Music News

Weekly Roundup: Friday 28th February

Chris Cudby / Friday 28th February, 2020 4:53PM

We're still feeling the effects from LA synth-goth duo Drab Majesty's audio-visual spectacular at Whammy Bar last night – we highly recommend Wellingtonians don't miss them playing at Valhalla with Giantess and Radar Angel tonight! Announcement highlights for the week included Melbourne extreme metal maniacs King Parrot have forged an unholy alliance with California deathgrind veterans Exhumed for Thrash Blast Grind Tour double headline shows in Auckland and Wellington, Pōneke's Mermaidens revealed a stacked lineup for their multi-stage Mermgrown Festival in March, and Dunedin duo Sewage will bring the noise to venues across Te Wai Pounamu on a special four date autumn tour, presented by the Audio Foundation.

Here's a song I just made up: "Interviews / we ran a few / that's what we do / let me tell you (all about it)" – referring of course to the clutch of insightful conversations we showcased on the site over the past week. Lagwagon frontman Joey Cape chatted with Ayn Randy's Kitt Verhoef and Bonnie Tonkin in advance of the veteran South Cali skate-punk group's return to NZ in March, we caught up with Joel Green of Canberra doom metal masters Witchskull ahead of their double headline tour alongside Sydney's Potion, concluding at Upper Hutt's mighty Obey The Riff festival, and the legendary Bill Direen had an in-depth chat with Sam Longmore about the multi-disciplinary Aotearoa artist's new group Ferocious – performing in Auckland tonight and in Wellington on Saturday. Ferocious are also squeezing in a Saturday afternoon set as part of the (nearly) all-free Outsider Sounds programme taking over the upper level of Auckland Town Hall all week, as part of Fringe Town 2020. We cornered co-curator Matthew Crawley for the exclusive low-down on the "festival within a festival within a Fringe Festival," dive into his handy guide to the whole shebang right here.

Our Caught Live video for the week features rapidly rising Los Angeles-based songwriter Meg Duffy aka Hand Habits, who'll be in Aotearoa for a trio of live appearances this coming March. As a taste of the good stuff to come this autumn, experience sublime footage of the artist and band performing the title track to their 2019 album placeholder, live in the storied studios of KEXP...