CONNOR NESTOR'S BLOG: Catching Up With Kids Of 88's Sam McCarthy

After months spent locked away in their Mt Eden studio, Kids Of 88 are back with the first offering from their upcoming second album. The new single is called 'Tucan' and features none other than Alisa Xayalith from The Naked & Famous.

I fired through some Q's over to Sam McCarthy from the band who kindly gave me some A's,

Check out the brand new video then read on to find out a little bit more about it and what the boys have been up to.

KidsOf88 - Tucan


Firstly where the heck have Kids Of 88 been for the last year?
Working like hermits, away in our studio in Mt. Eden, working on this album. We've written and produced around 30 songs, so about 3 albums worth, just fine tuning ideas and developing our sound. We love pop music and we want to make music that is good in a world sense.

Tucan is the first track released from the new album, what's it all about and why have you decided to come back with something thats not your traditional KO88 banger?
Tucan is about Astral Projection, for those who dont know what that is, it's an outer-body experience where your 'astral body' leaves your physical and somewhat gives you the ability to travel, anywhere in the universe on whats called the 'astral plane'. Haha it sounds really hippy and spiritual but as people we're really into the power of the mind and soul and life outside of a physical realm. We never thought such a subject would make a pop song however haha. I guess we arent seeing Tucan as a 'single release' like one that would include immense advertising and general 'hype', although such songs are soon to come, we love pop bangers and there are several on this album, for the time being we just wanted people to 'feel' good.

Alisa from TN&F features on the track, how did that come about?
TNAF are hands down our favorite people on the planet, for a band with such grand success we still feel humbled that they enjoy our strange company haha, however we'd been wanting to collaborate on a track for a while, since we used to tour in NZ back in 2010, so it was a somewhat natural occurrence which was so great based on how the song sounds and what it's about.

Did you guys know what you wanted from the video? and how did it come about doing it with Levi Beamish?
We didnt have the most ridiculous concept in mind, something that visually echoes the textures and the dreaminess of the songs production. Something to package the work in a fuzzy astral ball of goodness. I've known Levi since he was knee high to a duck, he's a good family friend of Jordans.

Have you got a name for the new album? Release date?
The album is called ModernLove, the record is looking up for a July release.

What have you guys been listening to lately?
Oh goodness, too much. A lot of production heavy music like Porcelain Raft, Young Magic. Plenty of A$AP, Teebs, Rick Ross haha. Classic dance like Orbital, even a bit of psy-trance. I've been getting back into 60s Girl Garage, I love girls, fuzz and reverb. This great celestial music producer from the 90s called 'Iasos'.

This is some of the stuff the boys have been listening to. The first is my favorite because it has only had 10 views.



Harmonium Ascension Experiences 3

Orbital - Impact (The Earth Is Burning)

Sunstryk - Pure Essence

A$AP Rocky - Leaf Ft. Main Attrakionz

Porcelain Raft - Is It Too Deep for You?

The Bittersweets - Hurtin' kind

So there you go. I'm really looking forward to the albums release...I think its going to be a real doozey.

@ConnorNestor