The Barn Tapes  - Arnold (September 1998)
 A frustrating mini-album this. Arnold seem to still be hunting for exactly what they are trying to sound like. Because of this, the music varies wildly from track to track. The first track, "Float my boat", sounds like a cross between Crosby Stills Nash and Young and More/Meddle era Pink Floyd ("St Tropez" comes to mind in particular). When you think you have their sound nailed, the second track, "Calling Ira Jones", comes in with harsh distorted vocals and a funky beat. "Face" sounds like a Radiohead track, slow bass, high floaty synth and breathy and melancholy alto vocals drifting across it. The short instrumental "Medication time" adds a twangy country feel. None of the nine tracks (eight plus lovely hidden instrumental) is a write-off - they all show good songwriting, and proficiency, and there is enough passion in there to make it feel more than just mechanical, enough to make me want to hear more of their music. But I hope that their next release is a little more cohesive, rather than a bunch of songs in such differing styles that it is nigh on impossible to really get into the sound of it.

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Midnite Vultures - Beck (September 2000)
This is a real change of direction! The country twang and left-field melodic bite of Beck's last couple of albums (Odelay and the much underrated Mutations) are gone, and in comes rampant, funky Beck, sounding like a mutant crossbreed of 80s David Bowie and Prince, with just enough of Tim Buckley thrown in for this disc to ooze raw sex. Hot, funky, slick, and recommended.

Take in the Sun - Bike (November 1997)
Bike is the new band of the softer half of Straitjacket Fits' gentler songwriter, Andrew Brough. So it's no surprise to find that Take in the Sun sounds similar to the softer end of the Fits' sound. Not that they don't rock out occasionally (like on the title track), but it is the slower, gentler songs that highlight Andrew's melodies and choirboy voice. The first single, "Save my life" gained some air play, and amazingly this sweet number is far from the album's best track. Other standouts are the slow groove of "Welcome to my world", the gentle, John-Cale-Paris-1919-like "Inside", the faster, slightly thrashier "Keeping you in mine" (which oddly reminds me of "Don't fear the reaper") and the JPSE-like "Slide on by", with its trademark Brough unexpected minor chord change.

Bengali Bantam Youth Experience - Black Star Liner (May 1999)
So many groups try to mix Britpop, their own Asian ethnic roots, and the dub/drum'n'bass sound. So many fail. Black Star Liner show a bit more originality than most, and are a definite cut above the likes of Cornershop and Kula Shakur. And its so damn catchy, too!

The Great Escape - Blur (September 2001)
For a while there in the mid-90s, Brit-pop fans seemed to divide themselves into two camps: Oasis vs Blur. No doubt this was at least in part fuelled by the scathing comments that the leaders of these two groups hurled at each other, but all in all,  I don't really see the reason. Oasis had it all over Blur in terms of style and substance, and the divide ignored the fact that if any group should have taken the mantle of the 90s' top Brit-pop band, it should have been Jarvis Cocker's Pulp. All three of these bands (along with many other Brit-pop groups) use Britain's pop heyday of the 60s as their kick-off point. But whereas Oasis's Gallagher brothers seem intent on trying to mimic the music of the Beatles in every way possible, and Cocker sounds like Townshend's nastier side, Blur's aspirations - if this album is to be believed - seem to have been less lofty. At times, they do attempt the laddishness of the Kinks' more throwaway numbers, but sadly they tend to land fair square on the style achieved by Herman's Hermits - not one of the 60s' classier acts. And it seems the harder they try for the Kinks effect, the less well it comes off. The only times I was truly impressed with tracks on this album (and they were few), were when the songs were least affected. Even here, Blur came across as a second-grade Madness.

13 - Blur (November 1999)
Normally known for being, along with the likes of Oasis, at the front of the return-to-the-60s sound of BritPop, Blur here get deeper and darker - and far more interesting - thanks to producer William Orbit. It'll take months to travel this particular road, but so far, the journey's gone better than with any of their other albums.

The fine art of surfacing - Boomtown Rats (May 1998)
Back before Bob Geldof was a sinner, he was a saint. And before he was a saint, he was an ordinary bloke who wanted to make music. And this was his band, post-punk powerful noise. Most people know the big single off this album ("I don't like Mondays"), but far fewer realise there are some other great wee noisy ditties here, too, like "Diamond smiles", "Wind chill factor minus zero", and "Someone looking at you". Ah, 1978.

