Off-Topic Forum

My wife and I are fans of the Anne of Avonlea series of books and videos, and our four children all read some if not all the series as part of their schooling. We sat as a family often to rewatch the PBS series and enjoyed it tremendously.

So, my wife and I as we're socially distancing ourselves from family and friends began watching Anne with an E - not a spoiler but it is non-canonical to the original books, but does abide by the character's personalities and tends to be darker in essence overall. Anyway, the theme song really struck a chord with me, and as is wont for me I researched the artist and listened to the whole song, "Ahead by a Century" and discovered a great Canadian band called Tragically Hip. The band no longer exists since the lead singer died of brain cancer a couple of years ago.

Anyone else follow their music? I'm sure our Canadian brethren are familiar with them, but I wonder if any from the US or other countries are familiar with them.

They have now been added to my list of artists that I listen to frequently and happen to be from Canada.

Yes, they were kind of a big deal in Canada. From our perspective your discovering them now is comparable to someone asking "Hey, has anyone ever heard of this obscure group called the Beatles?". I think their first album came out in 1987 and the last one around 2015 so there's a pretty big catalogue for you to discover.

I was never that much of a fan myself. I really liked some of their big radio hits and really disliked some others, but the hit/miss ratio was never high enough for me to explore any of their full-length albums. (And I'm not basing this on a small sample size. I'm sure I could rhyme off close to 50 of their songs from hearing them on the radio. They were that big.)

They also famously stole the lyrics for one of their songs from the write-up on the back of a Pro Set hockey card, so I guess that makes them on-topic here!

i was once bassist for "Stand Tall"--a Burton Cummings tribute band. 

Yeah, in Canada they were bigger than... every other Canadian band likely. Certainly in the last 25 years. Likely Rush has a bigger worldwide following, but in Canada, they were like Stephen Foster-yeah, that's my comparison! Canadian as they come, never really made it big anywhere else, but on their farewell tour it was like a month of national mourning. I think 10 or 11 million watched their last concert on tv. That's out of 35 million. What do 125 million Americans watch!? Superbowl maybe?

Their lead singer only had about a three note range but he was a poet first and I think that's why people here loved them, simple, hooky, intelligent, lots of Canadian references. Their song Bobcaygeon made a brief comeback here in Ontario in the last two weeks because the town Bobcaygeon, small little tourist place, was hit hard by COVID 19. Many deaths in one nursing home for such a small town (20+ without looking it up). So people rallied around the town by making covers of the song, etc.

Bevans - Wow! That's some comparison. They certainly understood how to stay together longer than the Beatles. Which song is the Pro Set Hockey card?

EddieLeon - I didn't know you were a musician. Nice. Did you play that wonderful bass line for "These Eyes"? Who do you pattern yourself after?

Ron - I've seen a lot of YouTube links for "Bobcaygeon", but haven't given it a listen yet. It'll be next. I did read about their lack of US following, but that only means we're a bit slow.

Here is the card:

And here is the song:

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

Thanks for the info, Bevans. I happen to have the PS French card on my trade list, so I'll probably have to pull it and add to my collection as that's an interesting connection. I'll give a listen, too.

The name of the song Bevans is referring to is "50 Mission Cap"

I grew up in Windsor so my radio media was saturated with Detroit radio stations. I never really heard the band until I started university where fellow students from other parts of Canada brought their music with them, and then moving more toward the Toronto area. I love this band now.

was joking about the burton cummings cover band, and i'm a very amateurish drummer/bassist/guitarist. you're so right about that wonderful melodic bassline on "these eyes". motown/stax from alberta!

I see BuccaneersDan uses a Tragically Hip song as his signature at the moment...