"Oh, my darling, I love you, and I always will ..." Erica Miller has broken into song for the third time in just over an hour.
Not to be outdone, a ginger tomcat called Jack slinks into the room and lets loose a mewing that, though loud, is clearly less melodious than Erica's occasional outbursts.
Perhaps it is concerned there's a stranger in the living room brandishing pen, pad and recording device.
Jack might have to get used to a few more visitors to this St Kilda villa, which rests a couple of blocks from the red and yellow stripes of Badminton Hall, locked in a tight grid of streets that sometimes funnel the amplified commentary of the races at nearby Forbury Park or, on a quiet night, a distant rumble as waves rearrange Middle Beach.
Here, too, ripples are emanating. Word is being spread. Figuratively and literally, the media is gathering at the door.
Why? Well, this grandmother is about to release her debut album, a collection of Elvis Presley covers, under the guise The Erica Miller Experience.
Cool. Crikey. Cringe. Erica admits there has been a range of responses to the news of her forthcoming release, which, all going to plan, will be distributed by major label Universal next month.
Yet any knee-jerk reactions might be tempered by the disclosure that Erica is the mother of Shayne Carter, frontman for a range of bands over the years, including 2008 New Zealand Music Hall of Fame inductees Straitjacket Fits and, more recently, Dimmer.
Erica says she has just been on the phone to her first-born, wishing him a happy birthday (her 64th was a couple of days earlier).
Among their regular chats has been much discussion about the pending album, Reconsidered.
Named by Shayne, the title reflects a reworking of material made famous by Elvis, but also hints at self-examination.
The selection of songs includes more than a few that are sad, painful even.
Though pain is something Erica has had her fair share of over the years, her demeanour is upbeat, an impression accentuated by a rapid-fire combination of words and laughter.
Warmed by regular bursts from a nearby heat pump, she occasionally changes position on her leather couch, sometimes leaning into the conversation to stress a point, other times reclining to conjure forth a memory or two.
In short, she's fizzing about her new baby. And so she should be.
As Shayne points out in a recent internet posting, Erica has waited more than six decades to make this album "and it shows ... there's a whole lifetime behind this record".
Erica, who describes her family as "Elvis heads", spent about three months listening then choosing the songs for Reconsidered, which ranges from more obscure tracks such as Long Black Limo to the mega-selling Love Me Tender.
"I really related to them. They all told a story from my perspective," Erica explains.
"I wasn't going to just sing them - I was feeling them."
Erica always knew eyebrows would be raised over the project.
As she says, "if you've got half a brain, it has got an angle".
"I said to Shayne, 'There is going to be a lot of media interest in this'. He said, 'Why's that?' I said, `Because you're Shayne Carter, I'm 63 and I'm your mother'. People are going to be curious, even if they listen to see how awful it is.
"I told Shayne last week, 'Just imagine if this had been awful - one of you kids would have had to tell me'. And Shayne said, 'I would have sent you an email, Ma'. We cracked up over that."
If Erica has any nerves about the reaction to her debut album, or is uncomfortable about the growing list of interview requests, she's not about to reveal them. The cat might be frazzled but she isn't.
Put something out there and be prepared to accept criticism, she says. "Not everybody is going to like it. But I think you've got to be able to take it. There's no point in going off with your tail between your legs ... I'm not a prima donna.
"I don't think I'm wonderful, but I'm canny enough to know there would be a lot of interest.
"I'm actually very touched that Shayne has stood beside me, because he has got such a huge profile and he could end up with egg on his face, you know what I mean? I'm very humbled by that. When he told some of his friends his Mum had made an album, he said he got a few raised eyebrows.
"To me, the fact that he believed in me was a big thing. I could say that about my other children, too, but I'm referring to Shayne because he is such a public persona."
The idea of recording an album of songs already performed by a legendary figure began germinating in 2001 when Erica sang Love Letters at a Brighton tribute concert to her first husband, Jimmi P Carter, who had died the year before.
"It was terrible grief," Erica recalls.
"It was a very sudden loss. I'd known him since I was 16 years old. Even though we were no longer married, he was my whanau. We were very close. We separated [in the early 1970s] because we were young and stupid. But he was my family.
"He was a Maori boy adopted by pakeha and didn't know his own people and I was a welfare kid. We were two lost souls, I suppose.
