Watch: This Pale Fire Perform Northern Lights at The 13th Floor

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This Pale Fire, the musical project of Auckland-based singer/songwriter Corban Koschak, is due to release his debut long player, Alchemy, tomorrow.

Corban and his band, including noted producer Levi Patel, visited The 13th Floor studios and and performed a few songs from the new album along with chatting with Marty Duda. We’ll have the entire session ready soon, but here is their performance of Northern Lights for you now.

Here’s the record company blurb:

Born in Wellington and moving to the concrete jungle of Auckland from a young age, and having never formally studied music, the 27-year-old’s passion started when he was gifted a guitar when he was just 14-years-old. He’s always loved poetry and soon started writing song after song in his bedroom. It wasn’t until a fellow musician and close confidant heard some of this and encouraged him to pursue it that he broke out of those four walls.

The result was his first EP Dusk. Enlisting the help of Ekko Park’s Nick Douch (drums), alongside Dead Favours‘ Kyle Wetton (electric guitars and bass) and Josh Steyn-Ross (keys), the band added further layers to his honed pop instincts, with the result a stunning introduction to the honest independent artist.

It was also during this time that This Pale Fire had a very fortuitous meeting with fellow local artist and producer, Cymbol 303 – who had been steadily building a profile in his own right, taking out the George FM Remix Factor Competition in 2013 and playing high-profile shows including Rhythm & Vines. Crossing paths professionally, the two would ultimately go on to release collaborative EP The Cycle in July 2015.

While dance floor EDM meets earnest indie rock may at first seem like an unlikely collaboration, This Pale Fire and Cymbol 303’s collaboration was a bold and realized one. Compiling a compelling collection of songs, the EP explored the different stages of relationships, from infatuation through to bitter resentment, while the artwork – which features an infinity sign – is all about trying to break this relationship cycle. Lead single off the record ‘Burst of Colour’ has had over 460k + streams to date.

Koschak has been dubbed one of the most unique new voices to emerge from the Auckland scene – a voice that threads emotion throughout his unique brand of classically inflected ambient folk-pop.

Having worked with acclaimed Auckland ambient artist and producer Levi Patel on the forthcoming work, the songs on Alchemy dance between the subtle and gentle pastures of tracks like ‘Northern Lights’ and ‘Curse’ to the darker, angstier depths of Koschak’s repertoire like ‘End of Science’. The whole album is a self-written and overseen project – with everything from the songs to the album artwork created by Koschak. With initial recordings taking place at Patel’s isolated Matakana studio, the tracks were recorded and finalised at Kingsland’s Studio 509. The 12-track offering takes you to the centre of Koschak’s fabric through deep observations, love songs and existential thought.

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