New Music Friday: 13th Floor New Album Picks: April 4, 2025
It’s an all-Kiwi New Music Friday with new releases from Marlon Williams, Tom Lark, Neive Strang and more!
The 13th Floor’s Marty Duda picks these five new releases for your consideration:
- Neive Strang – Find Me In The Rabbit Hole (Polly B) Produced by Sean Donnelly (aka SJD) Neive reflects on the record that has consumed her solo artistry during this time: “Although this isn’t a concept album, these songs were written over the course of a few years with the earliest in 2021 and the latest in 2024. The growth and healing I hear in these songs takes me from start to end every time. It has captured some of the most transformative years of my life, which can now be reflected on forever. It’s for me a very honest and raw album, and Sean Donnelly has handled it beautifully in the producing department. We are both very proud of it.”
2. Marlon Williams – Te Whare Tiwekaweka (Self) Supported by long-time touring band The Yarra Benders, co-producer Mark Perkins, the He Waka Kōtuia singers and featuring a collaboration with Lorde, Te Whare Tīwekaweka is a collection at once contemporary and timeless, traversing Marlon’s familiar folk-country-bluegrass territory, while continuing his exploration of poppier waters and the inherent rhythms of Māori music. Click here to read the 13th Floor Album Review. And…Marlon Williams: Ngā Ao E Rua – Two Worlds, the forthcoming documentary film by Ursula Grace Williams, will be released alongside the album.
3. Tom Lark – Moonlight Hotel (Okie Dokie) Tom Lark, aka Shannon Fowler, explores the parallels between his family’s historical displacement following the 1929 earthquake that destroyed Murchison – a pioneer town in the upper West Coast of the South Island – and his own following the 2011 earthquakes that levelled much of Ōtautahi.
4. Alisa Xayalith – Slow Crush (Nettwerk) After a decade as one-half of The Naked And Famous, Alisa Xayalith is blooming into a solo artist. On the record Xayalith shares, “This album happened during a season when I felt myself shifting into the next phase of my career. I was yearning for a safe space to write and grow. I committed to prioritizing the health of my creativity, and as I did, love and romance began to fill the cracks in my life, leading to my eventual album. My process felt reminiscent of a slow crush building over time. It was the catharsis I needed to push me into this next chapter where I could simply be.”
5. Elliott Dawson – Certain Death (Self) Recorded and produced in Wellington throughout 2023 and produced by James Goldsmith (DARTZ, Wiri Donna, Recitals) Certain Death is a cinematic autobiography of the period immediately following the full development of Dawson’s pre-frontal cortex. Having reached the peak of his brain growth, Dawson leaves behind the abrasive time signatures and penis jokes of his debut Hang Low, to bring us something equally chaotic, but infinitely more refined. Says Dawson, “This record took a lot out of me. I did a lot of staring at the ceiling and scratching my head, like do I really want to go there? Some things are better left in the ground, and this one felt like exhuming my own remains”.
