Bringing a high-energy blend of alternative indie rock to the Party in May 2024, Wellington student four-piece Lipstick delivered a debut EP, ‘Rom-Com’, just months later. Drawn from a style palette of new wave and post Britpop, along with inspiration from local acts like Daffodils, they’ve followed up in 2026 with an even more punchy, hook-laden sophomore alt-rock EP, titled ‘Better Ways to Spend The Night’. Richard Thorne talked with vocalist, guitarist and songwriter Oliver Bailey.

Lipstick celebrated the release of their second EP with a typically storming gig at Pōneke’s San Fran on the first Thursday of March, filling the venue and performing to a growing legion of local fans. When we talk a few days later lead singer and guitarist Oliver Bailey is still savouring the moment.  

“It was awesome, so good! We sold over 200 tickets and San Fran was packed. It was so much fun, a classic Lipstick show! And the openers Felix Bird and Homing were also so cool, it was just a great night of live music. That was our first show of the year and it went so well, yeah, fantastic.”

Initially formed in 2023, when three of the four were studying music at Massey University, Lipstick quickly attracted positive commentary, and an enthusiastic following in the Te Whanganui-a-Tara indie music scene. Bailey describes their audience as mostly about their age (early 20s), and typically students.

“We’ve got a really loyal fanbase here in Wellington, of like people that always come to our shows, which is so nice to see. And it’s also such a great feeling because they’re singing the words back to us. Pretty unmatched!”

Their EP launch was also an introduction to the Lipstick audience for bassist Tyrone Henderson, who has stepped into the role vacated by Dillon Bouchier, who left the band late last year. Lipstick originals Bailey, Bouchier and Harry Thomas and were all acquainted from their shared high school years in Queenstown, drummer Jake Stokes being the outlier in hailing from Wellsford, north of Auckland. 

“We all played in separate bands, and just knew each other through doing music together at school – and then sort of joined forces, if you will, in Wellington.”

Almost incredibly replacement bass player Henderson is another former Wakatipu High School pupil, so maintaining the Queenstown membership quota. Pulling the net even tighter the three southern men also live together, recently moving into a flat where they’ve converted a second lounge into a convenient band rehearsal room.

Lead guitarist Thomas is still studying law, while his three bandmates have all now completed music degrees and, as musicians so often do, are working in hospitality.

“We all work like late nights at bars and restaurants, and reconvene after and talk about, ‘Oh, we should do this tomorrow, I’ve got this idea…’ and we just sit down and jam out a song or whatever. Yeah, that’s what gets us by!”

Embracing the indie band ethos Lipstick are wholly self-managed, Bailey mostly handling the commercial aspects and public-facing stuff like press interviews. It’s not a band prescribed role, but one he’s been happy to fill.

“We definitely talk about what’s going on, what we what we want to do, what we’re planning to do – but when it comes to the admin side of things I sort of just smash it out, and then catch them up on it. With all the boring stuff like press releases and everything I just do it, and then let them know if I need help with anything. We all keep each other in the loop, and we’re always bringing up new ideas and priorities, but it’s all fun. Basically, it’s the beauty of it, just being able to be in a band with my friends!”

The process of song development runs with a similar dynamic, front-man Bailey leading with lyrics, but the rest of the band all chiming in. Again, it’s just how things have worked so far.

“I think we’ve definitely gotten more comfortable with each other, so if Harry doesn’t like something I write, he will just be like, ‘That’s terrible,’ and tell it to my face! But the songwriting process is never the exact same. It’s mostly I write lyrics with a rough chord structure and bring it to the band, and then we can build a song around that. Or Harry’s got a riff and we just go from there, or Jake has a drum groove… and Tyrone is a songwriter as well!”

Initially planned as an album, ‘Better Ways to Spend The Night’ is a long EP at seven tracks, though Bailey points out it still only runs to around 25 minutes.

“Yeah, we kind of decided against going for a full album, just because of the time frame over when the songs were written. Giving it Up and Better Ways…, the title track, were both written around the same time as our first EP ‘Rom-Com’ [released in September 2024], and then the others sort of came with us playing shows.

