Canadian Music That Made It Trivia Quiz

Answer: The Guess Who

The Guess Who was formed in Winnipeg, Manitoba in or about 1964, and gathered some initial fame as the result of a recording of the Johnny Kidd song 'Shakin' All Over'. The band produced the song for radio, and shipped the recording in a plain cover, with the words 'Guess Who?' on the cover. Disk jockeys thought the cover implied that the group was a new British act.

It was from these simple beginnings that the Guess Who was born, and lasted until September, 1975. The group has some famous Alumni {too;} Burton Cummings, the lead singer, went onto a solo career as well as forming various smaller acts and Randy Bachman went on to form Bachman Turner Overdrive (of 'You ain't seen nothing yet' fame).

The only member of the band that was there from start to finish, however, was the drummer, Garry Peterson.

Answer: Corey Hart

Corey Hart smashed onto the pop scene in North America in 1983 with his soon to be multiplatinum album, 'First Offense'. He was born in May of 1962. His current residence is in the Bahamas, however, that is only one of the many places that Hart has lived in. Hart was the youngest of five children and started in Montreal, Quebec, but then moved to southern Spain, Mexico City, Florida, returning to Canada in 1974. Hart continues to write music and recently brought out his eighth album, 'Jade' in 1998. 'Sunglasses at Night' was his first single ever and was a big hit. Hart was only 21 at the time.

At the pinnacle of his musical career, Hart sold over 10 million records and earned nine U.S. top 40 Billboard hits

Answer: Chantal Kreviazuk

Chantal comes from Winnipeg, Manitoba and began playing piano at the age of three and hence, the piano features quite significantly in the majority of her music. She first hit the music scene in a significant way in 1997 with her debut album 'Under These Rocks and Stones' (the album has already hit Double Platinum Sales in Canada), and has gained more international and particularly North American exposure with songs on the Armageddon soundtrack (a rendition of 'I'm Leaving on a Jet Plane') and on the Dawson's Creek soundtrack project (a take on Randy Newman's 'Feels Like Home').

She released her second album in 1999, 'Colour Moving and Still'. Chantal performed the National anthems of the USA and Canada on October 11, 2000 at the NHL game between the New York Islanders and the Calgary Flames. Chantal is married to the lead singer of Our Lady Peace, Raine Maida.

Answer: Barenaked Ladies

Barenaked Ladies is a group of five friends from Toronto, Ontario. They had relatively humble beginnings as a two man band who played at local festivals in the late 80's and early 90's. Slowly they built up to a total of five members around 1991. The group are noted primarily for the wit and humour they weave throughout their songs. One of their sons is called 'Be My Yoko Ono', which was heard by Sean Ono Lennon. Sean took the track home to his mum, who is said to be very fond of the song. Despite virtual obscurity in mainstream US music scenes, BNL has had substantial support in Canada from the very early 90's.

In 1990 BNL were crowned best band in the nationally broadcast YTV Youth Achievement Awards. In July 1991, all 5 members present, BNL recorded the first indie cassette to reach platinum status in Canada, 'The Yellow Tape'.

The band released their first full length CD 'Gordon' in 1992, which sold more than 80'000 copies within the first 24 hours of its release. Their music has been nominated for numerous Juno awards (Canadian music awards), they have been on countless television appearances, they have attracted substantial support from Hollywood (notably from Jason Priestly (from Vancouver, British Columbia) who got them an appearance on Beverly Hills 90210 in April 1997 and directed one of their music videos), but only gained more attention from the US music scene in 1998.

Their album 'Stunt', released in 1998 has gone Platinum.

Answer: Great Big Sea

Great Big Sea are Alan Doyle, Sean McCann, Darrell Power and Bob Hallett, an unlikely bunch of lads from in and around St. John's Newfoundland who formed their band in 1991. Their original idea was to play old songs, but pick up the tempo a bit if it was needed.

Instead they evolved and have created an instantly recognizable mix of Celtic sing-along traditional folk songs swamped with a nicely supporting rock undercurrent. Their first self-titled album was released in 1992, then 'Up' in 1995, 'Play' in 1997, 'Rant and roar' in the USA in 1998 and Turn in 1999. Two of their albums have gone Platinum.

Answer: Rush

Rush was conceived in 1969 by Geddy Lee, Alex Lifeson and drummer John Rutsey (who had to leave due to illness in 1973) in the City of Sarnia on the Michigan-Ontario border. Their original sound was purely cover work of groups such as Iron Butterfly and Cream, but when their drummer Neil Peart joined in 1974, the group began to develop a more personalized style, becoming one of the first 'progressive rockers' band.

