Phoebe RIngs photographed by Frances Carter
This interview was initially published in Debate Magazine on 4 August, 2025.
Hot off of the release of their debut album ‘Aseurai’ via Carpark Records, Auckland indie-pop quartet Phoebe Rings are currently bubbling under the surface of international recognition. This year alone, they’ve opened for Japanese Breakfast at the Auckland Town Hall, toured through Asia, and kept their friends and fans back home in Aotearoa well fed with frequent gigs and presence across the scene. I spoke to band members Crystal Choi (Skogkatt), Simeon Kavanagh-Vincent (Lucky Boy, Princess Chelsea), and Alex Freer (A.C Freazy, Tiny Ruins) at Whammy Public Bar, the successor to the old stomping grounds of The Wine Cellar about their debut album, their international shows, how they work together collaboratively, and more.
(Note: Bassist Benjamin Locke was off in the UK at the time of this interview, but I’d like to note that his track “Get Up” on the album is one of my favourites, and not a ‘leaden moment’ as the otherwise lovely Pitchfork review states.)
Liam:
I think most people within the Auckland scene became aware of you guys around 2022 after the EP came out. How long had the group existed before that point?
Crystal:
We had our debut show February of 2020 - Right before the lockdown, of course.
Liam:
Was Phoebe Rings your first main project? Or did you have other various things before?
Crystal:
Oh, I had a jazz 10 piece project called Skogkatt, and that was more chambery.
Liam:
Were the others in that band, or was it just generally around Auckland music scenes that everyone met?
Crystal:
Yeah, we're such a small scene that we kept bumping into each other at gigs and watching each other play. Simeon and I had very briefly both been in Princess Chelsea, and Simeon still is. I was also in Alex's band, A.C. Freazy.
Liam:
I think that the first EP immediately did well within Aotearoa, simply because you are all talented, long-performing musicians who have the skills to be able to put together an EP that's immediately quite good without having to find the sound too much. Did you go into writing the EP with a particular goal in mind, or was it basically just like "These are the songs I've written. Phoebe Rings will be the name for how I release them."
Alex:
[To Crystal] Yeah, you had a couple of songs you played with Skogkkat, with the 10 piece jazz ensemble. Why did you want to change it to a more indie pop sound?
Liam:
You're taking my job!
Crystal:
[Laughs] Well, there actually was a song that I had as a demo, but I had never released it because it was too in the Skogkkat world - a bit more chambery. I mean. There always were songs that I'd written that didn't really fit into that genre. And I thought, "Ah, this does much better in a more indie rock/pop world", which I became a bit more drawn to after I'd been on some tours with other artists. When we formed the band of Phoebe Rings, I wrote some more, thinking of you all in mind. So it was a mix of pre-written songs and songs that I'd written when I called the band.
Liam:
So then, would the album have been all songs that were written with the band in mind?
Crystal:
There was one, 'Playground Song', that was written around the EP time. But other than that, everything was written, not just since the band was formed, but it was actually co-written by all four of us.
Liam:
Yeah, I was re-listening to the album on the way in, and it's paramount how much the full band's influence grew from the EP. Maybe that's just because there were more voices on it than just Crystal, but even then, I think there are maybe one or two that you're the only vocalist on, and then everything else has at least one of your voices in the background.
Alex:
[To Crystal] You did all the BVs for the EP - did you originally do all the BVs for the album, and then we added our own ones?
Crystal:
I think I did guide vocals, but the idea was to have all of us.
Alex:
It was a conscious decision to be like, "We don't have to have a chorus of Crystals now, we can put ourselves in."
Simeon:
I definitely brought it up, to not make it a Fleetwood Mac situation where everyone sings lead. We knew Crystal was gonna sing lead, and then Ben had his song, obviously. But other than that, you two [Crystal and Alex] share vox on ‘Mandarin Tree’, and we [Crystal and Simeon] share on ‘Drifting’. So there's some heavy backing vocals that we do, but we don't take any lead in the album.
Crystal:
I do like how there are some duet moments.
Liam:
It's mixed in a very full band way, where a lot of the vocals don't feel like backing vocals. Everything feels very balanced out, and it's so much more of a collaborative work between the four of you - which is actually something I'm curious about, Crystal, if it felt weird to hand over parts of the project?
Crystal:
It was the most liberating thing ever [All laugh]. Honestly, it was the best decision I've ever made. Everyone has such amazing, slightly different to each other tastes. It's so fun to witness their skills coming into the Phoebe Rings world. Seeing other people write other tracks of the album in their own way, and layering things on top of that was so fun.
Liam:
Did you give any guidance of what a Phoebe Rings song should be?
Crystal:
I don't think I've ever told the band exactly what sound I wanted. But I do remember Simeon and Alex talking about how writing songs for Lucky Boy or A.C. Freazy would have been a bit different, like they did have Phoebe Rings in mind, maybe having the EP as a bit of a sound template. But I definitely didn't want to specify what that was going to be, because that's gonna kill the creativity.
Liam:
What was the approach on both your ends for the tracks you wrote, Alex and Simeon? Did they start immediately as Phoebe Rings songs?
