Matthew Frederick, The Age. July 2008

"With influences including Billie Holiday, Sun Ra and Tim Buckley, Henry Manetta is Australian jazz's most unique vocalist bar none. A brave improviser, Henry plays his voice like a horn, bending and stretching tunes in ways that have to be heard to be believed."

Cue, SYN FM. June 2008.

"An impressive range indeed. Like some mystical combination of Tom Waits and Nina Simone."

Ron Spain, 'Seen and Heard' Jazz Scene Magazine, April 2008.

Melbourne's Manetta is an annual visitor to Adelaide, doing his unique vocal gymnastics with physical contortions and a top band lifting him to the heights. Right on. 

Matthew Frederick, The Age. October 2007. 

Imagine a world where Captain Beefheart and Tim Buckley decided to form a band with Sun Ra sitting in on keys. Defiantly individual and possessing a vocal range that almost defies belief, Henry draws influences from the grand traditions of jazz and soul, as well as the world of the avant-garde, to create music that is nothing if not unique.

Henry Manetta and The Trip plus Adam Rudegeair's One Hat Band featuring Anna Gilkison@ Melbourne Fringe.  Paris Cat, Friday October 5th by Helen Milte, Inpress 2007.

Rudegeair's deconstruction of Surrey With A Fringe On The Top sets the standard for a mesmerising night of jazz, his fingers making virtual splashy springtime in the underground bar. Add Adam Spiegl on double bass, Scott Hay on kit, the One Hat trio look like they'd never belong together, like the wrong guys who got together in year 9 and accidentally became best mates, and that's what makes them sound so right! Spiegl's joyful bass is both energiser bunny and deeply grounding; Scott Hay squeezes molten sounds out of his kit, all handsome angular, reading the singer, his face torn between laughter and pain with brushes. Rudegeair takes keys and paints them round the room upside down. He adds Anna Gilkison, so lyrical to his lyrics, and the girl has lime and Haigh's chocolate for vocal chords; together they make the cocktail they call Hedonism. Rudegeair's original set builds complexity and sexy energy. 'Disinterested' was a stand-out track for me with its "Call me, call me.." refrain, along with the power of 'And the T, it's me', slick American sounds, all Brad Pitt white suits and water fountains. Supersexy soul music!

Henry Manetta takes up vocals as the crowd continues to purr down the Cat's stairs ready for the second set. Manetta's cologne-filled note announces This Is Boysland and the room sits up for an edge of your Vegas (sorry, Paris) bar stool vocalist, his sound rich in the ecstasy and gamble of being a man in love with jazz. Manetta's highs are liquid Pernod-drenched thrill, and he makes the lows dirty, fills them with history, like the dark city landscape we were dug into. The trio proceeded to treat the now standing room-only bar to a love affair between his body-bending full throttle funkesque throat and Ron Romero's golden saxophone; the glassy piano working to the kit, and Manetta himself walking righteously to the confessional tone of the bass, deeply guilty and loving it. The night progressed through jazzy song stories, always eclectic, ever intimate; songs like singing the hospital ward under fluoro. 'Monkesque 3' managed the feat of taking apart and reassembling what lovers do; there were unforgettable shimmering solos from every instrument. Forget YouTube, get a beautiful date and get on out to where they're making it last and newly.

Review of Henry Manetta and the Trip @ Blue Diamond by Tony McMahon, Inpress, May 23rd, 2007.

