Niis announce new EP Play Niis and share the single "Earthquakes"

Niis have announced Play Niis, their new Rise Records EP, alongside lead single "Earthquakes" and its accompanying video. The six-song release marks a shift for the Los Angeles duo of vocalist Mimi Doe and guitarist Ryan McGuffin, who formed in 2020 and have built a catalog around rage, confrontation and uncertainty.

The songs came together during a stretch of heartbreak and personal upheaval. Doe says the writing began at the start of a breakup, with studio time already booked for the following day, leaving her no room to sit with what she was feeling. Everything went straight into the material instead. "I'm a full pop girly [with lyrics]," she says, describing her taste for confessional, direct writing.

That anger hasn't gone anywhere, according to Doe, even if it now surfaces differently. She notes that the EP sounds soft on the surface while the lyrics still deal with things that made her furious. "Earthquakes," which she calls a love letter to heartbreak, addresses unsteady relationships and the work of relearning how to love after a profound loss.

The video leans into a deliberate '90s and early-2000s aesthetic: black and white, warehouse shots and no real narrative, a nod to the clips Doe grew up watching. That nostalgic framing runs through the project as a whole.

The release arrives ahead of a tour supporting Movements. Doe describes a Niis show as a community first, where anyone who falls in the pit gets picked back up, and says her hope for the EP is that at least one song connects with someone on the other side.