Influential New Zealand trio LUNG turn fragments of their own history into something newly volatile on Isolated Gun, a signature moment from their sixth album, FOG. The track reconnects the band’s present with two earlier incarnations, combining lyrics revisited from She’s Got a Gun, released on their 1991 debut Cactii, with the rhythmic foundation of Isolation from 2024’s Cancer.
Decades collapse into the same immediate performance, demonstrating how naturally the band’s art punk, no wave, post punk and noise rock instincts continue to communicate across different periods of their catalogue.
“We always liked the lyrics to ‘She’s Got a Gun’,” says the band's own Dave White. “Marrying them to the drumbeat from ‘Isolation’ gave us ‘Isolated Gun’ – a classic love/hate song with a little extra sonic edge that’s great fun to play live.”
Recorded in only two days with engineer Lee Prebble at The Surgery in Newtown, Wellington, the new album favors spontaneity and physical energy over excessive refinement. Isolated Gun carries the resulting urgency, sounding less reconstructed than seized in the moment.
The accompanying video follows the same DIY principle. Filmed, directed and edited by Alan Beere of TrustFundKid111, it was shot in under thirty minutes inside the hallway of frontman Dave White’s Wellington home. Its modest setting and rapid execution suit a band whose power has always depended more upon instinct than spectacle.
“We like to work fast and furious and give it everything in one quick blast,” says White. “That’s how we recorded Fog, and Alan immediately understood that approach. What you see is us — a genuine snapshot of our live performance and a taste of what audiences and promoters can expect.”
Emerging from Palmerston North’s underground during the late eighties, LUNG became a pivotal voice within New Zealand’s lineage of abrasive no wave and noise rock, standing apart from the country’s more widely recognized jangle-pop tradition. Released through Yellow Bike Records, FOG proves that their past remains a living material, available to be dismantled, recombined and made dangerous again.
ZR