Powers, Opus & Fifi – Audio Foundation: March 28, 2026 (13th Floor Concert Review)
A break, a reprieve from the rock n roll experience. The Audio Foundation, located in a basement of a building, on Poynton Terrace, is a place, an opportunity, a refuge for the adventurous, visioned, critical and genre-bashing, offers such. Armed with giant cans of Sapporo, a crisp twenty-dollar note (always supporting the locals)13th Floor pundit Simon Coffey went out of his comfort zone to experience Aotearoan avant-garde.
fifi
fifi is Fi, of Te Papa-i-Oea (Palmerston North) groups SODA BOYZ, Bitch Whistle & Puketiro Superhero (all of which can be found on Bandcamp). She is now based in Ōtepoti, and tonight she is solo.
Alone with her guitar, electric, in the limelight, she has already started when I find a seat, and (quietly, surreptitiously) open my can of beer. The songs seem introspective, intricate to play, and Fi vocals are strained, likely for effect. As she endeavors, she uses her voice and mouth to add dimensions to the simple songs. Not a long set, but an increasingly engaging one.
O/PUS
Seeing O/PUS is always a joyous affair. O/PUS is a Tāmaki Makaurau supergroup featuring members of Pumice, Ducklingmonster, Hex, and Cloven Hearts. Their 2025 album Out At Sea, The Water Is Deep was one of this reviewer highlight albums (alongside Pearly* – Not So Sweet)
O/PUS momentarily falter, then fill the space with a swirl. A swirl of bass, guitar, violin, drums and voices, that is unequal as instruments pulse in and out as the soundtech finds the ruma’s sweet spot. Stefan Neville’s bass lines convey rhythm and drive to the songs, I feel Black Sabbath and The Undertones, but with the others I hear psychadelia, krautrock beats, punk and noise. Beth Dawson, with guitar shoulder battles with mic stand, finding her sweet spot, the space is renowned for idiosyncrasies. Meanwhile, Jade Farley’s finesse adds richness with her violin playing.
There are standout songs, many, but it’s a number on which drummer Liz Mathews just hits her tambourine that enthralls. They finish, and the few call for more, Neville seems keen, Dawson’s guitar comes off, goes back on, comes back off. They leave the people wanting more.
Powers
Poneke born Campbell Kneale, is Birchville Cat Motel, a project that spread, once enveloping Sonic Youth’s Lee Renaldo and Dead C’s Bruce Russell in separate collaborations (both available on Bandcamp). Tonight he is Powers, another solo project, new.
As he engineers his impressive tray of goodies, readying, checking, conferring (with the sound tech) eyes are on him, and phones are on the pedals, clicking, there are people in the know, here tonight.
A wall, a wavering wall, that ebbs and flows, distorts, contorts and momentarily waits. Powers, Kneale creates with guitar and pedals, a share-filling soundtrack. For 30 odd minutes, as he manipulates guitar, dials and pedals, he is in constant flux, altering, preempting and managing his output. It is absorbing, inflicting, soothing and energising at the same time. I disappear and reappear in different moments of the journey. It was the experience I was looking for tonight, my beer cans are empty.
Simon Coffey
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Powers:
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