Premiere: Sere Unleash Self-Titled Debut Album

Auckland thug-psych four-piece sere are sadly playing their last show for the foreseeable future this weekend, but before they dematerialise into another dimension they've decided set fire to all reality, dropping their incendiary self-titled debut album for your listening derangement. Drawing inspiration from psychedelic figureheads Blue Cheer, Acid Mothers Temple and San Francisco sci-fi punks Chrome, sere's new collection is overflowing with ear-bleeding, in-the-red, monster riffage and mystic vocals echoing into outer space and back again, mixed and mastered with considerable aplomb by Wellington sonic shaman James Goldsmith. The cosmic team of Zac Arnold, Calum Gunn, Grant Sheridan and Thomas Shoebridge are performing alongside Green Grove and Mutation this Saturday at hometown venue The Wine Cellar, try not to get too upset as individual members are already hinting at more aural outpourings to come. Gunn reflected on highlights from the group's career, why they're parting ways, and their final show - read his words and dive into sere's debut album below...

"In all honesty, the real deciding factor in getting this album out the way that we have, was because we decided not to be band anymore. It seems we have unintentionally followed the typical kiwi band career arc of being around for a while playing shows, writing an album, recording an album, mixing an album, and then breaking up just in time to not play any shows to promote it.

Having said that, we are still very proud of the album, and very thankful to have had our friend James Goldsmith who put a huge amount of time and effort into the recording, mixing and mastering of it. We recorded the album over the course of a few days in October of last year with James at Blue Barn studios in Wellington, which thanks to James’s ability to decipher requests like “can you make my guitar sounds more like a screaming computer,” and an abundance of sandwich ingredients, was a really fun and easy process.

We decided to no longer be a band for the simple reason that it wasn’t much fun anymore and we were struggling to come up with new ideas. We already had a show booked at The Wine Cellar, so we decided that it would be the last one. Then we decided that we should release the album digitally when it was ready. Then we decided to try and get it ready to release for the show. Then a couple of weeks ago we decided we wanted a physical release as well, so (fingers crossed that they arrive) we will have the album on cassette for the show on Saturday!

We have lots of fond memories of this band, a lot of them predictably involve travelling together and being in transit. Being in places like Hatepe, Newtown Bowls Club, the cable car (thanks Lucie!), derelict Lancaster Park, Flat Point, gravel pits on the side of State Highway 1 or eating souvlaki… anyway this is starting to sound a bit like weepy eulogy, whoops.

So basically, come to our final show on Saturday, our good friend Mutation has come up from Wellington to play the show, and we are also joined by Green Grove, who we are very excited to be sharing this with. We’ll play some screaming computer for you."

Catch sere playing their last ever show at Auckland's Wine Cellar on Saturday 15th September alongside Green Grove and Mutation, you can snap up your tickets here.