Grace - Jeff Buckley (May 2001)
It's always very difficult to review an album overshadowed by events since its release, especially if those events are tragic or odd. In Jeff Buckley's case, the events since the release of Grace were both. Jeff was the son of Tim Buckley, a singer whose majestic voice soared and wailed its way through several fine albums of steamy white soul during the late 60s and early 70s before his untimely early death at the age of 28 from a drug overdose. His son Jeff produced this one splendid album, Grace, and a handful of outlines of material for a second, before he too died young, in a swimming accident in 1997, aged 30. Many of the songs contain images of drowning, of being drawn into an endless sea, of loss. It is fair to say that this subject matter is quite common among melancholy songwriters in general, so any preternatural significance is unlikely, but it makes any listening to the album more poignant than it might otherwise be. As to the album itself, the first thing that strikes the listener - if they are familiar with the work of Buckley senior, is the uncanny similarity in their vocal styles. Though without the full depth of his father's voice, Jeff was still possessed of a strong vocal gift. Instrumentation is sparse on this album, allowing Jeff's voice to show through to full extent. The songs are good: shimmering soulful ballads, hard-edged bluesy rockers, and introspections. Even this early in his career his songwriting abilities were fairly well-formed, and his covers (especially a great version of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah") are well chosen and performed. When he does crank the volume up (as in the ending of the first track, "Mojo Pin", and on the Chillipepperesque "Eternal Life"), he shows that the voice has power too. All in all, this should be regarded as an excellent album even without the extra relevance and weight placed on it by circumstance.

The Byrds reissue series (Turn! Turn! Turn!; Mr. Tambourine Man; Younger Than Yesterday; Fifth Dimension; The Notorious Byrd Brothers; The Ballad of Easy Rider; Sweetheart of the Rodeo; Dr. Byrds and Mr. Hyde) (September 1997)
The Beatles were the most important British group of the 1960s. No question. But it would be much more difficult to claim any one group as most important American group. Several have good claims - such as the Beach Boys, Simon & Garfunkel, the Velvet Underground, the Doors, and the Byrds. Of these, the Byrds were perhaps the most adventurous in their search for new (or old) styles to incorporate into their sound (The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds notwithstanding). From the jangly twelve-string folk-rock of Turn! Turn! Turn! and Mr. Tambourine Man, they moved through raga-inspired instrumentations to rootsy blues-tinged country, producing a series of very fine albums. The first eight of their albums, containing their best work, have recently been remastered and reissued, complete with bonus tracks, comprehensive liner notes and astonishingly improved sound quality. All are worth the purchase price. For the novice, I'd recommend either Mr. Tambourine Man or The Notorious Byrd Brothers. For the Byrds fan - trade up to the reissues, you won't regret it!

Farther Along - The Byrds (July 2000)
Finally, about two years after the first eight Byrds albums were re-released in immaculate remastered form, the remaining albums of the Byrds oeuvre have appeared - some for the first time on CD. The packaging is less spectacular than the first eight reissues, and there is less in the way of bonus tracks, but the sound quality is way up on the original releases. Sadly, though, these albums show the band in distinct decline, with ever-changing line-ups and wild and wide-ranging changes in style, and a distinctly jaded feel to the songs. There are still gems here, but it's a big step down from the likes of the gorgeous Notorious Byrds Brothers.

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No more shall we part - Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds (October 2001)
The Verlaines had a song called "Slow sad love song" and that is a good description of many of the songs on this sumptuous album, which could well be one of the year's best. Nick Cave often comes across as a latter-day Leonard Cohen, his sepulchral tones full of emotion as he spits and croons his way through songs that are gothic not in the 'white make-up and spiky hair' way of the Cure or their contemporaries, but in the gothic-romantic tradition of the romantic poets. This album sees Nick at his most lushly produced, as he sings of the alienation that accompanies the sadder side of love. A comparison would see this as equal parts Cohen, John Cale, and Patti Smith in sound. It's not an album to cheer you up, but for those moments when nothing makes sense anymore and you cannot express in words the emotions that well up inside you. Cave has been there, and this is the diary of that journey.

The blurred crusade - The Church (March 1992)
People who know the Church will probably best know their songs "The unguarded moment" and "Under the Milky Way". They're far less likely to know this album, which is a big shame, as it is full of great songs - songs that insinuate themselves, songs with lyrics to awaken your imagination. "So deep/deep without a meaning" sang vocalist Steve Kilbey on "The unguarded moment", but these songs make you stop and wonder whether there isn't some deep mysterious meaning to it after all. Best songs: "When you were mine", "Just for you", and the bittersweet "You took".

