iHeartRadio Sessions: Trinity Roots

We're proud to bring you our next exclusive iHeartRadio Sessions, this time with luminary purveyors of New Zealand roots music, Trinity Roots.

The Wellington stalwarts reunited in 2010, and have been playing various local and international festivals since, but 2015 saw them release their first new album in 10 years, Citizen, and mark the occasion with headlining slots at Splore and Womad, as well as a mammoth national tour.

Having wrapped that up, they found time to head along to the Barkers flagship store on High Street to perform an intimate six-song set.

Who: Trinity Roots
From: Wellington

Line-up: Warren Maxwell (vocals, guitar) and Rio Hemopo (bass, vocals) are both founding members of the band, having been friends and bandmates since 1998. They both have other musical projects (Maxwell leads Little Bushman and was a member of Fat Freddy's Drop, and Hemopo has contributed to Breaks Co-op, Fat Freddy's Drop, and others), but Trinity Roots has once again become the focus in 2015.

The group have had several different drummers since Riki Gooch left in 2011, but new drummer Ben Wood has slotted right in, having the perfect musical vocabulary, mixing jazz, classical, rock, and blues styles in an unconventional way, which inspired Maxwell and Hemopo in creating the new album Citizen. They're fleshed out by Ed Zuccollo here playing synth parts.

Where they're at: Before they wenton hiatus in 2005, the band had released a self-titled EP, and two platinum selling albums - True, and Home, Land, and Sea, which made them local legends.

The musical landscape and business has changed since they got back together, but the group continues to evolve, and maintain their sincere, conscious, and at times political slant in their writing. Citizen debuted at No. 6 in the Top 40 album chart in March, and the band continue to tour. They've recently returned from another UK tour, and they're playing several dates in Australia in November, as well as collaborating on multiple other projects.

What they sound like: Psychedelic rock, jazz, blues roots music, with influences that range from Queens of the Stone Age to Maori waiata.

Setlist: Citizen, Haiku, Just Like You, Home, Land, and Sea, The Dream, Egos.

Highlights: Maxwell's grin as he incorporates some crazy guitar techniques into the jam section of Citizen; the soulful harmonies of Maxwell, Hemopo, and Wood, which sound as comfortable and in the pocket as a pair of those Barkers jeans hanging in the background; the excellent choppy, groovy ending of Just Like You; and the spine-tingling strains of Home, Land, and Sea which feel just as relevant today as they did 10 years ago.

- nzherald.co.nz