In a surprising step away from the usual rock band origins, all three members of the group were actually talented musicians and Peart found a forum to express his fantasy-based lyrics.

The group's first significant appearance on the world's music scene was the release of their album 2112 in 1976, but the scene stealer was 'Permanent Waves', their album released in 1980, followed closely by 'Moving Pictures' (1981) and 'Signals' (1982). Every single album that Rush has produced has gone Gold or Platinum, that's 23 albums, the third-longest string behind the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. Rush is tied in third place with KISS.

Answer: Shania Twain

Shania (which translates roughly as 'I'm on my way' from Ojibway, a native tribe, predominant in Ontario) grew up in considerable poverty. Her mother and step-father moved from Windsor, Ontario (on the Michigan-Ontario border, across from Detroit) to Northern Ontario, ending up in the town of Timmins. Shania (whose actual name is Eileen) had to raise her siblings when her mother and step-father were both killed in a car accident in 1987. Due to a lack of money, the Twain kids often went to school with mustard sandwiches for lunch. Shania had musical aspirations long before her parents' demise, however, she had been performing since the age of 8 in local bars, being woken up at 1am, when minors were allowed into bars.

She was actually trying to start her music career in Toronto when her parents were killed.

After a slow start in Nashville in 1993, her navel caught the attention of Robert 'Mutt' Lange in her video of 'What Made You Say That' and he agreed to help her write further albums.

The pair were married in late 1993. Lange had helped produce albums for AC/DC, Def Leppard, The Cars and Bryan Adams. With Lange's help, Twain released 'The Woman in Me' in 1995, which went on to sell over 10 million copies, which surpassed the sales of any previous female country singer. She has received such notice that in 1998 she was invited to sing at the Divas Live event hosted by VH1.

Answer: Neil Young

Neil Young is a living legend in the rock music industry. He was born in Toronto in 1945, but moved to Winnipeg with his mother after his parents divorced. After playing in a number of bands in Winnipeg and Toronto in the 1950's, Young went to the burgeoning Los Angeles music scene in 1965 as part of a duo called the Mynah Birds. Shortly thereafter, the Mynah Birds grouped up with two other Canadians to form Buffalo Springfield. Young's output from that point on has been phenomenal. Buffalo Springfield put out three albums, and Young has put out 21 albums since his initial solo release in 1969. Young was also a member of Crazy Horse (a band which he formed in 1969 with some fellow Canadians), who have released 13 albums and contains what is reputed to be some of Young's finest work. Young joined Crosby Stills and Nash as well in 1969 to form Crosby Stills Nash and Young, who have released five albums. Stills and Young also produced a separate album as the Stills and Young Band. Young was made out to be the mortal enemy of Lynyrd Skynyrd when he sang 'Southern Man', a very uncomplimentary song about men from the Southern US. Skynyrd rebutted Young's attack on the Southern Man with their song 'Sweet Home Alabama', but the animosity is a little unfounded, considering that Young has played with and written songs for Skynyrd.

Not only has Young written or released a vast array of songs and albums for himself and the groups of which he is a member, but he has written for, produced and played with hundreds of well known artists, such as The Monkees, Tracy Chapman, Bachman and Pearl Jam, to name a few. Young is firmly entrenched in the rock music scene.

Answer: The Philosopher Kings

Gerald Eaton, along with Jason and Jon Levine formed The Philosopher Kings in the early 1990's to break the sterile atmosphere of the music school they attended. Thier first album came out in 1994 and contained the hit 'Charms', which quickly reached the Top Ten in Canada and the Top 40 in the US. 1997 was their real breakout year however, when they released three hit singles, 'Hurts To Love You', 'Cry' (a remake of the Godley and Creme song) and 'You Don't Love Me'.

They are still going strong, having released three albums, their latest being 'One Hot Night' in November of 1999, which contains the hit 'You Stepped on My Life'. Once you have heard the Kings, you will always recognize them by the powerful voice of Eaton.

Answer: Blue Rodeo

Blue Rodeo was formed in 1984 in Toronto, Ontario. It was essentially created by its two lead singers Jim Cuddy and Greg Keelor, who had moved to New York City together in the early 80's, formed a couple of failed bands, moved back to Toronto and looked for additional members for their new band.

