem River Blues (Bloodshot/Southbound)

Over three previous albums this son of Steve (and named for Townes Van Zandt) has cut an increasingly confident path with originals which are nominally country-Americana but refer to alt.rock, bluegrass, honky-tonk, ragtime and Hank Williams-styled truck-stop rock. His shows here have been popular and on this album he slips in the aching Christchurch Woman (with guitarist Jason... more >>

Justin Townes Earle: Rogers Park

Added: 27 Sep 2010

Jah Wobble: Welcome to My World (30 Hertz/Southbound)

Jah Wobble has been one of the most interesting and innovative musical explorers of the past few decades but, as I discovered in '96 at the time of this interview – he does it mostly without leaving home. Travel is for the middle-classes he said and a working-class geezer like himself, well . . . Anyway he'd done the touring thing, so . . . Fascinating man whose music... more >>

Jah Wobble: London

Added: 27 Sep 2010

Various artists: The Cramps' Jukebox (Chrome Dreams/Triton)

The Cramps' passion for old rock'n'roll is well known: they are archivists for music styles, bands and old singles which might have otherwise been forgotten or lost. This double disc (with a useful backgrounder booklet) pulls together 30 obscure songs on one disc and on the other Lux Interior and Poison Ivy speak about their passions through a collection of interviews recorded from 1990.... more >>

The Flamingoes: I Only Have Eyes For You (1959)

Added: 26 Sep 2010

Nina Simone: At Town Hall/The Amazing Nina Simone (Jackpot/Southbound)

Troublesome woman though she may have been -- angry, politically volatile, courageously self-obssessed -- there was never any denying her phenomenal, rare talent. Classically trained but with her heart also in gospel, r'n'b, jazz and blues, Nina Simone (1933 - 2003) crossed stylistic boundaries on piano as if they didn't exist, and her expression-filled vocals would occupy a lyric in a way... more >>

Nina Simone: You Can Have Him

Added: 26 Sep 2010

Yes: Keys to Ascension (CD/DVD, Proper/Southbound)

San Luis Obispo isn't a name you readily associate with rock music. The picturesque coastal town in northern California -- near Hearst's castle -- still isn't on the radar despite it being the place where Yes -- the original line-up -- relaunched their career in '95. Well, "relaunched" might be overstating it, but they certainly re-formed in their San Luis Obispo studio (world... more >>

Yes: Roundabout (live)

Added: 26 Sep 2010 1 Comment

Mark Eitzel, Klamath (101/Southbound)

Eitzel was the former frontman for the very wonderful but poorly named American Music Club (probably still is, I think they have reformed) but this solo album dates from a retreat to a cabin (around Klamath Falls in central Oregon I guess) a year or so ago. As befits it origins this is very intimate music -- although far from the introspective Nick Drake-folk tag some have laid on it.... more >>

Mark Eitzel: Remember

Added: 26 Sep 2010

Bannerman: The Dusty Dream Home (Rhythmethod)

Bannerman is New Zealand singer-songwriter Richard Setford whose purpose in life seems to be to confound those who would easily pigeonhole him. He appeared at Elsewhere previously with his quietly intense EP (here) which stood at some distance from his work with the roiling Batucada Sound Machine and the soulful One Million Dollars. For this debut album under his own nom de disque he... more >>

Bannerman: She was a Mountainside

Added: 20 Sep 2010

Robert Plant: Band of Joy (Decca)

In 2003 this former frontman for Led Zeppelin released Sixty Six to Timbuktu, a double disc retrospective of material from his solo years which was impressive in its scope: old blues and r'n'b to Zepp-framed stadium rock and his journey into music from North Africa. As a musical explorer Plant hasn't stopped: two years later came the exceptional album with his band Strange Sensation,... more >>

Robert Plant: Monkey

Added: 19 Sep 2010

The Yardbirds: Shapes of Things, The Best of the Yardbirds (Music Club/Triton)

Aside from the obvious ones -- the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and arguably the Small Faces and perhaps the Animals -- was there any other group in the mid-Sixties which was such a magnet for, and breeding ground of, talent? And it's not just the roster of guitarists who passed through its ranks -- Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page -- or that in their closing overs (with no... more >>

The Yardbirds: Happenings Ten Years Time Ago (1966)

Added: 13 Sep 2010 1 Comment

The Coral: Butterfly House (Shock)

Sometimes sounding like an odd collision in the studio of early Echo and the Bunnymen and America, Liverpool's the Coral here deliver their big songs (big on melody, choruses, drama and references) with enjoyable passion but never quite approach that frisson they had on their thrilling self-titled debut album of '02. However these lightly-delic and powerfully pop-conscious songs (produced by... more >>

The Coral: Two Faces

Added: 13 Sep 2010

JJ Grey and Mofro: Georgia Warhorse (Alligator/Southbound)

Grey and his companions out of Florida have been pulling Southern funk, Memphis soul and dirty blues together for the best part of a decade now and their 07 Country Ghetto album should have gained them a lot of mainstream attention. But it didn't. This one – with guest vocalist Toots (of the Maytals), and hot young blues guitarist Derek Trucks laying sweet and spooky slide on... more >>

JJ Grey and Mofro: Lullaby