Rory Ellis – Road of the Braver Man

Rory Ellis is one of Australia’s leading new wave of acoustic performers taking audiences by storm and impressing music critics. His music defies the simple folk categorisation and uses a collection of progressive contemporary and roots music influences to create a style he labels Urban Folk. Road Of The Braver Man was recorded completely live with renowned players Dave Steel and Stuart Speed, and captures an earthy, totally acoustic account of an artist whose material and personality is completely upfront, humourous and insightful.

“Having seen Rory’s powerful live performance definitely helps to appreciate him fully. This new “live in the studio” album is a fairly good representation of his current work and captures him in a deceivingly lay-back style, with his by now familiar raspy deep voice, working successfully with Dave Steele (various instruments) and Stuart Speed on double bass. His songs on this CD appear at first as a somewhat negative observation of urban life. But the lyrics are not meant to be obvious, they are rather poetic and even cryptic at times and need further listening to. But on first playing several songs stood out for me: the “Million dollar question” -how can you confidently answer your children’s questions? Or “Migualito”, an interesting song about a migrant from Uruguay: the more positive song about friendship “Good Friends” the short but very haunting war song “Last Man Standing” and the self-questioning “Big Picture.” Review by Dieter Bajzek.