The two singers had been friends since High School. Blue Rodeo has produced numerous albums, including: 'Casino'; 'Days in between'; 'Diamond{mine'; 'Five days in July'; 'Just a vacation'; 'Lost together'; 'Nowhere to here'; 'Outskirts'; and 'Tremolo'. Jim Cuddy also released a solo album called 'All in time' and Greg Keelor released his solo album 'Gone'.

Answer: The Tragically Hip

People either love them or hate them, but the Tragically Hip are a major musical force to be reckoned with. Every concert they play is sold out within hours and their fans are unswervingly loyal. The 'Hip' (as they are more commonly known) formed in 1983 in Kingston, Ontario, where all of the members are from.

Their name came from the movie 'Elephant Parts', starring ex-Monkee Michael Nesmith. 'The Tragically Hip' was their first album, released in 1987, but the band went unnoticed until 1989, when they released their second album 'Up To Here'. 'Up To Here' contained 'Blow at High Dough' and 'New Orleans is Sinking', two of their most well known songs and from that point on they became Canadian household names. Since 1987, they have released nine albums, and with each one have become more and more entrenched in Canadian Music scene lore. What is most bemusing, is that the Hip have not made it South of the border (mostly due to poor support from US record labels and distributors) and a common sentiment among their Canadian fan base, is that their fans hope that they do not make it in the US, so that they will stay in Canada.

The Hip are almost seen as a Canadian secret that should not be despoiled by a world spotlight. If you haven't heard of them before, you should definitely try and find a song and see which category you fall into, love or hate. My suggestions, 'Bobcaygeon' off their album 'Phantom Power' or 'My Music at Work' off the album 'Music at Work'.

Answer: Sarah McLachlan

Sarah McLachlan is originally from Halifax, Nova Scotia and trained as a classical musician in piano, guitar and voice. She was 'discovered' at the age of 19 while fronting a group called October Game in Halifax and was moved to Vancouver by Nettwerk Records in 1985 to develop her songwriting capabilities. 'Touch', her debut recording went gold shortly after its release in 1988 and she has since released seven other albums (eight if one includes her rerelease of Touch with some additional tracks).

Not only noted for a very distinctive acoustic sound, McLachlan has also been highly praised for her artistic videos to accompany particular singles, most notably for 'Drawn To The Rhythm' and 'Into The Fire'. 1993 saw McLachlan break into the US market with her album Fumbling Towards Ecstasy, but she then experienced a bout of writers block due to a heavy concert schedule, not producing a new album until 1997's Surfacing. Shortly after the release of her album, McLachlan created Lilith Fair, a concert series which spotlighted Female talent and has included gigs by the Indigo Girls, Suzanne Vega, Tracy Chapman and many others. By 1998, McLachlan had sold over 5 million CD's and also won four Juno's (a Canadian music award).

She continues to produce and reached number one on the album charts in 1999 with Mirrorball, which had already sold thousands of copies two months before its release, due to pre-orders at Amazon.com.

Answer: bryan Adams

Adams is one of the most successful singer-songwriters in music history, having sold over 50 millions albums worldwide and having won 24 Juno nominations (16 won), 13 Grammy nominations (3 won), 3 Academy Awards {nominations;} 4 MTV Awards nominations (2 won), 5 MuchMusic Awards nominations (3 won) (Canada's MTV) and literally dozens of other awards worldwide since 1983.

He has so far released 12 albums, with 'Reckless' being his most successful, selling over eight million copies worldwide. Adams initially started his musical career in 1976 with the band 'Sweeney Todd', but left them in 1977 after too much constant touring.

In 1978 he bumped into Tim Vallance, with whom he went on to write music with for 10 years. It was during this period in 1978 that Adams signed up with A and M records for one dollar. Adams has played with, written for and sung songs of many many other famous musicians, including Tina Turner, Sting, Rod Stewart and lots of others. Along with Vallance and David Foster, Adams wrote 'Tears Are Not Enough' for the Canadian Live Aid contribution in 1984.

Despite some flagging sales of his more recent albums, Adams remains one of the main names in Rock and Roll.

Answer: Big Wreck

Big Wreck are four friends who started playing jazz together at music school at Berklee College in Boston in the early 1990's. Ian Thornley, Brian Doherty, Forrest Williams and David Hennings decided to drop out of school and formed Big Wreck instead in 1993. Apart from Toronto native Thornley, the other three are all from the US.

