Album Review: Vorn - The Late Album (2023)

After reading the Will Not Fade blog’s far more timely review of this album I was quite taken by something the author noted in the review’s final paragraph about “imposter syndrome”. And although I’m not sure those words are the precise words I’d have used, I got the point, and I could relate to the dilemma.

It’s that sense you get when you feel ill-equipped to critique the work of someone you admire. That feeling of inadequacy, and the notion that whatever I wrote, no matter how honest, how insightful, or even how witty I thought I was being, Vorn Colgan - musician, wordsmith, funny-man - could have articulated it so much better himself.

It’s all there in his songs, and if you’ve ever had a chance to read Colgan’s own (far too irregular) written word musings on his Vornography website … well, it’s enough to make you want to permanently retire your own keyboard out of sheer frustration. Vorn Colgan knows how to create a little bit of magic out of words. And he seems to be able to do so without much effort at all.

Writing words is one thing. Turning them into a bunch of decent tunes is quite something else. What are we up to now? Album number eight? Album number nine? And still so little mainstream traction. Colgan probably couldn’t care less. His songs, after all, “are his children”. There to be shaped, nurtured, and loved, and like any parent, his starting point is just as likely to be “who bloody well cares what anyone else thinks? … I love these snotty-nosed little bastards”.

 The Late Album, of course, had long threatened to be a posthumous release, given Colgan’s recent brush with cancer. A fairly advanced stage of cancer too, if I have my facts correct. Yet all through that, I’ve seen him out and about. Conducting pub/music quizzes as the MC, playing music with a number of different “side-projects”, and as a one-man grinning machine - armed with a walking stick, no less - up on the dancefloor at Atomic retro nights at San Fran (venue). Not just surviving, but raging against death in ways I simply couldn’t imagine. There’s a lot more to admire than mere words.

Words are mostly what it is all about though. Words and music. There’s some pretty great words on The Late Album, all underpinned by the unique musical talents of Thomas Liggett (violin) and Nick Brown (drums, percussion) who also support Colgan - who does a lot of everything else - on vocals at various points. As Vorn, the band, this is a tight, well-honed trio, operating at something close to a peak. Although, to be fair, every new Vorn, the band, release across the past two decades has felt like a peak.

Death is, naturally enough, a prominent theme – the album opens with a track called ‘Fanfare For An Album That Beat Terminal Cancer’ and closes with ‘A Dying Man’s Curse Be Upon You’ … the opener being exactly what it says on the tin, a brief “fanfare”, while the closer veers into faux-country-prog-hybrid territory. Several listens in, I still can’t really make out the exact lyrics, but suspect its title rather gives the game away.

Between those two bookends we get various musical forms and a mix of genre, with the most common thread being that wicked sense of humour in the lyrics. I’d be lying profusely if I said that ‘Aging Hipster Blues’ and ‘Drug Friends’ didn’t, for my own sins, touch something of a raw nerve. I laughed and I cried a little, simultaneously.

Then there’s ‘Somebody Wrote A Prog Song About The Internet And It Is (Flame emoji)’ … where to even start with that little 6-minute-plus beastie? Sort of epic, a little bit Beatle-esque, with chunks of pretend Black Sabbath, just for laughs. There’s definitely something quite psychedelic about it, whatever the hell it’s supposed to be.

Suffice to say, without going through all of the individual highlights or trying to dissect each track, the two advance singles - odd timings and breakdowns notwithstanding - ‘No Arms, No Chocolate’ and the covertly catchy ‘A Safe Pair of Hands’ are perhaps the most pop-friendly tracks on the album.

All up, 13 tracks, a lot of hooks, a solid baroque feel - another Vorn staple - thanks largely to the presence of Liggett’s violin and other unusual instrumentation (um, a “banjolin”?), and more than the odd morsel of humour, it’s another worthy addition to Vorn’s ever-expanding musical legacy.

Just a note on that album cover: once you’ve seen it as The Latex Bum, it becomes impossible to unsee it. With thanks to the person who pointed that out … (I think).

