Who is Crack Cloud?

Meet one of Complex Canada’s Top 25 rising artists to watch out for in 2021.

Crack Cloud is an art punk band and multimedia art collective that is made up of 20 members (could be even more now) formed by Zach Choy. Crack Cloud began in Calgary as Zach Choy’s solo project as a singer and drummer. Then it later made its way here to Vancouver where most of the members met through various addiction recovery and mental health programs as either participants or support workers. Zach Choy said the purpose of Crack Cloud is a healing mechanism.

Crack Cloud has designers, artists, filmmakers and musicians which really sets them apart in their music videos and storytelling visuals. The lyrics are true poetic pieces of the hard realities of addiction and mental health. Choy explains that Crack Cloud became their recovery from addiction, music became “an obsession that replaces substance abuse”.

 

Having struggled with addictions themselves the collective works together in harm reduction units on Vancouver’s Downtown EastSide, where the heart of drug addiction lies. In an interview with Vice Choy explains the neighborhood has a rich culture and that he and many members take inspiration from it.

There are many things you can learn from the group by just listening to one of their songs, if you’ve ever struggled with any addictions or mental health problems you will see beyond just the lyrics.

For me this is the first time I have seen such a collective like this from Vancouver, so they are worth checking out. You can listen to their recent album Pain Olympics which was very popular with critics.

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