Jay Crocker

Tucked away behind an inauspicious house a fair distance from Calgary’s oil-rich downtown core rests an unassuming shack unlike any other. 10’ x 10’ in size with scuffed hard wood floors, full of rare (and in some cases, even homemade) recording implements and instrumentation, this shed is a rare anomaly in the digital age – a fully analogue studio without even a digital clock as distraction. To those in the know, this simple hand-built shed is Sea Legs, the secret hide-out bunker and personal recording space of Jay Crocker, producer and arranger of several of 2010’s finest Calgary-produced records including Ghostkeeper’s self-titled Polaris Prize-nominated opus (on Flemish Eye),  internationally acclaimed NOMORESHAPES’ Creases Crisis (on Flemish Eye / Drip Audio), and Ryan Bourne’s The Super Modern World of Beauty (released by Saved by Radio).

But while much of Crocker’s props these past few seasons has focused primarily on his gifts of production and arrangement, much like Sea Legs itself there’s far more to Crocker than simply a set of skilled fingers at the mixing desk. Performed almost entirely by his own hand within the walls of Sea Legs tiny confines (and a couple of apartment spaces in Calgary and Montreal), the cheekily-titled Co-Stars (since there aren’t really any) marks the studio re-emergence of one of Canada’s most unique musical talents from noted side-man behind the scenes to front-and-centre.

Packing an album’s worth of ideas into each and every track, Co-Stars bewilders and surprises at every turn. Colliding old-school pop songcraft with experimental tendencies – call it avant-pop if you’re the type who yearns for genre-fication – Crocker’s sense of composition and adventure is unleashed in full over the album’s 10 quick-moving tracks. Looking past the all-encompassing melodies (Crocker’s voice has never sounded quite so assured, quite so endearing), looking deep into the sounds of Co-Stars is like glancing into a skilled magician’s bag of tricks – you’ll never quite figure out how it’s all been done. At one moment pulsating and severe, while at the next gentle and serene, the force behind Co-Stars is one grappling with the possibilities of sound, wide eyes and blown eardrums echoing in Calgary’s sprawling beltline.

The pummeling opener ‘Super Disease’ meshes distorted quick-fingered riffs with a hook so sticky it’s unforgettable after the first listen, while the gorgeously elegiac ‘Beard in a Mirror’, sees Crocker attempt to define himself with the lyrical knock-out, “There’s a few words that come to mind when I try to describe myself this time: earthquake / handshake / paranoid believer just trying to be a dreamer.” Furthermore, it’s a rare record that can string together the electro gristle of ‘Porno is a Mustang’ and the gentle The Band-style shuffle of ‘Beaver Hat Man’ and still sound from the same source. Surely, here is a musician who never sits still.

Hard to pin down? Maybe. Worth giving into and following through its myriad nooks and crannies? Definitely.