They decided to try and make their start in Toronto and soon enlisted the help of Allan Gregg, co-manager of the Tragically Hip and co-owner of Oasis Entertainment (a fairly big Canadian promoter). Big Wreck was signed by Atlantic Records in 1995 and released their only album 'In Loving Memory Of' in 1997. 'The Oaf' a song off their album, actually did receive well in the US, reaching the top ten, but their subsequent single releases have only made the top ten in Canada.

Answer: The Band

The Band was actually a collection of musicians from two former incarnations 'The Canadian Squires' and 'Levon and the Hawks' and started playing as The Band in 1967. All of the various incarnations favoured a distinct Southern sound. While performing as Levon and The Hawks, two of the members were recruited as the backing band for Bob Dylan, but slowly manipulated Dylan into hiring all of the former Hawks.

While playing for Dylan, they slowly changed their name to The Band. Throughout the late 60's and early 70's The Band produced numerous songs that have become well known, but never made it on the charts, such as 'Rag Mama Rag', 'The Weight', 'The Night they Drove Old Dixie Down' (a Joan Baez hit in 1971) and 'Stage Fright'.

The last big bang in the public's eye for The Band was at their 1976 Thanksgiving Day concert in San Fransisco (mentioned in the question), where a lot of friends and musical colleagues turned out to support them.

They continued as a band for a number of years after, but basically drifted apart in the late 1970's.

They reunited for a short time in 1983, but again split apart, performing together occasionally for reunion shows and a brief European tour in the 1990's. In all, they produced twelve albums, with a number of 'Best of..' albums as well. They also produced three albums with Bob Dylan.

Answer: Celine Dion

Celine began singing at the age of 5 in her parent's piano bar. At the age of twelve she brought out her first album 'La voix du bon dieu' in 1981, financed by Rene Angelil, the man she was to marry in 1994. Since then she has gone on to release 21 more albums, and gathered numerous Juno awards, Grammies and lots of platinum sales. Dion holds the privilege of being the first Canadian to have gone platinum for a single in France, with her song 'D'amour Ou D'amitie' in 1983 and her album 'The Colour of My Love' stayed in the British charts for five weeks, a feat not achieved since the Beatles in 1965.

It was not until 1990 that she finally hit the mainstream English speaking world, with her album 'Unison' which contained material written by a number of well known Canadian artists, such as David Foster and Paul Bliss.

Some of her more international hits include 'Beauty and the Beast' (from the Disney soundtrack), 'When I fall in Love' with Clive Griffin (the love theme from Sleepless in Seattle), a remake of 'The Power of Love' (Air Supply and Jennifer Rush), 'All By Myself', 'Because You Loved Me' (featured in Redford's movie Up Close and Personal) and 'My Heart Will Go On' (from Titanic). Dion has performed with some of the biggest names in music as well as sung tunes written by very famous musicians, including Dianne Warren, Jim Steinman, Corey Hart and Bryan Adams (whom she sued over royalties), The Bee Gees, Barbara Streisand, Luciano Pavarotti and many more.

She entered semi-retirement in 1999, finishing off with a concert on New Years Eve in Montreal.

Answer: Platinum Blonde

Platinum Blonde started out in Toronto, Ontario as a Police tribute band which occasionally dabbled in punk rock. They named themselves after a 1931 movie of the same name starring Jean Harlow, mostly as a sneer at Hollywood's glitter and pretentious attitude.

The main player in the original PB was Mark Holmes, who fired the other original band members in 1982 and advertised for replacements. The group reformed with two new members, Chris Steffler and Sergio Gali (two friends studying architecture) and started playing to live audiences only one week after the trio met.

This was in 1982. Shortly thereafter, PB recorded a demo in a friend's living room and managed to persuade David Tickle to fly over and produce an album for them. This was no small thing, Tickle had produced for groups such as Split Enz, Peter Gabriel and Red Rider and would only do the LP for PB if he started immediately as he had other commitments.

The album was finished in 16 days and immediately went all over the radios. PB' s rise to fame was fast, incredibly fast.

In 1983 they toured incessantly with some of the biggest names, such as Bryan Adams and Billy Idol and by the summer of 1984 they were headlining arenas, with up to 25,000 fans coming out to see them. In 1985 the band increased to four members and they brought out their highest reaching album 'Alien Shore', which included the hit 'Crying Over You'. Despite some key member changes (such as Steffler leaving), the band continued to do well, until it was discovered that their record label and management company had not been paying the band the royalties they were owed. PB begged out of their contract and changed their name to The Blondes to distance themselves from their former image, but their new material was a flop and they folded almost straight away. They made six albums as Platinum Blonde and one as The Blondes.

