I WENT TO FIND YOU
Twenty-three years barrelling towards the next is how STARS has lived since we started.
Births of children, deaths of loved ones, pandemics, broken limbs, lost gear, lost minds, none of it changed the trajectory of more, we just never stopped. Making records, making plays, tv shows, tours, plans, campaigns, merch more and more STARS.
The summer of 2023 I declared I needed a mental break. A year at least, away from the hive mind had come to feel like the STARS grind.
Over the years STARS has typically done a Holiday show in early December. We all knew it wasn’t going to happen in 2023.
Singer songwriter Hayden has an annual fundraiser “THE DREAM SERENADE” for the Beverly school for neuro divergent kids in Toronto at Massey Hall. He had been asking STARS to play but every year it was always in conflict with our Holiday show. I thought this would be such a beautiful way to put STARS to bed for a year, our last show, finally playing this stunning and important fundraiser.
The night before the show Hayden texted me asking if I might want to sit in with his band singing the duet he had written for Feist on his latest album, the single “On a Beach”.
“Was I secretly hoping you would ask!?” I reported back
“Jay McCarrol (my bassist) would sing harmony. He’s a great harmony singer” Hayden texted me, and so it was arranged we would meet at soundcheck to run it.
Indeed Jay was great at harmony, it turned out particularly with me there was an undeniable vocal chemistry between the two of us you can watch Here, and thus the album journey launched.
Backstage during the show, when I cracked a joke that I was now in Hayden’s band, Jay said with a smile “I would love to be in a band with you!” What I didn’t realize was, it turned out this was not our first time sharing a stage. Jay reminded me we had played together with Jason Collette at FIELD TRIP ten years prior when I sat in singing the duet Hangover Days. McCarrol remembered that I had a baby on my hip, so obviously distracted with a young child and playing in three other bands, my memory of this was foggy. I was able to come across some proof of the occasion Here (that is Jay on the keyboards and indeed a baby Delphine on my hip).
The day after Dream Serenade I was getting sent many videos of Jay and I singing the night before. I had loved singing with him! He had a gentle way of lifting up my lead. There is a reason why when things are going smoothly they say “things are in harmony” harmony is good for the nervous system. I was mulling this all over in my head when my phone rang. It was my oldest friend Emily (yes Haines of Metric more on this friendship in a future substack).
“This is the guy you are supposed to make your next solo record with, this is the person you have been looking for” Emily declared like a soothsayer. I did think to myself, “Well it was his idea, he’s the one that said he wanted to be in a band with me”
The leap. I reached out and asked if he would be up for making some songs with me. He told me he was quite busy (many exciting other Jay McCarrol things on burners you will hear about this year) but that he would love to throw some paint at walls and see what might come of a collaboration.
Wire Walks, out today, was the third song we wrote together in a matter of weeks.
Details and stories of how the record was made and with whom to come here on substack. All credits available where you listen.
We are obviously in scary, unknown and unsettling times.
When Jay asked me back in October 2023 what kind of record I wanted to make I texted him “quiet songs for a loud world.” The world has gotten considerably louder since then and I have been deeply aware of trying to create a sonic landscape to calm nervous systems. This is my first solo song released since 2009. Stars continue but with a little more space for a new “more.” This year, there will be more written beacons from me here, more songs eventually in the form of the impending album and more solo shows so I can come find you, and you can come and find me.
BONUS VIDEO OF HOW WIRE WALKS WAS MADE HERE