Narc. Magazine Online
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The Canadian mixed media collective bring their radical sound to Newcastle for what promises to be an explosive show
Crack Cloud are so much more than a band. Initially the solo project of singer and drummer Zach Choy, the Vancouver-based mixed media collective now includes 30 musicians, artists, filmmakers and dancers all living and working together. On Saturday 14th May they take on Newcastle’s Cluny.
Where Crack Cloud’s debut LP had channelled a more orthodox post-punk restlessness akin to Gang of Four and Television, 2020’s Pain Olympics brought in elements of funk and hip-hop. It’s a shared mindset rather than skillset or sound that brings Crack Cloud together.
A lot of bands flirt with political outrage and sensitive themes without any real integrity. Crack Cloud take their first-hand experiences of addiction and trauma and create vulnerably moving art out of it. Working closely with social workers, overdose prevention services and their local community, Crack Cloud refuse to create music that has no bearing on reality. Tracks like The Next Fix read like diary entries in the way they intimately expose the reality of getting clean.
In interviews Crack Cloud describe their music as a vehicle for recovery, but it feels more radical than that. The collective may have been born out of addiction recovery programmes but its music transgresses the clinical austerity of medical spaces. Defiant and energising, this might just be the soundtrack of the revolution.
As they grace the stage, Crack Cloud may look like they’re a seven-member Canadian art punk band. Yet, their music is simply a shadow of something much, much greater…
Crack Cloud play The Cluny, Newcastle on Saturday 14th May.
