Release Radar: Windswept, TAKATAPUNANI, The Paradox Princess, Hominid, TL Stamp, Clementine + More

Scroll downwards for new and recent Aotearoa highlights from Windswept, TAKATAPUNANI, The Paradox Princess, Hominid, TL Stamp, Clementine, Jeff Henderson, vegetable.machine.animal, and the latest In The Pits video podcast starring Amamelia.

Including members of Bulletbelt, Imperial Slave and Dole Bludger, Te Whanganui-a-Tara's morningstar-swinging extreme metal collective Windswept unveiled 'Cenote' — a majestic and pulverising lead cut from their forthcoming debut album Howling in Baptismal Filth. Out in full on Friday 29th May via Northern Void Records, the barbaric energy expressed in director Amber Beaton's accompanying video whips anticipation to insane levels.

Produced by Big Fat Raro, TAKATAPUNANI's new club anthem 'Perfect Ten' positively leapt out of our office radio speakers (tuned in to 95bFM natch), boasting ultra-sassy lyrics "dedicated to the party girls of Karangahape Road."

An unstoppable force on (and off) local stages and airwaves, The Paradox Princess directs digital hardcore hellfire at our current PM on new banger '1term.govt'. "I wanted to make a song that attacked our prime minister’s absolutely monstrous weakness he carries within him. The way he goes online and the media saying he’ll "be tough" on attacking the poor. "Cracking down on justice" which just puts more POC and indigenous in our prisons. It’s poisonous masculinity that I wanted to make fun of for most of the song in this distortive dance beat. Shedding it down and hint at the continuous colonial history this government is gunning for with full violence."

The electronica project of producer Benny Jennings, Hominid's Play Fighting EP sports four frisky and crisply detailed sound worlds — this time injecting rock heft into the artist's crystalline designs. "It’s heavier, more abrasive in places than any of my previous work, at times leaning into a more intentional idm aesthetic but still at its heart striving to be pretty music."

Playful yet sleek, TL Stamp's third single in less than six months 'creases' feels like a vaporwave-adjacent apparition — weaving live recorded instrumentation with strategic funk sample snatches. "A few years ago I was in Vienna and got to spend some time using my friend’s studio. I recorded myself playing her violin, recorder, and other bits and bobs including the kalimba you can hear in this track. Bass and acoustic were tracked back in my NZ flat, as was a mandola another friend had gifted me (it’s layered and reversed a lot in the back half)."

Laid down live at Double Whammy in Tāmaki Makaurau just before Christmas, Clementine's new single 'Smile! You're On Camera' delivers oodles of scrappy emo-punk energy while calling time on spoiled relationships.

Tāmaki Makaurau outer limits saxophone supremo-o, Jeff Henderson drew upon a dynamic assortment of sound-producing sources — including his own voice — for new two track aural mosaic School Daze. The second track seems to clearly seperate out the individual sounds from the opening title track, potentially a sample artist's playground. "These pieces came about after an invitation by the great Richard Dawson to contribute some sounds to the new Hen Oggled album — his duo (at the time) project with Rhodri Davies. Richard had toured NZ as part of the Altmusic programme and blown everyone away with his incredible solo show. I somewhat (or entirely) misinterpreted the brief and went ahead and sent a bunch of tracks I had been working on at the Audio Foundation which layered recordings of the school kids playing next door, various bowls, percussion, blowers, vocals, saxophones etc etc... the pieces were too formed to be of use, bar the very first note played on marching bass drum. So the fabulous Hen Ogledd album Bronze begins with a nice bass drum note culled from these pieces - for which I am very honoured and pleased!"

Exploring the periphery of human-centric music / sound creation, Electrical Minzu 35 is a new collection from Aotearoa electronic voyager and percussionist vegetable.machine.animal, recorded during a residency at Ting Shuo Hear Say, Tainan, Taiwan. "To the curious, I describe my synth, via a translation app, as something like an ECG, that medical device that makes image from electrical activity in the heart. However, my machine converts fluctuating electrical activity into audio. I connect sensors to the resident green leaves of Eternity Plant, fern, and shrub, recording a sounded representation of their internal aliveness. The sound choices are mine, the dynamic changes are theirs. I use a field microphone to collect the ambient sound of ‘our’ realm - scooters, dogs, conversations, the hush, and jet planes overhead. I sit between parallel and active sound worlds."

Brought to you by the overwhelmingly talented team of Callum Devlin, Zoë Larsen Cumming, Annabel Kean and host Rachel Ashby, the In The Pits video podcast made a welcome return late last week. Mandatory viewing and certainly an emotional roller coaster ride, the star of Episode 7 is Tūī award-winning, Naarm-based producer and songwriter Amamelia aka Amelia Berry — who spilled the beans about her fab new album The Joy Of Living (out now via Sunreturn) and much of her hugely productive career to date.