Most Canadian song

Mon pays ce n'est pas un pays, c'est l'hiver.

Faites votre choix.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-t8W4X8Obo

funny, I came here to post this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofChsLBfBp0

http://youtu.be/kS138NuLRzU

I think 'This Is The Ice Age' by Martha & The Muffins has played a large role in determining what comes to my mind when I think of Canada, but I don't know much about Canada and have never been there

I don't think I've ever heard that!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ga9UPYNfpqM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IY_bhVSGKEg

www.youtube.com/watch?v=IokkPlY2HOY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCPYO-qzLTs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1BFPt001PYU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7k4cFMVfnCE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxlEqO_MA04

Kroll's Canadian accent is p. classic.

Neil Young's "Journey Through the Past"
Gordon Lightfoot's "If You Could Read My Mind"
Ian & Sylvia's "Four Strong Winds"
Bruce Cockburn's "Goin' Down the Road"

There are Lightfoot songs more specifically Canadian. But they're not as good.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxJvrD80nJ4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f389hIxZAOc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upsZZ2s3xv8

Good an excuse as any to post this from SCTV.

https://youtu.be/kZlrrwUIwcE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qvNk52mXiU

Re: Lightfoot on SCTV... is that really Rick Moranis? That's up there with Jim Carry as Clint Eastwood. Spooky.

northwest passage

Rheostatics - Northern Wish

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkcqGxtbBtQ

I thought it was "Helpless," but what do I know?

Sorry to hijack your thread, but it is kind of on-topic.

Does anyone remember a song by a popular (Canadian) band that references IGA? I thought it might've been Rheostatics, but I don't recall.

Anyway, when I first heard it, that sounded like the most Canadian thing to me at that time, even though I now realise IGA is not really Canadian.

Can't find a more suitable thread...Coming back from Toronto tonight, I was listening to one of those "'70s at seven" shows and they played something I hadn't heard for almost 50 years: "Linda, Put the Coffee On." The DJ didn't say who it was, so I was very impressed with myself for retrieving Ray Materick's name from some synapse up there. Wasn't in the Doors--checked Wikipedia and he's from Brantford (still alive), which I passed on the way home.

I don't think I hated it in 1974; I was 13, so more likely it was a complete blank. It wasn't K-Tel or Alice Cooper or the Guess Who or anything else that caught my ear back then. Sounded pretty good tonight: kind of a rough-hewn vocal falling somewhere between singer-songwriter and country crossover.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzTRyD5k8t0

Something about his particular vocal timbre (plus the era, of course) makes me think that this sounds like something that could've been on Tumbleweed Connection.

The most Canadian song is bilingual, obv.:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lm622tnjmjM

(xpost) Canadians sometimes blatantly imitated stateside artists (cf. Joey Gregorash's CCR imitation, "Jodie"), so that's as good a guess as any as to what he may have been aiming for.

This is really puzzling: no listing for him in the The CHUM Chart Book. That's the only possible way I would know the song. It was definitely played on there, but evidently not enough to make their Top 30.

"Johnny Go" is trilingual if you count "amigos"!

I came up with an argument once for why Lawrence Gowan is the most Canadian artist: born in the UK, currently working for Americans, bilingual with an accent, overeducated and moderately progressive but blatantly commercial

successful but a bit player in international terms

He's a strange...never mind.

That's what I know.

You almost convinced me, Sund4r.

As is widely known, however, the real answer is Céline Dion.

I thought this thread was going to be about this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQF5xuLrjpY

No offense if you're a fan, Sund4r, but long ago, when I was writing for Nerve in Toronto, the editor--a punk, Jesus & Mary Chain-type guy--interviewed Gowan for another publication, one that paid, after which Gowan and awakening the giant became a long-standing inside joke.

Just makes him all the more Canadian

(I do have an affection for bubblegum prog and loved his hits when I was in elementary school but wouldn't describe myself as a big fan.)

Moses Znaimer's Zoomer (ugh)station is a repository of minor Canadian hits I haven't heard for almost 50 years (see above). Coming home tonight, two back-to-back:

"Dunrobin's Gone," Brave Belt
"Passing Time," Bearfoo

Came up with the title of the first, but not the artist (I might have with some more time--it was a post-Guess Who, pre-BTO Randy Bachman band); drew a complete blank on the second (started thinking it was Elvin Bishop for some reason).

