Music at Elsewhere
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The Beatles: On Air - Live at the BBC Vol 2 (Universal)
8 Nov 2013 | 2 min read
Just as the Beatles enjoyed that long and rare association with producer George Martin and EMI's Abbey Road studios, so too they had a mutually beneficial relationship with the BBC. The "Beeb" as it is affectionately knows may have been the conservative face of British broadcasting, but it was also aware of its mandate to represent a wide cross-section of British tastes and... > Read more
I'm Talking About You (March 1963)
Barrence Whitefield and The Savages: Dig Thy Savage Soul (Bloodshot/Southbound)
4 Nov 2013 | <1 min read | 2
On the bruising evidence of this album – the energy of British pub-rock in a noisy collision with bluesy Chicago-soaked rock'n'soul – you'd probably crawl across broken booze bottles to see them live. This, the third album by this re-formed (but not reformed) band from Boston, finds classic rock and soul shouter Whitfield in roaring form in front of the band helmed by... > Read more
Bread
David Dallas: Falling into Place (Dirty/Universal)
4 Nov 2013 | 1 min read
In times to come when collections of contemporary New Zealand poetry are written (if not published in the form we have been used to), you'd like to think recent lyrics by Miriam Clancy, Moana Maniapoto, the Veils, Dubious Brothers, Lorde and people like Mareko will be in there as a reflection of who we are/were. And I'd be astonished -- if not outraged -- if lyrics from this sometimes... > Read more
Southside
Males: Run Run Run/MalesMalesMales (Fishrider)
3 Nov 2013 | <1 min read | 1
Attuned to elevating West Coast USA pop – with a twist of power-pop in the manner of the close-harmony Shoes – this Dunedin duo here add an early single (the likably chipper, slightly New Wave So High) and last year's MalesMalesMales EP to a new EP Run Run Run. The result is an economic nine-song collection of mostly brightly summertime pop cramming a lot of melodic hooks... > Read more
Madeline
Blackfield: Blackfield IV (Kscope/Southbound)
2 Nov 2013 | <1 min read
This century has seen the rehabilitation of prog-rock. Generations which weren't around for punk's late Seventis scorched-earth policy towards progressive tendencies are finding something in thoughtful, musically interesting and vaguely philosophical prog. Contemporary prog is often more economic, sometimes hauls in elements from metal as much as whiffily pretentious poetics, and the... > Read more
Firefly
Bond Street Bridge: The Explorers Club: Antarctica (Banished from the Universe)
28 Oct 2013 | <1 min read
Auckland's Sam Prebble of Bond Street Bridge admits to something approaching obsession after reading about Robert Falcon Scott's fatal expedition to the South Pole in 1912. Immersing himself in Scott's diary, books about the journey (they arrived at the South Pole to find Norwegian Roald Amundsen had beaten them) and looking at photographs of brave but doomed men in that aridly icy... > Read more
The Wreck of the Endurance
Paul McCartney: NEW (Universal)
21 Oct 2013 | 1 min read
After his previous pop-rock album Memory Almost Full six years ago which included songs that seemed to be farewells or self-penned eulogies (“On the day that I die I'd like bells to be rung . . .”), this one by 71-year old McCartney comes with a title that exudes capital letter optimism and in a cover radiating assurance. Working with smart young producers (Paul Epworth... > Read more
Appreciate
Julian Cope: Revolutionary Suicide (Head Heritage/Southbound)
21 Oct 2013 | 1 min read
When Julian Cope emerged in the late Seventies/early Eighties as the singer-writer with the often thrilling and melodramatic Liverpool band Teardrop Explodes, few could have guessed -- perhaps not even Cope himself -- what a life he would make for himself. He has written knowledgeably and with passion on Krautrock and Japanese rock, was very early on an advocate for the rediscovery of Scott... > Read more
Paradise Mislaid
Gareth Edwards: Nowhere To Go Nothing To Do (garethedwards.co.nz)
20 Oct 2013 | <1 min read
Although few -- actually none -- would hail UK-born singer-songwriter Edwards as an exciting new voice in New Zeaand music, his unpretentious and often rather simple take on country-rock and pop has some charm for the ordinariness of his worldview which takes straight shots at just hanging around, relationships and a laid-back existence. On the singalong Friends he sings; "Where would... > Read more
Sitting in the Sun
Tamikrest: Chatma (Glitterbeat/Southbound)
14 Oct 2013 | <1 min read
More than a decade ago what became known as “Sahara blues” or “desert blues” -- the mesmerising sound of mercurial guitar, drone-like vocals and rolling rhythms – floated into consciousness via bands like Etran Finatawa and Tinariwen, and great female singer Malouma, out of North Africa. The next generation are represented by Terakaft and Tamikrest who have... > Read more