You can pick up a copy of Vorn’s The Late Album here (Bandcamp)

Album Review: Vorn – More Songs About Girls And The Apocalypse (2014)

Wellingtonian Vorn Colgan and his team of merry pranksters always leave the impression that they’re so full of clever ideas there’s never quite enough room or time to get them all down on one album. As is the case once again with album number seven, More Songs About Girls And The Apocalypse, which is fair brimming with wry observational humour, smart social commentary, and the usual Vorn-sized portions of self deprecation.

Out on Powertool Records, and recorded at You Call That A Studio studio in Newtown - which I suspect is something akin to Colgan’s bedroom - More Songs is yet another example of Vorn’s predilection for thumbing a nose in the face of convention.

This time out we get a little bit of everything and a whole lot more; from the Sgt Pepper-esque chamber pop of the opener ‘Flint And Tinder’, to the warped synthpop of ‘Drowning Kittens’ (featuring Anna Edgington), all the way across multiple styles to the Celtic flavours of ‘This Is What’.

We even get a variation on Hip hop, and some plain old fashioned guitar-driven pop. You never quite know what’s coming next - and that’s a pretty cool thing. There’s plenty of violin, there’s trumpet, double bass, and that wonderful piece of technology we call the Kaossilator, yet somehow the music almost feels peripheral at times, such is the dizzying appeal of the lyric sheet.

And while the very funny and hopefully-not-autobiographical ‘The Story of My Fucking Life’ perhaps offers us the best illustration of that, I find it hard to go past ‘Repentance Song’, which coughs up this little gem:

“I have strayed and I have sinned, I can’t even touch myself because I don’t know where I’ve been … my straight and narrow’s bent and stretched beyond repair ..."

(an edited version of this review originally appeared in the June/July edition of NZ Musician)

Linky Love

I noticed that the online edition of NZ Musician has posted my June/July issue Q&A with local indie god and funny man Vorn Colgan. I thought the questions I posed were really rather ordinary but Colgan’s responses were superb ... here's the link:

Q&A with Vorn Colgan (of Vorn) as featured in NZ Musician June/July 2014

Reasons To Be Cheerful parts 1, 2, and 3 ...

Well it’s been a crazy couple of weeks here at the everythingsgonegreen mansion, and it has only reinforced my belief that nothing brings a family closer together than serious illness. Suffice to say I’ve seen more of Wellington hospital over the past week or so than I have over the previous three decades put together. In short, the blog has been a bit quiet while real life kicked in once again.

That’s not to say I haven’t been thinking about music, and I’ve certainly been listening to more than my fair share. They say every cloud has a silver lining, and if four nights in hospital was genuine torture for the teenager concerned (and it was!), it did give her old man the chance to “road test” some new music while pondering the fragility of life during those daily 100km-return trips to and fro.

So, new albums from the likes of Sun Kil Moon, Warpaint, and Dum Dum Girls will be reviewed here over the next couple of weeks. But in the meantime I wanted to make local (Wellington-based) readers aware of a couple of upcoming gigs featuring bands with a close association to the blog – three of Wellington’s finest ... all playing at Meow on Edward Street:

First up, this Friday March 21, we have blog favourites Black City Lights alongside Pikachunes, Beat Mob, and Groeni. The flyer says Black City Lights will play at 11pm, but get along for the support bands – I can highly recommend Pikachunes in particular – and then let Beat Mob take you further into the weekend after Black City Lights has done its always impressive darkwave thing. All for $10.

Then on Saturday 29 March we have hard-working local funkateers Bikini Roulette, a band that produced one of this blog’s favourite albums of 2013 (Erotik Fiction) with its heady mix of funk and old fashioned dirty blues. Lady Parts provide support – as it so often does – and although the name Steezin’ Hawkings is new one for yours truly, it’s certainly an intriguing name, and at just $5 on the door, what could possibly go wrong?

 And finally, at the same venue, on Friday 11 April, we have the much anticipated return of Vorn, whose 2011 album Down For It did so much to restore my faith in local music with its spellbinding mix of quirky pop and humour. This is an album release party for More Songs About Girls And The Apocalypse (is it really album number seven?) and support this time will come from Warwick and the Wankers, and NEVERWOZ. Just $10 on the door.

So that’s three reasons to be cheerful; three potentially great gigs in the next three weeks, all at Meow, ten acts for a combined total outlay of just $25 ... quality.
 

