Lost Canucks

Where have all the Canadians gone?

The world does not want more Canada. That’s what this year’s lists tell us.

In the mid-’90s, many of my favourite Canadian artists were invisible in the international press. I was (and am) a voracious reader, so I was well aware which records were resonating beyond borders. I never developed the pathology of Tragically Hip fans, who wrung themselves into knots wondering why their heroes were only a cult band outside Canada. (Short answer: luck.)

I didn’t need external validation in order to think a Canadian artist was cool. But I found it interesting.

That led, in part, to co-writing Have Not Been the Same in 2000-01. That book was a way for Jason Schneider, Ian Jack and I to ensure that English Canadian rock music of our generation, mainstream and non-mainstream, had its own history book. Because unlike the Neil-Joni-Leonard-Band generation, absolutely no one other than fellow Canadians were going to write about it.

That flipped for Hearts on Fire. For that book, it was fascinating to me that so many weirdo Canadians were the ones with sustainable careers outside Canada, and who were favourites of international critics — often without any love from the mainstream Canadian music industry.

That era is now definitely over. Canadian music is marginal once again, outside the obvious blockbusters. After that the list gets really short, really fast.

Last year non-blockbusters Orville Peck and Alvvays did very well critically (and with ticket sales), the latter ending up in many year-end top-fives. This year it’s… who? The two artists I thought would make more of a splash — one a longtime critics’ darling, one who fills arenas — barely showed up in any 2023 pieces written outside the country. More on that below.

One colleague who tracks these things said that 2023 was the worst year he’s ever seen for Canadian representation on international year-end lists.

I tracked 21 lists from major media in the U.S. and the U.K. to find out. The pickings were extremely slim.

Only four artists appeared on more than three lists. I can guarantee that you can’t predict the top two (unless you’re a music critic, but even then…). And one of them, a duo, might not qualify as Canadian, depending on how you slice these things.

Here’s how it went: