Winston Watusi Music Plus

Recently I've been wondering about this whole ‘Americana' thing.

Last week I mentioned a couple of Americana duos coming through town. There are many more. And it strikes me that of all the labels put to music, that's about the worst of the bunch.

Here's how I see it: nearly every form of music most people play are rooted in America. This is, of course, a generalisation but I'm happy to defend it. There are exceptions. Of the more recent forms, punk – proper punk that is – and the new wave music that followed were certainly rooted in England. It's also obvious that particular countries have particular musical styles. It's not hard to guess, for instance, where Afrobeat came from.

But most of it is American. Jazz, blues, soul, reggae, rock ‘n' roll, hip-hop, country (and western), these are musical genres that originated in the States. Sure, there are strong regional variations. Europe is the home of Gypsy jazz. But the jazz bit started in New Orleans (probably).

It's those regional variations that make a difference these days. We've just had a jazz festival here where artists gave a Kiwi interpretation of jazz. Some of it sounded just like American jazz but elsewhere acts introduced uniquely New Zealand attributes to the music, which can genuinely and proudly be referred to as ‘Kiwi Jazz'. The same is true of the blues of Darren Watson or country music from The Warratahs. It's Kiwi music now.

American folk

But many, many places you go these days what you'll find, especially by smaller groups and duos, is American-based folk music. And, confoundingly, that's called Americana.

All it means is that its roots are in America as opposed to England. The one type of music I neglected to mention earlier that did not originate in America is folk music. Largely because it thrived in England (and elsewhere) before America existed. So it's kinda predictable that Americans would want a special name for their own branch of folk music.

The problem is that name. Americana music itself is a broad-ranging mix of country, blues, folk and gospel, variations of which huge numbers of people all round the world play. But just as the term ‘Kiwiana' really needs to involve New Zealand subject matter, so the implication is that Americana should be about America.

But it isn't. The description, like ‘blues' or ‘jazz', is of a musical style not of the subject matter. Despite that, wherever and whoever you are, if you play ‘Americana' you are tarred with the brush of being an American imitator, simply because the term contains the word ‘American'. Today's conundrum – what's a new, less parochial word for this type of music?

Saturday sessions

A lot of this Americana can be heard down at Jack Dusty's Ale House in Bureta. I don't normally mention the regular gigs around town by covers acts but let me make an exception here due to the sheer volume of music that Jack Dusty's presents. They are giving constant work to many a musician and that, in these hardened times, is nothing but a good thing.

The bar currently features live bands on Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons and an open mic night on Wednesdays. From May they'll be adding an extra session at 2pm on Saturday afternoons in their newly-built undercover ‘Front Bar'. The Saturday sessions start this weekend with Mike Garner & Robbie Laven – blues and Americana – and May also features Novak an Goode, Blarney Boys, H2O, Distraction, Tim Armstrong, Trevor Braunias and Jill Leighton, Piston Broke, Blaze, Native Poms, and Shabang. Good effort!

After mentioning English singer Frank Turner in last week's column I've been not exactly inundated, but at least asked a couple of times for updates. I have little to offer. Frank was in New Zealand last month supporting Counting Crows. The Crows cancelled at the last minute but Frank did a one-off solo show in Wellington and announced band gigs for later in the year.

Those shows, in November, duly appeared on his website. A couple of weeks later they disappeared. They are still missing. Apparently there have been promoter issues. Things will hopefully be sorted soon – expect further updates...

Frank Turner.