Hamish Kilgour - Finklestein CD
The Clean member Hamish Kilgour's second-ever solo album, Finklestein,
flips the singer/guitarist/drummer's path taken on All Of It And
Nothing. Having previously gone for intimate, minimalistic
performances, Finklestein displays a chock-full production quality
akin to a fairytale. It's a fitting change, seeing as the songs are
based around a children's story Kilgour conceived for his son about a
kingdom that invents a way of dealing with their depleting gold
resources. The songs include organ, saxophone, pedal steel, piano,
vibraphone, harmonica, even footsteps (Hamish is renowned for his
stepping), most of it performed by Kilgour and his
producer/collaborator Gary Olsen at Olsen's studio, Marlborough Farms
in Brooklyn. Originally conceived as being a children's book as well
as album, Finklestein rides roughshod through this fairytale world
with grace.
Finklestein took a year to record, as Hamish's involvement with a
large part of the Brooklyn music scene, as well as dates with recent
New Zealand Music Hall of Fame inductees The Clean, split his time.
His songs benefit from this elongated recording period, as each track
creates its own space within the Finklestein world, mixing instruments
and melodies in a rainbow of ways. Yet it's Kilgour's songwriting
sensibilities that hold the album together, his charismatic and loose
arrangements within a congenial environment of musical play.
flips the singer/guitarist/drummer's path taken on All Of It And
Nothing. Having previously gone for intimate, minimalistic
performances, Finklestein displays a chock-full production quality
akin to a fairytale. It's a fitting change, seeing as the songs are
based around a children's story Kilgour conceived for his son about a
kingdom that invents a way of dealing with their depleting gold
resources. The songs include organ, saxophone, pedal steel, piano,
vibraphone, harmonica, even footsteps (Hamish is renowned for his
stepping), most of it performed by Kilgour and his
producer/collaborator Gary Olsen at Olsen's studio, Marlborough Farms
in Brooklyn. Originally conceived as being a children's book as well
as album, Finklestein rides roughshod through this fairytale world
with grace.
Finklestein took a year to record, as Hamish's involvement with a
large part of the Brooklyn music scene, as well as dates with recent
New Zealand Music Hall of Fame inductees The Clean, split his time.
His songs benefit from this elongated recording period, as each track
creates its own space within the Finklestein world, mixing instruments
and melodies in a rainbow of ways. Yet it's Kilgour's songwriting
sensibilities that hold the album together, his charismatic and loose
arrangements within a congenial environment of musical play.