Ecco2k

Ecco2k
Ecco2k performing with Drain Gang in 2022
Background information
Born	Zak Arogundade (1994-10-23) 23 October 1994 (age 32) Stockholm, Sweden
Genres	Pop cloud rap hip-hop experimental
Occupations	Rapper singer-songwriter record producer visual artist fashion designer
Years active	2013–present
Labels	Year0001 (former) Trash Island 9th. (Ninth)
Member of	Drain Gang

Zak Arogundade (born 23 October 1994), known professionally as Ecco2k, is a British-Swedish rapper and singer-songwriter. Arogundade founded the band Krossad with Bladee, his then-classmate, in 2004. Three years later, he founded his first fashion brand, Alaska, and later joined the Swedish shoe brand Eytys as a designer. He founded Drain Gang with childhood friends Bladee, Thaiboy Digital and Whitearmor in 2013. Arogundade appeared on albums with Drain Gang and directed music videos before releasing his debut solo studio album, E, in 2019. He released the EP PXE in 2021, and the collaborative studio album Crest in 2022. Arogundade is a private and secretive person who has incorporated queer themes in his work.

Early life

Zak Arogundade was born in Stockholm, Sweden, on 23 October 1994. His mother is a Swedish makeup artist, while his father is a British graphic designer, writer, and architect of Nigerian heritage. For a short time, he lived with his father in London; he spent most of his childhood with his mother in the Hornstull area of Stockholm.

Arogundade had his first experiences with visual art at age five, when his father gifted him a graphics software program and taught him how to use it; Arogundade created album covers and logos for imaginary bands. In 2004, he became classmates with Benjamin Reichwald (Bladee) and founded the punk-oriented project Krossad ("crushed" in Swedish) the same year. They released a demo CD in 2007. That same year, Arogundade created a fashion label, Alaska, a streetwear brand. Although he was only 16 years old, he managed to develop the brand through online communication with Chinese factory managers who were unaware of his age. This experience led him to join the Swedish sneaker brand Eytys.

Career

Musical

2013–2019: Founding Drain Gang, singles, Crush Resist, and Trash Island

In 2013, Arogundade founded the Drain Gang collective, first called Gravity Boys, with childhood friends Bladee, Thaiboy Digital, and Whitearmor, adopting the alias Ecco2k. The four had been a part of the musical group Smög Boys.

The name "Ecco2k" was inspired by the titular character of the Ecco the Dolphin video game series. Drain Gang signed with Year0001 and began regularly collaborating with the group Sad Boys and their labelmate Yung Lean. That same year, Arogundade became Lean's creative director.

Still in 2013, Arogundade started his music career by releasing singles "Bleach", "Hold Me Down Like Gravity", and "Mirage"; "Hold Me Down Like Gravity" received a music video directed by Arogundade himself. The following year in 2014, Arogundade also founded the fashion brand g'LOSS, under which he designed Drain Gang merchandise.

In 2017, he released an instrumental EP, Crush Resist and appeared on the Drain Gang collaborative album D&G later in the same year. Around this time, Arogundade began to perform solo live sets for the first time.

In September 2019, Ecco2k appeared on the second Drain Gang collaborative album Trash Island (2019).

2019–2024: E and PXE

On 27 November 2019, Arogundade released his debut solo studio album, E, which was a surprise album. To record it, Arogundade had to leave his day job as a designer and photo retoucher at Eytys. It was recorded in Stockholm, Berlin, Los Angeles, London, Falun, and Bangkok, and preceded by singles "AAA Powerline" in February 2018 and "Fruit Bleed Juice" in November 2019, with the latter receiving a music video. E was first issued on CD in July 2020 then was issued on vinyl in both June 2021 and December 2022, with the second release featuring artwork from French artist David Rappeneau.

In 2020, Arogundade toured Europe and released more music videos for E songs: "Peroxide" on 29 January and "Security!" on 30 July. That year, he also released singles "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" with Bladee on 24 February and "Pollen" on 17 September, in which Arogundade sings in Swedish.

On 31 March 2021, Arogundade released a surprise EP, PXE, fully accompanied by a video from artist and animator Freddy Carrasco. Unlike E, PXE was entirely produced by Arogundade.

On 19 January 2022, he released the standalone single "Amygdala" with Bladee. On 17 March, they released a collaborative studio album, Crest, which was recorded in the Swedish countryside. The Fader staff considered it the 22nd best album of 2022, while Pitchfork included it in their list of best progressive pop music of the year. After the album's release, Arogundade toured worldwide with Drain Gang in their first world tour as a collective.

