Each week, Rolling Stone AU/NZ highlights our favourite New Zealand music from the past seven days.
Check out last week’s picks featuring BENEE, Daily J, Fat Freddy’s Drop, Georgia Gets By, Dateline, and Tami Neilson, and check out newer highlights from Nadia Reid, Albert River, Goodnight My Darling, Goodwill, Delaney Davidson and Barry Saunders, The Nomad, Karl Sölve Steven, and Heidi Simpson below.
Nadia Reid – “Changed Unchained”
Nadia Reid returns with her first new music in four years since her 2020 album Out of My Province. Her new single, “Changed Unchained,” marks a move from folk to a bolder sound. Reflective yet powerful, it’s a fresh chapter for Reid under her new international label, Chrysalis Records.
“I still feel uncomfortable about the word folk and being a folk singer. It makes me sort of cringe. It’s too confining,” she says. “‘Changed Unchained’ is a great example of me bringing lyrics and a melody into the studio, then Tom (Healy, producer) and the band letting the mojo/muse/spirit do its thing in the room. That was a really freeing feeling for me. The song begun in this delicate introspective way and formed into something quite powerful.”
Albert River – bank woe
After six years, Lower Hutt artist Albert River has released a new LP. The 7-track collection, described as “neon-like ghosty hymns,” explore life, death, and the artist experience, featuring delicate vocals alongside piano, finger-picked guitar, harmonium, and a kauri wood flute.
On bank woe, he says “there is a ghostly energy in these songs, bank woe has many meanings interweaving, it is very much exploring life and death…about being a poor artist.”
Goodnight My Darling – “Ruby”
Pōneke’s Goodnight My Darling (Maxine Macaulay) has dropped a magical synchronised swimming-themed video for her latest single, “Ruby.” The track tackles themes of creative repression, motherhood, and female empowerment, with visuals that beautifully sync with the song’s soothing arrangement.
“The video was a true collaboration,” says director Belle Gwilliam. “I had ideas for the look, like specific camera angles and a unique colour scheme, and Maxine had a certain style in mind – but the choreography was all the Synchro girls; Amelia Livingston and Justine Carter really led the way.”
Six60 – The Grassroots Album
Recorded live on their NZ tour, Six60’s The Grassroots Album offers acoustic versions of their hits like “Don’t Forget Your Roots” and “Someone To Be Around,” plus covers of Fleetwood Mac’s “Landslide,” Bob Marley’s “Waiting in Vain,” and Che Fu’s “Misty Frequencies.” It’s like an intimate jam session with the band.
Speaking about the album, frontman Matiu Walters said, “when we set out on the Grassroots tour, we had the plan of recording a live album. We had no idea how it might turn out, but we wanted the road, the people and the venues to inspire us. The grassroots album ended up being taken from the acoustic part of the show and now the fans will be able to hear some of our catalogue, live, acoustic and from some of New Zealand most unique venues. It’s something we are really proud of.”
Goodwill – “Obamas”
Ōtautahi songwriter/producer Goodwill (Will McGillivray) has announced his debut full-length album, Kind Hands (out October 4th via Winegum Records), with the restrained and striking “Obamas,” featuring his deep baritone.
Goodwill shares, “I’ve shown this song to friends and had some people find it really sad and others find it more on the hopeful side of town, I like that there’s some ambiguity to that line ‘I’m so happy I could die’ – I won’t say which way I feel, but I can say that when I first wrote and sung that chorus it was probably the most elation I’ve felt from writing a song.”
Delaney Davidson and Barry Saunders – “Yeah Yeah Yeah”
“Yeah Yeah Yeah” is the new single from Lyttelton’s Delaney Davidson and Barry Saunders’ upcoming second collaborative album Happiness Is Near, following up their 2019 award-winning Word Gets Around. The track takes a swipe at media hype and fear-mongering, exposing how complex issues are often exaggerated despite possible solutions. Davidson’s moody vid features mushroom clouds, found footage, NASA clips, and self-shot snippets.
Davidson explains, “An unsolveable mountain of terror and problems, whipped up by the media in an age where there should be very tangible solutions. Using newspaper headlines and pamphlet titles that are at least 50 years old we see the patterns of propaganda and how the things we were being told then we are still being controlled with now”.
The Nomad – “Momentum” (ft. Michèle Ducray)
Aotearoa electronic music trailblazer The Nomad (Daimon Schwalger) returns with “Momentum”, a collaboration with Michèle Ducray, his first single in ten years. It’s a taste of the limited edition double-vinyl Infinite Part III and a preview of a future album set for release in 2025.
Karl Sölve Steven – “Bookworm Theme”
Thames-based Karl Sölve Steven continues his synth magic after July’s V Ä V A with “Bookworm Theme,” a lush and cinematic track featuring LA-based whistler sensation Molly Lewis (who performed at last year’s Others Way). It’s the first taste of the official soundtrack for director Ant Timpson’s new adventure comedy, Bookworm.
Heidi Simpson – “icy girl”
Wrapping up this week’s roundup, Auckland’s Heidi Simpson makes a cool debut with “icy girl,” the first single from her upcoming indie pop EP.
