About
Stars and the Underground
Stars and the Underground is the the musical project of Auckland, New Zealand based singer songwriter John Mason. (ex Winterland circa 1999)
Our name suggests a duality between musical textures. Usual motifs include ethereal and dark musical tones. If you walked into a music store people might file us alongside other artists and styles but how do you categorise yourself?
If you must then I would prefer it to read something like Post Punk, Darkwave and Dark Synthwave and Shoegaze.
But if you were to ignore us due to such categorisation you’d be doing yourself and us a disservice.
The honest truth is our songs encourage you to look at the darkest of things and find beauty and peace and freedom of expression within them. They compel the listener to emerge with a greater sense of purpose and understanding of the events they communicate something about.
Our single “Nosferatu Upon Tyne” was released in August 2020 and received airplay in New Zealand, Australia, Mexico, Peru, Argentina, Canada, Greece, Germany, UK, France and the US. Nosferatu was also included on the US compilation UnObscured Comp Vol 2 2020 along side bands like Altar De Fey Shadow Assembly and Ashes Fallen.
After a long hiatus due to a re-imagining of this project the body of our new album “Guardians of the Night” is complete. While I can’t commit to a release date as of writing this, what I can promise in the near future is the release of the first single “Lonely Black Hearts” and also a return to the stage for 2025.
Press
“Dark Soulful Post Punk from New Zealand…”
Mick Mercer (UK)
“Stars and the Underground conjure a dark synthwave and shoegaze sound that drifts like cathedral smoke and sways like twilight on the tide. Guitars chime and shimmer with celestial clarity, while basslines brood beneath, steady as sleepwalks. Vocals echo like lost prayers, half-whispered, half-resolved. Drawing from the same windswept well as The Church and The Mission, they summon atmosphere over aggression, beauty over bombast, mood over momentum…”
Alice Teeple Post-Punk.com
“After a two-year silence, Stars and the Underground are back—louder, darker, and more cinematic than ever. Their new single ‘Lonely Black Hearts’; marks the first taste of their upcoming album Guardians of the Night, a brooding blend of post-punk, synthwave, and shoegaze that’s already turning heads internationally…”
Nick EmptySpaces.co.nz
“Moody, atmospheric textured landscapes of sound which wash out like smooth rolling waves…”
Rev Orange Peel, 13thfloor.co.nz
“Moving through the set that combined facets of post punk, shoe gaze and dark electronic music with vocals from Mason intermingly added in just the right places Stars and the Underground proved itself to be a worthy live act…”
Sarah Kidd Ambient Light Blog
“Stars and the Underground are a nice bit of post punk…”
Darryn Baser music.net.nz
Social
https://www.facebook.com/starsandtheunderground/
https://www.instagram.com/starsandtheunderground/
https://starsandtheunderground.bandcamp.com
https://www.youtube.com/@starsandtheunderground8183
https://twitter.com/starsandtheund1
Booking