Something Elsewhere
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SOUL FOOD Y'ALL: Inna German style?
23 Jul 2013 | 2 min read
To be honest, for many decades I thought succotash was some kind of cuss word. That was probably because I'd seen the perpetually angry Loony Tunes character Yosemite Sam bellow out "sufferin' succotash" one time -- and that fitted right in alongside his other, largely unintelligble, quasi-profanities. These days I know that succotash is a cheap and easy beans, tomatoes and... > Read more
Fried Neck Bones and Some Home Fries
WIRED FOR SOUND: Electronic music for the mind and body
3 Jul 2013 | 3 min read
When composer Douglas Lilburn left New Zealand at the dawn of the Sixties, it was because he felt he had been isolated from developments in contemporary music, and he was curious about electronic music.* He was almost 50 when he left in '63 to travel to Hawaii, New York, Paris and England where he visited electronic studios, such as the BBC Radiophonic Studio in London, famous for producing... > Read more
Tweeklank
AND 10 MORE SHAMEFUL RECORD COVERS I'M PROUD TO OWN
24 May 2013 | 8 min read | 1
The occasional installments in this series of shameful record covers which I have in my possession always comes with this caveat: if you're curious about any you shouldn't pay more than $6 for them. I didn't, and that's the point. If you buy an album for its cover art -- odd, frightening, kitsch or whatever -- then you do need to keep some perspective. Given you probably won't know the... > Read more
She Went So Lonely
AND ANOTHER 10 SHAMEFUL RECORD COVERS I'M PROUD TO OWN
10 Apr 2013 | 7 min read | 3
Further to previous confessional postings along these lines (here and here), this is another installment in albums bought on the basis of their cover art -- although "art" is perhaps far too lofty a word for most. Bought out of curiosity about their contents, might be a better way of putting it. And what better one to start with than this appropriately titled collection . . .... > Read more
Venus
THE CRITIC REVILED (2013): With Ringo and BB KIng reviewed
11 Feb 2013 | 5 min read
There are many perils in writing reviews: you might report a song title incorrectly, you might misname a member of the backing band, you might get abuse and threats in a bar afterwards . . . sometimes many years afterwards, especially from a musician who feels you didn't accurate report their particular genius. The internet has actually helped the hapless reviewer, people can now pour their... > Read more
10 SHAMEFUL RECORD COVERS I'M PROUD TO OWN
25 Jan 2013 | 7 min read | 2
As mentioned previously in regard to Record Store Day -- the day when artists release albums and singles on vinyl to encourage people back to the format and into record shops -- people who just download music are missing something. Quite a lot of something. Not just sound quality but that tangible object: the record cover. Not all album covers are works of art however, and there's... > Read more
A Mustache, a Derby, A Cane and a Cop
EVERYWHERE ELSEWHERE: Enter through the gift shop
30 Sep 2012 | 2 min read
Having paid our respects at Buddy Holly's grave in his hometown of Lubbock in west Texas, where the inscription takes the family spelling “Holley”, it was time to get serious. And shop. Back at the excellent Buddy Holly Center in town there was the inevitable gift shop and I had my eye on a bobble-head Buddy doll to match a Wonder Woman one I'd bought previously. These... > Read more
SPOTIFY'S HQ IN SWEDEN: The quiet revolution
19 Jun 2012 | 1 min read
The ambience of the Stockholm headquarters of Spotify – the world's fastest growing online music streaming service – isn't what you might expect. No skateboard-riding computer nerds giving high-fives and blasting some cutting-edge soundtrack as they chug energy drinks, no rowdy office banter around the coffee machine. If it weren't for a few handsomely framed photos of... > Read more
SPOTTED ON SPOTIFY: An endless stream of music
24 May 2012 | 2 min read | 1
The hills – and elevators, supermarkets and doctors' waiting rooms – are alive with the sound of music. Yet despite being assailed by often unwanted Muzak, most of us still want music in our lives. And more of it judging by the success of iTunes, iPods and the download culture. You can add to that list a new player in the New Zealand market, Spotify, which brings you essential... > Read more
10 MORE SHAMEFUL RECORD COVERS I'M PROUD TO OWN
21 May 2012 | 6 min read
Further to the previous selection of bad taste or just plain awful album covers, comes this batch . . . kicking off with PIL playing the old Magritte card with their album That What is Not. Rene Magritte was the Belgian surrealist who painted a pipe and added the words "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" (This is not a pipe), the point being it wasn't a pipe, but a painting of a pipe.... > Read more
