Absolute Elsewhere

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BARRY MARKWICK, AT AUDIOCULTURE (2023): The man who jazzed on the Bealtes

12 Oct 2023  |  1 min read

In Christchurch in 1965, years before jazz musicians came around to the Beatles’ music, a young pianist Barry Markwick – with bassist Gerald Newson and drummer Harry Voice – recorded an album of Lennon-McCartney tunes, perhaps the first full album of jazz interpretations of Beatle songs anywhere in the world. At 22, Markwick wasn’t much of a Beatles fan.... > Read more

All My Loving

THE BEAU BRUMMELS' COMPLETE RECORDINGS 1964-1970 (2023): Beat-pop out of LA, destination Nashville

9 Oct 2023  |  4 min read

Like their peers the Beat-era Buckinghams from Chicago, the Beau Brummels out of San Francisco formed in the wake of the British Invasion and adopted the look, style and a name which ensured that they would be mistaken for another great UK pop-rock band. Needless to say they would insist that much of this wasn't deliberate – yeah, like naming yourself after an English Regency dandy... > Read more

NEIL YOUNG. YET AGAIN? (2023): It's yesterday once more.

8 Oct 2023  |  2 min read  |  1

Elsewhere has been clear about what we think of the never-ending releases by Neil Young, new albums and those pulled from his archive. This slew of releases – at a guess almost a dozen studio albums and even more live sessions in the past decade – has, in the words of PR, tainted his brand and confused the market. There have been box sets and collections which have included... > Read more

THREE THE HARD WAY, INTERVIEWED (1994): Hip-hop to the top

8 Oct 2023  |  <1 min read

When there is time, Elsewhere will be sourcing a rich vein of its archival material which was published in various places during the Eighties and Nineties which are not available on-line. These will most often be reproduced as they appeared in print. Some may be a little fuzzy in the reproduction but we think the story or interview are worth it for researchers or fans. Best read on a... > Read more

WIRE, 1977-80, CONSIDERED (2023): The short, sharp pop of art-punk

7 Oct 2023  |  2 min read  |  4

The best thing about the punk years wasn’t punk of course. That stuff exhausted itself pretty fast. No, punk’s importance was the doors that it opened to let in the likes of the Gang of Four, This Heat, Pere Ubu and musical architects such as Wire -- whose early claim to fame was getting 21 tracks onto two sides of vinyl. Field Day for the Sundays on their ‘77 debut Pink... > Read more

Outdoor Miner (from Chairs Missing)

STING, IN CONCERT (1994): The fine art of appropriation

6 Oct 2023  |  <1 min read

When there is time, Elsewhere will be sourcing a rich vein of its archival material which was published in various places during the Eighties and Nineties which are not available on-line. These will most often be reproduced as they appeared in print. Some may be a little fuzzy in the reproduction but we think the story or interview are worth it for researchers or fans. Best read on a... > Read more

DAVID McCOMB OF THE TRIFFIDS, INTERVIEWED (1994): Here . . . and gone too soon

4 Oct 2023  |  <1 min read

When there is time, Elsewhere will be sourcing a rich vein of its archival material which was published in various places during the Eighties and Nineties which are not available on-line. These will most often be reproduced as they appeared in print. Some may be a little fuzzy in the reproduction but we think the story or interview are worth it for researchers or fans. Best read on a... > Read more

RICHARD FARIÑA REMEMBERED (2023): The man who wouldn't be king

1 Oct 2023  |  12 min read

See him there in that photo from the early Sixties, the young singer standing alongside the beautiful Baez sisters Joan and Mimi. There he is again, a key figure hanging out in the downtown New York folk scene around the Village, his original songs pulling an audience his way, their lyrics political, allegorical, metaphorical and sometimes as gentle as a butterfly alighting on a leaf.... > Read more

Michael, Andrew and James

MITSKI PROFILED (2023) Risking it on the fault-line

1 Oct 2023  |  2 min read

Recently Elsewhere wrote about artists – locals particularly – who, despite having a strong mandate from their hard-won audience, seem to be risk-averse.  You get the impression the songs have been run past and shaped by a focus group which warns the artists not to do anything different and stick to the formula of pop bangers or songs which have their Selfie Generation... > Read more

THE LAUFEY PERPLEX (2023): To jazz or not to jazz

30 Sep 2023  |  1 min read

Okay pub quiz time, but be warned this could be a track question: Who was last year's most streamed jazz artist on Spotify?Now you might reasonably go for the ever-popular Miles Davis or even the great Pharoah Sanders who underwent a rediscovery with that 2021 album Promises with Floating Points and the LSO. But actually the most streamed jazz artist on Spotify – with 425 million... > Read more

