THE MAGAZINE FOR CURIOUS PEOPLE
Elsewhere is a concept and a place, and for many years Graham Reid has been going there for his wide angle travels, writing, music review columns and interviews with writers, musicians and artists.
Elsewhere is an ever-expanding on-line magazine for people curious about new music, different travel, interesting arts and much more. This site is dedicated to the diversity and possibilities of Elsewhere. It is an equal opportunity enjoyer. Subscribe here (it's free) for a weekly newsletter and be in to win CDs, DVDs, books and more. Welcome . . .
Latest posts
The Famous Elsewhere Questionnaire
THE FAMOUS ELSEWHERE REGGAE QUESTIONNAIRE: Logan Bell of Katchafire
22 Sep 2017 | 2 min read
Elsewhere has long gone into bat for the reggae gifts of Katchafire who walk a canny line between righteous roots and pop-reggae without ever standing too close to the barbecue. They have toured New Zealand and internationally very extensively, are crowd pleasers wherever they go and bring people together in the spirit of Bob Marley's One Love. And they have... > Read more
I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO, a doco by RAOUL PECK
18 Sep 2017 | 2 min read | 1
Some years ago in New York I went up to Harlem and by chance there was an exhibition of photos and memorabilia about James Baldwin. It was interesting to note that among the many people there, were a significant number of college age kids, all of whom seemed quite engrossed in the life and times of this great black thinker and writer. A woman there with her... > Read more
WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT . . . MIDORI TAKADA: Through a glass, brightly
18 Sep 2017 | 2 min read
It's a given these days. The moment you write about a musician who exists in an obscure corner of the mainstream world – or has absolutely no presence there at all – then someone in the internet world will weigh in telling you about their longtime fandom, offer footnotes, advance the better album you should have referenced and so on . . . Well, let's... > Read more
Neil Finn: Out of Silence (EMI)
18 Sep 2017 | 3 min read
Even if you don't much care for Neil Finn's music – and there might be one or two who don't – you can't help but admire how he has successfully negotiated (at perilously close to 60) the troubled waters of becoming a senior statesman in a pop-rock culture which has the Youth Audience as its default position. Finn has constantly pushed himself into... > Read more
THE NORTHMAN WHO WENT NORTHER (2017): Into the ice with Arctic explorers
18 Sep 2017 | 5 min read
Exploration was different in the old days. Consider the case of the Arctic adventurer Sir John Franklin who lead an 1845 expedition of 129 men. When they set off 59-year old Franklin – who weighed 15 stone and was just 5ft 6in – took with him 1700 books, a hand organ, fine china and expensive cutlery . . . and his pet monkey. They were never heard... > Read more
ELSEWHERE WORLD SERVICE: A quick overview of recent world music releases
18 Sep 2017 | 2 min read
Here's a frequent flyer/transit lounge column for those at home who want to get their musical passport stamped. Elsewhere has so many CDs and downloads commanding and demanding attention that we run an occasional column which scoops up releases by international artists (IN BRIEF), in much the same way as our SHORT CUTS column picks out New Zealand artists. And of... > Read more
.jpg)
Motorhead: Ace of Spades
18 Sep 2017 | 1 min read
Most bands have at least one defining song and for Motorhead – if it isn't their idiot-classic Killed by Death – it is the title track of the '80 album. Their sound was by this time, their fourth studio album, an archetype of metal with furious punk energy which birthed thrash metal but was angry enough to hook in the middle class British punks... > Read more
Halim el-Dabh: Leiyla and the Poet (1959)
18 Sep 2017 | 1 min read
One of the less recognised figures in the genre outside the inner circle of electro-acoustic pioneers, Halim el-Dabh was in the vanguard of the using the emerging electronic equipment and instruments such as the synthesiser. In the mid Forties he experimented with, and composed on, tape which he manipulated to create the cornerstone piece The Expression of Zaar... > Read more
The National: Sleep Well Beast (4AD)
14 Sep 2017 | 1 min read
On the fashionable foreshore in Copenhagen at a prime spot just around the corner from the busy Nyhavn tourist-magnet area is a cluster of up-market restaurants and bars in a beautiful building with views across the water. Among them is the Michelin-starred pair of Almanak and Studio. We mention this because they are co-owned by Aaron and Bryce Dessner of The... > Read more
