The making of The Fool is the story of two pals who have never really been in the same place at the same time.

“I’d met Mike while living in Berlin sometime around 2008 or 2009,” remembers Stewart, “and immediately became an admirer of his songwriting and production.”

“He must have come out of curiosity to one of my shows,” says Feuerstack, “and I guess that’s how we met. Over the next while we’d cross paths once in a while and stay in touch.”

A shared love of making music and a respect for each other’s craft lay at the centre of a long-distance friendship that emerged over several years.

“I’ve been lucky enough to have him lend his touch to some of my past records, but we’d never collaborated at the level of song composition,” says Stewart.

“There were near misses where I intended to visit his studio north of Berlin and then later somewhere in Italy,” remembers Feuerstack. “Eventually he landed back in Canada and for some reason the idea to collaborate emerged even though the geography still barely called for it, since we live many miles apart.”

Enter covid, and a paradigm shift that siloed most everyone into the realm of virtual life and isolated artistic practice.

“I had the idea at the outset of the lockdown in March 2020 to remotely make collaborative songs with other music makers,” reflects Stewart. “I was nervous to ask Mike because he operates on a different level than most of us, and who the hell am I?”

“He sent me this oddball sludgy guitar riff that he had recorded, probably thinking I’d want to sing or develop the guitar ideas alongside his,” says Feuerstack. “I started messing around with rhythm section ideas, and added a beat and a bass track and sent it back to him.”

The two artist’s distinctive styles were a natural fit, and the atypical process yielded exciting results that took the music to unforeseen places as they responded to each other’s ideas like a game of musical ping pong.

“I brought Mike’s ideas into the session, added some more sounds, and sent them back,” remembers Stewart.

“By the time I heard it again,” says Feuerstack, “he had built it into a bona fide song, thanks to his keyboard and vocal additions.”

“Being such a fan of Mike’s, I’d secretly hoped to have his voice be the main vocal part,” reflects Stewart. “But inspiration struck one night, and some lyrics poured out. So the song got stuck with me taking the lead.”

“I threw in some nasty synth and a couple of backing vocals, and we shipped it off to our friend Pietro Amato to mix,” says Feuerstack.

In the end it took four artists in four different studios, never once stepping foot in the same room at the same time, to bring the composition to it’s natural conclusion. Amato’s mix was shipped off to be mastered by longtime collaborator Andy Magoffin at the House of Miracles.

“In the end I’m just happy and honoured to be singing a song with Mike,” says Stewart.

“The result is The Fool,” offers Feuerstack, “which we humbly present for your listening pleasure.”

The strange and unfamiliar process that led to the creation of the song somehow runs parallel to the long-distance friendship that Stewart and Feuerstack have maintained for the past 15 years. But it’s also proof positive of the universal and connecting force of music.

As geographically disparate as the ingredients that made the song were, the end result is natural and familiar; a heartfelt pop gem bursting at the seams with satisfying hooks, intricate production, and unassumingly thoughtful lyrics.

“The Fool is about a particular memory I have,” reflects Stewart, “of a moment when it struck me how fully absorbed in unhealthy illusions I was during a particular time, and how even with the awareness that some of the things I was doing was debasing myself and causing pain to somebody else, I lacked the courage to let go.”

The song is released alongside an animated lyric video made by Stewart, who says it didn’t take long to execute, but it took over three years to finish.

“An idea for a video came to me soon after completing the song but it required a meticulous, frame-by-frame rotoscoping technique,” says Stewart. “After putting in a bunch of work and making it about 5% through that process, it became clear that what I was setting out to do was untenable. I stopped working on it, but I kept telling myself I’d find a way to see it through.”

Time passed, and The Fool collected dust. “A few years blew by, and along the way I pretty much gave up on the idea of putting the song out there,” says Stewart.

Cut to October of last year, and Feuerstack came to play a show at Andy Magoffin’s House of Miracles, bringing the two together after a lengthy hiatus.

“We hadn’t seen each other in years, and our conversation eventually made its way to our forgotten song,” remembers Stewart. “Mike convinced me it was time we gave it over to the world, and that got me excited about it again. Lightning flashed, and a solution for how to finish the video came with it. I got to work, and about two days later it was done.”