Weekly Round-Up: Friday 21st February

While tour announcements haven't been very forthcoming this week (other than actor, and musician surprisingly),  Hugh Laurie's New Zealand tour announce,  it has been a very busy week of shows. Wire kicked things off with a one-off Auckland show on Monday (see here for photos + a review) followed by Stiff Little Fingers who played Christchurch, Wellington (photos up here) and Auckland, Slow Magic commenced his tour last night in Wellington (interview up here), Soundwave side-festival of sorts, Westfest took place in Auckland on Weds and Thurs (some great shots up here) and Eagles of Death Metal and Uncle Acid and The Deadbeats (great interview up here) played a sideshow in Wellington last night (awesome photos of EODM up here) - phew! And there's more to come this weekend of course, see our weekly gig picks below.

Things have been much livelier on the release front with the lovely Tiny Ruins announcing details of her second album and sharing the first single, grunge legends The Afghan Whigs shared the first single + video from their new album Do To The Beast out in April,  black metal supergroup Twilight which now includes Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore released a new single from their forthcoming album, Melbourne's East Brunswick All Girls Choir released a video for the second single from their debut album out in April, compatriots HTRK also shared a second single from their new album Psychic 9-5 Club, Real Estate shared a new track  from their forthcoming album Atlas due out next month, Beck's new album Morning Phase has been streaming this week as has St Vincent's and we have an interview up with her about it, we also had a chat with up pop upstart Sky Ferriera about her brilliant new album Night Time, My Time, and finally in strange match-up news,  Lana Del Rey is apparently working with The Black Keys' Dan Auerbach on her new album Ultraviolence - should be interesting...

In other news, the finalists for the annual Taite Music Prize have been revealed, Lorde picked up another international accolade at the Brit Awards held yesterday in London and sadly, Bob Casale of Devo passed away suddenly from heart failure. We feel honoured to have got the opportunity to speak to Casale when the band were here in 2012 and he provided us one of our best interviews ever.  

Our  video this week couldn't be anyone else, here are Devo performing their amazing and timeless track 'Gut Feeling' live in the late 70s....

WEEKEND GIG PICKS

FRIDAY:

Auckland: Slow Magic, Cassette
Auckland: Sal Valentine and The Babyshakes, Wine Cellar and Whammy Bar
Wellington: Terror of The Deep, Mighty Mighty
Wellington: Vas Deferens, Puppies
Christchurch: Flip Grater and French for Rabbits, darkroom
Dunedin: The Prophet Hens, Taste Merchants
Dunedin: Awesome Tapes from Africa, Re Fuel

SATURDAY:

Auckland: Team Ugly, Mean Girls, Proton Beast + more, Whammy
Auckland: Seeds of Orbit, Psychic Maps and Gem Indigo, Thirsty Dog
Wellington: Charles Bradley, James Caberet
Wellington: Awesome Tapes from Africa, Mighty Mighty
Christchurch: The Undercurrents, Salad Boys and Jay Clarkson, darkroom
Dunedin: Dinosaur Sanctuary, Bad Sav and Not From Space, Re Fuel

Head over to our gig guide for more awesome live music or grap our iPhone app (Android version coming soon!).

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