New Zealand reggae institution Katchafire have joined forces with Quino and James McWhinney of California reggae band Big Mountain for the new single ‘Lose Your Power’, the latest preview of the upcoming album ‘Revival 2.0 Guest Edition’ due later this year.
by Paul Cashmere
Katchafire have expanded the international reach of Pacific reggae with the announcement of ‘Lose Your Power’, a cross-Pacific collaboration featuring Quino and James McWhinney of American reggae band Big Mountain. The track is the latest single from Katchafire’s forthcoming album ‘Revival 2.0 Guest Edition’, scheduled for release on November 27.
The project brings together two long-running reggae acts from opposite sides of the Pacific, united through a shared history of roots music, cultural identity and socially conscious songwriting. For Katchafire, the release marks another chapter in a career that has seen the Hamilton, New Zealand band become one of the most internationally recognised Māori reggae groups of the modern era. For Big Mountain, it reconnects the San Diego band with the global reggae circuit that helped propel them into mainstream charts in the 1990s.
Quino said the collaboration was built around reggae’s long-standing role as a voice of resistance and commentary. “Reggae has always been about speaking truth to power. Katchafire have been doing that from Aotearoa, Big Mountain has been doing it from California. On ‘Lose Your Power’, those voices become one,” he said.
The release is part of a broader collaborative concept behind ‘Revival 2.0 Guest Edition’. The album will feature a rotating cast of international artists including Hawaiian musician Mike Love, Australian First Nations singer-songwriter Emily Wurramara and Jamaican reggae veterans Third World, with additional guests expected to be revealed throughout the year.
Katchafire first emerged in 1997 as a Bob Marley tribute act before evolving into one of New Zealand’s most successful reggae exports. Their name itself references ‘Catch A Fire’, the landmark 1973 album by The Wailers that introduced Bob Marley and reggae music to a wider global audience. Over time, Katchafire developed a distinctive sound blending roots reggae rhythms with Māori language, Pacific musical influences and themes centred on whakapapa, family and community identity.
The band’s breakthrough came with ‘Giddy Up’, which became one of New Zealand’s biggest singles of 2002 and helped establish debut album ‘Revival’ as a major local success. Subsequent albums including ‘Slow Burning’, ‘Say What You’re Thinking’ and ‘On The Road Again’ strengthened the group’s international reputation. ‘On The Road Again’ also reached No. 3 on the Billboard Reggae Albums chart in the United States, further confirming Katchafire’s growing global audience.
Across nearly three decades, Katchafire have toured extensively through Australia, Europe, the United States, Brazil and the Pacific, sharing stages with reggae heavyweights including The Wailers, Third World, Steel Pulse, UB40, Shaggy and Lauryn Hill. The current line-up features Logan Bell, Jordan Bell, Leonard “Leon” Davey, Tere Ngarua, Roy Kaiki and Wiremu Barriball.
Big Mountain’s story follows a parallel path through reggae history, albeit from the American west coast. Formed in San Diego during the late 1980s, the band initially evolved out of an earlier group called Shiloh before adopting the Big Mountain name in 1991. Frontman Joaquin “Quino” McWhinney became the public face of the group, bringing together reggae influences with Latin, pop and Californian roots music traditions.
The band achieved international success in 1994 with their reggae interpretation of Peter Frampton’s ‘Baby, I Love Your Way’, recorded for the film ‘Reality Bites’. The song reached No. 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States and No. 2 in the United Kingdom, helping expose reggae fusion to a mainstream audience at a time when alternative rock and hip-hop dominated commercial radio.
While Big Mountain’s chart success was tied to crossover radio, the group remained deeply connected to reggae culture through appearances at Jamaica’s Reggae Sunsplash festival and ongoing international touring. The band has continued through multiple line-up changes and periods of hiatus, reforming during the 2010s for renewed recording and touring activity. Current members include Quino, James McWhinney, Paul Kastick, Richard “Goofy” Campbell and Michael Ortiz.
The collaboration between Katchafire and Big Mountain reflects a broader trend within reggae music, where artists from Indigenous, Pacific and multicultural communities continue to reinterpret the genre through local identity and political perspective. In recent years, Pacific reggae has increasingly developed its own global profile independent of Jamaica and the United States, with artists from New Zealand, Hawaii and Australia building significant international touring audiences.
For Katchafire, ‘Lose Your Power’ positions the band within that continuing evolution while also acknowledging reggae’s foundational traditions. The upcoming ‘Revival 2.0 Guest Edition’ appears designed as both a celebration of reggae’s international community and a statement about the genre’s enduring cultural relevance in 2026.
Katchafire’s ‘Lose Your Power’ featuring Quino and James of Big Mountain is out now. ‘Revival 2.0 Guest Edition’ will be released on November 27, 2026.
Stay updated with your free Noise11.com daily music news email alert. Subscribe to Noise11 Music News here
Be the first to see NOISE11.com’s newest interviews and special features on YouTube. See things first-Subscribe to Noise11 on YouTube
Follow Noise11.com on social media:
Bluesky
Instagram
Facebook – Comment on the news of the day
X (Twitter)