"We met in Dunedin, at a party. A fight broke out and I was terrified. This very quietly spoken, very handsome young Maori man walked up to me and said 'Come on, this is the way out; I'll see you home'. I think we were totally attracted to each other. I was a pretty spunky chick and he was a really handsome fella. It just went from there, really.
"Through the various traumas in my life - and there have been a few - his death was the biggest. It was like, 'How do I deal with this?'. He was my brother, my confidant, even up to the day he died. He always rang me on my birthday or Mother's Day; I'd have him over for Christmas dinners.
"I mentioned to some of my kids - I can't remember who - that I'd like to do an album. My whanau is all into music so it has always been there. But, you know, it's about money and this and that, so it went on the back burner. But a few years after Jimmi died I felt that more and more strongly. That was the catalyst for me. I know he'd be chuffed.
"If he were alive, he'd say something like, 'About bloody time, Ric. It took you long enough'."
There is certainly a strong sense of family to this album.
Erica's youngest son, Kristen, filmed and documented the proceedings; daughter Natasha, a music manager who worked for Flying Nun records for several years, brought her organisational skills to the project, which was recorded and mixed by her husband, Dale Cotton; eldest son Shayne contributed slick guitar and harmonies to a range of tracks; and husband Laurie, whom Erica married late last year, is executive producer.
"I'm lucky that my family have got the talents they have," Erica says.
"I remember when Shayne announced to me he wanted to do music. He and Wayne Elsie had their Bored Games band. They used to chew up Weet-Bix with toothpaste and they'd stand in the lounge with their out-of-tune guitars. It was terrible," she whispers before adding: "You know, they were into punk.
"But there was always encouragement. Natasha worked for Flying Nun for eight or nine years, Kris is getting into his filming, [second eldest son] Marcel is an entrepreneur in Hong Kong ... Some parents freak out, say 'I've paid for you to go to varsity' and all that, but you can't tell your kids what to do.
"I hope it doesn't sound clichéd, but the actual fact that my family were there and put their expertise and support forward - there was never any thought of, `Mum, are you nuts?' - to me, that is hugely important. If nothing else happens, I can have that. No bugger can take that away."
Erica knows all about having things taken away. At the age of 5, she and her two older sisters were made wards of the State, separated and sent to foster homes.
"We were all neglected," Erica reflects.
"It wasn't my mother's fault. She was very unwell. She had post-natal depression after me and never had any treatment and my father was a violent man.
"The tragedy of it is ... the saddest thing about that is we were separated. I didn't see my sisters for about eight years. That was very bleak. I spoke to a panel of people yesterday, to do with kids in foster homes, and had them in tears.
"We were made wards of the State and I was sent down south [from Dunedin]. I went to some Catholic schools and some state schools ... I didn't have contact with anyone."
Having spent 11 years in at least a dozen different foster homes, some good, some not so good, Erica returned to Dunedin at the age of 16 only to be put into a "home for naughty girls".
She says she was sent there because the State didn't have anywhere else to put her.
"I didn't get into trouble. I was a good kid. I wasn't running around, being sexually promiscuous or getting off my face. I was just a lost kid who had a lot of trauma in my life."
A year later, she met Jimmi P Carter.
Engaged at the age of 17, she discovered she was pregnant (with Shayne), so took a midnight train to Christchurch with Jimmi.
"In those days, you were a ward of the State until you were 21. They didn't find us until I was very pregnant with Shayne. They tried to talk me into adopting out my baby, but you could imagine what my reply to that was after my experiences in foster homes. I said, `No, no, never - it's not going to happen'. I told them to get knotted. They gave up and discharged me. There was no way my child was going to go into the system."
The couple married and performed as an acoustic folk duo in Christchurch clubs, playing songs by Bob Dylan and Peter, Paul and Mary, among others, before returning to Dunedin when Shayne was about 7 months old.
"In Dunedin, going on 19, I saw an ad for a female vocalist and replied to it," Erica recounts.
"I was really nervous but I had this desire to sing. It was at the Sunset Strip in Rattray St. I got the job. At the time, it was the real `in' place. All the mods and rockers went there. I was probably there for about two years, singing Sandy Shaw, Lulu, Dusty Springfield, guy's stuff, whatever. It was packed and I was damn good."
She went on to work with jazz outfits, playing Friday-night dances at Dunedin's Agricultural Hall and later became resident vocalist (with a different band) at La Scala for two or three years in the early-'70s.
