Penknife Glides - Pleasure Thru Tears
14 May 2013 // review by Petros
Straight out of 80’s and onto your stereo, Penknife Glides are back and bring you their newest release. Pleasure Thru Tears is a collection of songs written by the band between ’81 and ’85 as punk pulled itself to pieces and began its twenty year hibernation.
Read More...

PlasticGroove - Pointless Single Review
10 Apr 2013 // review by Petros
The semi-anonymous masked men in black are back with a new track, though in many ways PlasticGroove never left the scene. Junky Monkey is still doing the rounds, currently sitting at number 40 on the Audience.
Read More...

The Bads - Travel Light Album Review
02 Apr 2013 // review by Petros
Once the Julie Dolphin, then Boom Boom Mancini, dynamic duo Brett Adams and Dianne Swann are back as The Bads and with a brand new album Travel Light. If neither of the previous band names sound very familiar, perhaps I should throw in that Adams and his guitarist skills have been heard alongside Gin Wigmore and Neil Finn, and Swann has recorded duets with Radiohead’s Thom Yorke and OpShop, and was formally a member of kiwi supergroup When the Cat’s Away.
Read More...

Death In Texas - Fear of the Hundred Single Review
21 Feb 2013 // review by Petros
Death in Texas are another great band that has escaped the chain-like clutches of the New Zealand native music scenes, and for good reason. Their sound is at the dark end of pop, a vine the local bigwigs fear to pluck fruit from, and in whose shade the sheeple fear to tread.
Read More...

David Rasmussen - Blue Sky Shining Album Review
10 Jan 2013 // review by Petros
Serve Blue Sky Shining with a sweet cocktail. Best enjoyed in a hammock.
Read More...

Alizarin Lizard, Brown & Guests @ The Badcave, Palmerston North, 06/12/12
21 Dec 2012 // review by Petros
Last week I read the following headline in the local Manawatu Standard: “City folk ‘intolerant of noise’ – Musician ‘banned’ from playing music” The picture of Harry Lilley, a well-known busker in Palmerston North, and his white blonde hair, sunglasses and guitar made this annual report for the Environmental Protection Services Noise Control seem like someone else actually cared about Harry’s plight, the plight of many a practicing musician. This article came a week after: “Explicit PN hip-hop video an online hit” The thing I like about this article is it summed up the closed mindedness of this rural town that masquerades as a city.
Read More...

The Wendy Morris Band - Entangled Album Review
28 Nov 2012 // review by Petros
Finally, New Zealand has produced the perfect accompaniment for a summer drive around the Whangaparaoa pennisula in a blue Capri. Introducing the Wendy Morris Band and the new album Entangled.
Read More...

2 a.m. Orchestra - Heads & Tails Single Video Review
15 Nov 2012 // review by Petros
A devil and an angel, one wonders as the black, devil tailed chap approaches the white, anthropomorphic bird dude.  A tussle ensues and these enemies become a rotating yin-yang.
Read More...

Hello Sailor - Surrey Crescent Moon Album Review
28 Oct 2012 // review by Petros
Hello Sailor are one of those bands that need no introduction. They’re a kiwi institution, like L&P and Pav.
Read More...

The Glocks - Magpie Genocide Album Review
17 Oct 2012 // review by Petros
“To all those that have run the gauntlet to avoid the dive bomber – this is for you.” With apologies to the SPCA, I admit my first time firing a weapon at something other than a stationary target followed an experience running from a pair of those thieving black and white crows.
Read More...

Jackal - Only Everything Album Review
14 Sep 2012 // review by Petros
I confess. I join random things on Facebook whenever people suggest them, and often for no reason other than it was suggested.
Read More...

Stray Theories - Even Though We Sleep Album Review
24 Aug 2012 // review by Petros
There is nothing romantic about insomnia.  Chuck Palahniuk misled me.
Read More...

Stefan Wolf - Quiet! Can't You See I'm Dying Here? EP Review
17 Jul 2012 // review by Petros
“Perennially unfashionable… “ “Virtually unsaleable…” “Bound to be another shelf sitter…” Reading reviews like the above makes you question the adage “any press is good press.” If you took the reviews seriously that is… A grain of salt is the recommended accompaniment with Stefan Wolf’s latest release, self-described as “the paradox of a happy life tangling with the possibility of death.
Read More...

Gunt - From Darkness to Deletion EP Review
16 May 2012 // review by Petros
Gunt is another of those bands I’d heard on the radio before hearing of them and subsequently been asked to review. Little did I know they were a kiwi band.
Read More...

