the Big Shiny late-90s/early-00s CanCon poll

ah at last my thread

good call cutting sloan and the hip, who loom larger than any of these bands imo

anyway let me be the first to say that early treble charger slaps

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xd6Ytvgz2wE

Lol I was def gonna post the "Red" video.

I highly recommend the first Don Vail album, which has some Treble Charger + Chore membership.

I've listened to more OLP than any of the other bands, but I'd rather not hear them ever again.

Drinking In LA wasn't a huge hit over here but it's basically never gone away. Everyone over the age of about 25 knows it.

My first instinct is to say that The Tea Party aged best (as per the other thread), but I'd have to indulge in some heavy duty nostalgia to reassess the lot of them.

Oh wait, it went top three here and was just ~in the air~ for a lot longer. Point is it was huge even if no one bothered to listen to another Bran Van 3000 song ever again. That alone puts them in a different category to any of the rest of these bands.

i love olp but they're like an inherently flawed band bc raine maida is their lead singer. they get better as they get big concept (happiness is not a fish that you can catch and spiritual machines are their twin peaks) but also way goofier

HOWEVER this video contains one of the most incredible drum performances i've ever seen in my life, jeremy taggart 4ever

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6i9_LQQ-x0

I recall vaguely liking Moist as a 12 year old. I have no idea how any of their songs went, though.

David Usher apparently went on to have a minor hit covering the Manics' "If You Tolerate This..." which is exceptionally weird to me

i'm voting for matthew good though. i think he's made at least three masterpieces (beautiful midnight, avalanche, hospital music) and his other records all have good stuff on them. he's incredibly self-serious but i'm fine with it for some reason? i moved to canada for 10 months when i was 15 and saw the "weapon" video shortly after i got there and was blown away

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zv0w8LIzo6I

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cXvNEU5f4Bc

PICTURE yourself

ok i'm done

I kind of remember OLP and MGB as tonal polar opposites almost duking out in some way, though never explicitly I don't think, with Raine as the careening rafter-climbing pretty boy and Good as the sneering, self-hating loser who was above doing rock moves.

my fave MGB singles were the ones off of The Audio of Being, which is half-great but you can practically hear how miserable it was to make

I remember finding the MGB overly lacking in the angst department. But then again, Bush was my favourite band for a few months.

my fave MGB singles were the ones off of The Audio of Being, which is half-great but you can practically hear how miserable it was to make

― Simon H., Wednesday, April 3, 2019 5:37 AM (forty-two seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

agreed on both counts. "carmelita" is prob their best song!

yeah, absolute snarler. nasty tones.

"carmelina"* lol

great video too, good was always uh good at maximizing the ideas he could get out of his videofact budget

not so successful that they actually made it big in the US.

I don't remember any of Our Lady Peace's songs, but Clumsy shifted quite a few units.

olp are an odd case, the title track of clumsy was kind of an alt rock hit in the u.s., and then they had a legit hit many years later with "somewhere out there," yet they're forgotten enough to qualify i think

I think I would die of embarrassment if I heard any of the Gravity singles today

i loooooved "innocent" at the time

re: music videos and working on a budget, Big Wreck did their best with some lighting and a long staircase

https://youtu.be/0JtB0Y9oM0I

my favorite fact about our lady peace that makes no sense: happiness is not a fish that you can catch ends with a drum duet between jeremy taggart and elvin jones

lmao just watching that "Automatic Flowers" video again and just...yeah, no, Maida is just too much. I can't with him at all. Idk why cause I like other bands with objectively worse frontpeople.

i don't blame anyone for not being able to deal with raine maida, you can hear his smug smile in every line he sings

skip to the perfect drumfill at 1:35 imo

I've owned the first Our Lady Peace and Moist CDs. I'm pretty sure I just got these from either columbia house or BMG, probably as my last picks in the X CDs for a penny thing. As I mentioned on the other thread, I spent a lot of time listening to Edges of Twilight, but relistening to it now, it doesn't really hold up.

Bran Van 3000's albums were really good, they really deserved to be more than just a one hit wonder.

