Vancouver’s SUNDAY MORNING Honor Love and Loss on “Carry the Sky,” Their Most Immediate and Cinematic Work to Date
Vancouver’s Sunday Morning return with their most radio ready and emotionally resonant single to date, “Carry the Sky,” a sweeping tribute to love, loss, and the weight of memory that never fully lifts. The project, led by frontman Bruce Wilson, has long navigated a space between poetic storytelling and cathartic art rock, drawing comparisons to David Bowie, Nick Cave, and Iggy Pop, yet this track brings a newfound immediacy and accessibility to Wilson’s singular voice.
“Sunday Morning has always been a very personal project and the subject matter of the songs come from my direct experiences though they’re often masked in allegory and poetic license,” says Wilson. “‘Carry the Sky’ differs from previous songs because it is, at its essence, a tribute to two beautiful people I loved dearly who died and left intangible chasms in my life that will never be filled.”
He wrote the soaring chorus after losing his close friend Christian, and the verses after the death of his sister Juliet soon after. The result is a song that faces grief honestly while refusing to drown in it.
“I didn’t want this song to be stuck in my grief but to have a sense of celebration for these two lives who brought so much love, compassion and wisdom into my life.”
Sunday Morning is the brainchild of Vancouver music scene stalwart Bruce Wilson. His prolific art and music career took shape in New York and Detroit after his drug and alcohol fueled grunge punk band Tankhog imploded in Vancouver in the late 90s. Years of addiction, lost time, and eventual recovery would reshape his entire creative voice. Returning to Vancouver, Wilson cloistered himself away in a tiny room at the historic Waldorf Hotel to rebuild through writing, an effort that evolved into Sunday Morning’s acclaimed 2016 debut.
Produced and mixed by Jamey Koch (The Tragically Hip, Copyright) at The Warehouse Studio in Vancouver, with additional production by Felix Fung, “Carry the Sky” boasts a remarkable lineup of players: Kevin Rose on guitars, Chris Gestrin on piano and keyboards, Koch handling bass, additional guitars, and backing vocals, with Share Dada on drums and Lone Willow adding ghostly harmonies. The chemistry is both intimate and cinematic, elevating Wilson’s trademark vocal presence into something widescreen and deeply affecting.
“Jamey also knew Christian well and had himself experienced recent familial loss,” Wilson adds. “He had an innate and intimate knowledge of exactly how to present this song and did such a beautiful job.”
The Warehouse Studio itself carries legendary weight. Built into the oldest brick building in Vancouver’s Gastown district, it was rescued and restored by Canadian rock icon Bryan Adams and painstakingly converted into a world class recording space. Over the past few decades, it has hosted an astonishing roster of major artists across genres, earning a reputation as one of the country’s most prestigious and creatively charged studios. Sunday Morning’s choice to record here places “Carry the Sky” firmly within the tradition of ambitious, high impact Canadian recordings.
This latest release extends Sunday Morning’s ongoing creative renaissance. Launched in 2016 with their self-titled debut, named the best Vancouver album of the year by The Georgia Straight, the project has consistently drawn praise for its shape shifting sound and fearless emotional depth. The band’s evolution has been guided by top tier collaborators including Stephen Hamm (Slow), producer Felix Fung (Girlfriends and Boyfriends), and Chris Birkett (Sinead O’Connor), with recent singles featuring contributions from Dave Genn (54 40) and mixes from Howard Redekopp (Mother Mother). Each chapter has expanded the band’s sonic terrain without compromising its core: Wilson’s compelling, vulnerable songwriting. Critics have taken notice. Vancouver Guardian praised the music as “layered and complex, both musically and lyrically… adapting and translating influences like Iggy Pop and David Bowie into something wholly new and enthralling.” Louder Than War described Sunday Morning’s emotional delivery as “an outtake from a Nick Cave album.” And as The Georgia Straight wrote, “No one is supposed to take an extended lost years hiatus from the music industry, and then return almost unannounced, with a record this brilliant.”
At its heart, “Carry the Sky” is a message sent beyond reach, an act of remembrance through shared sound.
“The crushing weight of loss is a universal inescapable gravity and yet trying to express it is so difficult,” Wilson reflects. “I have certain spiritual beliefs that allow me to talk to Juliet and Christian often and I hope they like this song as they carry the sky.”
It is a moment of catharsis not only for Wilson, but for listeners seeking beauty in the spaces where love and grief meet, a song built to stay with you long after it fades.
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