Release Roundup: Reb Fountain, Clear Path Ensemble, Hun Lynch, Junny, Household Spirits, Sheep, Dog & Wolf, FULL FLOCKING FORCE + More

The stardust has settled from Wednesday's big night at the Taite Music Prize ceremony, all afterparty hangovers are now a misty memory and NZ Music Month / Te Marama Puoro o Aotearoa has arrived. The Bandcamp Friday initiative is back this weekend, running for 24 hours from 7pm (NZ time) this evening, an ideal way to direct some dosh into the pockets of your favourite local artists. Scroll downwards for new and recent Aotearoa highlights from Reb Fountain, Clear Path Ensemble, Hun Lynch, Household Spirits, Sheep, Dog & Wolf, PARK RD, We Will Ride Fast, Casual Healing, Adam McGrath, and the powerfully stacked FULL FLOCKING FORCE: A Fundraiser Compilation from Aotearoa for Emergency Relief Aid in Lebanon.

FULL FLOCKING FORCE: A Fundraiser Compilation from Aotearoa for Emergency Relief Aid in Lebanon brings together rare and unreleased tunes by a murderers row of local mega-talents, united to "support a verified grassroots network on the ground in Lebanon to buy and disperse emergency supplies and care to people displaced by the bombings in Beirut and southern Lebanon." The immense tracklisting includes the first new tune in forever from Disasteradio, plus contributions from Earth Tongue, Stälker, TOOMS and heaps more, all bookended by Displeasure and Unsanitary Napkin (same membership / different bands).

Leaning into booming electronic dream-pop and trip-hop / big-beat territory on her new SMOKE SIGNALS EP, multi-award-winning songwriter Reb Fountain collaborated with her daughter, director Lola Fountain-Best on a theatrically stylised series of "vignettes" for nearly every song. Experience today's new clip for 'KEEP YOUR HEART OPEN' plus the full EP below.

Aotearoa's outer limits jazz project helmed by the polymathic Cory Champion (Borrowed cs), Clear Path Ensemble's percussive new single 'Tongue Rhythm' ventures even deeper into the minimalist compositional zones explored on 2025's Black Sand, and the results are straight up magical. Sporting delicately detailed and layerd cover artwork by Jade Townsend, CPE's fourth album Ascending launches on 27th May.

Deservedly earning a rapt response for her debut album Sycophant — launched last week via Noa Records — Tāmaki Makaurau's multi-faceted Hun Lynch reveals artful visuals co-directed with THUNDERLIPS for synapse-rearranging standout track 'I Want You'.

The project of Jenn Tamati (Te Arawa, Ngāti Tuwharetoa, Ngāpuhi), Junny reveals 'OOTD', a dancefloor-moving pop-beatscape infused with local natural sounds produced by Amelia Berry (Amamelia) — the second tune from the Whangārei-based artist's forthcoming Kumara Suite EP via Sunreturn. “OOTD is a nostalgia driven pop song. At the time of writing, I was reflecting on my love of popular music in my childhood - 2000s R&B groups like Destiny's Child. Singing along to that music is how I learned I could sing and it heavily shapes my vocal sensibilities even now (also shout-outs to my mum and Okaihai College Kapa Rōpu of 2001). I also had Moana Maniapoto, Teremoana Rapely and Ardiijaah on heavy listening rotation at this time. Their music is everything. Amelia named K’lee as inspiration which was spot on - her cover of Broken Wings is so good."

Household Spirits are the improvisational sound-shaping Tāmaki Makaurau duo of Independent Spirit Award winner Rohan Evans handling "bass noise & editing" and Steve Cournane on drums. Unafraid of embracing craggy textures when the occasion calls, A Time For Monsters rewards open ears with a six track balance of fiery impulse and elegant restraint — "recorded live, Bass and Drums edits and vocal samples added later words are from the Antonio Gramsci’s Prison Notebooks."

Daniel McBride thrills devotees of the Aotearoa songwriter / composer / producer's award-winning solo project Sheep, Dog & Wolf with news of imminent new album Ceiling Waves, out on 7th August via Nacre Recordings. Today's single ' Guessing' feels suitably momentous and virtuosic, swelling from pastoral folk strings to pummelling, searing avant-rock, as McBride observes (perhaps ruefully) "We’re all gonna die sometime / I guess we’re getting by / and someday we’ll be alright." McBride's unpacked the song's origins in grief: "I think that I always expected grief to feel like sadness, or pain. And it was that, of course. But for me there was also so much rage, this feeling of having parts of our lives and futures torn away. With Guessing I tried to capture how huge that injustice felt - how much was being taken from us."

Now based in Sydney, Tāmaki Makaurau's PARK RD tease the upcoming launch of their second album, piling up the emotive punk-pop hooks to skyscraper heights on new anthem ‘Burn Away'.

Heroically flying the flag for post-punk / cyber-rock in Tauranga, We Will Ride Fast reunites with Frances Ellen on smouldering darkwave / synth-punk duet 'In Numbers' — complete with moody DIY clip.

Te Whanganui-a-Tara songwriting star Casual Healing aka Nikau Te Huki (Ngāti Kahungunu ki te Wairarapa completes his four-part cycle of EPs — embodying the four elements and "inspired by Te Taiao (the natural world)" — with today's launch of ONE (earth). Standout new reggae-soul single 'Life Worth' feels like a mighty culmination of Casual Healing's ambitious personal sonic journey. "ONE is the end of one chapter and the beginning of another as we discover higher and wider what it means to be human in the 21st century. Keep your eyes on Casual Healing as we witness music return to its natural mode of bringing many people together."

Award-winning Ōtautahi Christchurch folk music figurehead and helmsman of The Eastern, Adam McGrath's new album Wrecker Songs — subtitled "Songs From And For The Maritime Union of New Zealand" — harnesses the collective power of a small legion of instrumental contributors. "The work we’ve done for unions over the years suggested there were songs to find within the scope of the Maritime Union and the Seafarers’ and Watersiders’ unions that preceded it. The songs run the gamut from fight songs to lonesome songs, drinking songs, unemployment songs and the little shared experiences of women within and close to the Maritime Union movement."