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 QUESTIONNAIRE: Jed Parsons
17 Jul 2018 | 3 min read
It sometimes seems that Jed Parsons' debut album Midnight Feast – recorded with Lee Prebble at Surgery in Wellington – has been a long time in the telling . . . because he has been touring, played Auckland City Limits earlier this year and has been an increasingly visible presence after three advance singles. Midnight Feast was released last week (we were... > Read more
Time
Bob Dylan: John Wesley Harding (1967)
8 Jul 2018 | 5 min read | 1
There are of course many albums by Bob Dylan which would immediately go into an Essential Elsewhere list: All of those in that remarkable 18-months recorded between January 1965 and July 1966 (Bringing It Al Back Home, Highway 61 Revisited and the double album Blonde on Blonde); Blood on the Tracks ('74), “Love and Theft” and Modern Times in the early 2000s which... > Read more
All Along the Watchtower
The Famous Elsewhere Questionnaire
THE FAMOUS ELSEWHERE QUESTIONNAIRE: Chris Dent aka Albi (of Albi and the Wolves)
8 Jul 2018 | 7 min read
With their debut album One Eye Open of 2016 – which won praise at Elsewhere and them the award for Folk Artist of the Year in 2018 – the hard working trio of Albi and the Wolves brought raw energy and passion to their chosen idiom, and also pulled in ideas from rock, world music, soul, jazz and more. The trio of singer-guitarist Chris Dent (aka Albi) from... > Read more
EPs by Yasmin Brown
8 Jul 2018 | 4 min read
With so many CDs commanding and demanding attention Elsewhere will run this occasional column by the informed and opinionated Yasmin Brown. She will scoop up some of those many EP releases, in much the same way as our SHORT CUTS column picks up albums by New Zealand artists, and IN BRIEFdoes for international artists. You can read her previous... > Read more
PAUL SIMON, A LIFE by ROBERT HILBURN
8 Jul 2018 | 1 min read
For someone who can be prickly in interviews, defensive when criticised and whose private life has been off-limits, Paul Simon offered rare and unfettered access to longtimeLos Angeles Times music critic Robert Hilburn for this account of his life from childhood to this year. In more than 100 hours of interviews over three years, giving permission for Hilburn to speak... > Read more
ERIKA DARKSSON INTERVIEWED (2018): What lies beneath
8 Jul 2018 | 5 min read | 1
Warning: The following article contains references to violence, sex and obscene language. Reader discretion is advised. When I look back, I think I was always different from other children. They could be distant and stay in their rooms reading, but I was always very outgoing, loved to run and play and actually had quite a lot of friends. I grew up in a very... > Read more
MORE PROVOCATIONS OF RATTLES (2018): Elsewhere, classical, jazz and further elsewhere
6 Jul 2018 | 4 min read
As recently as April – just three months ago – Elsewhere acknowledged not just the quality of recordings on Auckland's contemporary music label Rattle, but the sheer number of albums it is releasing. As we had done in August 2017, we pulled a bunch of them together in a single column (as we are going to do here) but would also note that between times we had... > Read more
I, ME, MINE; THE EXTENDED EDITION by GEORGE HARRISON
6 Jul 2018 | 2 min read
When George Harrison's slight autobiography I, Me Mine was first published in 1980 as a limited edition hardback his onetime friend John Lennon was livid. He said George had barely mentioned him (true, just 11 single references in about 80 pages of text, and there in only half a dozen of the many photos) and Lennon was angry that the kid he got into his band would be so... > Read more
MAORI METAL, a doco by DAVID FREID
5 Jul 2018 | <1 min read
You have to love this short (18 minute) film which starts with a warning: "The following film contains heavy metal. Viewer discretion is advised". It shines a spotlight on the formidable New Zealand metal band Alien Weaponry who are, as of this writing, taking their astonishing te reo hard rock to the world . . . and frankly we think they could be the Next Big... > Read more
JOHN COLTRANE'S LOST ALBUM (2018): Four guys walk into a studio in New Jersey . . .
