Negative Nancies exist in their own universe. The songs evolve organically through rehearsal room experimentation. Amid the No Wave art-punk chaos an irrepressible undercurrent of pop melodicism and moments of eerie psychedelic calm shine through the noise. Negative Nancies don’t play by anyone’s rules. Songs unfold in unusual ways through an organic wild-yeast
read more >Author: peter@toucanmedialtd.com
Pōneke/ Wellington jangle / surf / fuzz-pop sextet Tidal Rave return with an eight song album. “Albumette” was primarily written during the seemingly never-ending 2020 lockdown era, and explores such pertinent topics as “police incompetence, problematic capitalism, disconnection and in-between spaces.” The recording sounds darker and heavier on “Albumette”, and the bands song-writing
read more >Wellington based six-piece band Tidal Rave continues a New Zealand (and Australasian) tradition of dark, compelling guitar and keyboard lead garage rock. There’s something slightly claustrophobic and unsettling at times about the churning dense weave of the three guitars and bass backed by ghostly organ and insistent drum pulse. Add the character provided by the
read more >Emily Fairlight has a proper folk singer’s background having been, among other things, a teenage runaway adventurer in Australia and India, a circus school student, a barista and a runner turned jack-of-all-trades at a digital visual effects company. “Mother of Gloom” an elusive creature, but the prevalence of acoustic guitar and intimate sharing of lived experience point
read more >If guitar rock is dead, no-one told Bad Sav. The latest blast of Analogue Dunedin comes from the band that refused to be left behind. Although featuring Death And The Maiden guitarist/vocalist Hope Robertson and bassist/vocalist Lucinda King, plus Shifting Sands guitarist Mike McLeod (on drums here), Bad Sav are the primary strain
read more >The second album from Port Chalmers, Dunedin band Death and the Maiden creates a shadowy world within a world; populated by melancholy melodic synth waves, dreamy reverb washed guitars and vocals that celebrate the excruciating beauty and crushing weight of everyday life. The band – Lucinda King (vocals, Bass), Hope Robertson (guitar, drums,
read more >The expression Élan Vital describes the impulse of life. The music on the debut album “Shadow Self” by Dunedin cold-wave trio Élan Vital represents that life impulse in an ambiguous zone between machine and human worlds. A dense claustrophobic swirl of dark dance-tempo synth-pop blooms from gloomy cold industrial dance music with vocoder
read more >On their debut album, Death And The Maiden craft a shadowy sound world, filled with melancholic synth arpeggios, reverb-drenched guitars, and sighing vocal melodies. The combination is both hypnotic and devastating, exploring themes of love, loss, and decay, wrapped in tactile electro-acoustic languor. A party record for heartbroken romantics. “The combination of drum
read more >The sound of this trio is, they say, “an absurdist-logico mix of Euro-pop, Beat poetry, and subterranean lo-fi adventuring.” Although their music ranges from oddly poppy carnival waltzes through to manic and melodic post-punk and no wave this is no retro exercise. The album is their own unique genre-defying trip through the experimental
read more >The 7th album by The Puddle is two proposed 5-track EPs recorded a year apart & pulled together into one cohesive album. Their 1986-93 Flying Nun Records catalogue is long out of print but this album (their 4th on Fishrider since 2007) is George D. Henderson’s best in a storied career as the
read more >