Crack Cloud

Vancouver-based multimedia collective Crack Cloud draws on the pooled skills of assorted artists, filmmakers, musicians, and designers to produce vivid imagery alongside a central ensemble that moves between art rock and post-punk. Following a tentative 2018 collection of two self-released EPs, the group settled into a stronger identity with the intense Pain Olympics in 2020 and its boisterous successor Tough Baby two years later. Despite lingering doubts about what lay ahead, they issued a fourth album, Red Mile, in 2024.

The project originated with vocalist and drummer Zach Choy together with keyboardist Mohammed Ali Sharar, who sought an activity to divert attention from their worsening substance problems. They soon attracted additional participants facing similar struggles along with several mental health workers, all united by a desire to foster personal growth and communal effort; guitarist Jon Varley and multi-instrumentalist Daniel Robertson joined among this later wave. Although membership remained fluid, the collective assembled the EPs Crack Cloud and Anchoring Point, which were combined into their self-titled debut album in 2018. With more than twenty contributors overall—seven of whom focused on live performances—they broadened their sonic approach and studio methods in preparation for Pain Olympics, the first full-length proper, released in 2020 and marked by a sense of release. The follow-up Tough Baby, issued in 2022, examined ongoing motifs of emotional development, recovery, and endurance. Throughout the ensuing tour, members repeatedly noted onstage and in conversations the toll that constant travel was exacting on the group. Their unexpected return from the studio with Red Mile in 2024 therefore arrived as an encouraging development, documenting a renewed sense of direction and positioning the band in a stable position for future work.