The 10 Best New Zealand Tracks of 2015

It's been an eventful year in New Zealand – farewelling one of their greatest sporting legends, spending a whole lot of time, money and tweets on what their new flag should look like, not to mention their greatest living musical icon covering the biggest track of the year. Amongst the big ticket news items, the country's vibrant electronic music communities produced some incredible records. Here Leo G. Clark guides us through the ten best dance and electronic tracks made by Kiwis in 2015.

10) SoccerPractise - Windfall

Like some sort of twisted hybrid, Windfall strips down garage drums and works a pop song around them. There's low-key a bunch of excellent singers operating around New Zealand electronic music at the moment, and SoccerPractise are very good at working excellent tracks around theirs. Bonus points for bringing Te Reo back into the club.

9) Totems – Echolocate

Totems has already proven himself super adept at taking any number of influences and paying tribute to them excellently, but on his recent EP everything melts together a bit more. This newfound focus is showcased best on "Echolocate", with flashes of footwork and jungle, slices of dubstep rhythms and muffled hooks hidden in the same four bars, making it a 100 percent engrossing listening experience.

8) Introverted Dancefloor – Take It High

Bevan Smith's a 'patience makes perfect' sort of dude, but the payoff you get in "Take It High" makes it well worth the wait. Moving from previous dubbier works as Signer into a more straightforward poppy realm as Introverted Dancefloor, his 2015 album is hit after hit. "Take It High" makes you wait, slowly building towards a hands-in-the-air euphoric chorus that deserves to be played at every summer festival this year.

7) Keepsakes – Ever So Merry

Keepsakes lives here but comes from England, and it's blatantly obvious as soon as "Ever So Merry" starts kicking. This is someone who's been raised on a steady diet of techno since they were a baby instead of "Slice of Heaven". His resting heartbeat is probably 128bpm. "Ever So Merry" doesn't let up for six and a half minutes, and is probably the biggest out-and-out techno slammer New Zealand has been blessed with this year.

6) Chelsea Jade – Low Brow

While New Zealand deals with a swathe of post-Lorde Dark Minimalist Pop, Chelsea Jade is offering a way out. "Low Brow" feels like the first of her tracks that brazenly aims for stadium status, and it more or less gets there with expert restraint and an easy hook. Hands down the best pop hit New Zealand produced in 2015.

5) Wywy Brix – Polydactyl

1080p's steady output of bizarro house and techno struck gold with the Wywy Brix release earlier this year. "Polydactyl" is better suited to the bathtub than the club, as arpeggiated synths bubble up and around your brain. It isn't until everything fades out at the end that the drum patterns become totally clear, at which point you're hitting repeat to pick apart its layers all over again.

4) Jon Sable – Dust To Ashes

Sable is another classic NZ producer, in that he's finding success by not living here. I'm a sucker for anything that follows in the footsteps of "Deep Burnt" and Dust 2 Ashes bears that influence proudly. It's all about stuttery hi hats and swelling strings, and could easily coast by on this for its nine minutes. But two and a half minutes in he adds a horn hook and it finds another gear, making this track perfect for kicking back in amazement.

3) Fis - Sternum Sanctum

Fis fled Wellington before everything really took off for him, so every new release feels like a postcard from a distant friend. A harrowing, hypnotic postcard that you hit repeat on again and again. "Sternum Sanctum" puts drone aesthetics through the blender, carving out a stuttering head-nodder that suddenly blossoms at the two minute mark into something truly beautiful - only to take your hand and drag you back into its gaping, noisy abyss again.

2) Violet ft A.M.O.R., Nightwave, Nancy Whang, Mamacita, Coco Solid - Transition(Underground Resistance cover)

Released for International Women's Day, this track would make the list based on the all-star cast alone. But the call to arms slays on every level, stripping down the Underground Resistance original and only adding to its power as they go. If it's good enough for Versace, it's probably too good for us. A true gift – it might be a stretch to label it purely a New Zealand track, but it seems pretty silly if Coco Solid did something in 2015 and it didn't make this list.

1. Chaos In The CBD – Midnight In Peckham

Chaos In The CBD have finally perfected the chilled out lounge house jazz vibe they have been playing with since 2013's ode to their native North Shore, "78 to Stanley Bay". Gorgeous piano chords are played over little more than a kick, a shaker and the occasional hi hat, but the real joy here comes straight from those damned beautiful horns. Buy your mum this EP for Christmas. I swear she'll love it.

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Lead photo by Joel Fowler, Design by Christopher Classens. Drum machine featured: Elektron Analog Rytm.