I imagine I would recognize songs by most of these other bands (I kind of vaguely remember liking a I Mother Earth song that was getting radio airplay), but I can't say I ever got into any of them.

I always found it kind of odd that for as big as Our Lady Peace was in Canada, it took until Big Shiny Tunes 6 (From 2001) for them to show up on one of those comps.

I noticed that too! Must have been a label issue or something.

It's wild that BV3000 had a single with Curtis fucking Mayfield.

I mostly know Pluto for this song, which I was a fan of as a kid:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OeDs-jZBh5s

Also I noticed you left Bif Naked off this list.

lmao fuck I specifically meant to include them! (tbf though I never found them any...good, really)

I remember listening a lot to this 1998 Edge compilation, which looks like it was angling to tag along on the success of BST1/2. They put OLP right up front.

https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/4PcAAOSwoFVabinq/s-l640.jpg

Big Sugar, fuck. Bloozy Canadiana is pretty bleak.

I still love the first Big Wreck album, so I voted for them here. I really love the song Under the Lighthouse, its like a pre-emptive Interstate Love Song.

Also when winter turns to spring I invariably end up listening to Drinking in LA about 50,000 times in a row. It's a beautiful day.

Also - didn't Pluto include members who went on to form the New Pornographers? Or am I thinking of a different band?

simon you were talking about bif naked (who i had never heard of) when you were talking about this poll on facebook!

if Bran Van 3000 win this poll it means UK ilxors voted as that was a megahit here

bif naked did kinda suck it's true

Also - didn't Pluto include members who went on to form the New Pornographers? Or am I thinking of a different band?

associated acts to New Pornos, acc to Wikipedia:
Pretty Girls Make Graves, Destroyer, AC Newman, Limblifter, Superconductor, Age of Electric, Zumpano

(no idea what the PGMG connection is?)

I really enjoy Big Wreck whenever I hear them.

xp tbf that's not really an exhaustive list, for ex Neko Case was in Cub and Maow and neither of those are there

was kinda surprised Drinking in LA wasn't a hit in the US cos I associate it with a trip to the west coast in 1999 but tbf we started off in Vancouver BC so I assume it must've been there that it was playing in bars all the time

Are any of the Big Wreckers Americans or were they all just studying at Berklee when they formed?

Ha, wow, I don't remember this video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtBYIghz6MU

oh god I remember these literal kids now.

also, someone get fgti in here

associated acts to New Pornos, acc to Wikipedia:
Pretty Girls Make Graves, Destroyer, AC Newman, Limblifter, Superconductor, Age of Electric, Zumpano

(no idea what the PGMG connection is?)

Ah I was thinking of Zumpano. No idea what the PGMG connection is either.

Are any of the Big Wreckers Americans or were they all just studying at Berklee when they formed?

Thornley and Doherty are Canadian's of course but Williams was American I think, not sure about the bassist.

not really poll-relevant but this is my fave pre-NPs AC Newman tune

https://youtu.be/TvTltNhTy-E

speaking of 90s Canadian culture and Jeremy Taggart, there's a quasi-Street Cents revival in the works

http://www.yourtwocentstv.com/

Matthew Good Band by a long shot, a band I not only like but actually LOVE. I go back to all those albums all the time, particularly UNDERDOGS which I really think is one of the best rock albums of the 90s, period. As mentioned above, OLP had their moments on Happiness... and Spiritual Machines, and also on the debut Naveed, but I agree the band was inherently flawed, and I don't find myself going back to them despite liking those albums a lot at the time. Tea Party and I Mother Earth were nice radio rawk bands. I have no impression of the rest.

Underdogs, though. Anybody else like that CD as much as I do? That's one for the pantheon, if you ask me.

underdogs kicks ass. i prefer beautiful midnight bc it feels a little more balanced to me but. "prime time deliverance"!!!

also the singles which are all incredible

in fact i even forgot how much i love "indestructible"

Word. Perfect album there, track for track, everything just HITS.

i have embedded too many videos in this thread but i wanted to shout out this song, as i was listening to it this morning i realized it's my favorite from any of the artists listed (still haven't heard a tea party record)

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

Don’t know if they were still around in 1996 but I would hear the Gandharvas ‘first day of spring’ every day on 89x out of Windsor. This is What I hear when I think CanCon.

