Tag Archives: Music

David Bowie Saw Lorde As ‘the Future of Music’

David Bowie Saw Lorde As ‘the Future of Music’

David Bowie believed the young New Zealand singer Lorde was “the future of music”. “David really liked Lorde. They had a few wonderful moments together,” said Mike Garson, Bowie’s longtime pianist. Lorde was chosen to perform…

Kimbra Takes A Visit To Sesame Street

Kimbra Takes A Visit To Sesame Street

New Zealand singer-songwriter Kimbra has been spotted on one of the world’s most well-known streets and has been seen with some of its most famous residents – Elmo and the Cookie Monster. The effervescent star…

Kimbra – The Making Of The Golden Echo: Episode 2

Kimbra – The Making Of The Golden Echo: Episode 2

In the second of five short videos New Zealand recording artist Kimbra talks about collaborating with Silverchairs Daniel Johns, bassist Thundercat and composer Van Dyke Park in Australia on…

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug Production Blog Part 14

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug Production Blog Part 14

Take a peek at Peter Jackson’s fourth video blog for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. In this entry, it’s all about the amazing development of the new music…

Far Over The Misty Mountains Cold

Far Over The Misty Mountains Cold

Take a look at an exclusive video clip from Warner Bros and TheOneRing.net from Peter Jackson’s film: The Hobbit. Far Over The Misty Mountains Cold is a song sung…

Kiwi Band Wins Top Prize at US Music Competition

Kiwi Band Wins Top Prize at US Music Competition

New Zealand band, Streets of Laredo, have taken a top spot in the US indie music competition, Unsigned Only. The New York-based band, made up of brothers Dan and Dave Gibson, and Dave’s wife,…

Harpooning Hearts in Vegas

Harpooning Hearts in Vegas

Auckland jazz singer Sarah Frances Johnston, 21, is this month beginning a two-month residency performing at Oscar’s Beef, Booze and Broads at the Plaza in Las Vegas. Johnston, who began acting at age 11…

Recommended Listening

Recommended Listening

The release of Ladyhawke’s second album Anxiety is one of Guardian reviewer’s Alex Petridis’ “top picks of the spring.” Petridis writes: “The second album by this self-styled ‘pop superwoman creating radio-friendly songs with a single bound’ — aka…

Conducting Lifelong Love

Conducting Lifelong Love

New Zealand-born conductor Andrew Sewell is in contention to replace the current Illinois Symphony Orchestra’s music director and is profiled ahead of his Springfield audition in the State Journal-Register. Sewell, who lives in Wisconsin, previously…

Lynch Pin Performs Wonder

Lynch Pin Performs Wonder

Originally from Auckland, SF Jazz Collective bassist Matt Penman studied at Boston’s Berklee College of Music before relocating to New York in 1995. Penman, 37, is a longtime lynch pin of the Collective, which…

Lo-fi Musical Shift

Lo-fi Musical Shift

New Zealand chanteuse Ladyhawke, 32, talks to Vogue Australia about her new album Anxiety and the musical shift between this recording and her self-titled debut. She’s progressed from the synth-heavy 1980s to the gritty guitars of the 90s….

Hohepa’s Fearsome High Notes

Hohepa’s Fearsome High Notes

“Based on a true story spanning nearly 150 years, Hohepa lays bare some of New Zealand’s most painful wounds — and seeks to heal them through music,” Mike Silverman of the Associated Press writes. “The opera,…

Juke Joint Revelations

Juke Joint Revelations

In the wake of her successful debut album Holy Smoke, Auckland-born songstress Gin Wigmore talks about the process which led to her second, the blues-inspired Gravel and Wine, a sophomore album high on sass with numbers…

National Treasure On Tour

National Treasure On Tour

“Beloved at home but never exactly part of the mainstream, McGlashan has maintained a level of consistency over both group and solo releases, which has earned him great respect within his peer group…

Ridiculously Handsome Nomads

Ridiculously Handsome Nomads

The biggest thing to happen to New Zealand since Peter Jackson’s makeover is Auckland band The Naked and Famous according to Aidin Vaziri writing for the San Francisco Chronicle. “ a…

Foo Fighters Make Earth Move

Foo Fighters Make Earth Move

Auckland GeoNet scientists have said that the recent Foo Fighters concert at Western Springs caused geological vibrations on par with “volcanic tremors”. The vibrations emitted “a strong low signal,” geologists at GeoNet reported. “The…

Album Upbeat She Swears

Album Upbeat She Swears

Ladyhawke has announced the release of her second album, Anxiety, which will be out on 19 March 2012. It has been recorded over the past year at producer Pascal Gabriel’s house in the south of…

Composing For Kermit

Composing For Kermit

Wellingtonian Bret McKenzie has applied “his rare talents to a sacred” and “daunting” “Muppets-related endeavour” writing three songs for the forthcoming movie The Muppets. The New York Times’ cultural editor Adam Sternbergh writes for the publication’s magazine:…

Musical portraiture

Musical portraiture

Photographic portraits of New Zealand musicians Bic Runga, Dave Dobbyn and Neil Finn are included in a new international coffee table book, called Music, shot by renowned New York photographer Andrew Zuckerman. Zuckerman flew…

School of Rock

School of Rock

A music teaching program designed by four Christchurch friends has taken off online, selling more than 10,000 copies – mostly in the US – in just two years. Jamorama is a step by step guide to…