Following an extensive European tour, Foster had to undergo a cardiac double-graft surgery, a procedure initially planned to be a 4-hour intervention that turned into a 10-hour life-threatening tour de force for the surgeon. While a success, the prolonged period of intubation after the surgery, along with the several blood transfusions needed, would have a devastating effect on Foster, as added to his fragile physical state, he would have to endure months unable to talk, not knowing if he would have the ability to sing in the future, the significant blood loss contributing to severe episode of memory fogs, incoordination, dizziness and substantial headaches, having for direct result the impossibility for him to read, write, play guitar, or look at a screen. For a usually ongoing individual and upbeat type, he was now powerless. Slowly starting to regain energy, at least just enough to envision the possibility of being able to dedicate the few functioning hours of his days, Foster contacted his friend and longtime creative accomplice Ben Lemelin (co-writer and multi-instrumentalist for his live band The Long Shadows) to assist him with what initially seemed a sort of positive recovery venture before he realized the ambitious amplitude of what Foster wanted to dwell on and accomplish considering his fragile physical and cognitive state. The whole project was initially perceived as an instrumental one by Lemelin, Foster only being able to whisper when the idea was brought up,