Gandharvas had another Canadian radio "hit" in 1997 with Downtime.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qWTfECBP6ts

"prime time deliverance"!!!

yup, gorgeous tune. tbh Avalanche never grew on me that much for the most part. never liked the production or the string arrangements. I ought give Hospital Songs a shot. I seem to recall White Light Rock and Roll Revue having a few crackers despite being very much a Try-Hard Return To Rock record.

I'm a song guy, so Treblecharger for "Even Grable" and "Brand New Low."

Some of those bands, or at least the little I was unfortunate enough to hear--I Mother Earth, the Tea Party, Our Lady Peace--I remember as being considerably worse than Iron Butterfly.

tbh Avalanche never grew on me that much for the most part. never liked the production or the string arrangements

i refuse to accept this opinion! i was listening to the title track just now and thinking "simon should like this!!!!"

I have a soft spot for the first IME album with their second vocalist, Blue Green Orange - good prog gateway for me, though I'm sure it sounds naff now

Oh well, this is a depressing and happening thread.

I can't really type about this too much. I really like the first OLP album. I don't really remember a lot of these bands, but I liked Big Sugar (not listed) and Zuckerbaby (not listed). Treble Charger were cool when they were on Sonic Unyon, I think, then they got bad. One of my first ever shows I went to was Treble Charger/Hayden when I was like 15.

I don't remember anything about the sound of the band Pluto but I remember the album cover.

j. englishman was a big-dollar signing, he is Esthero's younger brother. The album flopped enormously but had one minor hit, a song called "More". j. was friends with friends and Kurt Swinghammer (a friend) worked on it so I remember listening to it and hearing garble. Like, the mix was so dense that it just sounded like garble. It was really interesting. It got really bad reviews iirc.

This is unrelated but I thought it was very funny, prior to Ron Sexsmith becoming a thing, he and Kurt Swinghammer had a two-piece band in like the very early 90s and they called it Sexhammer which is just great.

Oh and yes, I never liked IME even for a minute until they got Brian Byrne in the band, at which point I liked them for six minutes or however long "Summertime In The Void" is, it's a good song!

Gandharvas or Spooky Ruben would get my vote.

I didn't actually live thru any of this not being from here and am unfamiliar with a lot of these names

The Gandharvas' "Watching the Girl" also got radio play. I liked thise albums reasonably well and would have voted for them if they were here, like I lobbied for.

those

But if a Windsor station was playing "First Day of Spring" daily, it probably had more to do with the band being from London, ON, than anything else.

I weirdly have no recollection of those guys at all

In 2008, Edwin announced that he, Mike Turner (Our Lady Peace) and Jeff Burrows (The Tea Party) planned to record an album together.[5] The band, named Crash Karma, is rounded out by former Zygote bassist and lead singer Amir Epstein. Crash Karma released its debut album, produced by Turner, in March 2010 and released it on E1 Music Canada.

i'm not ever going to listen to that, but it's sure a fact

omg @ serial joe

Fun fact: The kid from Serial Joe was also the kid in the music video for Our Lady Peace's Superman's Dead.
Also Fun Fact: Said video for Superman's Dead doesn't seem to be on YouTube, despite the fact that it's used as the thumbnail for the other version of the video.

Growing up in the 90s in my American town on the border, I remember an distressing number of these acts. OLP were just massive in my high school, one of the handful of bands that I didn't realize werent megastars in the states until I got to college, lol. Had completely forgotten it, but after clicking play on the j. Englishman's "More" I definitely remember hearing it on the radio.

I don't remember seeing any of these Big Shiny Tunes comps growing up though - were they not distributed in the states?

I think they were just sold in Canada. This page only lists Canadian chart performance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Shiny_Tunes#Charts_and_certifications

Did you get MuchMusic (Canada's MTV equivalent)? I'm pretty sure that's how we were brainwashed into buying so many copies.

We didn't have MuchMusic but we got the Edge from Toronto, which is I think what drove much of the popularity of those acts in my town. Plus the bigger ones got played on our local US stations, I guess because it was pre-Clear Channel merger and there could still be things like regional radio hits.