The fact that these songs got onto CHUM and other Canadian Top 40 stations, and hung around for a few weeks on their playlists and charts, precludes calling them obscure--they were a little more visible than some buried track on a Pebbles compilation. But they sure are forgotten.

Bearfoot...

When I was a kid, my mom always had CFRB AM radio on (70s MOR). The only Randy Bachman associated songs I remember them playing were the Brave Belt song you mention and Looking Out for No 1 by BTO, it gave me a distorted soft-rock picture of Randy's oeuvre.

Never heard or even heard of Bearfoot, this song might as well be from 1873 for all the current resonance it (doesn't) have.

Another old Canadian, alright...Another one from that moment I associate with the Guess Who/BTO/Brave Belt is Scrubbalo Caine's "Feelin' Good on Sunday"--the Guess Who's Jim Kale was in the band, and I saw them open for the GW at Exhibition Stadium circa 1974.

That song and band I only know because it was the theme song for Psychedelic Psunday on Q107. CFRB and Q107 are the two poles of my knowledge of pre-1980 Canrock.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhEA4vGbvBs

Come on you all, it's obviously "The Rodeo Song"

Heard this the other day for the first time in ages: Steel River, Toronto band circa 1970, better known for "Ten Pound Note" and "Southbound Train." I thought at first it was Bob McBride.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kW0OfXdSVI

I know the two songs you mentioned, but never heard this one. It does indeed sound most Canadian.

Dunno, the obvious missing artist here would be the Hip: I don’t love either song, but “Ahead by a Century” or “Bobcaygeon” seem like obvious picks.....

those are great and everything but

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9wW9ENBPlQ

because "You said you didn't give a fuck about hockey/And I never saw someone say that before" is the most Canadian thing I've ever heard.

Sounds like he should’ve spend more time among immigrants.

I was listening to Love Junk by The Pursuit of Happiness in preparation for the Todd Rundgren poll (he produced it). I hadn't heard the whole album, but the four singles were all over MuchMusic at the time. I was imagining an alternate reality where Moe Berg became a Gord Downiesque Canadian hero.

*spent

xp

thread made me remember how funny it was that Sloan's "Twice Removed" topped "best Canadian album of all time" list(s?) around 2000. I looked up this song and it turns out they put out a video on the occasion of the reissue. What a cute time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXgLzlRJRYI

"To me you seem giant" i bet that's about Canada

xp I just kinda dig that song's vibe and how he clearly meant Heard someone say, not Saw. It's just yknow, Canadian or whatever

Love “Penpals”! “Underwhelmed” might be my vote for most Canadian Sloan track though....

I dig it too, and my response was mostly in jest, but it did get me thinking about how the only people I know who follow hockey are, to quote Stephen Harper, ‘old stock Canadians’.

It's definitely the most Sloan Sloan track

I was listening to Love Junk by The Pursuit of Happiness in preparation for the Todd Rundgren poll (he produced it). I hadn't heard the whole album, but the four singles were all over MuchMusic at the time. I was imagining an alternate reality where Moe Berg became a Gord Downiesque Canadian hero.

I really didn't get what he meant by "had her hands around him and she's been giving it a beating" in Grade 6. I realized when watching recently that Berg even mimed it in the video.

https://i.imgur.com/bfgB4G9.png

a part of me died when they stopped making this in 09

the only "malt liquor" product sold in Nfld

I may or may not have had one of those without realizing it.

do tell

(i realized i also got married that year...hmm)

Tbf, watching now, he may just be shaking his fist for emphasis.xps

Nothing exciting, but I’m pretty sure it made its way into one of my teenage binges and I only took stock of it the morning after.

It's true, though, that Moe was pushing sexual boundaries in 80s CanRock.

Isn't part of the point in "Fireworks" that the protagonist's worldview was limited and provincial before meeting the love interest?

You held my hand and we walked home the long way
You were loosening my grip on Bobby Orr...

...Isn't it amazing what you can accomplish
When you don't let the nation get in your way...

i have only ever shouted along to this song holding Extra Old Stock, you're blowing my mind

Gord Downie singing about his "grip" on Bobby Orr has different connotations than The Pursuit of Happiness.

I just post old Canadian stuff here because it's convenient--I'm not really making grand "most Canadian" claims for these songs (although, if you're of a certain age, they resonate).

