Watch Our 2018 New Zealand Video Highlights

We're stoked to finally dive into our 2018 end of year roundup features! This week we'll be presenting our mighty 2018 End Of Year Playlist, our local album highlights, our contributors' top musical moments of the year, and today we're proud to showcase our selection of New Zealand video highlights for 2018. As with last year's feature, we've gathered together a collection of clips containing images we simply couldn't get out of our heads, ranging from super slick audio-visual extravaganzas to artistically innovative DIY homebrew creations...

Orchestra Of Spheres - 'Āta'

Wellington psychedelic travellers Orchestra Of Spheres unveiled a mind-boggling clip in October for their warped dance-funk tune ‘Āta’, which means "reflection and a human shadow," drawn from this year's expansive double album Mirror. Created by the band, Dan Harris and Nathan Taare (ENT) and featuring Jonny Marks (The All Seeing Hand), the unforgettable visual adventure depicts a blob named Āta’s quizzical life, metamorphosis and eventual demise...

Avantdale Bowling Club - 'Years Gone By'

Tom Scott's new project Avantdale Bowling Club announced themselves to the world in July with their expansive jazz / hip hop single 'Years Gone By'. Directed by Arty Papageorgiou, the song's spectacular accompanying clip was shot against the faded glamour of Auckland's once-ornate St. James Theatre, showcasing the next-level skills of Scott's musical collaborators Julien Dyne, Guy Harrison, Tom Dennison, Mara TK, Ben McNicoll and JY Jong-Yun Lee playing amongst the rubble.

Carb on Carb - ‘It’s been a rough year’

How about a fashion show? Auckland emo-punk duo Carb on Carb dropped an effortlessly charming clip for their song ‘It’s been a rough year’, directed by Adrian Harris, featuring Zuri Gaffney The Dog and drawn from their sophomore album for ages which released to significant worldwide acclaim in May. Soak up the mid-00s nostalgic style as singer / guitarist Nicole Gaffney and her cool dog pal try to figure out the very best outfit to wear before hitting the streets...

Dudley Benson - 'Cook Beleaguered'

Dunedin alt-pop artist Dudley Benson is not one to do things by halves - his latest album Zealandia features over one hundred and sixty contributors, including the Dunedin Symphony Orchestra, the New Zealand Youth Choir, and even beats made with GNS Science geologists. Benson's self-directed clip for 'Cook Beleaguered' is an intensely moving rumination on the heroic status of English navigator Captain James Cook, featuring Cat Ruka, painter Nigel Brown and 2018 Walters Prize-nominated artist Pati Solomona Tyrell, of Auckland's Fafswag collective.

Jonathan Bree - 'Boombox Seranade' (feat. Crystal Choi)

Everything Auckland pop sophisticate Jonathan Bree released in the lead-up to his superb third solo studio album Sleepwalking is worthy of note, but we were particularly taken by the unsettling vibes conveyed in his video for 'Boombox Seranade' featuring Crystal Choi. The self-directed clip casts the masked artist as a handsome yet possibly nefarious horse-riding stranger, conjuring eerie sensations not unlike a Dr Who alien roaming the fields of classic UK horse show Follyfoot.

Earth Tongue - 'The Well Of Pristine Order'

There's something in Wellington's water supply and we want some of it. Capital city psych-rock duo Earth Tongue's video for 'The Well Of Pristine Order', created in collaboration with Will Agnew, Lily West, Thomas Harnett O’Meara and Neirin Best, is a eldritch collision of stylish props, vivid outfits and tripped-out animation, drawing inspiration from the mind-expanding visuals for UK singer Julie Driscoll’s version of 'Season Of The Witch'.

Situated somewhere between short film and music video, NZ-raised, Berlin-based Pasifika singer Noah Slee's clip '...and so, we move to Otherlands' is a stunning audio-visual experience. Directed and produced by Slee and Sam Templeton and described as an "ode to the LGBT Community and to Queer Tagata Pasifika," the gorgeously filmed and choreographed fifteen minute work fleshes out themes of identity and community expressed on the award-winning artist's 2017 debut album Otherland.

Shiraz & LSJ - 'Where Tha Pape$ @'

Contender for no-budget clip of the year, the inventive DIY video for Shiraz & LSJ's 'Where Tha Pape$ @' (from their excellent mixtape AkL Maverickz) teams housebound mania with streetwise cool, as rapper Shiraz dispenses off-the-dome rhymes from his bed on top of a roof in Auckland's endless suburbs.

Womb - 'Satellite'

The kaleidoscopic clip for Wellington psychedelic trio Womb's dreamy single 'Satellite' opens up otherworldly spaces to lose bodies and minds inside, created by the band with Laura Duffy. An intoxicating blend of digital animation and soft-sculpture engulfs viewers in the woozy vibes of the song, lifted from this year's excellent debut collection Like Splitting The Head From The Body.

Goodwin & Kyle - 'Downtown Club' (ft. St Vaseline)

Sometimes all you need is a great tune and some powerful moves on the dancefloor, as demonstrated in the DIY clip for local duo Goodwin & Kyle's only release in 2018 'Downtown Club', featuring the intriguingly named St. Vaseline. Created by David Becham, the sizzling video depicts a man possessed by the spirit of dance, bringing the good times to some of Wellington's finest inner city locations. Here's hoping we see the enigmatic duo's debut collection Keep On Truckin' released soon...