There was a kind of subtle thing happening with these Big Shiny Tunes comps, sliding in a Wide Mouth Mason track between Chem Bros and Radiohead, artificially inflating the perceived worth of the Canadian product

Wide Mouth Mason played at my high school in grade 9, I think as a reward for some fundraising thing. What I mainly remember is that the announcements every morning were trying to hype us up to get out and raise money because WIDE MOUTH MASON ARE COMING!!

I remember literally nothing about them, save for them nicking the moniker from the famous jar of the same name

In the last two days I noticed two different people on the subway listening to Heaven Coming Down. I should put on some Tea Party when I get home from work today.

I vaguely recall Wide Mouth Mason but had never heard of Gandharvas prior to this poll.

I just remember mistaking both "Harder to Breathe" by Maroon 5 and "The Remedy" by Jason Mraz as Wide Mouth Mason songs when I first heard them on the radio.

never heard of Gandharvas prior to this poll.

Sort of a quirky art-rock band who got a few singles on alt radio/Much but I don't think ever crossed over to top 40 or became as big as some of these bands. (But apparently "First Day of Spring" got so much play on the Windsor station because of listener requests.) Their last album was 97 so probably early for this poll. "Coffee shop Jane's Addiction" is probably the best description I can give but even that doesn't do justice to the number of bases they tried to cover on A Soap Bubble and Inertia. Idk if it's worth it if you didn't hear them at the time, and I wouldn't make extravagant claims for it, but it could be a contender for the least acclaimed album I love.

i feel like the philosopher kings' "i am the man" could slot in here, maybe the later jet set satellite "best way to die" but good list to choose from. i'd never listen to any of this music except to evoke the feeling of sitting in the basement after school watching muchmusic. oh also maybe "groovy dead" by rusty? basically just want to list minor canadian rock hits. maybe "shine" was a bit too early. just listing songs now.

i think a lot of these the clip on youtube is clearly vhs'd off muchmusic sometime in the mid- to late-1990s, like this age of electric video.

also i want everyone to enjoy this video of i mother earth from snowjob 97

Ha, do you mean the Doughboys' "Shine"? I listened to Crush a lot in 93/94.

omg there is just SO much to cringe at in that Snowjob video. good/horrible find

I loved the Philosopher Kings when I was like 12/13

Lots of great hockey haircuts in that Snowjob vid, a+++

SFO14
3 years ago
OLP, I Mother Earth, Moist, Age of Electric, Big Wreck, The Tea Party...amongst some of my favorite bands of the 90's.

(taken from the youtube comments for olp's "one man army" video)

I always did like "One Man Army".

yes doughboys and it was voted in 2000 as the 26th "Top Canadian Single of All Time" by Chart Magazine...
what a list! there are two evaporators songs in the top 50.

rusty at snowjob 96 is pretty cool. most of the clips preserved online are of collective soul and crazy town, unfortunately.

"one man army" kicks ass!!!! the drums! (i'll say this about every olp song)

well i guess since jeremy taggart left the band a few years ago, not anymore lol

I never noticed how awesome the bassline is.

i would like however to rep for a record outside the timeframe of this poll: in 2012 our lady peace, having produced two uneven stadium-directed albums with bob rock and one really abysmal album by themselves (burn burn, a remarkably empty rock record), did a "return to our roots" record, though it was more of a "return to the experimental impulse that drove spiritual machines." it's a really dark and cloudy but very catchy record called curve; if you like prime olp at all you'll find something to like there imo

this got me to look up an old this is the thread where we talk about muchmusic thread
it's interesting. lecoq mentions partying with rainbow then complains about muchmusic being too "socially conscious"

it features a very post from a much music insider, too long to quote

rainbow sun franks: a cunt. easy.

bradford how: just a total joke and a symptom of a dying station. exhibits the typical overcompensating, annoying personality of small town folk who move to the big fucking city.

hannah sung: the girl will fuck anything that moves yet masks it all with her boring persona. i know way too many girls like her.

sarah taylor: saw her eating lunch in yorkville about 2 weeks ago. seems kinda listless.

also i'm voting limblifter based on "tinfoil"

Another band/song from this era that I remember getting quite a bit of airplay that surprisingly didn't show up on a Big Shiny Tunes compilation was The Watchmen with Stereo.