5 Jul 2018 | 3 min read
In the half century since his death (in 1967), the music of John Coltrane has inspired, charmed and challenged musicians, jazz aficionados and even worked its way into the language of hip-hop and more edgy contemporary r'n'b. In his growth, Coltrane went through many changes and when he died at just 40 there seemed so much more to come. Two years before he had wound up... > Read more
Untitled Original Demo 11386 (take one)
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GUEST PHOTOGRAPHERS ROBERT KNIGHT AND MARYANNE BILHAM share their portfolios and a new venue
4 Jul 2018 | 5 min read
From the Elsewhere editor: It is in the nature of change that music venues come and go but a new music and relaxation space – sophisticated, central, slightly secluded and very tasteful – has just opened in Auckland, and it is more than just a venue. It is the project of rock photographers Robert Knight and Maryanne Bilham who – separately and as a... > Read more
WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT . . . MAL EVANS: In the court of the kings
2 Jul 2018 | 4 min read
In January 1976 when the four LA police were called to a disturbance in a motel they were confronted by a huge, semi-naked man who was angry, seemingly high and out of control . . . and carrying what they took to be a firearm. When he wouldn't drop the weapon – an air rifle as it happened – they shot him dead. And so ended the life of Mal Evans, at just... > Read more
The Famous Elsewhere Questionnaire
THE FAMOUS ELSEWHERE SONGWRITER QUESTIONNAIRE: Erin Cole-Baker
2 Jul 2018 | 2 min read
New Zealand singer-songwriter Erin Cole-Baker spent time in the US earlier this year and, given how her work would easily sit with both country and folk audiences it is no surrise that she is heading back up that way. In August and September she is playng dates in California, Oregon and Washington. She wil be touring on the back of her delicate new album Till The... > Read more
Debashish Bhattacharya/Bob Brozman: Mahima (2003)
2 Jul 2018 | 1 min read | 1
The late American guitarist and raconteur Brozman was one of the unexpected delights at the 2003 Womad, where he appeared with Takashi Hirayasu playing Okinawan folk songs which they took off into the realms of Delta blues, soul funk, punk and boogie. Brozman was one of those irritatingly gifted performers who seemed to acknowledge no boundaries between cultures and... > Read more
Debashish Bhattacharya/Bob Brozman: Maa
LOCUS AND LOCATION: THE SOCIO-GEOGRAPHY AND POST-COLONIAL DISCOURSE IN DON McGLASHAN'S DOMINION ROAD
30 Jun 2018 | 4 min read | 3
Don McGlashan is one of New Zealand's most respected and successful songwriters. He been awarded the Apra Silver Scroll for songwriting 47 times and has been given honorary doctorates from many New Zealand universities which allow him to practice medicine. He has turned a keen eye onto New Zealand society in songs like There is No Depression in New Zealand in which he... > Read more
Thundercat + OG Ron C and the Chopstars: “Drank” (Brainfeeder/Border)
29 Jun 2018 | 1 min read
For a guy who goes by the provocatively loud sounding name Thundercat and whose showing the Auckland City Limits festival ran headlong into virtuoso playing and very quickly shapeless jazz-funk noodling, singer/multi-instrumentalist Stephen Lee Bruner's Drunk album of last year was a very mainstream, almost MOR, retro jazz-lite outing with vocal guests Michael McDonald and... > Read more
A Fan's Mail/Trong Song Suite II (remix)
Erin Cole-Baker: Till the Feeling's Right (usual streaming outlets)
29 Jun 2018 | 1 min read | 1
Earlier this year this New Zealand singer-songwriter was in Kansas City – with assistance from the NZ Music Commission – alongside Anika Moa and Milly Tabak (of the Miltones) at the Folk Alliance International gathering. She played showcase gigs and collected business cards to follow up on. On the evidence of songs here such as the gentle, cleverly... > Read more
Morning Dove
Wee Willie Walker: There Goes My Used to Be (1967)
28 Jun 2018 | 1 min read
By the time Wee Willie Walker – who stands not too far over five foot in his bare feet – recorded this soul classic for the Goldwax label in Memphis the days of the great soul singers was almost at an end. Sure Al Green, Curtis Mayfield and Marvin and so on were still right there, and Otis lived on in the memory, but the world was changing and black music was... > Read more
Giannouli/Thorne/Garden: Rewa (Rattle)
25 Jun 2018 | 2 min read
Releases on Auckland's Rattle label seem now to fall into a few distinct categories: There is Essential, Important and last -- but far from least -- is Fascinating (But For A Select). Sometimes, of course, the music resides in a couple of those: Essential and Important being the most common pairing. This album by pianist Tania Giannouli, taonga puoro master Rob... > Read more
A Forgotten Land; The Uprooted Tree
Kamasi Washington: Heaven and Earth (Young Turks)
25 Jun 2018 | 3 min read | 1
When composer/saxophonist Kamasi Washington announced himself with the magisterial triple CD The Epic in 2015, many were impressed by the ambition and scope (it was indeed epic in both) as much as by how Washington integrated a considerable number of black American music – jazz which reached from bop to astral aspiration but also soul, funk and more -- into what seemed... > Read more