Description
The Great Ocean Rd in South Eastern Australia officially runs between the Victorian cities of Torquay and Warnambool.
The sense of history is strong in the area owing to the early aboriginal settlement, the arrival of the early penal colony settlement and the many shipwrecks make this area bound with history expressed through the songs
- It all comes around
- voices from the ocean road
- Will you offer me your hand
- Heading down from Flinders
- With someone else
- That old sixth sense
- Mountain holiday
- Tail of the comet
- Good ship Lochard
- Urban skyline
So sit back and listen to great songs that are brilliantly crafted that take you on a journey.
CD Review by Hugh Worrall
This is a nicely packaged CD and we find out from the cover notes that the Ocean Road travels from Melbourne along the southern coast of Victoria between Torquay and Warrnambool before it heads off to South Australia.
Pete Lashley tells us that it’s the “grand ever-changing nature of the Victorian coastline” as well as the history of the Aboriginal people, the convicts, the colonists, returned soldiers, tourists, local workers and the shipwrecks that provide the stories and the inspiration for the music on this album.
I love hearing local place names and local stories in our folk music.
This is definitely singer-songwriter music and it’s clever how he weaves in the stories from the Great Ocean Road.
Pete Lashley sings, plays all the instruments – guitars, harmonica, percussion and keyboards – and writes all the songs.
His singing, guitar playing and song writing are the stars of this album and are front and centre.
Pete’s voice reminds me of Tim Buckley sometimes, jumping up into falsetto at times and he uses a fast distinctive vibrato to lovely effect.
He plays steel-string acoustic guitar in a modern full-strumming style with plenty of rhythmic drive.
You can hear several layers of guitars in the mix and it gives it a full, folky sound.
You could imagine many of these songs being recorded as pop songs, al la Paul Kelly.
They sound modern and use current stylings and form, although he’s also not afraid of adding in interesting, unusual chord changes and melodies in some places.
I could imagine Pete going over really well with the material from this album and a band in a night-time spot on a big stage at a festival.
It turns out that Pete is actually an Englishman who has been busking extensively in Australia and New Zealand and that’s how he came to be inspired by the Great Ocean Road.
He’s got a good catalogue of albums, some of which feature traditional folk music and songs inspired by the Lakes District in England, where he currently plays local pubs and other venues.