That's an interesting list. Always annoys me that "I'm an Adult Now" is the TPOH song people remember since it's so monotonous and says nothing to me. Much prefer "She's So Young" or "Beautiful White".

TIL Big Wreck have more monthly listeners on Spotify than Sloan.

TS: Guitar Player vs Pitchfork

Wow at that IME Snowjob video

Edwin perfectly encapsulating a now-extinct version of “hunk”

Like they look like Lisa Simpson’s favourite band

Hey, early shoegazey Len is pretty good. I love this video too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1EUfNFL8vk

wasn't there some story about them swiping a copy of Pro Tools from some famous producer?

Lol @ that Snowjob video, what a find!

our lady peace intimate & interactive 2000
great chance to get up close and personal with the band and hear their best songs in a stripped down environment
"the guys are looking forward to it," announces rick "the temp" rick campanelli.

Did Jean Leloup get any airtime in anglo Canada?

I don't remember much French-language music on English radio at all, sadly. MuchMusic tried to make Mitsou's "Bye Bye Mon Cowboy" happen in 1988.

OLP were absolutely inescapable the summer of 1997, so it's hard to pick anything else

incidentally i'm about to drive up north for my cousin's funeral, with whom i spent a LOT of time listening to this stuff in that era; about the only upside of this whole situation is that i'll be within range of ottawa rock radio; chez 106 is more or less permanently stuck in the summer of 1997, which i suspect i will greatly appreciate

That's too bad. Mitsou is best forgotten but I'll easily take Leloup's 90s albums over just about any CanCon. And I say this as someone who absolutely hated almost all music sung in French at the time (I still don't know why).

xp, obv.

I think OLP were ruined for me the day that I was at my painting job and we listened to an OLP mix about ten times. I never need to hear "Innocent" again.

As a side note, I'm amazed that 99.9 The Buzz is still around. For a US-based radio station, they played a surprising amount of Canadian alt rock.

I dimly recall being at this

https://www.setlist.fm/festival/2000/summersault-2000-halifax-43d6ebd7.html

the Pumpkins were shockingly awful

Catherine Wheel, eh? Interesting.

a note for brad re: the Catherine Wheel's set

The only sign of life came when Our Lady Peace guitarist Mike Turner joined the band on stage for a tune. They bid farewell to Halifax stating “We will never, ever see you again.” Good riddance!

so there was a brief OLP/Catherine Wheel crossover

For a US-based radio station, they played a surprising amount of Canadian alt rock.

I felt like kids in Buffalo, NY, might have been even more passionate about Canadian bands than Canadians were. It seemed to have aome kind of cachet. People would eagerly want to talk to me about Matthew Good, Tea Party, or the Hip when they found out I was Canadian. (I lived there 05-08, during my PhD!) OLP played our uni's Fallfest one of those years

loool, this video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHu3ZKXZrf4

god, Edwin was such a prat

Just for the sake of balance:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gljv7NNgQD0

And of course:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5gidM31MCM

We do get some good French radio in Ottawa. In my more enlightened middle age, I really enjoy listening to trad French country on CHUO every Thursday morning to get into a French headspace for that day's teaching.

(Portentous, Live 88.5 and Rebel 101.7 are both also happy to dip into the 90s alt vaults.)

Sund4r I was at that OLP show, ha

I’m think a lot of it might have been that those band played Buffalo/Upstate New York a ton, and felt like “big” bands, when other touring bands from farther away in the US hardly ever came through, so the fan bases got huge. Like I remember going to see BNL play the hockey arena before “one week” was a thing.

Heh, you're definitely more Québécois than I am if you can listen to country in French. I'll get there some day.

xp

weirdest bit of trivia related to this poll that I've dug up so far: MGB's "Omissions of the Omean" ('95) supposedly contains the first recorded use of the expression "first-world problems"

!

(Sorry for your loss, btw, portentous.)