Answer: k.d. lang

Katherine Dawn Lang, originated in a small town in Alberta and fashioned her early career on tribute gigs to Patsy Cline as the Re-Clines with her friend Ben Mink. She released her first album 'A Truly Western Experience' in 1984, which gained quite a fan base in Canada due to her slightly off-beat approach to music and image.

Her first US and then international recognition came with her album 'Angel with a Lariat' in 1986. The album was a huge success in Canada and worked its way into the American mainstream mostly by underground routes, such as colleges, radio stations and rock critics, but was mostly snubbed by traditional music powers in Nashville, because Lang's style did not conform with their view of what 'Country' should be.

Her next album 'Shadowland' in 1987 made Nashville take more notice as it was recorded in Nashville, was produced by Patsy Cline's producer, Owen Bradley and included a duet with Roy Orbison of his hit 'Crying'.

After that she gained popular support, bringing in many country awards and grammies, as well as chart hits.

Her popularity enabled her to make political stands against issues such eating meat and garner an audience. Just prior to the release of her album Ingenue in 1992, Lang announced in a media interview with 'The Advocate' magazine that she was a lesbian. With her own particular way of going about things and with a more solid popular support than before, Lang easily deflected any possible barbs that were aimed her way for coming out of the closet. Her next big hit was 'Constant Craving' off her 1992 Ingenue album, but since then she has had very little chart topping success, although she has continued to produce. Lang wrote the soundtrack for Even Cowgirls Get The Blues, which was masterfully written, but did not sell so well. She still puts out new music and in all has brought out nine albums. Lang is still considered as one of the strongest vocalists of her time.

Answer: Alanis Morissette

Ottawa native, Alanis Morissette actually started out her career on a kids TV show called You Can't Do That On Television' in the late 1980's. At the age of twelve, she sang her own song 'Find The Right Man' at a big Canadian music festival and caught the ear of Stephan Klovan, a big entertainment impresario.

After a number of attempts to break Morissette into the limelight, Klovan (with help along the way from many others) managed to get Morissette into the mainstream as a very pop oriented Alanis. Alanis was compared to other singers of the same genre such as Tiffany and Debbie Gibson, but still had commercial success, especially with her single 'Too Hot', which made the top ten in 1991. Over the next two years, Alanis started to achieve more and more success, but in an ironic twist (don't ya think?) Alanis was more of a pop icon in the US than in Canada, where she was seen as the Disco Queen and not considered very highly.

In 1994 she released 'You Oughta Know' from her album 'Jagged Little Pill', a song that was to gain notoriety, and thus popularity, for its use of a profanity. Rather than give in and follow the media path to short-lived popularity, Alanis, who had changed her stage name to Alanis Morissette (her actual name anyway), toured and performed instead of interviewing and appearing on TV shows.

She managed to sneak her music back into Canada by having her album played without revealing who she was. It succeeded and not only did she manage to secure a fully North American fan base, her album 'Jagged Little Pill' went on to sell over 15 million copies worldwide. Since then she has brought two more albums 'Former Infatuation Junkie' and 'MTV Unplugged' and has had a few more chart hits, such as 'Uninvited' from the City of Angels soundtrack. Morissette has a total of five albums and in addition has received a number of Juno's and Grammies.

Answer: Joni Mitchell

By Grade 7 Mitchell was already playing folk music and singing her own songs in coffehouses and at parties. This was around 1954. In 1964 she moved to Toronto to pursue a career as a folk singer, rather than as an artist, which is what she concentrated on at high school and the Alberta College of Art in Calgary.

After a move to Detroit, Mitchell settled down somewhat in New York in 1967, but still played gigs virtually everywhere South and West of New York City itself. In a gig at Florida she met David Crosby, who helped her put out a more commercially viable album 'Joni Mitchell', and then the two moved in together in California.

She began to play larger venues with bigger names singing with her (many of whom are mentioned in the question itself).

She released 'Clouds' in 1970, winning her a Grammy, and continued to be a commercial success, with acclaimed albums such as 'Blue ' in 1971, 'For The Roses' in 1972, 'Court and Spark' in 1974, 'The Hissing of Summer Lawns' in 1975 and 'Hejira' in 1976, which went Gold and lingered on the charts into 1977.

Despite not doing as well as she did in that particular period, Mitchell still produces new albums today, with releases throughout the 1990's and has 23 albums to her credit..