‘Stately and Befrothed’ is the fantastically titled new EP from Christchurch four-piece Wurld Series. Hushed vocals and extended guitar passages are the order of the day here, with each song pulsing softly into the next.

NZ has long had a knack for producing understated guitar music and that tradition is alive and well here.

One noticeable difference between Wurld Series and other contemporaries is the clarity and dryness of the recorded vocals. This is a good thing, especially when singer Luke Towart drops brilliant lines like, “Look what we’ve found/put it on the table for all to see/a stinking mound/of southern hospitality,” in closing track Mound.

The centrepiece of the EP is The Bend, which breaks into a three-minute outro of meandering guitar leads. Slow Going and Befrothed also use subtle instrumentation to great effect, all the while managing to keep listeners’ attention. The bassline of Befrothed is a standout with twanging acoustic guitars jostling for position alongside it.

Recorded/mixed by Brian Feary and out through Melted Icecream, Wurld Series have pulled off the ‘less is more’ approach to great effect here. Fans of The 3Ds, Pavement and The Clean will no doubt lap these six songs right up.