Oh, and since we’re counting reasons to be cheerful, I’ll add reasons four and five right here and now; reason number four is that said teenager’s illness was finally diagnosed and she is now out of any immediate danger and is happy to be back home – massive love and respect to her for her bravery and maturity in the face of considerable adversity. While reason number five is simply that this blogpost is post number 200 for everythingsgonegreen ... a small milestone that even your humble blogger never expected to reach.

Albums of 2011 … Afterthoughts …

Since I finished compiling a list of what basically amounts to my “most listened to” albums of 2011 (see the ten most recent posts to this blog), I’ve had some thoughts on a few more 2011 releases that for one reason or another didn’t quite make the cut.

A couple of really strong hip hop albums I got into near the end of the year would probably have made my list had I taken the time to absorb them earlier – The Roots album Undun really is a masterclass in story-telling, and although it doesn’t grab me in quite the same way as How I Got Over did in 2010, it confirms my long held belief that when it comes to intelligent state-of-the-art hip hop, The Roots lead the way by some distance. These guys play live funk/hip hop crossover and do so better than any other act with claims on hip hop’s mythical throne. Make sure you check out Undun if you get the chance.

The second thoroughly enjoyable hip hop release from earlier in 2011 – and I’m no huge fan of the genre – was Talib Kweli’s Gutter Rainbows which continues a run of solid releases from a guy I know very little about. Talib Kweli’s strengths are found in timing and flow, and on Gutter Rainbows he delivers a superb set, with some powerful semi-political lyrics underpinned by a variety of beats and samples. This is another album worth checking out if – like me – you view hip hop with a smattering of cynicism but nonetheless keep willing yourself to remain open-minded about it.

Beyond that, Jamie Woon’s Mirrorwriting came extremely close to making the final selection – tracks like ‘Night Air’, ‘Lady Luck’, ‘Shoulda’, and ‘Spirits’ are all fine examples of Woon’s longer term potential as an artist/producer. The main reason Mirrorwriting didn’t quite get there for me was the realisation that I actually preferred remixed versions of many of Woon’s tracks – as opposed to the originals as found on the album itself. Woon seemed to be everywhere in 2011 – his own remix of Lana Del Rey’s ‘Video Games’ rates as one of the definitive versions of what became one of 2011’s most talked about songs, while a moody yet brilliant remix of Woon’s ‘Spirits’ by a producer called sy.ic was easily one of my electronic tracks of the year (see video link below).

I really wanted to include the Easy Star All-Stars album First Light on my list but over time I came to realise that for all that it was nice to see this collective finally release an album of original material – after successfully covering Pink Floyd and Radiohead on previous efforts (a version of The Beatles’ Sgt Pepper – um, not so much) – it was ultimately a fairly bland piece of work. First Light was just too generic and “safe” for my taste; despite making a good impression initially, it failed to move me much beyond the first few listens. I had expected more from this group. The Dubmatix remix of the title track is still well worth checking out however.

 New Zealand album of the year – Vorn’s Down For It, without a shadow of a doubt. I picked up this quirky pop album in exchange for a crisp $20 note from a close friend of Vorn Colgan, and I foolishly thought it would remain something akin to an intimate little secret but boy was I wrong. It turns out every critic and his dog was raving about this humourous and talented Wellingtonian come year-end. Down For It is strongly recommended.

Reissue(s) of the year – Paul McCartney (1970) and Paul McCartney II (1980). I was lucky enough to be sent a copy of the updated deluxe versions of each of these albums (on CD) by the prolific Graham Reid of Elsewhere http://www.elsewhere.co.nz/

Thanks Graham, your efforts and random weekly giveaways are much appreciated! A superb package, and it surprised me how listenable these albums were, even after all these years. The bonus discs (one for each) contained the genuine highlights however and they offer yet another reminder of what a talent Paul McCartney was. If you’re looking for an insight into the real Paul McCartney – outside of his life with The Beatles or as Wings’ leading man – then you could do a lot worse than to start right here. This is Paul McCartney solo, naked, raw, and not really conforming to anyone else’s expectations. There is some weird and wonderful stuff here, with bonus points given for historical significance.

Here's a sy.ic remix of Jamie Woon's 'Spirits' ...