Old favorites Crack Cloud in session for Marc Riley tonight. Recorded and broadcast on September 23, 2024 at the BBC’s Maida Vale Studios.
Formed in 2015, Crack Cloud started as the solo project of lead vocalist and drummer Zach Choy while he was living in Calgary, Alberta. Soon after, the project moved to Vancouver, British Columbia in 2018, where most of its members met through various addiction recovery and mental health programs both as participants and as support workers. Choy stated that the purpose of Crack Cloud is a “healing mechanism” The group’s logo is also notable as an appropriation of the exclamation mark used by Concerned Children’s Advertisers, a series of public service-announcements aimed towards children on various topics (drug abuse, peer pressure, exercise, etc.) that were broadcast on Canadian television during 1990s until the mid-2000s.
Crack Cloud released their first self-titled EP, in 2016, followed by another the next year called Anchoring Point in 2017. These two EP’s were re-released as a self-titled compilation via Deranged and Tin Angel/Meat Machine Records on 1 June 2018. Following those releases, the group toured internationally and featured at several music festivals including Levitation, End of the Road, and Roskilde which garnered the group considerable exposure between North America, the United Kingdom and Europe respectively.
Crack Cloud released their debut studio album, Pain Olympics, via Meat Machine Records on 17 July 2020, preceded by four singles, The Next Fix, Ouster Stew, Tunnel Vision and Favour Your Fortune, released between May 2019 until October 2020. The record was received favorably, based on the album receiving an average score of 87 from 8 reviews on Metacritic, indicating “universal acclaim”.
On 8 July 2021, the group were named as the winners of the Hi-Fidelity Award, a prize for Canadian recording artists use of innovation within their music videos at the 2021 Prism Prize.
On 11 May 2022, Crack Cloud announced their second album, Tough Baby, released 16 September 2022, via Meat Machine, with the release of the album’s first single, Please Yourself. The album’s self-titled second single was released on 8 July 2022. Costly Engineered Illusion, the album’s third single was released 1 September. 2022.
On 15 May 2024, the group revealed they had signed to American independent label, Jagjaguwar, and announced their third studio album, Red Mile, set to be released 26 July. 2024. The announcement was in-tandem with the album’s first single, “Blue Kite”. Follow-up single, “The Medium” was released soon after on 18 June. 2024.
Okay, you’re all caught up – all you have to do now is dive in and crank it up.
Monday night is starting to look good!
