Hamiltonian alternative R&B musician Duckai released his debut album earlier this year- introducing the emerging artist as a creative to keep your tabs on.
Ezekai Robinson is Duckai, the duck-masked alt-R&B musician emerging into the Hamiltonian music scene with a eight-track debut titled Future Vision. Originally, Ezekai ordered the duck mask simply because it looked funny, and tried it on while making music- eventually the musician grew to like the animal mask, committing to the bit by combining 'duck' and 'Ezekai' into Duckai- pronounced 'Do-Kai,' "Like I'm saying I should do me, and be myself."
Robinson describes his musical style as "fairly diverse, yet organized," taking inspiration from a variety of different genres and sounds, a strategy the musician says is both artistically fulfilling for him, yet remaining digestible for all listeners of his music.
"My sound as a result, to me, sounds very unique, but for simplicity's sake I just tend to call my music alt-R&B and hope that's enough of a label for it," said Duckai. "My major musical influences could be rounded down to James Blake, Frank Ocean and Tyler the Creator. James Blake taught me how to sing, Frank Ocean taught me how to build worlds in music production and Tyler the Creator just heavily inspires me to stay authentic. A lot of older Japanese City Pop/Blues/Rock from the 70s-80s also heavily inspired the instrumentals on my album."
Future Vision first began emerging around mid to late December of 2022, and took Ezekai around a month and a half to complete.
"The album starts with "Future Vision!", a track that's a reflection on where one would be mentally after a failed relationship," said Duckai. "Throughout there's a lot of messages of feeling burdensome to others and feeling as though you should know better than to get involved into someone's life."
The secondary track, "Orbit," the musician describes as an 'ode to love itself,' a track encouraging the listener, and artist himself, to not lose sight of the fact that love exists for everyone.
Track three, "See You Through/PDA," is the start of a story between two people.
"This song depicts someone being attracted to someone where the attraction is mutual, yet they are still nervous about one of them potentially getting hurt," said Duckai. "Nevertheless, in order to be certain about the premonition, you have to see it through and see where it'll end up. The next half "PDA," is a desire for secrecy between this newly formed bond, in hopes that no one else gets involved and attempts to ruin what has started."
"Attachment" is the only song featuring another artist: a London, Ontario-based musician, Gabi. The single describes classic feelings around a new crush- excitement, hesitation, and searching for reciprocation. Next comes "Ride This Ship," a track about self-respect and putting yourself before your romantic partner.
""My Stone" is an interesting point in the track list, because it really is just about showing gratitude and being grateful for someone being there thus far, even through a hard time or tough situation," said Duckai. "However, there's definitely a sense of worry about what's to come in this song."
The second last track, "Call It Off," shows Duckai asking his partner to acknowledge the failing parts of their relationship. "It's Been Nice" wraps up the album, a finale about waving farewell and thanking your past partners for the time you had together, even if the goodbye is bittersweet. Future Vision was written, composed, produced, recorded, mixed and mastered solely by Duckai in his bedroom, showcasing the artist's multitalented creative drive.
"The process was honestly very smooth," said Duckai. "There were some tracks I had to cut for being too redundant, and there were also some tracks that I didn't add simply due to time constraints. I wanted to finish the album before February, and I'm just happy I managed to do that and be as satisfied with how it sounds as I am."
The musician hopes that his listeners can relate to the emotions expressed on Future Vision, and that they hopefully feel represented by the themes within the album.
"I think the main reason why I release music is because I want to contribute to the pool of great songs released by creatives," said Duckai. "If I can get into someone's playlist for them to dance, cry, drive and work to, I've succeeded."
You can help support Duckai by following his socials linked below, streaming his music, and by seeing him live.
"If you do enjoy it and want to see the live performances that would be an even bigger support and I'd love to feel that energy," said Duckai. "Sharing the album with friends, family and strangers alike goes a long way and putting people on past tracks as well helps significantly too. Overall just enjoying the music is great support in itself!"
Upcoming gigs:
City of Hamilton Summer Concert Series
July 14, 2023- 7pm @ 96 James Street North.