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. Welcome . . .
Latest posts
Various Artists: The Myndstream Collection Vol 1 (digital outlets)
25 Sep 2021 | <1 min read
At Elsewhere we make the distinction between New Age music and ambient, although we're prepared to acknowledge the border between is pretty porous. However this collection of ambient and meditative sounds recommends itself if for no other reason than the name players involved: by my count between them these people have had more than 30 Grammy nominations, more than half... > Read more
Glenn Bodger: I'll Leave the Light On (digital outlets)
25 Sep 2021 | 1 min read
Christchurch's Glenn Bodger was the singer in the Nineties Auckland rock band Braintree which recorded for Murray Cammick's Wildside and played extensively. On various instruments (notably acoustic and electric guitars) and with producer and multi-instrumentalist Darryn Harkness (Braintree, From Scratch, New Telepathics, Loud Ghost etc), Bodger here opens with a... > Read more
Brigid Mae Power: Burning Your Light (Fire/digital outlets)
24 Sep 2021 | 1 min read
Irish singer-songwriter Power released a universally acclaimed album Head Above Water last year which garnered her considerable attention, even though it was her third album. She had also released a number of EPs and this, having just six songs (five covers and a traditional song). But at 27 minutes it's about the length of many albums which pass our ears so . . .... > Read more
One More Cup of Coffee
KAREN BLACK IN THE SEVENTIES (2021): The singer not the star
23 Sep 2021 | 3 min read
Karen Black had key roles in game-changing films in the late Sixties/early Seventies: a New Orleans hooker in Easy Rider; Jack Nicolson's working class, country music-loving girlfriend in Five Easy Pieces (she was Oscar-nominated for best supporting actress, won a Golden Globe and the New York Critics poll for it); and the object of affection in the messy Drive, He Said.... > Read more
Desu ExSounds: Figments (Naviar/bandcamp)
22 Sep 2021 | <1 min read
Naviar Records out of London is certainly interesting in its ethos, it speaks of exploring the connection between contemporary experimental electronica and Japanese haiku. It seems to be a collective, has a weekly half-hour broadcast of new music which are responses to particular haiku and has released numerous albums (we stopped counting at 50). We have only... > Read more
BOB DYLAN: SPRINGTIME IN NEW YORK 1980- 1985, THE BOOTLEG SERIES VOL 16 (2021): Looking for water in a dry well
22 Sep 2021 | 6 min read
The early Eighties weren't the best time to be Bob Dylan, and not for anyone who'd had their head turned by him the mid-Sixties. Or in the mid-Seventies when he released that famous return-to-form album Blood on the Tracks. But after that latter highpoint there had been lesser returns. While they had their moments, neither Desire nor Street Legal (“utterly... > Read more
QUEEN IDA. COOKIN' WITH QUEEN IDA, CONSIDERED (1989): Getting that bon temps rouler-ing
20 Sep 2021 | 2 min read
Before Ry Cooder "discovered" Cuban music for a mainstream audience with the Buena Vista Social Club (album/tour/film) there was cajun which was enormously popular for a while and artists like BeauSoleil, Wayne Toups (who came the New Zealand), Jo-El Sonnier and other became well known. An off-shoot of the cajun connection was zydeco which also emerged out of... > Read more
Low: Hey What (SubPop/digital outlets)
20 Sep 2021 | 1 min read | 1
The American husband-wife team of Mimi Parker and Alan Sparhawk have built their alternative credentials over three decades now from a kind of slowcore guitar and casually melodic sound (elevated by Parker's terrific vocals, which in another context, could be profitably deployed in alt.country) and towards an increasingly experimental sound of distortion, surface noise,... > Read more
Elsewhere Art . . . Robert Graettinger
20 Sep 2021 | <1 min read
Our on-going WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT . . . pages allows us to introduce unusual artists or albums, and sometimes another view of a familiar name. There are some pretty oddball characters covered there, and one is this fellow, Robert Graettinger. The heading on my piece was The Ghoul of Third Stream because he was a two-metre tall musician/composer described by Art... > Read more
Timba MM: Outstanding (Naxos/digital outlets)
20 Sep 2021 | <1 min read
Cuban music out of Montreal, and why not? This band of Cuban and Canadian musicians -- an eight-piece, but only six pictured on the cover, but an additional nine Cubans on the sessions – bring to a boil a boisterous Afro-Cuban/Latin sound of horns, percussion, guitars, son, samba flamenco and jazz. Although grounded in traditions –a Yoruban prayer also... > Read more
