Single Review: Love and War

It has been quite a while since I last heard from Wellington-based singer songwriter Cathy Elizabeth, and back then Rain was seen solely as a studio project with Cathy being accompanied by Thomas Te Taite, who provided all the instrumentation including digital drums. Now they are a full band who have been performing live, and it is the first time they have recorded as such, with Thomas now, just providing acoustic guitar (plus engineering and producing etc.), having been joined by Jacob Whittaker and Israel Burke on electric guitars, Chris Fewers on bass and Murray James on drums. Apparently Love and War is an older song of Cathy’s, now being recorded for the first time, and it’s a classic builder.

An acoustic guitar and a few keyboard sounds are all Cathy has to pitch her vocals against at the beginning, with Murray then making his presence felt with a dynamic approach to drumming, not content to sit meekly at the back. The bass is nicely intricate while never overpowering, while the twin guitar stay somewhat muted for the most part until it is time for Israel to provide some wonderfully dramatic lead lines which he pulls tortured out of his guitar.

There were a few moments at the beginning of this track when I wondered if Cathy was moving more into a country territory, but she soon removed that possibility, and again I found myself being reminded of Pat Benatar, an influence I have referred to in other reviews of Cathy’s music. Now it is even more dramatic with the use of a full band and it is great to have Rain back again in a new and improved version. I look forward to hearing a lot more.