Release Roundup: Chances Are, Church & AP and Deadforest, Trioglodyte, Sunset Temples + More

Another scorching hot week in the office and out, when we covered tunes from DARTZ, Swallow The Rat, Riiki Reid featuring Balu Brigada, NO CIGAR, Caru, REPAIRS, The Wendys and The Cthulus. We recommend hitting the beach this weekend (if you're lucky enough to dodge the rain) while blasting the following new local releases from Chances Are, Church & AP and Deadforest, Blair Parkes, Trioglodyte, Sunset Temples, Thee Righteous Yeah and Bodyache, your neighbours will love it.

Featuring members of Trust Punks, Cool Cult and Long Distance Runner, Chances Are announced a renewed outburst of activity, welcoming listeners into their intricately assembled world with nearly ten minute single 'Asleep At The Wheel Of Love'. Based between Tūranganui-a-Kiwa, Tāmaki Makaurau and London, the post-punk trio of Alexander Grant, Lliam Powell, and Maté Vella's debut album of the same name is launching on 11th April via Sunreturn — including standout earlier singles 'Dining Room, 2001' and 'Peach'. Grant shared: "I recall that the idea behind Asleep At The Wheel Of Love was to write a song differently to how we previously had (i.e. small room, guitars, bass, drums, riffs, melodies etc). Ideologically when writing we took a maximalist approach, throwing all the ideas we had possible at the songs and seeing what stuck".

Three of Aotearoa hip hop's finest, Church & AP and Deadforest find no respite in the strange world of dreams with ominous organ-drenched new cut 'Nightmare'.

Ōtautahi's prolific DIY guitar-pop / crunchy shoegaze maestro Blair Parkes reunites with vocalist Miss Mercury and bassist Marcus Thomas on new eight track album old plastic — including recent singles 'time will stop all of its meaning' and 'go baby go'.

Kiwijahzz imprint's first release of 2024, Tales of a Master Mariner finds jazz adventurers Trioglodyte — Jeff Henderson, Eamon Edmundsen-Wells, Chris O'Connor — teaming up with saxophonist Roger Manins & Kat Tomacruz (guitar & cello) on seven evocative tracks. "Tales of a Master Mariner is a suite of music which follows the journey of a ship on a doomed voyage. Inspired by, and dedicated to Captain Andrew Leachman and his wife Viv Leachman, the music imagines a voyage which begins calmly and ends in disaster, with the crew of the vessel travelling into a violent storm, drowning and being taken away by angels".

No stranger to aurally uncharted waters, Altamont Young's (P Wits) II is two tracks of abrasive textural noise and distant explosive percussion, taking on doom metal qualities and crushing all listeners with relentless lead number 'Third Judge'.

Founding father of Aotearoa subterranean doom metal scuzz, Campbell Kneale (Birchville Cat Motel / Black Boned Angel) teamed up with Sarah Bingle (Universal Joint / Hoopla) and Elise Bishop (Universal Joint / BadCop BadCop / On) on Sunset Temples' searing nearly forty minute Another (Future Blues) Sunday, out via Masterton's Another Sunday imprint. Kneale put it thusly: "It’s getting to where we want to be somehow… drums that are ‘felt’ more than heard, bass that wobbles and loops, guitar that almost fractalizes into complete abstraction… and yet still be a three piece blues band like Hendrix and Led Zep and The Stooges. I dunno… some grubby kinda Fushitsusha nonsense".

Fun fact: all releases from the Another Sunday imprint share the same title. Another Sunday (Ghosts) is a three track collection from Michael Morley's (The Dead C) ambient project Thee Righteous Yeah, clocking in at over an hour of reality reconfiguring atmospheres. "Despite the ever present haze this is a strident and emphatic work, perhaps not for everybody but transformative and rewarding for the brave".

Te Whanganui-a-Tara sound artist Bodyache returns to blast away ears and minds with meditative forty six minute HNW (heavy noise wall) / ambient work The Sound of Accretion.