Pomenitul, it helps a lot that the words are p much always crystal clear, and that it makes it harder to fall asleep on a longish morning drive, but I'm also somewhat fascinated by this show: I didn't think a French twang was possible beforehand, and the host of this show manages to come up with four new hours of music in a fairly specific vein every week.

Thanks, I'll check it out.

Prob goes without saying that it's super hokey.

(no idea what the PGMG connection is?)

― Simon H., Wednesday, April 3, 2019 9:08 AM (two days ago)

None, other than both were Matador labelmates at the same time for a brief moment.

That's alright, being abroad has a way of making even such things appear exotically palatable.

xp

not really poll-relevant but this is my fave pre-NPs AC Newman tune

https://youtu.be/TvTltNhTy-E

― Simon H., Wednesday, April 3, 2019 11:24 AM (two days ago)

Same, might even be my favorite of his including NPs.

This is probably way too under the radar for Big Shiny but this was one of my fave Canadian songs of the specified era:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrWq4J4GzLA

That's an interesting list. Always annoys me that "I'm an Adult Now" is the TPOH song people remember since it's so monotonous and says nothing to me. Much prefer "She's So Young" or "Beautiful White".

Yes! I thought I was alone on this. I'm an Adult Now drags so much compared to the rest of the album.

Also - is this the place where we can discuss how awesome the first Lowest of the Low album is?

im an adult now is a shitty song.

I like those Doiron records a lot

I don't know that I've ever consciously heard Lowest of the Low.

this is the LotL song that got much music play...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-t06Kg3LwyE

I love it and the rest of the album, Ron Hawkins is one of my favourite songwriters.

ah now I see why you just referred to it as "the first LotL album" and not by name lol

I'll check it out!

haha, yeah brutal album name.

Heh, I just put on Radio-Canada in the van and they were playing Jean Leloup's "Joue de la Guitare".

Yeah that album is loaded with hits, top 10 Canadian albums ever for sure

*LotL that is

Fuck the system, do it, do it, do it, do it, yeah!

ugh i relistened to a bunch of olp records today and now i have to change my vote to them

happiness... is pretty perfect

I definitely bought Moist's Mercedes Five and Dime as a #teen for....some reason. Relistening now I have no idea what prompted that, but it's not bad. There's a certain lightness / airiness to the sound that's not very typical of the era.

Went with Odds. Their albums are consistently good, their live show fun and hilarious, and they are also my second CD purchase.

Though Pluto almost made it on the strength of "Paste" alone. Likewise The Killjoys on the strength of "Today I Hate Everyone"

My principal conclusions after going back through the MGB discography afresh is a) man, that guy wrote a lot of good songs that are more melodically clever than I remembered and b) Warne Livesey is a very dull producer who did them no favors. Loser Anthems is their most distinctive-sounding record and it's the only one he wasn't involved with. (OTOH he has a songwriting credit on the Mark Hollis solo album so he can't be all bad.)

I need to admit that I cannot remember how a single MGB song sounds. I'm not sure I consciously knew one at the time.

I'd be surprised if you put on "Load Me Up" or "Apparitions" and didn't have at least the slightest twinge of recognition.

Gob

I revisited a bunch of MGB singles the other day and while his songwriting does tend to surpass his contemporaries', the intervening decades haven't helped me warm up to his voice at all. And the production does indeed suck, although MGB are hardly alone on this one (I'd love me some Albinized CanCon).

I remember OLP working with THE Bob Rock was an actual talking point when Gravity came out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2KJDl-T-y4

JENNI
KILLED HER DAD WITH HER CAR
NOW SHE'S A MILLIONAIRE

idk i love the sound of those mgb records. they definitely sound like the '90s though

I tried to listen to Limblifter this morning but I just get nothing out of that guy's voice.

holy shit this thread is too much

keep clicking songs and having intense flashbacks to childhood

fucking i mother earth lmao

Def the most ridiculous of these bands

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

re the convo upthread, as a rural boy in 90s ontario i can tell you with absolute confidence that leloup, colocs, etc had zero penetration in my tiny circle, and in fact i did not really hear any of these artists/bands until the past couple of years bc of dating francophone person. like, even living in mtl and largely hanging out w/ anglos i still didn't get any exposure. but all of these BST bands i was at least very intimately familiar with their heavy rotation muchmusic/bst offerings.

still really split on who to vote for, OLP or Moist prob the most honest to me at the time (in that order chronologically, i think?), kinda wanna vote bran van for the most interesting career to me retrospectively, and kinda wanna vote holly mcnarland because numb just fuckin bangs

BV3000 had that one wild song where the video was just people making out for like 4 minutes. i think i liked the song but i was far too repressed to not feel deeply uncomfortable watching the video. maybe that was the point!