As I've pointed out before, I'm a non-fan (and one-time hater) who loves "Fireworks." Besides the significance of that goal, what makes the Bobby Orr line so perfect is "I never saw someone say that before." It's like Bo Diddley's "you should've heard just what I seen," the way it scrambles up senses.

"Canadian Railroad Trilogy", come on

Some of the early posts aren't loading, so here's Stompin' Tom Connors's "Sudbury Saturday Night" in case it hasn't shown up already.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sl751CDdRZI

Kim Barlow's "Humminah" (wish it were easier to find online) captures northern isolation well: "We rolled around in the snow beside Lucky Lake / I built him a table out of lumber to try and make me like him better."

The joker in me wants to nominate “So. central Rain”

Not with that pronunciation of "sorry", it's not!

"Fireworks" is kind of brilliant imo in relating the central relationship to iconic national/historical events like the Hockey Summit, Cold War, and National Fitness Program, but ultimately expressing cynical ambivalence with regards to nationalism - the marriage to the woman who doesn't give a fuck about hockey is the "one thing" that "doesn't have to go away". That might actually make it the most Canadian song?

idk if it's "the most Canadian song" but this is definitely the most Canadian stanza

Isn't it amazing what you can accomplish?
When you don't let the nation get in your way
No ambition whisperin' over your shoulder
Isn't it amazing you can do anything?

Kind of hits the nail on the head

The most Canadian stanza is also the most un-Québécois. Checks out.

the opening line of "problem bears" by the tragically hip is "writing a song about lake memphremagog" which feels the most canadian to me

i see the hip were summoned yesterday as well

"fireworks" a very good choice

That’s Anglo imperialist talk, like when people claim poutine is Canadian. Lake Memphrémagog is in Quebec (and, well, Vermont).

(Not being serious btw.)

I feel a "most" Canadian song has to do a lot of work reconciling the rural with the urban (Margaret Atwood probably has a record review somewhere about this). Like Martha and the Muffins' "You Sold the Cottage".

If we’re going to seriously answer the question only bilingual songs should qualify imo. So far most answers would in fact satisfy the staunchest of Québécois sovereignists because they imply an almost complete disconnect between Quebec and the ROC.

Kind of how the Hip never meant shit to the overwhelming majority of francophones here.

Gowan covering Harmonium?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZZk8skMY0U

Btw pom I have an Albertan friend who would argue equally strongly that all these answers are 'Eastern' chauvinism.

Sure, but I think it’s fair to argue that there are fewer cultural differences between Alberta and other parts of Canada than between Quebec and the ROC due to the language barrier. I don’t have a horse in this race btw, I just think the question is more complicated than first meets the eye and the answers that have been offered so far betray a very specific conception of Canadianness that provides a great deal of grist for the separatist mill.

there are fewer cultural differences between Alberta and other parts of Canada than between Quebec and the ROC

Haha you tell them that!

There's also the issue that many francophone artists don't see themselves as Canadian and would reject that characterization. You end up with this sort of CBC tokenism that doesn't satisfy either side. But OK, "Complainte pour Ste. Catherine" by Kate and Anna McGarrigle.

If I were to address the thread topic specifically, and not just post old stuff I hear on the radio, I'd go with some obvious picks: Ian & Sylvia's "Four Strong Winds," Gordon Lightfoot's "Early Morning Rain" (he has more definitively Canadian songs, but my second criteria would be that I love or at least like the song), Neil Young's "Helpless" or "Journey Through the Past." "Fireworks" would be a reasonable pick. I can't think of a Guess Who song that qualifies--"Runnin' Back to Saskatoon" is the first thing that comes to mind, and that's good but not good enough. The Demics' "New York City" actually gets at something very Canadian, wanting to light out for somewhere else.

There's also the issue that many francophone artists don't see themselves as Canadian and would reject that characterization. You end up with this sort of CBC tokenism that doesn't satisfy either side.

Absolutely, which perhaps points towards the impossibility of reconciliation?

Hey, I posted a solid federalist effort at cross-solitude outreach and it went unremarked!

Precisely!

Tbf I can’t think of a single national designation that isn’t bursting at the seams with irreconcilable contradictions. Like, what is Americanness, really?

This thread will be Exhibit A for the sovereigntists in the next Quebec Referendum.

Sorry, Justin.

Yeah, good luck even settling on a language for the most Indian song.xps

(The first song in the thread was in French btw.)

OP’s vision hath been betrayed!

