Māori musician Troy Kingi Photo: Abe Mora
On the new album Time Wasters, Troy Kingi uses his voice as an instrument layered over ambient music "to give it a bit more balls".
The multi-talented Māori musician and actor performs the tracks 'Happy Colour', 'Presidents and Assholes', 'Bastard' and 'Rubix'.
Listen to the session
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Troy Kingi plays Auckland's Powerstation on 23 November, Christchurch's The Church on 24 November and Wellington's San Francisco Bath House on 25 November.
Time Wasters: Soundtrack to Current Day Meanderings is the seventh album in Kingi's 10:10:10 series for which he's pledged to make 10 albums in 10 different genres over 10 years.
Kingi (Te Arawa, Ngāpuhi, Te Whānau-ā-Apanui) says his voice was struggling a bit on the tour for his previous album – the '80s-inspired Year Of The Ratbags And Their Musty Theme Songs.
Time Wasters was inspired by the evocative instrumental genre of film music.
"It probably helped that I was listening to Surprise Chef and Khruangbin and all these cool instrumental bands, so it made it kind of easy to transition.
"It's frigging cool but also scary because now I have to try and sound like I know how to play the guitar. I can't hide behind the vocals or the words anymore, it's all the music now so that's the new challenge with this one."
Photo: Supplied
All song titles on Time Wasters are inspired by different games that Kingi enjoys playing.
"Basically it's a reference to my time on the road away from home. I'm playing games on my phone or me and the band are playing card games and we're quite competitive. That's basically what this album is about."
The voice of Kingi's nine-year-old daughter Āio – "an amazing singer since she was a baby" – can be heard on the track 'Krispy Kreme'.
"She sings all the time, she doesn't really talk so she'll talk in melodies … She's always had this very mature voice.'
Once the Time Wasters album tour is complete, Kingi says it will be time to start working on the next album in the 10:10:10 series.
He's also got his fingers crossed there might be a second season of his RNZ video series Our Other Islands.
"That was fun, it definitely didnt feel like work. I basically got to check out a lot of amazing islands around Aotearoa and eat a lot of seafood, meet cool people."
Rakiura / Stewart Island was a particular highlight for Kinigi who'd wanted to visit the southern outpost for ages.
"No one eats kina (sea urchin) down there so they're giant massive things, [there's] pāua everywhere. It was amazing."
Related: Troy Kingi: 'They don't care about time'