Simeon:
I have a folder in my Dropbox for Phoebe Rings demos with a really, really bad filing system that's like, "idea one, idea two, idea three". There ended up being ten ideas which, as I felt things were progressing with other people's songs, I went in a specific direction of what ideas I wanted to look at. My personal philosophy for the album was writing songs that didn't exist on the album, if that makes any sense - like, I really wanted to write the last song. I felt like I had gained a lot more of an appreciation of pop music in the years we were recording, and I thought it'd be nice to write a sparkly pop tune. So I was deliberately looking at what the others were doing, and not trying to leave that world, but fill it in a little bit more.
Liam:
Did that pop understanding come from the time that you've spent in Princess Chelsea?
Simeon:
I mean, that definitely is a big help, because she is such an amazing example of writing a really fucking good pop song that, when you just break it down, have such an interesting arrangement and stylistic sound. So that has been more of an inspiration than an influence, because I don't think I could ever do what she does, but it's nice to look at examples of people writing really good pop music.
Alex:
I think I find it easier to write for Phoebe Rings than I do to write songs myself. I get really sick of hearing my own voice, saying my own thoughts. And I think it's really nice thinking about things that sound good in Crystal's voice.
Liam:
Have you gotten to a point now where there's much difficulty in coming up with parts for Phoebe Rings, or figuring out how to kind of approach songs individually, as a group?
Simeon:
There's certainly no throwing chairs across the room.
Alex:
There probably could be more throwing chairs across the room.
Crystal:
I think all four of us are very polite. And sometimes that can make you feel a bit like "are they really digging my idea?" But for myself, a lot of the ideas that all of us come up with are very tasteful. So I can pick, if they have options, which one is more to my taste. But yeah, in our arrangement sessions were a bit long - spanning four months, which I would say, is a very thorough and long process, but it paid off.
Alex:
Normally, whoever's song it was would lead the production of the song, if they had ideas or something sorted already, and everyone else would kind of chip in, but it would be up to that person to ultimately make the call.
Liam:
Each of you, particularly Simeon, seem to have hubs of so much different gear that's on stage as you're doing Phoebe Rings shows.
Simeon:
Yeah, there's been some fun things that have come and gone that we'd love to bring back. I’ve played an omnichord, I played lap steel for some shows, I played pedal steel for the Live Music Bar- it is just striking the balance of another suitcase being $400 each way. And like, we all had the time of our lives on the Asia tour we just did. We got our statement back of what we made on that tour, and it wouldn't cover an extra bag going to Japan, from Japan.
Alex:
You'll know we've made it when we have one extra instrument on stage.
Liam:
That was the Asia tour, yeah? How was it in general?
Simeon:
I don't believe that it happened still. I was over there, and I was calling my boyfriend, and I was like "I'm looking at it right now, and I don't believe that it's real."
Liam:
Is that the first time that any of you have played there?
Crystal:
I have played in Korea once with Princess Chelsea and Jonathan Bree. That was really fun, but it definitely is a different feeling when you are there with your band. Especially for me, because I come from Korea, to be able to speak in your own language, your mother tongue, to a Korean audience is very special. And I think there is a very special connection when you say "I am from Korea, I live in New Zealand, but I'm speaking to you in Korean right now!"
Liam:
Did Korean audiences take those shows well?
Crystal:
Yes! They're so respectful and lovely. They kind of respond like kindergarten kids speaking to their tutor, because they go, "Awww.." when I say it's the last song, and then I'll say, "This is Ben who's gonna sing to you the next song. They're like "Wooo!!!"
Alex:
People were really invested in the music. They're quite quiet in between songs, but they will show their appreciation.
Simeon:
There's a lack of ego and amount of sincerity that just doesn't exist as much in Western culture. Crystal was translating for us as people were coming up after the shows in Asia, and it's literally just, like, "Your music makes me happy." Just the most base level, heartwarming praise -There's no need to put on a front.
Crystal:
"Your music suits the season."
Liam:
Have you put much thought towards what's next, music wise?
Crystal:
Yeah, we've had meetings and get-togethers to try and talk about that, and we are very excited for album number two. We have had some little demos, tons of writing, and some playthroughs, but we're trying to just think about it a little bit harder. Album number one was quite organic, in a way - we didn't think about the album progression, start to finish, too hard - except for Simeon, who had gone. "I love the last song, I'm gonna write the last song." For album number two, we're thinking about it a little bit harder.
Liam:
Not necessarily in a way that you didn't think about album one?
Alex:
No no no, It's just that since we recorded all that, we've played so many more shows, we've gotten to know each other more. I think there's more trust, and there's more openness, and this idea of four people collaborating on songs is like, such a limitless possibility.
Simeon:
Really, the first album felt like a first date. It's a little bit tentative and you're not fully yourself, not for any particular reason.
Alex:
That's a great first date!
Liam:
From the outside, it sounds very sure of itself. It's the first date of a happy marriage.
Crystal:
Yeah, we all know that we like convenience store food!
Simeon:
We can bond over missing Korea.
‘Aseurai’ is out now via Carpark Records in all good music stores. You can keep up to date with the band at @phoeberings.