For the record while Nickelback and Bieber Fever are Canadian exports, it was Americans who made them big. Just saying we all played a part in that sad tale. And yet there’s so much good music coming out of Canada. I’ll be in the US Grandpa Simpson rambling about some band that’s HUGE in Canada and earn blank looks. Who or what are you talking about? So that’s the purpose behind this CanCon Column every Tuesday at 9am…to provide illumination of Canadian music: retro, past and present/future. Any suggestions email or use comments below.
The Tragically Hip
Formation: 1983
Twitter: @thehipdotcom
Website: The Hip
Fan Website: Hip Museum
Check Out:
World Container
World Container is a fun rocking album ideal for roadtrips, background music when you have company or just because. Check out one of the singles In View, it’s a mixtape special. Music@Work is another album worth checking out.
Sounds like:
R.E.M.-ish. Much like R.E.M. is entrenched in Athens, Georgia lyrically and sonically, same with the Hip. You’ll discover all kinds of Canadiana: Toronto hockey player references, Terry Fox and more. (Oddly enough there is no Degrassi references, sorry Kevin Smith).
Fun Fact:
Lots of Canadians have a Hip story, you want to lose half an hour or more of your life…ask the next Canadian you meet for their Hip story. Here’s mine!
Many moons ago the lead singer for the Tragically Hip Gord Downie released Coke Machine Glow a solo album/poetry book. (Coke is outstanding, even if you’re not into poetry I recommend picking it up). To celebrate the release of Coke Gord shot a live poetry performance accompanied with a band of non-Hip members.
My good friend and filmmaker J-Rock was hired to operate the jib for the special. You’ve seen these large cumbersome cameras if you’ve gone to award shows. It takes 2 people to operate them…one to operate it, the other to just be eyes to see where they land (and don’t hit anything on the way down or up).
Course I was eyes. Everything was going swell when J-Rock motions he’s gonna descend. I hold up my hand: wait. Gord’s singing with his eyes closed. After a bit he moves on; so I nod. J-Rock begins the slow smooth descent. Now of course with the weight of these suckers you can’t react or alter your course quickly. Rock stars meanwhile have no qualms. Gord began walking deliberately into the space he just vacated! Totally unaware of the danger coming down for him.
I frantically motioned to J-Rock to crank that sucker upward: it was like an action movie. One of Canadian’s premier talents and this jib is rocketing down on him like some odd Vincent Price torture device. With seconds to spare he caught sight of the jib, deftly stepped aside, put his arm on the camera’s arm all without missing a beat. Whew.
That marked the one and only jib experience for J-Rock and I.
(After the taping we all hung out with Gord and he told us all kinds of cool and funny stories about growing up in Kingston (Ontario), fishing and boating. Super cool dude).
Funky Cool Lyric:
“I had job before this, I had a job before this. Ultimately, it was that job that drove me into this. I worked at an aquarium, an aquarium with lots of money from the government so it was HUUUGGEE! I uh I was a clean n’ scrub man we called each other in the C n’ S union. I scrubbed the inside of the killer whale tank.”
~New Orleans is Sinking (Live on May 3rd, 1991 at the Roxy in Los Angeles)
