Singer songwriter Bic Runga has released her sixth studio album Red Sunset, marking her first collection of all new material in 15 years and a deeply personal return to songwriting.

In an interview with chrislynchmedia.com, Runga spoke candidly about stepping back into music after more than a decade focused largely on family life.

“I think I do purposely create that. That’s kind of what I’m going for,” she said, when asked about the calming and reflective tone that runs through the record.

Red Sunset was recorded in Paris during the winter of 2025 and is her first album of original songs since 2011’s Belle. Co produced by Runga and Kody Nielson, the album feels intimate and unhurried, as if each note has been carefully weighed.

“You have to keep distilling them until they sort of cut through,” she said. “I haven’t made a record in a really long time so I just had to make every word count.”

Some of the songs have been waiting in the wings for decades. “It’s like a perpetual stew isn’t it. It’s like a little bit of something from last time,” she said.

Runga said the long gap between albums was not strategic. It was life.

“I’ve just been concentrating on family stuff I guess and I just didn’t have the concentration for it,” she said. “Now one of my kids has actually left home so I’m like, ‘Oh I better get alive.’”

Her eldest is now studying at Victoria University of Wellington.

“I was devastated” she laughs “but he’s really happy at Wellington uni. It’s a new change and so I’m just like, ‘Oh what did I used to do again. I used to write songs.’”

That sense of rediscovery runs through Red Sunset. The album opens with an instrumental track titled Glass Atrium, recorded in part in Paris. Runga described it as a doorway into a new space.

“It’s sort of like entering this other space,” she said. “If you’re going to come into this album you’ve got to come through this doorway. This isn’t Sway.”

For many listeners, Sway remains the defining track of her early career. Runga is realistic about that legacy and unafraid to move beyond it.

“It’s really hard to recapture something that I wrote 30 years ago,” she said. “There’s probably not a big single on the album. It’s probably just this chill thing that makes you feel chill.”

Rather than chasing a radio moment, Runga said she focused on honesty. “I’m not intending it to anyone. I think I’m just trying to be as honest with myself as I can,” she said.

The collaboration with Nielson was central. The pair played almost all of the instruments themselves, building the album layer by layer.

“We just work really well together and he’s got a really good ear,” she said. “Sometimes he’s actually writing the harmonies because he’s kind of better at that than I am.”

The result is a record that feels textured but never crowded, with stacked vocals and subtle instrumentation supporting lyrics that reward close listening.

Runga will bring the album to Christchurch with a performance at the Isaac Theatre Royal, a venue she clearly holds affection for.

“It’s good that it’s reopened,” she said. “It was a really beautiful perfect sunny Christchurch day. I didn’t want to leave actually.”

The tour will also include a Wellington performance with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, adding another layer to songs that are already rich with detail.

Runga also reflected on how dramatically the music industry has changed since her early days working at The CD Store in Christchurch.

“I loved working at a record store and I loved when people would come in and I’d go, ‘I like this band. Do you want to hear this band,’” she said.

Now, in the era of Spotify and algorithm driven discovery, she acknowledged it is far harder for artists to cut through.

“It’s harder than ever for an artist to cut through,” she said. “It is hard to make a living out of streaming. You have to have really big numbers.”

“There’s just so many songs being uploaded. There’s short attention on everything.”

Even so, Red Sunset will be released on CD and vinyl as well as streaming platforms, a nod to listeners who still value something tangible.

“It’s all those things,” she said of the renewed interest in physical formats. “For me I’m really actively trying to get back into listening to music, really listening to it, just to slow my brain down.”

At this stage of her career, Runga appears less concerned with commercial expectations and more focused on the craft itself.

“I made the best record I could make and then just put it out there and just see what happens,” she said.

For fans who have waited 15 years for new original material, Red Sunset feels less like a comeback and more like a quiet continuation of an artist who never stopped evolving, even when she stepped out of the spotlight.

Buy tickets to Bic Runga’s Christchurch show (tickets nearly sold out)