Sam Hamilton is on tour of New Zealand for the release of his new album Pala. We rocked up to Happy last night hoping to catch him, amongst several acts, but we were late in our rocking and only managed to catch Mr Hamilton and Leno Lovecraft.

Which was all good as Sam’s set was most excellent. Happy is a chill lil boho-bar which entirely suited. You can get a taste from today’s song, the wicked opening track to his album, “Cities, Plants and People”. Would have liked to dance but the place isn’t configured for much of a dance floor when it is full.

After he played Leno did his thing on the CDJs and his thing is good. Very good… go grab one of his mixes off his soundcloud and his myspace for some of his original material. As the place had cleared a bit we managed to get our dance on. Which was extra bonus fun withthe guys from Slave Pianos there (they’d had a show in town that night) doing some impromptu performance art and beat.

We got ourselves a copy of Sam’s album on vinyl – which comes with a digital download – always a welcome bonus.