Skank Attack - Here on Out Album Review
01 May 2012 // review by Petros
Why the hell have I never heard of Skank Attack? Perhaps, because I spent the first half of the eighties in a womb, well nine months of it at least, and the last half destroying my parents’ cassette tapes with my teeth.
Read More...

Primmers - Durham Lane Album Review
13 Apr 2012 // review by Petros
One can find many pleasures in music.  Durham Lane from Primmers satisfies three of my main sources of pleasure; old, obscure, semi-forgotten music, previously unreleased music and true punk rock from the 70s, not that cringe-worthy neo-punk that emerged after the slow death of the boy band era.
Read More...

Kieran Cooper - Yes, No, Sincerely Album Review
25 Mar 2012 // review by Petros
In a rather novel move, over the past month or so Kieran Cooper has been releasing a track a week of Yes, No, Sincerely onto his bandcamp, a move previously employed by Smashing Pumpkins. This serialisation harkens back to the old days before we had unlimited high-speed internet and any album we could ever desire in a couple of clicks and a few minutes.
Read More...

Alizarin Lizard - The Weekend Went Without You Album Review
29 Feb 2012 // review by Petros
The Weekend Went Without You is a collection of catchy songs in the key of awesome.  The music is an amalgamation of juxtaposed styles and influences; an orgy of pop, punk, jazz, blues and garage rock.
Read More...

Beltane - Auld Toby Album Review
06 Oct 2011 // review by Petros
My interest in Beltane began as a sideline to my interest in the music of Palmerston North’s $lave Recordings. When people say the name Beltane their tone suggests there is some kind of dark back story, some hidden history I needed to know about.
Read More...

Head Like a Hole & Cairo Knife Fight @ The Royal, Palmerston North
09 Sep 2011 // review by Petros
A Savage Journey to the Heart of the Rock and Roll Dream. From a block away there is no sign of a crowd, the kind of thing you’d expect to see for a show like this.
Read More...

Head Like A Hole - Blood Will Out Album Review 2
03 Aug 2011 // review by Petros
If you’ve never heard of Head Like a Hole give yourself a slap. Do it.
Read More...

Kasium - Premonition EP
28 Jul 2011 // review by Petros
I realise that Kasium’s self-produced Premonition EP was released a good three years ago, but it’s a release I thought I needed to draw attention to. I’m not sure why these guys haven't taken off more than they have, they have a lot riding for them; the dark look, the rock angst, the cultural commentary video.
Read More...

Welcome to the FreeDay Album Review
01 Jul 2011 // review by Petros
This week I have had the pleasure of reviewing FreeDay’s debut, ‘Welcome to the FreeDay.’ FreeDay is the brainchild of the talented husband and wife team Glen and Alex Donaghy and their backing band.
Read More...

The DeSotos - Your Highway for Tonight Album Review
16 May 2011 // review by Petros
For us too young to have been there on that fateful April night in 1968 all that we know of the Wahine Disaster are the grainy black and white photographs of the giant ship on its side and the distraught faces of those rescued from the lifeboats. There is some small feeling of nostalgia, but the whole event is too distant from us to inspire any feeling of what it was like and how it affected our nation.
Read More...

Box Juice - Sunrise Ave Album Review
12 Apr 2011 // review by Petros
Box Juice's Sunrise Ave is a tropical cocktail of the same ilk as Kiwi greats Katchafire; reggae that remains true to its Jamaican roots with a subtle hint of South Pacific flavour. It's peaceful music for peace.
Read More...

Phil Edwards Band - Slow Borders Album Review
14 Mar 2011 // review by Petros
What we have here is the peanut slab of New Zealand music; no pretence, just good honest Kiwi music. Unfortunately that leaves out that portion of the audience that are allergic to nuts, but that takes nothing away from Slow Borders.
Read More...

Sleeping Dogs - 'Myth Reducer' Album Review
29 Dec 2010 // review by Petros
Do you feel that ‘Epic’ is a word thrown around with such enthusiasm these days that it has become blocked by the filters of selective hearing and any associated meaning is sucked out of it? Then listen to this album.
Read More...

Turbostill - Liquid Rock n' Roll
30 Nov 2010 // review by Petros
I recently rediscovered Turbostill’s third outing, Liquid Rock n’ Roll, in my music collection and can only conclude that I must have bought the CD at a local show I have no recollection of. This album represents everything your mother discouraged when you were growing up, but secretly did behind your back.
Read More...

Crackpot Theory - Black Metal Much? CD Review
05 Nov 2010 // review by Petros
It’s hard to believe this is the product of a brooding teenage boy locked in his bedroom. Like all their other releases Crackpot Theory’s Dan Ashcroft records and plays everything on this record by himself, but unlike previous releases it doesn’t show.
Read More...