The "pop and roll" outfit is led by ex-Dunedinite Anthony Lander, formerly of melodic fuzz foursome the Tweeks and Wellington psych band The Blue Onesies, the mountain from which Moses has now descended.
"The last band [The Blue Onesies], we played down in Christchurch one time and we found this band called Will Sergeant Survive to play with us,’’ Lander explains over the phone of the group’s dawning.
"They played a Brian Jonestown Massacre cover, and we had one in our set as well, so we thought ‘Oh these guys are cool’. Then later on, a couple of them moved to Wellington and started a band called Love You To and we used to gig with them quite a lot. So then when those bands broke we just ended up playing together."
American retro-psych revivalists The Brian Jonestown Massacre still serve as a point of inspiration; Moses’ most recent singles Life Finds a Way and New Day Dawning are inspired by the band and their co-stars in indie music documentary Dig!, the Dandy Warhols.
"Both of those bands still loom pretty large.
"I was still living in Dunedin when Dig! came out. I’d been listening to the Dandy Warhols and thought they were pretty awesome, then saw that documentary and like the rest of the world found out there was this really cool band called the Brian Jonestown Massacre. I think that was probably the same for [band mates] Teyler [Hayes] and Dan [Wylie]. All of us had those influences in common, and when that happens, it’s something that can give you some kind of direction."
They do their own little twist on their trippy forefathers on both tracks. Not quite the shamanistic outlaw circus of the BJM, nor the rock posturing of the Dandy Warhols, it’s indebted without carbon copying. The addition of a shimmering saxophone also works a treat.
"I’m [attracted to psychedelic music] because you can get lost in it, although that sounds so cheesy," Lander muses on his long love of the genre.
"You can wig out, you hear it, and it’s this repetitive, good groove, you can forget everything else. It also is a cool base to put melodies on top of. It just seems to connect with me. We’re all huge fans of The Beatles and the Rolling Stones and that too."
Moses plays Dunedin with support from The Violet-Ohs and Death and the Maiden.
KING LOSER RE-EMERGES
Primal interstellar surf rockers King Loser is having a 2016 Comeback Special this month.
The Kiwi band, which hasn’t been seen in years, is playing two shows in Dunedin next week, which seem to have the potential to be as wild, notorious and blistering as their original ’90s stint.
The gigs
• Moses’ Dunedin Album Release with The Violet-Ohs and Death and the Maiden, Friday, September 9, at Re:Fuel, Dunedin. $10 on the door from 9pm.
Moses’ debut album is available from mosesnz.bandcamp.com
• King Loser ’16 Comeback Special, Thursday, September 8, at the Tunnel Hotel, Port Chalmers, and Friday, September 9, at The Crown Hotel with support from Sleaze, from 9pm.
