Another month, another new Pickle Darling single.
The Christchurch-based indie-pop artist has released “Human Bean Instruction Manual”, a song “reconstructed out of old voicemails, broken keys, and a vague but pressing sense of dread.”
“Human Bean Instruction Manual” was assembled out of early fragments Lukas Mayo, the experimental musician behind the Pickle Darling project, recorded years ago, the perfect distillation of their DIY approach.
Mayo says the final version of “Human Bean Instructional Manual” was sparked by them turning 30 and realising “there’s no damn manual for this.”
“Transitioning out of being a young adult in 2025 is like suddenly landing on a hostile planet our bodies haven’t adapted to,” they say.
The result is a thoughtful, relatably anxious song transmitted from the edge of adulthood — an artist and person entering a new decade without any easy answers. “Everything we thought was important doesn’t mean shit. Everything is out to attack us, so all we can do is form our alliances and hang on tight,” Mayo adds.
“I always write with a kind of dream logic and never towards any sort of end goal, but I was on the cusp of turning 30 when I wrote this song and I remember feeling completely lost and unprepared and wishing there were some kind of manual.
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“Lots of stressed out dreams, fears of never being able to afford a house or never being able to retire, realising there’s no steady path to a comfortable future, you just need to form your alliances and see how far through this life you can get! I realise a near 7-minute song about being stressed about money isn’t really fun, cool, sexy playlist material, but that’s Pickle Darling.”
“Human Bean Instruction Manual” follows last month’s “Massive Everything”, Pickle Darling’s first original release since a Postal Service cover with The Beths in 2023.
“Maybe the first kind of ‘pop’ song I’ve ever made,” they said of their previous single. “And I think the most lyrically direct too, there’s no poetry or cleverness to it, I felt strongly about clear communication this time. I love Robyn, Ray of Light-era Madonna, Cher, Donna Lewis, I love those kinds of ‘empathetic’ pop songs that feel like a hug from a friend.”
Both singles follow the launch of a lo-fi video game built around Pickle Darling’s music. Made with Shortal (known for her work with Tiny Ruins and Mousey), Pickle Darling: The Game lets players search for a lost album in a retro, DIY-style world. The game features 8-bit renditions of Pickle Darling tracks, including “Bicycle Weather”, “King of Joy”, and “Invercargill Angel”.
In other Pickle Darling news, their 2023 album, Laundromat, featured in Rolling Stone AU/NZ‘s 80 Best New Zealand Albums of the Decade So Far list.
“A cult artist on Bandcamp for years, Christchurch multi-instrumentalist Lukas Mayo finally progressed to the next stage in their career with Laundromat, a magical little album that showcases all the best qualities of their Pickle Darling project,” we wrote of the album, which placed at No. 56 in our countdown.
Pickle Darling’s “Human Bean Instruction Manual” is out now via Father/Daughter Records.
