Thomston takes us through Auckland

6 October 2016 | 11:19 am | Julia Insolia
Originally Appeared In

Having just released his debut album, Thomston is quickly becoming one of our favourite acts, so we wanted to get to know him a little better.

Auckland songwriter and producer THOMSTON has been making waves the past couple of years, firstly with his experimental Argonaut EP in 2014, and then again with 2015's release Backbone. Now he's back and bigger than ever, releasing his debut album TOPOGRAPH just a few days ago.

The 20 year old musician wrote the album in five cities on three continents over almost two years, so you know it's something special. As Thomston explains, “I wrote it. I wrote it in the years I travelled the world and learnt vast amounts about people, places and myself. Releasing my first record is scary, especially because some of the material on it is two years old. I wrote it all while I was a teenager, so it has this wide-eyed, youthful innocence to it, but it’s ended up a coherent body of work that I’m proud of, and it sounds like me.”

To celebrate the release of his first debut album, we asked Thomston to give us a little insight and guide into his hometown of Auckland, to get to know more about this young intriguing artist.

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Close to home, this is Huia, a very 80s concrete viewing platform juts out just above the trees and gives you this view. On the other side of that mountain is Whatipu, a beach that is very significant to me. I’ve gone there to clear my head a lot.

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The Winter Gardens. I love stepping into the really dense atmosphere in the glass houses, walking past all kinds of tropical ferns and flowers. Friends and I look at the old coins thrown into the pond in the middle, trying to attribute wishes to them. There’s a lot to do. We have fun. We’re wild. We don’t get out much. 

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This is Mercer Bay, my friend Chase (the one who took this photo) and I went out there to film a little documentary introducing you to the world of my first record. We got there at 5:30am and watched the fog slowly dissipate as the sun came up behind thick clouds out east. It was so surreal and beautiful, I sometimes struggle to comprehend I live here.

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This is a staircase in the art gallery a short walk from my house. Every now and then the place has some killer exhibits that are interactive and calm the hyperactive child in me. The view from the roof is also a million bucks. 

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Auckland has some really ridiculous landscapes, take Te Henga, this almost-lunar landscape that’s a half hour drive from my place. Every time a new record comes out that I’ve been waiting for a while to hear (see; Wet, Frank Ocean, Kanye West, Drake) I take these roads out this way. It’s a beautiful drive that somehow hasn’t gotten old yet. I hope it never does.

TOPOGRAPH is out now, and is available on Apple Music, iTunes, and Spotify.

Words by Julia Insolia