Only One I Need is the fourth single to be released from Chris Hurn's debut album Too Busy Dreamin'.

Chris Hurn is a twenty-two year old folk-pop singer/songwriter from Lower Hutt, New Zealand. After playing in various local bands, including Play it Strange 2007 national competition winners The Lunch Box Boys, a 60’s style indie-pop band, he discovered a love for folk music and decided to go solo in late 2009.

Inspired by the likes of Paul Simon, Bob Dylan, Nick Drake and Leonard Cohen he began to write a collection of songs that would soon become his first album. Although heavily influenced by his folk heroes, he draws upon a wide range of genres and styles of music. As well as having a soft spot for modern pop and rock, Chris has spent a considerable amount of time soaking up 60′s pop groups, notably The Mamas and the Papas, The Beatles and the Kinks.

Coming from a multi-instrumental background, Chris commenced his musical endeavours at a young age with the piano and a cheap plastic recorder. His first album is heavily based around the acoustic guitar but whistles, clicks, claps, harmonica and harmonies also play a big part in the sound. Astonishingly, Chris plays all the instruments on his debut as well as mixing and producing it himself. His lyric-writing reveals a world-wise maturity beyond his years and coupled with his knack for writing highly catchy melodies, he seems sure to secure himself a place amongst a rising new generation of young singer/songwriters.

Too Busy Dreamin’ was recorded in 2010 in his Lower Hutt home studio, and mastered by Dave Cooley (Serge Gainsbourg, Polyphonic Spree) in LA.

When not playing folk music, Chris works as a composer writing orchestral based scores for video games and films.


REVIEW

While owing a clear debt to Paul Simon, the young Dylan, early Donovan and others in the acoustic singer-songwriter category, this young guy from Lower Hutt just north of Wellington, New Zealand brings a pop sensibility to his writing (the openers here Whatcha Got and Only One I Need hook you immediately) and often a deliberately light touch (whistles, handclaps). Maybe that is in part due to his background: He played in a pop-rock band The Lunch Box Boys which won the Play It Strange award in 2007 (which means he must have been about 17 at the time). Since then he discovered folk and that lineage of singer-songwriters and has struck out on his own. What is attractive about Hurn is that rather than indulging in melancholy miserablism which the idiom so often invites from a young and emotionally anxious performer, he has a sharp ear for a melodic hook and that he keeps each song distinctive. He also has an inviting, warm and believable voice which is persuasive when he get reflective (All I Really Want) or urgent (An Honest Man) as much as taking you along for a ride when the musical mood gets more breezy (Love and Silly Little Things with ukulele, whistling and la-la-la backing vocals). The closer is an ambitious, eight minute-plus Thank You and Goodnight which might also be his built-in encore... you will be hearing more of him, that's for sure. - Graham Reid, Elsewhere


Buy album on Bandcamp

Only One I Need

I had piano lessons from the age of 6 and studied piano at Otago University in New Zealand (not that it necessarily shows). 

These days I like to play my own humble compositions which are in a neoclassical style. I recently recorded my debut solo piano album in Berlin, where I now reside. 

I am greatly inspired by Nils Frahm, Hania Rani, Max Richter, Ludvico Einaudi and Philip Glass, to name but a few.

I have a solo electronic project called Broad Oak: https://soundcloud.com/broadoak and I'm in a band with my son: https://soundcloud.com/cosmoandthecosmonaut

I also have a band project called The Mung Beings: https://soundcloud.com/themungbeings

Chris Hurn is a twenty seven year old folk-pop singer/songwriter from New Zealand.  After playing in various local bands, including Play it Strange 2007 winners “The Lunch Box Boys”, a 60’s style indie pop band, he discovered a love for folk music and decided to go solo in late 2009.

Inspired by the likes of Paul Simon, Bob Dylan, Nick Drake and Leonard Cohen he began to write a collection of songs that became his first album, Too Busy Dreamin’.  Although heavily influenced by his folk heroes, he draws upon a wide range of genres and styles of music.  As well as having a soft spot for modern pop and rock, Chris spent a considerable amount of time soaking up 60′s pop groups, notably The Mamas and the Papas, The Beatles and the Kinks.