Toumast anlet
Lee Ranaldo and the Dust: Last Night on Earth (Matador)
14 Oct 2013 | 1 min read
With the indie-rock generation's favourite aunt and uncle – Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth – having separated after more than 25 years of marriage and the band officially breaking up we might actually expect even more from various, and prolific, Youth members. Gordon's new project Body/Head has just released a debut album, Moore continues to record (check the... > Read more
Late Descent #2
Elton John: The Diving Board (Universal)
14 Oct 2013 | <1 min read | 1
The resurrection of Elton John continues as he approves of younger talent (recently praising Lorde) and gets remade/remixed by Pnau, yet also hooked up with seventysomething Leon Russell for The Union and goes the whole Las Vegas at Caesar's Palace. Here again with longtime lyricist Bernie Taupin (and produced by T Bone Burnett) the piano-man and pals don't adjust the successful... > Read more
A Town Called Jubilee
Tony Joe White: Hoodoo (Yep Roc/Southbound)
7 Oct 2013 | <1 min read
Perennial Southern swamp-rocker and the Louisiana man who defined the genre (although John Fogerty of Creedence got there around the same time, albeit from San Francisco), doesn't change his winning formula here. It's still low-growl'n'mumble vocals, rolling grooves and razor-sharp guitar on these nine tracks which look to his own life for source material. Which means a rich vein... > Read more
Alligator Mississippi
Bill Callahan: Dream River (Drag City/Universal)
7 Oct 2013 | <1 min read
The final song on this short, emotionally dense album finds our weary, baritone narrator driving home in winter, listening to a Donald Sutherland interview on the truck radio as “time itself means nothing”. In this simple moment – as a slow fiddle keens supportively – he realises when things are beautiful you should just keep on with it. If Callahan's... > Read more
Spring
Various Artists: Good Vibrations; A Record Shop, a Label, a Film Soundtrack (Ace/Border)
4 Oct 2013 | <1 min read
We'll have to wait for the acclaimed bio-pic to get the full measure of the life and times of Belfast's Terri Hooley who started his record shop Good Vibrations at the height of what is euphemistically called "the Troubles" and, as self-confessed hippie, found himself a convert to punk. His shop spawned a label and gave us, among other classic songs, the Undertones Teenage Kicks.... > Read more
You're a Disease
Various Artists: Louisiana Saturday Night Revisited (Ace/Border)
3 Oct 2013 | <1 min read
The liner note writer Ian Saddler echoes my experience driving through Louisiana, being dumbstruck by the lively Cajun, zydeco and swamp pop coming out of the local radio stations. About 20 years ago the Ace label issued a couple of albums of Louisiana Saturday Night music and this one picks up some of the players on the scene today whose names -- aside from the great Warren Storm who... > Read more
I'd Like to Hear From You
Lorde: Pure Heroine (Universal)
30 Sep 2013 | 1 min read | 3
It is a rare and wonderful thing when artists channel -- intuitively or otherwise -- their own concerns and those of their generation, and in the language of their peers. Into that illustrious lineage which in pop culture stretches through Dylan, Paul Simon, Jackson Browne and Joni Mitchell is Lorde, a preternatural talent who on this debut album frequently adopts a slightly detached,... > Read more
White Teeth Teens
Neko Case: The Worse Things Get . . . (Anti)
30 Sep 2013 | <1 min read
This album's full title – The Worse Things Get, The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight, The More I Love You – barely hints at the emotional depth, anger, passion and soul-baring on display from someone who comes out bruised but swinging: “Fat-fingered bullies were no match for me . . . you'll have to deal with me” she sneers on the furiously jagged pop of Man with... > Read more
Man
Earth Wind and Fire: Now, Then and Forever (Sony Legacy)
30 Sep 2013 | <1 min read
The infectious horn-driven sound of EWF changed the coordinates of black music when founders Maurice and Verdine White envisioned a band crossing genres from soul and funk to pop, rock and Afro-inflected rhythm'n'blues. Early on they brought in singer Philip Bailey and later drew from disco and electro-pop. This, their 21st studio album since 1971 and eight years since their last, is... > Read more
Guiding Lights
Cher: Closer to The Truth (Warners)
30 Sep 2013 | 1 min read | 1
The prices Cherilyn Sarkisian paid on her way to becoming the iconic figure she is today were recounted in stark and moving detail in J. Randy Taraborrelli's biography Cher of '89. At the end of that book Cher was on stage at the Oscars picking up the best actress award for her role in Moonstruck and beating out Glenn Close (Fatal Attraction), Holly Hunter (Broadcast News), Sally Kirkland... > Read more