Arogundade left the Year0001 label in 2023.

2024–present: Collaborative and solo singles

On 19 April 2024, Arogundade released a collaborative single with Bladee and Thaiboy Digital, "TL;DR". He played at the Sydney Opera House on 1 June.

On 14 May 2025, Arogundade released the song "MAKKA" with British rapper fakemink, produced by longtime collaborator Mechatok. On 12 June, Arogundade was featured alongside Bladee on Mechatok's "Expression on Your Face" from his debut studio album Wide Awake.

Following a 5-year hiatus of solo work as the first work since PXE in 2021, Arogundade released the single "Aldehydes and Ketones", produced by longtime Sad Boys collaborator Gud. The song was accompanied by a self-directed music video, filmed across twelve countries over six years, in which Arogundade portrays a character named "Echo" exploring industrial and partially constructed environments, which according to a press release were "engulfed by the natural and manmade sublime." Kayla Sandiford of The Line of Best Fit called the release a "new musical and visual chapter for [Arogundade]." On 3 November, Arogundade released a second single "Sky Burial," produced by Whitearmor and accompanied by another self-directed music video with camera work from Cheuk Ng. The track was illustrated by Ove Svensson of Popzine as a "warmer, more euphoric counterpart." The video depicts Echo dancing in fields bathed in a sunset-orange glow produced by stadium lights. The maintained industrial visual language was interpreted as a continuation, yet contrasted response to the visual language of "Aldehydes and Ketones," offering what Northern Transmission called a "more intimate" quality.

Musical style and public image

Arogundade is part of Drain Gang, a group of electronic and cloud rap musicians. Although Drain Gang's music is intimate, their lyrics often reflect universal human experiences, rather than specifically their own. Arogundade has maintained a separation between himself and his music, explaining that he does not see Ecco2k as representative of who he is as a person. Jayson Greene of Pitchfork wrote that Arogundade produced "dissociation music" with "numb disorientation, but with flutey, high, fairy-like voices flitting about the mix", and that he "sounds less like a human and more like a pixelated sprite". Greene added: "The immersion in smoother and more hospitable worlds than the real one is everywhere". Writing for the same website, Nadine Smith noted Arogundade's "fluttering, almost angelic falsetto". David Crone of AllMusic said that, in 2013, Arogundade's style was "rough yet original, combining distant, hollowed-out vocals with cloudy instrumentals and emotive lyricism". He added that over the decade, Arogundade "embraced technological, forward-thinking sounds taking influence from the rising hyperpop and hyper-rap subgenres", consolidating his futuristic style with E in 2019.

Like other members of Drain Gang, Arogundade is a self-taught musician. As a designer and editor, Arogundade directs and edits most of his own music videos, and has directed and edited multiple music videos for other artists, including Yves Tumor. Commenting on his video work, he said he attempts to "express that there is beauty and magic here, but without putting special effects on it".

Despite the members of Drain Gang not subscribing to right-wing or white supremacist ideologies, their fanbase was still significantly composed of alt-right people, especially visible during the 2016 United States presidential election. However, Bladee and Ecco2k have increasingly incorporated queer themes into their work, including Ecco2k's feminine presentation in the "Amygdala" music video in 2020. The inclusion of these themes increased the visibility of Drain Gang's LGBTQ listenership and helped nonbinary, queer, and transgender people embrace their own identities. Cassidy George of 032c wrote: "Drain Gang’s ability to articulate a strain of suffering that is specific to the internet age has bred a fandom encompassing the two most extreme poles of the contemporary political spectrum".

Initially, Arogundade attempted to maintain privacy and secrecy regarding his personal life; until 2018, he kept his Instagram account private, as he dislikes making his personal information public. Although he has attempted to distance himself from Drain Gang's "obsessive fanbase", in the past, his fans have hacked his cellphone and social media accounts, leaked his music, and contacted his relatives. He commented that he found it "strange... to be such a big part of other people's lives". He has been impersonated on Facebook at least twice.

Discography

Solo albums

• E (2019)

Collaborative albums

• D&G (2017) (with Bladee and Thaiboy Digital)
• Trash Island (2019) (with Bladee and Thaiboy Digital)
• Crest (2022) (with Bladee)

Extended plays

• Crush Resist (CR_2015) (2017)
• PXE (2021)
• Cr₂ (Live) (2025)

References

External links

• Ecco2k discography at Discogs