Coming from a multi-instrumental background, Hurn commenced his musical endeavours at a young age with the piano and a cheap plastic recorder.  His first album is heavily based around the acoustic guitar but whistles, clicks, claps, harmonica and harmonies also play a big part in the sound.  Astonishingly, he plays all the instruments on his debut as well as mixing and producing it himself.  His lyrics reveal a world-wise maturity far beyond his years and coupled with his knack for writing catchy melodies, he seems sure to secure himself a place amongst New Zealand’s fine new generation of singer/songwriters such as Liam Finn, James Milne and Andrew Keoghan.

The release of Too Busy Dreamin’ in 2011 spawned a SoundCloud hit with the song Whatcha Got (over half a million plays) leading to a subpublishing deal with a UK based agent and a license by Swatch for a global ad campaign. Since then Hurn has been busy writing scores for film, finishing his university studies, playing in his band and recently relocating to Kuala Lumpur.

The forthcoming new album, If I Were You which is due for release in 2017, continues with the folk pop style evident on the previous release but is a more polished affair full of catchy hooks and well crafted writing showcasing the artist’s further maturation and development as a songwriter and performer. The title track and first single with accompanying video will be released early December 2016.

DJ Marco Polo has been entertaining audiences at festivals, parties and gigs around New Zealand for the last few years with a highly infectious, uplifting selection of world music guaranteed to set any dancefloor alight. A Marco Polo set encompasses the most danceable sounds from around the planet featuring Balkan Beats, gypsy music, middle eastern and Bollywood tunes, afrobeat and a sprinkling of Latin and Pacific flavours.

In New Zealand, he has played at Prana, Splore, Jambalaya, the Big Bay Out, Cross St Carnival, Culturefest, AK07 &amp; AK09, The Famous Spiegeltent and 2 WOMAD afterparties alongside Mr Scruff and Nickodemus. He has also supported The Hot Grits, The Mamaku Project, The Benka Boradovsky Bordello Band, An Emerald City, Niko Ne Zna and the Jews Brothers. He has toured NZ many times with various acts and in January ‘08, ’09, ’10 and ‘11 organised and went on the highly successful Gypsy Fever tours with the Benka Boradovskys and Niko Ne Zna.

DJ Marco Polo aka Nigel Braddock came from a musical family and studied piano from the age of five. At the age of twenty he graduated from Otago University with a Bachelor of Music in Classical Piano. After several years traveling he started his DJ career as DJ Lotus in the late 90’s playing at iconic outdoor dance parties such as The Gathering and Visionz. He set up his own record label, Monkey Records, in the year 2000 and under the name of DJ Monkey began djing NZ music from his and other like-minded labels. Following a trip to Berlin in 2006 and a meeting with renowned producer Shantel (Bucovina Club), Nigel was inspired to invent another DJ persona, DJ Balkanetic, aimed squarely at the dancefloor, and since then has been in constant demand as NZ’s top world music DJ. 

Nigel has been visiting Berlin in summer the last few years and has DJ’d at various clubs including White Trash, Kaffee Burger, Supermolli, Schokladen and Madame Claude amongst others. In August 2010 he played at the Inspiral Lounge in London. From the beginning of 2011, he will be based in Berlin more permanently and will be playing regularly around town under his new alias of DJ Marco Polo. 



Monkey Records is a boutique independent record label founded in New Zealand in the year 2000 by Nigel Braddock but now based in Berlin. 

After working for twenty years with some amazing artists from all over the world, Monkey Records is no longer accepting any new artist submissions and Braddock is now focused on releasing his own music. Projects include his solo piano compositions under his own name, ambient electronica as Broad Oak and Choam Nomsky as well as collaborations such as The Mung Beings, The Tellurians and Cosmo and the Cosmonaut (with his own son).