Lorde and Kim Dotcom. Photo / NZH
Lorde has responded to a story detailing the "hijinks and hazing" behind the recording of Kim Dotcom's album Good Times, calling it "bonkers".
The pop superstar tweeted her response to nearly 3.5 million followers, tagging her producer Joel Little in the post, saying: "We gotta get on this level".
She followed up with more tweets, expressing sympathy for the musicians and engineers who worked on Dotcom's album.
New details behind the recording of Good Times emerged today in a feature published in the latest edition of 1972, a pop culture and lifestyle magazine.
The article describes how a young recording engineer was allegedly dressed in a penguin costume before a series of tennis balls were smashed into his body at high speed.
The alleged incident took place in front of a crowd of people, including Kim Dotcom.
According to the story: "The young man went to work the next day covered in bruises, pulling up his shirt to show colleagues the blossoming patches of tender purple flesh. It wasn't an isolated incident. He'd also reportedly vomited after being told to drink a cup of soy sauce during a recording session."
Court documents show the record cost about $1 million to produce.
It was recorded at Neil Finn's Roundhead Studios in Newton over a two-year period.
Dotcom hired local and international musicians and producers to work on the record, including American Grammy-Award winner Printz Board and producer Deryk Mitchell, aka Sleep Deez.
The pair were reportedly put up in a luxurious mini-mansion at Dotcom's expense and paid well for their time.
Neil Finn was interviewed for the story, saying: "I didn't like the occupation of our studio by those guys because I sensed [they were] on the gravy train."
But ultimately, he said, the failure of the record was down to Dotcom who had creative control.
"His self-belief was absolute and he definitely made the decisions."
According to the story, the team recorded 156 songs, of which just 17 ended up on the final album.
The record was both a commercial flop and critically questionable, with the Herald's TimeOut magazine giving it one star out of a possible five.
Dotcom said yesterday the creation of Good Times was great fun for everyone involved and had been documented in more than 100 hours of video footage for a documentary. "Laughter was omnipresent. Jokes and dares were common."
He said he was proud of the album and that it had been downloaded and streamed more than two million times.
• Read the full story here.
'Now comes the hard part – convincing my parents it was a documentary'.