Ned Collette
Jokes And Trials
Dot Dash/Inertia


When Melbourne's Ned Collette first visited Adelaide without his City City City bandmates, he played a wild solo set sans PA in the dingy underground Avalon Gallery. We were introduced to Collette's strikingly Robert Wyatt-esque vocal and guitar playing which echoed Nick Drake and, when louder, the rhythmic, ecstatic Michael Rother of Neu!

On 'Jokes And Trials', his first album proper, emerges Collette the bona-fide songwriter. His guitar melodies are consistently beautiful, bolstered by a cast of supporting players on vocals, strings and more. The warm hues of his acoustic guitar are cushioned by pedal steel and progressive flourishes from synthesizers as on Boulder and The Laughter Across The Street, two of the more detailed songs in the set. But it's Collette's rich baritone voice that steals the show. His slightly Kiwi-ed, defiantly antipodean inflection perfectly suits these songs. On Heaven's The Key a vibrating electric guitar and processional drum thump is the milieu for Collette's echoing vocal. "I don't know how I feel" he sings, and it's the tenderest moment in an album filled with 'em.

Be he surrounded with full-bodied arrangements or left with naught but his guitar and vocal, Ned Collette establishes himself and shines fantastic.

Lenin Simos