"Feeling somewhat like I’m in a Woody Allen movie, I travel 15 floors above the city nightscape in a funky old elevator and enter the Blue Diamond, without any doubt Melbourne’s coolest new venue, with plush red velvet everywhere, plusher drinks and a city view to die for; the perfect place to see the cool jazz/soul/blues fusion that is Henry Manetta and the Trip. When the band start their fist set, just like in the book by Kerouac, the music makes me want to run around crazily, sweating, yelling things like “Yeah,” “That’s Right,” and, “Blow, man, blow.” Jazz, for some reason, is often best appreciated at 4am, after drinking a surrealistic amount of alcohol, but it’s testament to the Trip’s gravitas that they’d be just as good at lunchtime, stone-cold sober, at cocktail hour, a slight buzz on, or the aforementioned early hours, too drunk to see, but somehow still soaking in the band’s delicious, anarchic sound.
As a singer, dapper, diminutive frontman Manetta has a range to be envied, and a cadence all his own. His voice is almost an instrument in its own right: all rhythm, part melody, and scatt-a-tatt punctuation. Some of the band’s quieter, more improvised, tinkling moments were lost in the din of the large, elegant crowd, and this is a shame, they so obviously deserved our rapt attention.
By the second set, the crowd is quieter and the Trip are louder: pounding away and absolutely owning the place with sax solos straight out of the late forties Chicago night and mid song applause in earnest appreciation. People dance like they’re part of the band, such is the power and connectivity of the music.
Set number three – surely it must now be the small hours – and booze and music and atmosphere have all done their demon work. I’ve forgotten exactly how bad good Jazz can be, but Henry Manetta and the Trip have reminded me in an elegantly edgeless, no rules way. The next ‘song’ might be three or 30 minutes long. It doesn’t matter. Nothing does with music this good. Jazz is, or should be, every anarchist’s favourite kind of music, and this band are up there with the most exalted potentates of the form this particular anarchist has ever seen.
Make sure you visit the Blue Diamond. It’s an experience you won’t easily forget. If Henry Manetta and the Trip are playing while you’re there, it’s guaranteed to be one you’ll never forget."

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Review of ‘Erosophy,’ featuring Henry Manetta and the Trip, Adelaide Fringe Festival 2007. By Rosie Clarke. DB Magazine, March 2007.

In the sophisticated setting of Club 199, I settled in to a leather sofa for an afternoon of jazz and poetry on the theme of love. The dynamic Melbourne jazz group Henry Manetta & The Trip featured exciting piano virtuoso Adam Rudegeair, outstanding tenor saxophonist Ron Romero, switching between the highest harmonics and the deepest resounding blasts on Misterioso, supportive bass from Adam Spiegl and dramatic drums from Scott Hay. Manetta hunches and twists like a Spanish dancer, his resonant voice alternately growling and hollering compellingly.

Matt Hetherington read unemotionally, suggesting enigmatically in Love Poem that "Love is smiling at the world the way a dog smiles at a fence," while his Words I Promise I'll Never Use in a Love Poem list evoked laughter: "Ukelele. Stirrups. Howard! [...] Please. Clap." Angela Cook was accompanied by a drum pounding with growing intensity as she intoned, "I am the embodiment of desire, red with light." Reading Like This by the Sufi poet Rumi, to set off each epiphanic moment miniature cymbals were clashed together, their shrill sound hanging in the air.

Helen Milte's poem Hills Like White Arses sounded startling in her soft voice. Rudegeair was an effective accompanist, creating discordant thumps to replace explicit words. Her Text Message Love Poems written with partner Kris Allison seemed rather expansive for this terse genre, but were intriguingly counterpointed by his responses.

Allison was the most dynamic performer, taking on different personas to hector commuters "Read my arse!" Hetherington performed an electrifying Tom Joyce poem, Play, challenging Manetta's unpredictable voice to respond. For lovers of poetry and jazz, this was a stimulating series of conversations.

Rosie Clarke

Review of “Erosophy” featuring Henry Manetta and the Trip. Adelaide Fringe Festival 2007. By Pete ‘Festival Freak,’ March 2007.

