Tiny Ruins heading south

Hollie Fullbrook of Tiny Ruins. Photo: Georgie Craw.

Dark folk band Tiny Ruins is embarking on an 11-date national tour this winter, including two stops in Otago next weekend.

The project of British-born songwriter Hollie Fullbrook, the band is currently laying the groundwork for the release of its third album, now in its final stages of recording.

Fullbrook has kept herself busy since the release of Brightly Painted One in 2014, making records with the Clean’s Hamish Kilgour (Hurtling Through) and critically acclaimed film-maker David Lynch (the 2016 single Dream Wave).

According to a recent interview with Radio New Zealand, Fullbrook has been listening to more lyrically direct and instrumental music in the build up to the new album’s release, so expect her new songs to push into a more expansive and experimental direction.

ELSEWHERE IN DUNEDIN

Dunedin electro-doom duo Pesk (Amee and Rafferty Parker) has released its debut album this week, a titanic work of darkness, gloom and heaviness called ground.

Opener Forests sounds a touch like Irish rock band My Bloody Valentine at its most primal and destructive, the lo-fi drums setting a sludgy groove for the super-overdriven guitars, oscillating synths and vocals.

Elsewhere, there’s a touch of stoner metal from the pagan vibes of Song of the Hounds, Aphotic Zone is weird and alien, like the almost sunless section of ocean from which it takes its name, while the slightly more gentle and haunting Tyranny sounds just as good here as when it was first released in 2014.

Synthwave artist Embedded Figures, aka Amber Skye of Strange Harvest, has also shared new music this week in the form of Teen Vamp, the first single from mini-EP Le Tre Arterie.

While it is the first taste from a forthcoming album, Le Tre Arterie also forms part of an audiovisual collaboration between Embedded Figures and Ducklingmonster, of Dunedin noise rock band Futurians.

Each track corresponds with a video, produced by Ducklingmonster, loosely based on Dario Argento’s Le Tre Madri trilogy. The horror/thriller-themed video triptych is expected to be released in late July.

Opening with a dark and sinister Lynchian arpeggiator that calls to mind high school kids running from a bloodsucking vampire, the ominous air builds and builds, synth layers coming in waves, before some hard handclaps punctuate like exclamation marks.

If it’s something a little more mellow you’re after, Dunedin-based country duo Flora Knight and Sean Donald also released a couple of tracks at the end of May.

The pair sings in close harmony and play fiddle tunes gleaned from the southern states of America with talent and conviction. The duo will release their debut album sometime in 2017.