{"id":2278869,"date":"2026-02-12T13:44:42","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T13:44:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2278869"},"modified":"2026-02-12T13:44:42","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T13:44:42","slug":"vera-ellen-announces-new-album-shares-new-single-gayfever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/vera-ellen-announces-new-album-shares-new-single-gayfever\/","title":{"rendered":"Vera Ellen Announces New Album, Shares New Single &#8216;Gayfever&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Vera Ellen is back \u2014 and she\u2019s come down with a touch of fever.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The Taite Music Prize-winning singer-songwriter has announced her new album, <em>Heaven Knows What Time<\/em>, will be released on May 1st via Flying Nun Records.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">According to a press release, Ellen\u2019s forthcoming record follows a period of \u201cunconventionality,\u201d during which she learned to \u201cembrace the chaos that comes with being a self-sustained artist in today\u2019s constantly driving culture.\u201d<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">\u201c<em>Heaven Knows What Time\u00a0<\/em>is less about thinking and more about just being \u2014 embracing the masks we wear, but also allowing ourselves to take them off and bare it all; the exhausted, the messy, the fear, the adventure, and all of the joy too,\u201d the press release adds.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Ellen wrote the album during a two-week songwriting residency in Greytown, awarded through the NZ Pacific Studio Artist Residency Programme. Longtime collaborator Ben Lemi handled mixing and production.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Arriving alongside today\u2019s album announcement is lead single \u201cGayfever\u201d, which is described as \u201can anthem of that joy \u2014 dedicated to a person so infatuating they were deserving of their own sing-a-long.\u201d<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The absurd and alluring music video, helmed by Ellen\u2019s ex-bandmate Jerry Ramirez and starring Zipporah Norton, can be watched below.<\/p>\n<div class=\"observer-sub-form justify-content-center my-3 p-0 d-flex align-items-stretch bg-dark text-white\">\n<div class=\"observer-sub-form-info p-3\" style=\"justify-content: start;\">\n<h2 class=\"h5 mb-0 observer-title\">Love Music?<\/h2>\n<p class=\"observer-desc mb-2\"> Get your daily dose of everything happening in Australian\/New Zealand music and globally.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"spinner d-none\"> <\/div>\n<\/div>\n<figure class=\"op-interactive\">\n<div class=\"jeg_video_container jeg_video_content\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Vera Ellen - Gayfever (Official Music Video)\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/idiK55qy6W0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">It\u2019s been three years since Ellen released her excellent album <em>Ideal Home Noise<\/em>, which we named one of the Top 80 Best New Zealand Albums of the 2020s So Far last year.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf 2021\u2019s <i>It\u2019s Your Birthday<\/i> hinted at much to come, <i>Ideal Home Noise<\/i> was her confirmation. Born out of a troubled period of Vera\u2019s life, her latest full-length record journeys between light and dark, hope and despair, the tracks anchored by lyrics that makes a listener feel less alone in facing their own battles,\u201d <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/au.rollingstone.com\/music\/music-lists\/80-best-new-zealand-albums-of-the-2020s-so-far-78646\/vera-ellen-ideal-home-noise-album-78798\/\" target=\"_blank\">we praised<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSome artists would kill to have just one potential singalong anthem like \u2018Homewrecker\u2019 on their album, but Ellen has another few to boot, particularly \u2018Imposter\u2019 and \u2018Carpenter\u2019. The latter of these tracks is a towering achievement of songwriting and scope, a grand centrepiece to the album.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"op-interactive\"><iframe title=\"Spotify Embed: gayfever\" style=\"border-radius: 12px\" width=\"400\" height=\"352\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\" allow=\"autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/embed\/album\/3i41eZ3hpuwVUzlvZPyUPE?si=sf6CwaMbRSSzaYo6WXDbBQ&amp;utm_source=oembed\"><\/iframe><\/figure>\n<p><em>Ideal Home Noise<\/em> won the coveted Taite Music Prize in 2024, and Ellen said she was \u201cstill in shock\u201d when we caught up with her backstage immediately after her triumph.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cYou know how you think that people will secretly know, and then they just act shocked? Like, no, I literally didn\u2019t know\u2026 And then when it was my name called \u2013 I\u2019m still really shocked, honestly,\u201d <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/au.rollingstone.com\/music\/music-news\/taite-music-prize-2024-vera-ellen-jujulipps-interviews-58344\/\" target=\"_blank\">she told us<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">She followed that with a nomination for Best Alternative Artist at the 2025 Aotearoa Music Awards, following her win in the same category in 2022 for her album <em>It\u2019s My Birthday<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\"><em>Vera Ellen\u2019s <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/ffm.to\/vera-ellen-gayfever\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">\u201cGayfever\u201d<\/a> is out now. Heaven Knows What Time is out May 1st via Flying Nun Records (pre-save\/pre-order <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/ffm.to\/vera-ellen-hkwt\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>).\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script>!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s){if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;t.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window,document,'script','https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');fbq('init','243859349395737');fbq('track','PageView');fbq.disablePushState=true;<\/script><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source au.rollingstone.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Vera Ellen is back \u2014 and she\u2019s come down with a touch of fever. The Taite Music Prize-winning singer-songwriter has announced her new album, Heaven Knows What Time, will be released on May 1st via Flying Nun Records. According to a press release, Ellen\u2019s forthcoming record follows a period of \u201cunconventionality,\u201d during which she learned [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2278870,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25179],"tags":[441302,441303,441304],"class_list":["post-2278869","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music","tag-vera-ellen","tag-vera-ellen-album","tag-vera-ellen-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Vera-Ellen-Announces-New-Album-Shares-New-Single-Gayfever.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2278869","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2278869"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2278869\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2278871,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2278869\/revisions\/2278871"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2278870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2278869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2278869"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2278869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}