I mean, if we just want to identify a song that seems to resonate with people across the country and its divisions, we may be as well off putting on "Comfortably Numb" and calling it a day.

The album was inspired by a Montreal event at the least.

Did Waters spit on an anglophone or francophone?

Oh so Canadians a mari usque ad mare are comfortably numb is what you’re saying?!?!? (Kind of true, actually.)

cmon yall

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GICDnzm3QNc

Ha well that but also ime it has an exceptional stature on Canadian radio, and Pink Floyd seem as popular, if not more, with French Canadians as with anglophones. xp

Halfway there raises a vital question, though.

You end up with this sort of CBC tokenism that doesn't satisfy either side.

How about one of these per province/territory? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Canadian_Song_Quest

I've always thought the song that is most representative of "this country" is "Mon Pays", but I believe it is associated with QC separatism.

A sovereignty-associated song commissioned by the National Film Board does seem v Canadian tbf so maybe OP was OTM.

picking a song that represents an entire country, or one that resonates with most canadians, seems backwards in the 21st century. i can kind of understand how this was possible in the past, though.

you can probably do a serviceable attempt at picking a song that resonates with most people from a given province. someone said alberta isn't that different from the rest of canada (compared to roc and qc), being from vancouver and going to edmonton almost feels like going to a different country in some ways.

I didn’t mean to minimize the very real differences that exist between predominantly English-speaking provinces, but imo being part of the Francosphere makes for a more radical distinction still.

That said, Ontario certainly feels a lot more familiar to me than BC, for instance.

Well let's all just agree on this one then

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiGb31e5ydo

love it but what about Leamington?

No fucking way am I signing on to any pro-ketchup messaging.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLoO_XsYAxQ

Dave Marsh for prime minister!

ok i adore that they included the French on the ketchup bottle cartoon

Also, Stompin' Tom was terrible. /controp

I don't get the Stompin' Tom thing either.

Mitsou brought the Canadas together
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do_6YzvWqF8

I was thinking recently how it’s funny that “underwhelmed” is pretty much just a regular word now. They might not have been first to use it, but it definitely still had a jarring “wrongness” back when Sloan wrote that, so I guess that’s their legacy.

mitsou v compelling choice ngl

if the rankin family covered it that'd be the ballgame

lol

did anyone ever cover blue rodeo's "trust yourself" but in french? that would be a good one

Most mysterious mystery of a mysterious film: there are five Sloan songs in The Virgin Suicides.

I wonder if Air are fans.

to americans, it's probably 'having an average weekend'

bonus: no need to translate lyrics

I feel like someone needs to mention Leonard Cohen's version of "Un canadien errant (The Lost Canadian)".

I unironically like that everyone continues to ignore the Prairies. Western alienation is real!

Tbc, I agree that it's obviously true that it is impossible to do this:

picking a song that represents an entire country, or one that resonates with most canadians

We could certainly pick one that would piss off the entire nation evenly.

(eventually expands to the whole country except Alberta)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRjurRdep_Q

Has anyone already made a definitive playlist of "[this Canadian city/province] sucks" songs?

You should @ Amir Attaran on Twitter, he’ll post it in a jiffy.

How many of those are there? I can only think of "Winnipeg Is A Frozen Shithole"

'one great city!' (but not really)

Joel Plaskett dumps on Kelowna in “I Love This Town”

The Music Canada top 20 albums chart is ... something this week: https://musiccanada.com/charts/#albums . Pom will be glad to know that 5 of the top 10, including the top 3, are Quebecois, but the composition of it seems random. #1 is trad country singer Irvin Blais, whom I know from a UOttawa radio programme, with a single. #2 is Angèle Dubeau, a violinist I was unfamiliar with, with an album that apparently includes Philip Glass, Michael Nyman, Jonny Greenwood, and Olafur Arnolds compositions. #3 is Les Cowboys Fringants. Then Rob Zombie and Taylor Swift appear, below these, and just ahead of two albums by Lynda Lemay. I'm tbh wondering how these charts are compiled. (The tracks chart just looks like an American Billboard chart.) Or do French speakers just buy more albums??

Heh, I too would be very curious to know what the exact criteria are here. Angèle Dubeau is *the* classical crossover act par excellence in Quebec btw, or so it seems to me. A massive step up from the likes of André Rieu in Europe. Irvin Blais does not ring a bell, but that’s to be expected given my usual blind spots.

