Review: Elena Gomez
Down The Way, second album from beloved folksy duo Angus & Julia Stone, sees the siblings put on their Producer hats and travel the globe, touring and recording with the likes of Martha Wainwright and Brad Albetta. They’ve sacrificed their memorable melodies and the arc that seemed to form their debut album, A Book Like This. But what they lose in melodious offerings, they make up in having a much more polished sound. Where A Book Like This was a home movie filmed in sepia, filled with character-forming crackles and perfect imperfections, Down The Way has been steered more professionally. Its homey elements are still present but they have been muted.
– Angus & Julia Stone available at iTunes
The album opens with “Hold On”, in Julia’s fragile voice, and it’s clear from this point that the energy has been amplified, possibly a result of having a three year gap to progress and grow in their sound. There are lulls and swells in Down The Way that make for less passive listening. A little less of ‘round the campfire with last pair of clean undies’ and a bit more of ‘coasty road trip in a car with air-con and an icy-pole’.
Continue reading CD Review: Angus and Julia Stone – Down The Way
As Neil Young once sang, tonight’s the night – the big music has arrived in town. Along with fellow prog-rock fans, young and old, I walk to The Tivoli with a sense of excitement that only those who have a copy of Arriving Somewhere DVD can truly understand. Only two months ago, I was privy to witnessing Japan’s divine noise makers 
The afternoon brought with it dark clouds that took away the light but not the heat, and those of us wrapped in black shuffled through the cyclone wire fence that surrounds Riverstage dripping with something a bit more corporeal than anticipation. 