Below, is some propaganda about my music...
And the story since, is thus:
Since 2004 I moved to London, played a few shows round the place yonder with my best friend and cello genius Rebecca Turner, before deciding I should soon about now record my album.
And I wanted to do that at home, in New Zealand, in 2009.
So here I am.
It may be ready by mid-2009.
Naiina Hit Hard in NZ Music Month
NZ Musician Magazine, 7 May 2004
In time for New Zealand Music Month alternative folk duo Naiina release their debut EP Mercy.
Singer/songwriter/guitarist Janina Nicoll and cellist Francesca Mountfort have been playing together since studying musicology at Victoria University music school from 1998-2002. Nicoll also studied English at university and this is reflected in her deeply lyrical style of songwriting.
Inspired by writers such as Lord Alfred Tennyson, CS Lewis and musicians Tori Amos, Cat Power and Radiohead, Nicoll takes subjects from poetry, her personal experiences and combines them with her unique vocal style. Subjects include politics, Palestinian-Israeli conflicts, God, feminism, sex, and an endearing college stalker by the name of Mahendra.
Mixed with Mountfort’s Romanian, gypsy inspired and Bach influenced cello lines the duo aim to keep their music free from the world of music as a marketing tool. Free from the world of NZ Idol.
"Basically I feel like throwing up when I see music being used as a mere marketing tool and talented young singers being manipulated so some guy on the other side of the world can get rich. If I was going to be so opinionated about this I thought I at least had to get off my arse and record my own music," Nicoll says smiling.
Their aim to maintain simplicity in their music is paramount and their raw sounding debut EP, mixed by Justin Doyle at the Blue Room, reflects this.
Nicoll, senior reporter for Wellington arts rag Capital Times, heads to New York then Europe in May 2004 to pursue music journalism and promote the EP.
Mountfort is widely known in music circles round Wellington. She is the winner of the music category at this year’s Fringe NZ festival with her show Shadow Music. She plays regularly with jazz, classical and Celtic band Carousel who has just released their second album Bob ‘n’ Spin.
Naiina supported Carousel on their summer South Island tour playing at the Mean Fiddler in Nelson and Mussel Inn in Takaka.
Mercy also features percussionist Myles Climo (Mr Sterile Assembly) and Wellington musician (and Nicoll’s brother) Stevie Starr who plays theremin (air synthesizer) and guitar. Starr is currently in the process of recording his own album – a mix of mirror image compositions featuring string quartets and influenced by musicians such as Arvo Pärt and Icelandic bands Sigur Ros and Mum. [To be released early 2009.]
Naiina gig regularly round Wellington, have played at Victoria University Orientation 2004, Small Day In at Aro Park, and performed live to air on Radio Active in 2003.
"For me music is summed up in the words of my favourite composer Beethoven in a letter he wrote to German writer Goethe in 1810," Nicoll says.
"When I open my eyes I must sigh, for what I see is contrary to my religion, and I must despise the world which does not know that music is a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy. Music is the one incorporeal entrance into the higher world of knowledge which comprehends mankind but which mankind cannot comprehend’.
"I wish Beethoven could shove that in NZ Idol’s face."
Naiina Mercy EP release, 9pm, Happy, Cnr Vivian St and Tory St, May 15, 2004.
With support from John White (Mestar, Cloudboy)