Neil Young: Hitchhiker (Warners)
13 Sep 2017 | 1 min read
In a recent issue of Uncut, a diligent writer Tyler Wilcox looked at the “Lost Albums of Neil Young” and pieced together the track listings for nine albums Young recorded but never released, although most of the songs in one form or other turned up on other albums. One of the unreleased albums was entitled Hitchhiker, a 10-song solo collection recorded... > Read more
THE GENIUS OF ZAHA HADID (2017): The pulling power in Seoul
12 Sep 2017 | 4 min read
If anyone doubts the pulling power of great architecture and design to re-invigorate a city and lure tourists they need only consider one word: Bilbao. In the Eighties, this city in the Basque region of northern Spain was in economic free-fall: Industries were failing or in decline, unemployment – especially among the young – was climbing and the city of... > Read more
THE QUIET DRAMA OF BARK PSYCHOSIS (2017): The spell and the curse of the Hex
11 Sep 2017 | 4 min read | 1
Most dictionaries will tell you that a “hex” can be a benign spell at one end of the description but a curse at the other. It can also be a verb and a noun, so you can hex someone with a hex. And that makes “Hex” an appropriate title for the sole album by the British band Bark Psychosis. (An aside here, no dictionary will have an... > Read more
SHORT CUTS: A round-up of recent New Zealand releases
11 Sep 2017 | 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, in the same way it does IN BRIEF about international releases and Yasmin Brown... > Read more
Judy Garland: Judy at Carnegie Hall (1961)
11 Sep 2017 | 4 min read | 1
Many people who saw Judy Garland in the final weeks of her life in mid '69 described her in similar terms: That she looked like a sick bird, broken and unable to fly. She was battling a lifetime of debts, betrayals, pills, booze, chronic unhappiness, self-doubt . . . In one of her last interviews she said, “I've worked very hard, you know, and I've planted... > Read more
IN BRIEF: A quick overview of some recent international releases
11 Sep 2017 | 3 min read
With so many CDs commanding and demanding attention Elsewhere will run this occasional column which scoops up releases by international artists, in much the same way as our SHORT CUTS column picks up New Zealand artists and Yasmin does with EPs. Comments will be brief. . Graham Reynolds: A Scanner Darkly (Fire/Southbound) Elsewhere has... > Read more
ONE WE MISSED: Grayson Gilmore; Otherness (Flying Nun)
11 Sep 2017 | <1 min read
Although there never was anything such as generic “Flying Nun”, Grayson Gilmore has always seemed quite far from the centre of the label's usual releases. At times – and especially here – you feel he is more akin to an art music composer who is bringing electronica into his orbit. This appropriately entitled 10-song collection rides on washes... > Read more
Creedence Clearwater Revival: Green River
11 Sep 2017 | 2 min read
In a freewheeling and enjoyable interview before a solo show in 2005, John Fogerty -- mainman behind CCRevival -- laughed about how at the height of the counterculture in the late Sixties bands like the Greatful Dead and Quicksilver Messenger Service openly expressed envy at his band's success. They wondered how they couldn't get hit single on the radio, he laughed, but... > Read more
Peter Cook: Bedazzled (1968)
11 Sep 2017 | 1 min read | 2
Although best seen in the context of the hilarious Bedazzled film -- where poor Dudley Moore is granted wishes by the Devil (the smarmy and petty Peter Cook) -- this song still resonates for its emotional coolness and distance. Some context then? Moore plays a nervous cook in a cheap London diner who is smitten with the beautiful waitress Eleanor Bron. He meets the... > Read more
THE ART OF THE OILS (2107): Iconography and imagery on Midnight Oil album covers
5 Sep 2017 | 3 min read
When it came to rock culture and how artists presented themselves on album or EP covers, the Australians were about a decade ahead of New Zealanders in cultural and artistic associations with their homeland. The jazz fusion group Ayers Rock, for example, not only appropriated the European name of Uluru in the red centre but also had a cutout image of the rock on... > Read more
REB FOUNTAIN CONSIDERED (2017): Arrows from and to the heart
5 Sep 2017 | 4 min read | 2
Although this essay is about New Zealand singer-songwriter Reb Fountain, we need to start by acknowledging her friend Sam Prebble who died with tragic suddenness in 2014. Prebble was a gifted songwriter, an intelligent and likeable man. And, for me, that genuine rarity: a gentleman. Elsewhere had frequently praised his work when he appeared... > Read more