Magic and medicine - The Coral (February 2004)
Suddenly it seems cool again to sound like it's 1968. The Coral hit all the bases, yet in amongst the retro vibes there's a good feel for the music and a sense of melody. So what that the ghosts of Cream and the Crazy World of Arthur Brown seem to haunt songs like "Don't think you're the first" — in many ways that's the point. The songs capture that first stumbling into studio technology that the flower power generation were entering into in the late sixties. The sound revels in the lack of modern slickness, taking the sound back to the days before sequencing and multitracking took the soul out of it. Of course, this also allows the band to get away with some truly dodgy lyrics in an attempt to capture the feel of the era. No lyricist ever won awards for "In the year 2525", "Zabadak", or "Dance all around the world", and similarly some of these tracks here rely on the spirit of the times and the overall sound, and don't stand deep analysis. Not that it's all style and no substance — several of the songs are downright catchy. And as an attempt to recapture a time when rock (and youth) had not yet lost its innocence, this is one sweet album.

Doppelgänger - Curve (November 1993)
Curve's music is a wee bit harder than your standard neo-psychedelic swirl, backed with some hard goth drumming and electronic rhythms. But their most important feature is Toni Halliday's sultry lizard-like voice, which flows hauntingly yet menacingly around songs such as the stand-out "Already yours".

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I believe you are a star - Dimmer (September 2001)
Shayne Carter has a long history in new Zealand music, from early 80s schoolboy band Bored Games through the DoubleHappys to Straitjacket Fits. When the latter band split up in the early 90s, Carter decamped to Auckland and formed Dimmer. And then promptly disappeared without trace. Truth be told, Dimmer had so many line-up troubles that over the next half a dozen years they managed to release one EP and until now no albums.  Finally Shayne gave up, and took the name Dimmer for this basically solo album.So, what's it like? Well, anyone expecting the jagged guitar and wailing vocals that gave life to Fits songs like "She speeds" is in for a shock. This is smooth and sleek, tinged with ambience and even approaching jazz in places. Carter sounds assured, and though this lacks the immediate punch of an album like Melt, many of the tracks are beauties. The atmospheric effects used on Straitjacket Fits' quieter numbers have been honed, and this has been added to an almost jazzy shuffle that makes for a sultry late-night sound that would be more expected from the likes of Greg Johnson. So yes, I'd say this is well worthwhile, even if it takes a few listens to really sink in.

Hopetown - Dave Dobbyn (February 2004)
The most important thing to note about Dave Dobbyn's latest album is how happy he sounds. In the past few years, he has been exorcising various demons from his life, and it's been noticeable in his music. His battle with alcohol, and his railing at external ills such as world politics made his last few albums listenable to but ultimately less-than-enjoyable experiences overall. There was a bitterness that seeped into even his most melodic tracks. On Hopetown, however, he has put all this behind and, with the help of his own history in the music scene, has gone back to basics and back to his best. The title says it all — there is hope in these tracks, joy in life, and Dave sounds at ease. The experimental rhythmic spirit of the last few albums isn't totally lacking, though, and shines through on the likes of "A bridge on fire". But the spark that was ignited when Dobbyn was involved in compiling the retrospective Dudes compilation Where are the girls? is back, and several of the songs here sound as though the spirit of that spindly guy with the blond afro is still alive in 21st century Dobbyn. Songs like "Feel someone else's pain" and "Angels" could just about be Dudes or DD Smash tracks.

Hammers and anvils - Graeme Downes (October 2001)
It's been a while since we heard from the Verlaines front-man, during which time he's been teaching modern music at Otago University. The learning process of Downes's day-job may well have been a two-way process - Dr. Downes returns here with a mix that still has many of the qualities of his former band but (as with many frontmen gone solo) expands the pallette in surprising ways which he could never do with the band. Most startling among this are probably the boppy little dance sounds of "Alright by me" (one thing the Verlaines rarely did was a solid dance beat), the compelling rush and weird bridge of "Cattle, cars and chainsaws", and the laid-back, almost Chris Rea-like "Song for a Hollywood road movie". There's a distinct world-weariness in the lyrics, be it the view of a commuter trapped in gridlock ("January song") or watching an ageing rocker losing it ("Rock'n'roll hero", which reads like the Verlaines' "Ballad of Harry Noryb" fifteen years further down the track). The structures are complex yet work well, and the lyrics, melodies, and Graeme's playing are strong and passionate. This album may be his finest yet.

Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll - Ian Dury and the Blockheads (July 2000)
When Ian Dury succumbed to cancer a few months back, rock music lost a real original, the single-handed master of what could best be described as vaudeville punk. The music could be, at times, as brash as the Sex Pistols, but it was more often than not a bouncy, ska-tinged pub-band sound, heavily laced with a wicked sense of humour. This "best of" collection presents his best-known songs - notably "Hit me with your rhythm stick", the title track, and "There ain't half been some clever bastards", and also some neglected and overlooked gems like "Reasons to be cheerful, part 3" (which includes weird and wonderful reasons such as "sitting on the potty, and curing smallpox").

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