Del Bahia
George Harrison: Horse to Water (2001)
20 Sep 2021 | 1 min read
As with many people who have a religion, faith or some kind of mainline on what they believe to be the truth, George Harrison wasn't short of moralising and a bit of finger-pointing with warnings. At their best (early in his solo career) his lyrics were measured but later on the dogma and judging seemed to emerge more. In this, the final song he recorded when he knew... > Read more
THE DESSNERS, BON IVER AND THE BIG RED MACHINE (2021): With a little help from their friends
19 Sep 2021 | 2 min read
The Dessner twins in the American band The National, certainly put themselves about a bit. Paris-based guitarist/producer Bryce is a Yale-graduate composer whose work has been performed by the Kronos Quartet, Paris' Ensemble Intercontemporain and various American orchestras. He's worked with Steve Reich, Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood (the National sometimes... > Read more
Motorists: Surrounded (digital outlets)
19 Sep 2021 | <1 min read
We known absolutely very little about this Toronto-based three-piece. But after enduring the angst of Imagine Dragons ("I find myself in pieces, there are pills on the table" in the opener of their latest album) and a bunch of other artists whining about their lives or creating some fake image of themselves, there was something refreshing (if a bit early... > Read more
ARTIST, AUTHOR AND CAKE-MAKER ROSS MURRAY INTERVIEWED (2021): Muki, Pickles and an upside-down cake
18 Sep 2021 | 4 min read
Mt Maunganui's Ross Murray is one of Elsewhere's favourite illustrators and artists whose work has reached far beyond these shores. His clients have included Lonely Planet, NASA, Disney, Rolling Stone Magazine and The Washington Post, and among many at home, Garage Project. His distinctive graphic work evokes the landscapes and cultural life of Aotearoa New Zealand,... > Read more
Kendall Elise: Let the Night In (bandcamp)
18 Sep 2021 | <1 min read
We have been very keen on Auckland singer-songwriter Kendall Elis to the point of interviewing her when her debut album Red Earth arrived, and then again for this one when she answered some more personal questions, and her answers were very interesting. Although nominally along the folk-country axis (she's nominated for the second time in the Country Music Awards... > Read more
Rachel Magoola: Resilience, Songs of Uganda (Arc Music/digital outlets)
18 Sep 2021 | <1 min read
Ugandans have certainly needed to be resilient: in living memory there was the mad despot Idi Amin and subsequent disruption, the HIV epidemic, the civil war lead by the Lord's Resistance Army (more mad bastards), economic collapses and food shortages, Covid . . . Politician Rachel Magoona has raised money for healthcare and the education of girls, and along... > Read more
Sunsuuni
GREAT LOST KIWI SINGLES: Rock follies
18 Sep 2021 | 11 min read | 10
They are found at the back of cartons at record fairs, under beds in long abandoned houses and sometimes stored lovingly -- but rarely played -- in the collections of the obsessives. They are great, and not that great, rare Kiwi singles with an interesting story behind them -- often more interesting than the music. Here are some examples, more as they come to light. .... > Read more
Peter Cape: Coffee Bar Blues
THE EXPERIMENTAL GUITARS OF AOTEAROA SERIES (2021): Twang bang and spanky you, man
17 Sep 2021 | 2 min read
Further to saxophonist/facilitator Jeff Henderson's series of interesting improv albums under the collective title Jazz from the Underground Nightclubs of Aotearoa on the new Kiwijahzz label, our attention was drawn to another series . . . Experimental Guitars of Aotearoa, the first volume of which was released in 2019 (who knew?) and the second last year (ditto).... > Read more
Some Other Time (Malcolm, O'Connor)
Proteins of Magic: Proteins of Magic (digital outlets)
16 Sep 2021 | <1 min read
PoM is New Zealand singer, songwriter and visual artist Kelly Sherrod who studied at Elam in Auckland, played bass in Dimmer (touring at home and in the US), moved to Nashville for a while and now back home should be out promoting this debut album when supporting Dimmer. But . . . Although some of those dates have been postponed, this is a hypnotic album... > Read more
Hopeful Symphony
Marcin Wasilewski Trio: En Attendant (ECM/digital outlets)
13 Sep 2021 | <1 min read
Although this trio have recorded recently with Joe Lovano and under their own name, you can't help but wonder if the subdued mood here is a response to the death in 2018 of trumpeter Tomasz Stanko who this group had a long, profitable and beautiful relationship with. Even their treatment of the Doors' Riders on the Storm is taken at a melancholy, thoughtful... > Read more