“When we were touring in the last year we probably wrote the rest of the tracks, so they were all written sort of apart. We decided that for our first album we want it to be all recorded in one go, and we’re currently writing that at the moment.”

The band chose Joe Ledword, bassist with fellow Wellington four-piece indie rock act Wet Denim to produce and mix the EP. Little older than them, Bailey says they’d heard good things about him from other local musicians and first entrusted Ledword with recording the title track, Better Ways To Spend The Night, back in 2024.

“It’s kind of strange we recorded that over a year and a half ago now, but it was just a lot of fun, and so we decided we wanted to work with one person for the whole project. And obviously he’s with Wet Denim and has got sort of the same ideas as us in terms of like, pop and rock and indie stuff – all very much in that headspace. So yeah, it’s been really easy and fun.

“Before we even started recording the project, we agreed we wanted to have as we want to have a lot of musicians our age involved, so the project can hopefully appeal to a wide audience demographic. So we had Anton Parker, who worked on our last EP, engineering in the studio with us as well, and then we had River Hann-Ellen and Kahu Sanson-Bennett who are also producers in Welly, who we met at Massey. The whole process of recording this EP has just been really enjoyable.”

The first taste of ‘Better Ways to Spend The Night’ came with the single Giving it Up, released in June 2025. Bailey said at the time it was a song they always knew was special, with a simple catchy riff and hook, and lyrics that will run around your mind all day.

Second up in August, the part-punchy/part-dreamy You & Me drew references to The 1975 and Wolf Alice, while third single Hardly Know Her was described as channeling the angular energy of Interpol and Bloc Party.

“This record is about tension and release,” Bailey says of the EP as a whole. “The push and pull of wanting more from your nights, your relationships, and yourself. It’s the most complete version of our sound so far, and everything feels more direct, more intense, and more honest.”

Not yet released as a single, the title track builds ever upward from a picked guitar riff and floating vocal beginning.

“Harry and I wrote it, with him on his guitar. He just had this idea so I came up with the lyric, which is like the title, “I’ve got better ways to spend the night,” and we started building a track from there. We all love The Cure and The Smiths and that sort of new wave stuff, and I wanted to make a song that had a lot of atmosphere and build. If you listen to that one, you can really hear it in the track, a lot of romanticism and late night drama – young people things, drinking and partying – the romanticism but also the dramaticism of that!”

The EP closes with Short Strides, a song in which Bailey admits a more personal investment, and perhaps an element of metaphor for the band itself.

“It sort of just started like Better Ways…, so that’s why it felt fitting as the closing track, because it was another one where it was just like we were building a great atmosphere. I think it has quite strong lyrics, in terms of the story. I was sort of like going through a really hard time in my life last year, and it was around the time of Dylan leaving the band.

“Short Strides is about dealing with losing people in your life, and how you can sort of go about that. You can either sort of accept the loss, or really try and fight for what you’ve got. The chorus is about talking to someone you’re losing and sort of just reassuring them that, like, ‘We’re making short strides… we’re making progress,’ and like, trying to fight for that relationship.”

In an art school rock kind of manner the cover art for the EP and each individual track is just that, a piece of art. Bailey says the idea came way before the project itself.

“Harry had this idea of using one cohesive artwork that on Spotify say, the singles could line up and make one long piece of art. His friend Kyra Rowlingson, who does amazing art, was super keen to do it for us, and she painted this one long piece on canvas that makes the whole artwork. I think we just wanted something that really represented the sounds of the EP, very like jangly and all over the place, lots of colour and, yeah, we’re all super happy with that.”

For now Lipstick’s 2024 debut single Party remains the most heavily streamed of their songs, which Bailey says he’s good about because it’s fun to play, and the crowd always gets involved.

“But I’m so happy with how these new songs have turned out! I love those older songs, but I really think we’ve just gotten so much better, and I really hope people see that with the release of this EP.”