Has anyone already made a definitive playlist of "[this Canadian city/province] sucks" songs?

― intern at pepe le pew research (Simon H.), Saturday, March 27, 2021 4:22 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

i can get into this, ha!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_r5zXOnKio

My man Stan Rogers:

Ontario, y’know I’ve seen a place I’d rather be
Your scummy lakes and the city of Toronto don’t do a damn thing for me
I’d rather live by the sea.

In "Thoughts on a Rainy Afternoon", Bruce Cockburn asks "Jesus don't let Toronto take my song away".

Joel Plaskett dumps on Kelowna in “I Love This Town”

― FRAUDULENT STEAKS (The Cursed Return of the Dastardly Thermo Thinwall), Saturday, March 27, 2021 4:45 PM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

isn't grapes of wrath's backward town also about kelowna?

this all reminds me that the arrogant worms must have a few contenders for the thread concept

also, it seems like most songs about vancouver being crap are about e hastings, so my vote goes to hot hot heat's yvr

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOeTRurNG6E

Weakerthans One Great City seems almost insincere in its hate, but it still fits the sub theme here I think

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLlsjEP7L-k

Main topic - Besides Mitsou, there was also The Box with a few hits that bridged the language border.

One Great City is obviously a love letter disguised as a hate letter. Def still fits the sub theme.

Similar conflicted hate vein from Spookey Ruben - Leave The City. I assume it’s about Toronto.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoPSk92DiwU

Some days this one feels most Ontarian - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97CtEReZEaQ

it definitely would not be a french song!

Glad one of the Three Dead Trolls could join us.

Come on you all, it's obviously "The Rodeo Song"

― Lee626, Thursday, October 29, 2020 11:16 PM (five months ago) bookmarkflaglink

i agree with this one

alternatively log driver's waltz

"Log Driver's Waltz" ("La valse du maître draveur") might actually satisfy both pom and my Albertan friend!

If we’re going animated, “Black Fly”.

xp And girls. It pleases them completely.

OTM

I'm definitely out of my league here, but for me, this one that Kim posted must be the Most Canadian song.

https://i.imgur.com/isvPOwC.png

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOJemHKzRQY

Questionable track really but it's got some poetic moments, kudos to its songwriter:

Mississauga people
Carry the weight of common evil
And go about their lives with a whisper and a whine
About Mississauga goddam

C'est the season:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ri0r0_urwo8

I think we found it.

powerful stuff

+1 we're done here!

holy shit

absolutely voting for this in the 77, come back and fp me if I don't

i didn't think the perfect song existed.

Was Northwest Passage posted?

Because it is Northwest Passage.

Did you watch 'Income Tax' tho?

Because it is 'Income Tax'.

absolutely voting for this in the 77, come back and fp me if I don't

I never vote for tracks in the 77 but next year I will post a ballot containing only this song, come back and FP me if I don't.

Yeah it's Income Tax

Lol

Sublime guitar solo, to boot.

this is like if bill wurtz wrote a good song

Friggen A

I think the song is from 2020, unfortunately.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSffz_bl6zo

year of impact! xp

acadian boy summer

Jesus that song is amazing

P'tit Belliveau record is p good!

I couldn't figure out where the best place to post this, but somehow I did not know until today that the Canadian supermarket chain No Frills put out a rap album late last year:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDipchuzGnI

I did know about this, wish I didn't

Someone at head office is trying to take advantage of having to buy public performance licences for their stores. I've never heard this while I've been shopping there, though; grocery shopping is basically my only exposure to the music that most people listen to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SV3ubZ6fu3I

I don’t think it’s going to be a title winner in this thread, but kinda want to give a shout out to the multiple songs by Maestro Fresh Wes that incorporate/sample specifically Canadian rock hits (Haywire, Guess Who, Gowan, maybe more?)

i try to avoid no frills - crap produce, the local one is owned by an infamous slumlord family - although it is the closest grocery store to me and my immediate neighbourhood is a slight food desert, but i do end up going there for necessaries once in a while, toilet roll or that sort of thing. have definitely never heard this music before.

I spoke too soon, I heard "Bag It Up" at No Frills this morning, and I realized I had heard it there before.

I never realized that Maestro's "Drop the Needle" samples "Dance Desire" by Haywire. Though I am not and never have been a Haywire fan, I always thought that it was neat the way the guitar riff and bassline play off of each other in the intro of that song.