THE BIG DAY OUT (1994): The acts and a survivor's guide

23 Sep 2023  |  <1 min read

When there is time, Elsewhere will be sourcing a rich vein of its archival material which was published in various places during the Eighties and Nineties which are not available on-line. These will most often be reproduced as they appeared in print. Some may be a little fuzzy in the reproduction but we think the story or interview are worth it for researchers or fans. Best read on a... > Read more

NINA SIMONE, THE POLITICS AND THE PASSION (2023): From Porgy to protest

18 Sep 2023  |  4 min read

In 1964 before a predominantly white, liberal and monied audience at New York's Carnegie Hall, Nina Simone announced her song Mississippi Goddamn. It had been written quickly some weeks previous and she'd played it to a small audience in a Greenwich Village club, but here it became wide currency. She referred to it as a show tune, “but the show hasn't been written for it... > Read more

KRISTIN HERSH, INTERVIEWED (1994): One day at a time

17 Sep 2023  |  <1 min read

When there is time, Elsewhere will be sourcing a rich vein of its archival material which was published in various places during the Eighties and Nineties which are not available on-line. These will most often be reproduced as they appeared in print. Some may be a little fuzzy in the reproduction but we think the story or interview are worth it for researchers or fans. Best read on a... > Read more

BJORK, INTERVIEWED (1994): There's more to life than this

11 Sep 2023  |  <1 min read

When there is time, Elsewhere will be sourcing a rich vein of its archival material which was published in various places during the Eighties and Nineties which are not available on-line. These will most often be reproduced as they appeared in print. Some may be a little fuzzy in the reproduction but we think the story or interview are worth it for researchers or fans. Best read on a... > Read more

SORRY, YOUR BEST ISN'T GOOD ENOUGH (2023): When it becomes the singer not the song

11 Sep 2023  |  3 min read  |  1

Some years ago I was sent a CD for review. It came from a young woman and had been recorded in the South Island. It was spare acoustic folk and pretty grim. Every song opened with either “I” or “you” and over however many songs – far too many to my ears – she seemed to be either tearful or angry about the relationship. I pointed this out in a review... > Read more

Dissolve Like Salt, by Violet Hirst

THE WIDE BRIDGE NEVER THE TIGHTROPE (2023): The plague of risk-averse pop

10 Sep 2023  |  4 min read

A week or so ago over lunch, a couple of us were talking about the state of local music. “There's just a lack of risk,” he said with obvious exasperation. And that's something I'd been thinking about for a while. We could blame Spotify and young pop artists' pursuit of scoring a breakout on one of the curated playlists. To achieve that you aren't going to do anything... > Read more

THE NOMAD, RESPECTED AND A RETROSPECTIVE (2023): The electronica pioneer celebrated 25 years on

3 Sep 2023  |  1 min read

The Nomad – Daimon Schwalger – earned his pseudonym: he took his vision for drum'n'bass and inventive electronica from Dunedin to Europe but also remained grounded here through numerous collaborations (with members of Fat Freddy's and Black Seeds as well as Luciano, King Kapisi, Pearl Runga and Tiki Taane among them). Since the late Nineties there were also much admired albums... > Read more

Musical Direction

STING, INTERVIEWED (1996): Stayin' alive at 45

31 Aug 2023  |  1 min read

When there is time, Elsewhere will be sourcing a rich vein of its archival material which was published in various places during the Eighties and Nineties which are not available on-line. These will most often be reproduced as they appeared in print. Some may be a little fuzzy in the reproduction but we think the story or interview are worth it for researchers or fans. Best read on a... > Read more

PETER GABRIEL, INTERVIEWED (1994): This charming man

30 Aug 2023  |  <1 min read

When there is time, Elsewhere will be sourcing a rich vein of its archival material which was published in various places during the Eighties and Nineties which are not available on-line. These will most often be reproduced as they appeared in print. Some may be a little fuzzy in the reproduction but we think the story or interview are worth it for researchers or fans. Best read on a... > Read more

RECOMMENDED RECORD: CLEMENTINE VALENTINE AND VICTORIAN ROMANTICISM (2023): Soul dreams and sleepers wake

28 Aug 2023  |  4 min read

From time to time Elsewhere will single out a recent release we recommend on vinyl, like this which comes on red vinyl with a lyric sheet and, which we wish all vinyl purchases included, a download code for a digital copy. And it has a framable cover, which we talk about specifically because it is clue to the contents. Check out Elsewhere's other Recommended Record picks . . .... > Read more

The Understudy