Polar Bear Stomp
FISTFUL OF VINYL: Records ride back over the horizon
16 Apr 2012 | 4 min read | 1
A true coincidence? Within half an hour of speaking with my son in London about some wonderful on-line world which allows streaming access to what seems like a billion songs, a familiarly shaped parcel arrived at my door . It was of the kind the iPod generation probably knows very little about. It was a 12'' record in a beautiful gatefold sleeve. This was music – the... > Read more
Maggie May
Scratching the surface: In praise of old time music
9 Mar 2011 | 3 min read | 1
I confess to being a hoarder. Nothing embarrassing like bottles, matchboxes, or beer cans. I collect art objects. Well, records actually. Over the decades I've scrounged through junk shops and school fairs looking for that first Sadistic Mika Band album, things by Sam the Sham and Pharaohs, Japanese psychedelic rock from the early 70s, spoken word albums from the 40s, Gracie Fields' singles... > Read more
GETTING OLDER (2010: A greybeard still here
15 Aug 2010 | 5 min read | 1
A couple of weeks ago my wife and I went to the movies and, for the first time, I took advantage of what I am calling “Senior Discount”. The polite young man behind the counter laughed when I went to get out my driver's license as proof of age and said, “Nah, it's all right. You don't look it, but I believe you.” This was flattering on the one hand, but of... > Read more
Trade . . .Me? A story of failed entrepreneurialism
5 Jul 2010 | 3 min read | 1
The new poster boy for entrepreneurs is 26-year old Canadian Kyle MacDonald: he’s the guy who traded a red paperclip for a fish-shaped pen, then traded that for a doorknob, that for a barbeque and so on. He’s still trading up and some weeks ago looked set to get a house out of his on-line trading skills. My negotiating abilities are such that the other day I was prepared... > Read more
PAULY FUEMANA REMEMBERED (2010): Once in the land of plenty
31 Jan 2010 | 5 min read
I wish I wasn’t writing this. I wish it wasn’t humid and raining. I wish I could bring myself to put his album on right now. But – and I really don’t know why – I am overwhelmed by grief to learn that Pauly Fuemana has died. Many, many others knew him – or will now claim to know him – better than I. In truth I did not know him at all... > Read more
The Nightmare from Down Under: Paying the price for gluttony
5 May 2009 | 1 min read
The small city of Melaka two hours south of Kuala Lumpur is considered the cuisine capital of Malaysia, and my happy task there for a few days was to sample then write about the various foods -- notably the highly-spiced Baba-Nyonya style for which Melaka (aka Malacca and other variants) is renown. But with so many styles still to be sampled I decided to stay on longer and, to save money,... > Read more
Looking at Ourselves: the film New Zealand, in cinemas now
23 Dec 2008 | 3 min read | 2
I honestly thought that the new Keanu film The Day The Earth Stood Still was the worst movie I had seen in decades, then last night we saw Australia. Far be it from me to be a spoiler -- and please go see it, if you must -- but we thought it the most trite, sentimental, predictable, cornball, overblown epic ever. And I've seen some clunkers from the Fifties -- which stand up better... > Read more
Come, feel the noize: A true story from the suburbs
23 Oct 2008 | 2 min read | 3
A question: is female orgasm the satisfied whimper at the end, or the 40 minutes of moaning and groaning which my neighbour does loudly at 2am? Or at 6am. Living in a block of townhouses brings with it a certain unwanted knowledge of your neighbour's intimacies, although I am a little unsure as to whether they are unhappy about us knowing. She once said, "you've probably heard... > Read more
Stayin' Alive: The fitness phase (2005)
26 May 2008 | 2 min read
When you are over 50, becoming fanatical about exercise won't undo years of happy hedonism. For a year I have occasionally waddled to the nearby Health and Fitness Centre (their description, not mine) and – alongside lithe young bodies, walking-wounded Blues players and sometimes monstermen like the Tuaman – I have worked out. More correctly, I have ridden a... > Read more
Auckland City, Where The Past is Present
10 Aug 2007 | 4 min read
I just caught a glance at him out of the corner of my eye when I heard him shout “Why don’t you keep quiet”. Or words to that effect, with unprintable expletives included. He was dressed in a lawyer’s suit, had close-cropped hair, had those mad staring eyes like Chris Dixon, and was wound tight as a drum. His fist were tight balls and for the life of me I thought... > Read more