Album Review: Russell Morris - Van Diemen's Land

Clearly yearning for an old Australia, or at least wanting to have fun with some old myths and styles of old music, Russell Morris has delivered a mellow collection with Van Diemen's Land. Morris mixes international influences with local references from over time for his latest release. Opener Dexter's Big Tin Can is like a slowed-down Acca Dacca, mixed with mid-career U2 (especially if Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me were blues). The title track is a bit more straightforward but with a slight Springsteen edge, while Birdsville takes it to a clear type of rockabilly Americana (complete with a great female vocal and sax solo).
We're clearly back to Australian storytelling with Breaker Morant, though, the famous soldier already immortalised in the Bryan Brown film, and whose own history was rewritten a little while ago. It's appropriate then that this track is minimal in its approach, focusing on lyrics and developing story – the “scapegoats of the Empire” lyric left to hang over brushy drums and a weeping guitar. The Witch Of Kings X takes the blues to inner city Sydney (perhaps with a little sleaze thrown in) while Sandakan takes a basic 12-bar with slide guitar, muted trumpet and old-timey mics to channel a proper old-school pop music approach – lyric “ghosts in the jungle” 'answered' by the trumpet forms a fine little duet. A good collection of folk/blues and national myths delivered by a man who knows his way around the local biz.