I love stories about people making their dreams come true. Acoustic Indie/Rock musician Khellsey-Anna of Invercargill was determined to make and release an album before the age of 30.
At 28, she’d done it.
A women’s health nurse by day, Khellsey was previously part of successful covers band Euphoria for six years, playing at pubs and events by night and weekends.
Despite their success, original music never really stopped calling her back…
At just 19, Auckland-based singer-songwriter Saem Millward is busking his way into New Zealand’s music industry.
Originally from Palmerston North, Saem’s musical story began at age 13 when he sat down at a keyboard, picking up melodies by ear before moving into classical piano lessons.
High school brought a new chapter. Inspired by watching the school choir perform, he joined them before auditioning and landing a spot in the 2023-24 New Zealand Secondary Students Choir…
“Inspiration comes from my belief that anything can be creative, and is.” – Simon Byrne.
Saxophonist Simon Byrne recently made the leap from Britain to start a new life in Wellington.
Completing a Law degree in a previous life, Byrne’s calling has always been music. Using hospitality roles as a way to explore and perform his way around New Zealand, he is now committed to making music his main work source…
When life took a turn in 2019, 40-year-old Kiwi builder and designer Geoff Kunac picked up a guitar.
Six months later, he had nearly enough songs for a whole album.
“I think for lack of anything better to do more than anything else,” Geoff says. “It became my cathartic diary or voice, as I was silently watching my life simultaneously fall apart around me.”
Geoff of Martinborough didn’t come from a background of music. Teenage memories of messing around on the family’s piano, dropping out of guitar lessons at school, and listening to his older sister’s CDs and mixed tapes were the extent of his music experience…
“Failure is when you’re trying to please everybody… Just do you, and you only.”
Alternative Grime is a genre of music that was previously unknown to me.
But far from the rough-around-the-edges rappers with flabby and hollowly aggressive rhymes, is word wizard Ricardo Marinoni.
Marinoni is the well-presented, self-assured and lyrically talented front man of CHOZE.