WHA contains 10 new songs celebrating love, protesting against free trade, acknowleging the independence struggle of Timor and paying tribute to Maori soldiers buried in foreign lands. Produced by Mahuia Bridgman-Cooper and Moana Maniapoto, the album was recorded at Beaver Studios. Bandmembers Cadzow Cossar, Horomona Horo, Max Stowers, Ashley Browne and Richard Nunns were joined by vocalists Amiria Reriti and Trina Maniapoto. Scott Morrison co-wrote most of the songs with Moana, all of which are in Maori. The CD also features two brief archival interludes - recordings made in the Western Desert by B Company of the 28th Maori Battalion and a second on an unidentified marae.
This album might lack the obviously powerful and overt statements of material like Moko or Ancestors on previous outings -- and her more reflective side is generously served in some superb songs such as Rangikane ana commissioned for the first Moriori marae on the Chathams which comes with discreet strings alongside traditional flute. But the centrepiece Te Apo is a sonic battlefield inspired by protests at the WTO in Hong Kong and brings karanga, haka, the sound of street protest and a thumping rhythm section with urgent and stabbing cello adding gravitas.
The counterpoint to that anger and energy is in material drawn from and inspired by the legacy of the Maori Battalion. And then there are the delicate love songs, the deft reggae riddums . . .
These days Moana and the Tribe are more often taking their music to an international audience (big in Russia, mate) but the soul and spirit which drives and determines the course of this music is always close to home and heart.
Another diverse, informed and quite moving album (Titia is in tribute to the late activist and leader Syd Jackson) by one of our finest."
Graham Reid
"Te Reo is always difficult to record because it struggles at times to sit in frames of European or popular music framework which is why you have trouble with trying to do some R&B. Obviously reggae is really really simple. The track I have chosen (Pae o Riri) is a waiata in a classical sense, in an orchestral sense and its been produced by Victoria Kelly and it has an arrangement where it sits in this very (for want of a better term) 'European place' and yet it definitely holds its own. I think you have to continually experiment with styles in order to find a way for the reo to sit easily and I want to say, acceptably. But where you fall in love with the way its done - and on this record, there are a lot of styles here and they are successful with "every single one" of them - then that is a credit to her and the artists that she is working with.
It's really, really good. And as I said, its one of those things where in a completely neutral world if you dont even know anything about New Zealand or know anything about Maori or language or anything - this is the ideal instrument in which to lead people towards it."
Manu Taylor (National Radio)