Deafheaven (USA) Returning to Aotearoa New Zealand with Nothing (USA)

Icons in the scorched realm of blackgaze (roughly: black metal meets shoegaze), Deafheaven are making a monumental return to Aotearoa New Zealand this July. Playing winter headline dates at San Fran in Te Whanganui-a-Tara and The Powerstation in Tāmaki Makaurau, the innovative California collective are touring their sonically crushing latest album Lonely People With Power. Their newest record was roundly hailed as a masterpiece on release last year, reaping praise from Kerrang!'s Nick Ruskell for "their heaviest and most balanced, rounded record, perhaps ever" and The Needle Drop's Anthony Fantano as "Deafheaven's best album since the release of Sunbather."

As if that wasn't enough thrill-power already, Deafheaven will be joined for both NZ events by Philadelphia shoegaze propagators Nothing (not to be confused with Chris Knox's ensemble), who launched their new album A Short History of Decay just last month. Be sure to pounce on tickets when they go live this week — all courtesy of Banished Music...

Deafheaven (USA)
with special guests Nothing (USA)

Thursday 2nd July - San Fran, Wellington
Friday 3rd July - The Powerstation, Auckland

Presale from 11am, Thursday 26th March
General on-sale from 9am, Friday 27th March

Sign up for presale at banishedmusic.com/subscribe
Tickets from banishedmusic.com

Hit play on 'Magnolia' from Deafheaven's 2025 album Lonely People With Power...

Experience 'Toothless Coal' from Nothing's new album A Short History of Decay...

Press release:

American black-metal trailblazers Deafheaven announce their return to New Zealand this July, presented by Banished Music. The band will perform two exclusive headline shows in Auckland and Wellington, joined by special guests Nothing.

Formed in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2010, Deafheaven have spent the past decade and a half pushing at the emotional and sonic boundaries of modern metal. From their debut Roads to Judah, to the genre-defining breakthrough Sunbather, and subsequent records like New Bermuda, Ordinary Corrupt Human Love, and Infinite Granite, Deafheaven have continually redefined the limits of heavy music while confronting themes of alienation, addiction, family history, and self-perseverance.

The tour follows the release of their 2025 album Lonely People With Power. Their sixth album and first for Roadrunner Records arrives as both a culmination and a reckoning , an album that embraces the band’s full identity after years of evolution. Produced by Justin Meldal-Johnsen (Beck collaborator and producer of Infinite Granite), the record captures Deafheaven’s innate ability to merge melody with brutality, and pain with poetry. Through reflections on masculinity, inherited trauma, family, and self-perception, the album grapples with the idea that while we can’t fully escape our past or our nature, we can choose how we move forward. Ultimately, Lonely People With Power stands as one of Deafheaven’s most expansive and human statements.

The album has drawn praise from Pitchfork, Rolling Stone, The Line Of Best Fit, Kerrang and more, and features collaborations with Interpol’s Paul Banks and Boy Harsher’s Jae Matthews.

Revered for their transcendental live shows, Deafheaven have toured the world over, performing at festivals such as Coachella and Primavera Sound, and sharing stages with artists ranging from Slipknot and Knocked Loose to Chelsea Wolfe and Mono. They’ve received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Metal Performance and continue to command a reputation as one of the most compelling live acts in heavy music.

Joining them are American shoegaze outfit Nothing, whose latest release A Short History of Decay has been described by Pitchfork as “fresh and exciting.” Their fifth album and first for Run For Cover Records further expands the band’s sonic scope, delivering the most refined and immersive iteration of Nothing to date.

Deafheaven return to New Zealand at their most expansive and unrelenting. Don’t miss the chance to witness one of heavy music’s most boundary-pushing bands at full force.