"That was an amazing dine and dance cabaret. You didn't walk in; you rang the bell and the steward would open the door. I used to do a big walk-on into this cabaret room at 9 o'clock," Erica says, adding she also sang at the Savoy and was resident at the European Hotel "for a long time".
At some point, in the mid-'70s, the music stopped.
Having separated from Jimmi seven years after getting married and with two sons, Shayne and Marcel (five years younger), Erica eventually got into another relationship, remarried and had a daughter, Natasha, then a son, Kristen.
Erica says it was not her choice to stop singing.
"It was due to really personal circumstances, the circumstances of my second marriage, in a nutshell. There is a story to be told, believe you me but, suffice to say, it should never have happened. But I don't sit there crying about it.
"It wasn't family life - I want to make that quite clear - because when I was doing my singing originally, I had a child. I worked around having my children. I could have had half a dozen kids and still gone out and sung."
Having just turned 64, Erica says she is retired but emphasises that doesn't mean she won't work again. She has held down a range of jobs over the years, from running shops in Northeast Valley and South Dunedin to care-giving, commercial cleaning, waitressing and cooking.
"At the moment I'm hibernating because it's cold. I like mucking around in the garden, reading ... I play bowls. I know that sounds awfully staid, but bowls is an amazing game. It's a mind-game."
One gets the impression Erica is up for a challenge. She recently completed an 18-month computing course ("because I was computer illiterate"); three years ago, she successfully auditioned for a role on a Maori Television film, Jack In The Box, part of the channel's Table Plays series; and a few years back, she was named best supporting actress in the Dunedin section of the 48-Hour Film Festival.
"That was a real buzz. I am a bit of a ham. I like the stage," Erica says, adding that singing is like riding a bike.
"It is either there or it isn't. If you have something within, it's not going to go away.
"Technically, I'm not a marvellous singer. It's about how you do it. If someone asked me what is my favourite music, I'd have to say, whatever gives me goosebumps.
"Recording out in Dale's studio, just hearing these guys playing, hearing it thundering out, it touched your soul. It's like going home. That's what it felt like. I thought, 'This is what I should be doing'.
"I feel very confident people are not going to say, `Hey, little old lady, go back to your knitting', because it is a damn good album and I'm bloody proud of it."
Her eyes gleam.
The cat mews, again.
Outside, the frost having thawed, the day offers a mix of sunshine and shadows. Which is a bit like life. A bit like a song.
A FAMILY AFFAIR
Reconsidered is notable both for its musical muscle and deft touches.
Featuring her son, Shayne Carter (Straitjacket Fits, Dimmer, Bored Games), and solo artist Hannah Curwood on backing vocals, guitarist Tom Healy (The Tomahawks, The Low), drummer Marcel Rodeka (Mother Goose), keyboardist Aidan Fraser and saxophonist Paul Young (both from Dunedin dub/roots band Koile), the album was recorded by Erica's son-in-law, Dale Cotton, at his St Leonards studio.
Erica completed her vocals when she headed to Auckland in October 2008 to see Straitjacket Fits inducted into the New Zealand Music Hall of Fame.
In an attempt to capture "that old smoky bar vibe", a honky-tonk piano feel is employed to good effect, as are Motown-type backing vocals, particularly on the lesser known Elvis track, Long Black Limo, on which Erica's alto phrasing is both relaxed and soulful as the band builds a tension that comes to a head on the late key change.
On Don't, Erica's vocals evoke Dusty Springfield or - despite the band not being focused on any R 'n' B groove - a downbeat Esther Phillips.
Yet the best is saved for the highly personal Love Letters.
With her vibrato nicely suspended in a '60s-era reverberation, Erica times her delivery expertly, soulfully and with just enough grit to let the listener know she has traversed some interesting terrain in her lifetime.
As Shayne says: "These may be cover versions but it's like the singer has lived the tunes and the truths behind them. The record becomes the one person's story and, knowing my mum, I could guess the emotional space behind nearly every song here.
"To me it conjures up images of wandering into some dimly lit community hall in Dunedin, Saturday night sometime in the '70's, an unknown party, the whiff of fondue, the smell of Speight's rising off half-stacked crates in the corner ... The band is set up on the floor and they're going hard, whether the people dance or not - old favourites floating like ghosts around the hall's wooden walls."
• Reconsidered, by The Erica Miller Experience, will be released on August 16.
