Music Industry News

Canadian-born New Zealand artist C. Zukey unveils his debut album, Stone Fruut a heartfelt testament to love, resilience, and the power of music to heal. The album, produced in collaboration with acclaimed New Zealand producer Mark Perkins (Merk/Marlon Williams) and mixed by Shannon Fowler (Tom Lark/The Fuzzy Robes), marks a poignant chapter in C. Zukey’s life as well as his journey as a solo artist.

Drawing inspiration from the emotional landscape following his partner’s hypoxic brain injury, C. Zukey has crafted a collection of sincere and authentic song that capture this transformative time in his life. From the introspective melodies of ‘Happy & Healthy‘ to the musically uplifting rhythms of ‘Water Temple‘ each song on Stone Fruut offers a glimpse into C. Zukey’s profound commitment to love and profound personal growth.

Reflecting on the album, C. Zukey shares “This record for me is a journey through the grieving process. The ‘Grief Cycle’ isn’t like experiencing each stage until completion before moving onto the next stage. You might bounce from anger to bargaining, you might be in denial and then suddenly feel acceptance. Or you might experience every stage in the course of 20 minutes. The grief process can be seen in this album as a whole. There are moments of bargaining, depression, acceptance, denial etc because each song was written in a different stage of grief.”

Featuring instrumentation from Alex Freer (Tiny Ruins/AC Freazy) and Finn Scholes (Carnivorous Plant Society), Stone Fruut is the perfect introduction to C.Zukey.

To go alongside the album release we decided the psychedelic slow jam of ‘Holy Water’ would make a perfect fourth single. C. Zukey says “Holy Water started as an acoustic ballad but we weren’t digging how the recording sounded, so we decided to try something completely different and make it like a soft rock anthem with the stylophone solo at the start! Then it went through a complete restructure and it totally changed the sound and feel of the song. It went from being almost left on the cutting room floor, to being my favourite track on the album.”

Check out all things C.Zukey below:

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Photo credit: Shamima Lone