Henry Manetta and the trip open proceedings with some gentle jazz before Manetta performs a little solo scat singing; he's great, alternately edgy and fabulously booming when required. The rest of The Trip were awesome, too, especially Ron Romero on sax. Matt Hetherington opens up the spoken word portion of proceedings, and I was initially unimpressed with the contrived rhymes in his first (of many) Love Poem; he hits his stride later with Some of Us, the gigglingly good Words I'll Never Use In A Love Poem, and his choice of Ginsberg to close was solid. He also dropped the word "infinitude" into a poem, which earned big props from me.
Matt also played drums (bongos?) whilst Angela Cook read her piece Fucking, lending the performance the type of feel I always imagined the Beat Generation enjoyed. Angela was an ace performer - with a sparkle in her eye and a shy & knowing smile, her consonants linger and lead us gently through her lust. Fabulous.
Manetta and The Trip play a bit more either side of a break, kicking some solid grunt in at some point. Professional Lush almost trips over itself with its many distinct styles and solos, with Manetta lolling about the stage like a tripped-out skeleton. The sounds are great, and it's entertaining to watch.
After the break, Helen Milte-Bastow takes to the stage - and she is awesome, though sadly her soft voice is a little overwhelmed by her backing music. But her words are great - vivid imagery, pop-culture references ahoy, and just plain beautiful. Kris Allison joins her onstage for the fabulous SMS Love Poem, before continuing with his own work - and he, too, rules the stage. Rambling yet tight, urban and insightful, one line etched itself into my skull - "You want to reach me, but I'm too universal". Magic.
Hetherington returns to the stage to read some work by (the absent) Tom Joyce, accompanied by more Manetta scatting. The Trip come on for a great closer, with keyboardist Adam Rudegeair fronting up for some jazzy rap. And we're done; I chat to several of the poets, quite possibly committing more of the faux pas that I'm renowned for. Bugger :}
One weird thing, though - there were two odd guys pottering around the venue throughout the performance with video cameras; one, accompanied by an obscenely bright light, had no idea what he was seeing. The spoken word performances left him completely bemused.
And that makes me laugh. And, hence, happy.

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Review of “Bijou Box” by John Shand, Sydney Morning Herald. February 2006.

Henry Manetta’s singing is eccentric enough to catch the attention. After a listen, some will remain intrigued; others will run screaming from the room or burn the CD player in revenge. The Melburnian inhabits a seemingly conventional jazz world of piano, bass and drums, but he bends it out of recognisable shape even as he bends the syllables and harmonies until they surrender or snap. Often, successive lines could be delivered by different singers, so complete is his chameleon routine.

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Review of Henry Manetta and the Trip – Jazz at Fringe. Melbourne Fringe Festival 2005. By Helen Milte-Bastow, Inpress October 2005.

Down the Paris end of Swan St, Henry Manetta and The Trip made notes, dry as the driest Martini, drenched in rainmaker’s grumble: Manetta has the blues of his Marseilles roots – think voice of a refugee clown from the stage door of the winter circus [that’s Cirque Hiver, not du Soleil] the way he chats down his audience, like a landlady, and then delivers the solemnity of the lyric from behind the grease paint smile, his own soulful mask working Adam Rudegeair on piano/keys, Pete Mitchell on sax. This listener went to Paris, all Gato Barbieri traffic noise and Brando’s raincoat, via Victor Harbor’s black starry sky and the lunacy of space. Lyrics made jazz in a night-nurse’s delirium corridor; a holiday town at the end of the street of the world; the existential problem that is musical Adelaide. The smooth rhythms of Simon Bonney on bass and Scott Hay on kit added Miss Clare Moore on harmonies and sifted bells, her female hand on a silky tambourine, scratching out shaker moves with hair pins, eyes, city-smart lashes; she’s got to be the Sarah Jessica Parker of back-ups. God is in the details: Manetta’s suit, slippery as, slim chain, slim black watch; slim black scat like his moves. He sang what he loves and the band played the weariness of late night Melbourne kitchens; cigarettes, tea, yesterday’s sports page, Pernod – the rumble and silence of the tram under the train bridge outside. Manetta whispered his audience, like a boy, with his eyes closed, Prince-like, while the road got wet. His throaty-manly rendition of a blues standard made every woman want to get right on out there and buy one of them evening gowns, and make it tight. Offsetting the singer’s elegant lines, Rudegeair made action painting splashes on his keys, later adding white raps in a well-loved Melbourne voice, soloing an audience member in a Prince T-shirt Let’s Go Crazy on a melodica to finish the night. The preacher said, ‘Go in peace’. That was it. © Helen Milte Bastow

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Review of “Bijou Box” by Ron Spain, Jazz Scene Magazine, November2004.

