The new album from Redwood Trail is so good that people don't know what to make of it.

If that sounds strange, let me explain…

Every so often a local CD comes in that completely blows me away, something that – if it's not a patronising term – is of absolutely international quality. Earlier this year it was The Flame by gypsy jazzers Bonjour Swing; before that it was last year's debut from blues rock duo Swamp Thing.

For my own amusement, whenever this happens, I make sure I play the album for as many people as I can who happen to wander through the entrance hall of the Watusi Country Club, giving them no information whatsoever about the music and waiting for their opinions. People who come up here tend not to be shy about offering opinions.

And everyone, just as I was, is baffled by Redwood Trail's October Sessions.

I ask them where they think it's from. Most opt for somewhere in America's mid-west, though a couple of enterprising folk thought it might be Canadian.

You can just about hear the sound of jaws hitting the floor when I tell them that the album was recorded in Pukehina.

Now normally this would factor in as some sort of cultural cringe, the idea that if anything is really good it probably comes from overseas. Even calling it 'international quality” suggests something of the sort. But, by the same token, there is something improbable in the fact that this collection of absolutely self-assured alt-country tunes should come from somewhere as unlikely as Pukehina, not a place exactly known as a hotbed of alternative (or any other) music.

Redwood Trail is really the baby of Brad Taylor. He has assembled a group of friends to play his songs, has recorded them himself, and has created a thing of absolute beauty, a fully formed whole of an album, from the packaging to the sound to the material itself. He cites Neil Young, Iron & Wine, Jolie Holland, and Ray Lamontagne as influences but the sound is both distinctive and original.

What makes it most extraordinary is the confidence and maturity on display, a confidence that allows the six musicians to each play with absolute simplicity to match the stripped-down minimalist nature of the songs.

Brad is a man who writes songs with few wasted words – these are like little tone poems and it says a lot for the backing that you never once question the skill of the players, despite the fact that they never do anything elaborate enough to allow you to work out how good they are. Unlike most albums where how well someone solos is a point of interest, here it simply doesn't come up: there is a perfection about the backing and sound that make such considerations irrelevant.

So, a little history: Redwood (pre-Trail) released an eponymous album five years ago. It was really good. Brad (vocals, guitar, harp) was accompanied by Dene Thurston on drums and Daniel Wadsworth on bass.

On this album they are joined by electric guitarist Glen Brown (ex-Bare Bones and Cabaret), violinist Tristan Carter (taking the place of the previous harmonica) and harmony singer Alana Bevan. And that's the sound: a strumming acoustic, subtle atmospheric arpeggios on electric, soft twin voices and a mournful fiddle weaving through it all.

It's not often that someone has as strong and consistent vision as Brad: five years apart and both albums are clearly chips off the same block, the new one simply more refined, more distilled and even better recorded (Brad went to Auckland's School of Audio Engineering, which helps explain the beautiful sound). Even the evocative covers are almost a diptych.

Most astonishingly, pretty much the entire album was recorded over the course of one long day.

The songs themselves are beautiful. Each is a tiny meditation, sometimes just a thought or idea that is allowed to grow and whose subtle melody burrows its way a little more into your brain with each listening.

October Sessions is available on iTunes or you can contact Brad directly at brad@redwoodmusic.co.nz and get both CDs from him for a mere $20. If you like acoustic alt-country it will be one of the best buys you've ever made.

watusi@thesun.co.nz