UHH matthew good covered cloudbusting in 2015, feat. holly mcnarland????????????????? ok im voting for her

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Next to no discussion about the Odds and they sneak in for second place. Good band, occasionally great, and there's nothing embarrassing in their catalogue (even "Wendy Under The Stars" holds up) like any of the other acts that I was familiar with in this poll , so that's why they got my vote.

The only song I remember by them is "Heterosexual Man" tbh, which I do think of as a bit embarrassing.

It did have Kids in the Hall in the video tbf.

I guess it's a bit embarrassing, but I never took it as anything more than Gen X irony, and the video reflected that.

It was definitely ironic. I just don't think the by-the-numbers rock track or the joke have held up that great. Tbf, though, I doubt they were going for timelessness. It did give me a smile at 14.

told you who would win any why, Simon.

xp It's a safe bet that the by-the-numbers rock sound was imposed upon them by record company higher-ups (We'll let you self-produce but there had better be a radio-friendly hit)...they still managed to get Robert Quine and Warren Zevon to guest on the album.

Hm, maybe I should listen to more of the album.

A Tea Party song came on when I was out in the car today ("Temptation"). I reflexively reached to turn it off as always, thought of this poll and left it on. As they say in Newfoundland, lord thunderin' Jesus.

Oor was right, it's true

anyway 6 people voted for MGB in an ILM poll so my work was worthwhile

https://exclaim.ca/music/article/r_i_p_big_wreck_guitarist_brian_doherty

Big Wreck guitarist Brian Doherty has passed at only 51. Crank "That Song" this weekend in his honour.

:(

sadly it took the prompt for me to listen to their well-thought-of album from 2017 and it's quite a bit proggier, more psychedelic and colorful than the stuff they got famous with

if I thought anyone but brad and I would vote in it I would do a Matt Good singles poll. it's like a semi-secret history of alt-rock.

In the wilderness the only place to find freedom is in the dictionary
Under "F"

1. Odds won this poll righ?
2. Ton of cdn indie music at this time but not in this particular marketing strategy worthy of a thread?

Almost certainly!

In fact a fair number of bands that would presumably qualify were cited itt

if I thought anyone but brad and I would vote in it I would do a Matt Good singles poll. it's like a semi-secret history of alt-rock.

― Simon H., Wednesday, September 25, 2019 11:11 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

i found me a reason
so check me tomorrow

honestly i have no idea what i'd vote for? "future is x-rated"?????

"indestructible"??? "carmelina"??? "load me up"????

I even love "Rico" which, iirc, he completely hates.

everybody's gotta be something
me i'm garbage!

also love "Anti Pop" which instantly joins the pantheon of "singles tossed off spitefully when the band was told their album did not have a single" which is one of my favorite genres of song and I am thinking of polling

*sends my manager an e-mail* "Do I have to pretend to like Matthew Good? I do? OK thanks"

I guess he does a pretty reasonable Foo Fighters impression

lol

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s64LD9K-Fy0

rusty on rita and friends in late 95? 96?, doing "misogyny"

We heard the Tea Party's "The River" on the radio the other day. Weirdly, although I still hear the obvious Zep influence, I didn't hear Jim Morrison at all, although that's what it seemed like at the time and it's who Martin was always slammed for imitating. The vocals just sounded like post-Vedder alt-rock. Single holds up well enough.

J englishman + Late 90's + Canadian = Not Jenny Englishman alias Esthero, surely?

Quick discogs search revealed that it's Esthero's brother.

OLP's Is Anybody Home? has become one of my pandemic anthem. Happiness is one of the very first albums I bought.

thinking about "carmelina" again