Every tune on this recording explores rhythmic variations that are definitely “outside the square”, while the vocalist ranges from Buddy Greco to Buddy Hackett and Matt Murphy to Rose Murphy. The sensuous treat, ‘Misterioso’, composed by Thelonious Monk, is a highlight worthy of immediately pressing the repeat button, while Cole Porter’s ‘I love Paris’ is a riot. After decades spent worrying about vocalists who take no chances, playing it straight between very narrow parameters, this is a breath of fresh air. If the musos had as much fun making this as I had hearing it several times, we shared several happy hours.
Alternately manic, hilarious and ultra-cool, this is good, good, good

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Don Brow, Jazz Scene Magazine, October 2002.

Vocalist and songwriter, Henry Manetta, is accompanied by Geoff Kluke, bass and Bob Sedergreen, piano, forming the nucleus of the backing group. They are joined by a host of other musicians, including Christophe Genoux, saxophone, backing vocalist Clare Moore, and percussion on some tracks. Manetta sings some original songs joined by co-composer of three tracks on the CD, Evatt Christodoulou, also the pianist on ‘Love on the Wing’. Kluke features on ‘Prologue to Penelopeornthia’ with a walking bass line against the bluesy vocalise from Manetta. Sedergreen provides some soulful as well as swinging backing to Manetta’s vocals. Essentially a gutsy blues/soul/jazz influenced singer, Manetta will be performing at Dizzy’s Jazz Bar with The Trip on Thursday October 20th. If you like what you hear grab a CD on the night.

Don Brow, Jazz Scene Magazine.

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Review of Henry Manetta and the Trip at Dizzy’s by Joel Shortman, Beat Magazine, May 2002.

A wintry mid evening saw Henry Manetta and the Trip play to a cluster of devotees at Dizzy’s Jazz Bar, Richmond. Opening with a scat-bass duo (Manetta:vocals,dancing; Indra Buraczewska:double bass) the band filled out their sound with Adam Rudegeair on piano and drummer Scott Hay and played two originals: ‘Monkesque’ and ‘Shiver’. Mr. Manetta and the Trip then embarked on a set of originals and innovative takes on such favourites as The Duke’s ‘Caravan’. Their self-proclaimed brand of ‘Oblique Soul/Jazz’ enlivened such standards as ‘I Love Paris’ with humorous musical quotations and clever tempo changes, but the standout for me was ‘Bijou Box’, a ballad with a strong melancholy motif and plenty of space for each instrumentalist. The Trip’s eclectic range of influences were well displayed by a decidedly upbeat cover of Tina Turner’s ‘Funkier than a Mosquito’s Tweeter’ and the sweltering delta groove of ‘Deja Voodoo’. Henry Manetta’s stage manner suggests that of a seasoned cabaret performer, while his voice was hailed by way of introduction as ‘the reason vocal chords were invented’. This hyperbole holds some truth considering his confident delivery of repeated chorus lines. Manetta’s vocal improvisations have to be heard to be believed, though his style of scat might not be to everyone’s taste. The Trip provide great support and all have a chance to solo; ‘Monkesque’ and ‘Misterioso’ were showcases in particular for the talents of young pianist Adam Rudegeair, an acolyte of sorts of Thelonious Monk, right me was ‘Bijou Box’, a ballad with a strong melancholy motif and plenty of space for each instrumentalist. The Trip’s eclectic range of influences were well displayed by a decidedly upbeat cover of Tina Turner’s ‘Funkier than a Mosquito’s Tweeter’ and the sweltering delta groove of ‘Deja Voodoo’. Henry Manetta’s stage manner suggests that of a seasoned cabaret performer, while his voice was hailed by way of introduction as ‘the reason vocal chords were invented’. This hyperbole holds some truth considering his confident delivery of repeated chorus lines. Manetta’s vocal improvisations have to be heard to be believed, though his style of scat might not be to everyone’s taste. The Trip provide great support and all have a chance to solo; ‘Monkesque’ and ‘Misterioso’ were showcases in particular for the talents of young pianist Adam Rudegeair, an acolyte of sorts of Thelonious Monk, right down to the hat. The only notable flat spot was ‘Don’t Hold Your Breath’, which dragged a little, though when the audience swelled at 11pm The Trip were back en route, closing with Westwind, a tribute to Nina Simone.

Joel Shortman, Beat Magazine

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