BC Business
Charting our most embarrassing exports, the BCBusiness staff counts down the most dispensable Canadian music ever, from William Shatner’s Elton John cover to those rowdy boys from Calgary.
In our series on Canadian music, we’ve listed the 10 Best Classic Canadian Albums and the 10 Best Modern Canadian Albums. There’s nothing left to do but leap into the vast and icky pool of embarrassing Canadian music exports. These are the songs we’d like to be stricken from the record and permanently detached from our country’s identity.
Captain Kirk’s rendition of the Elton John classic is a synthesized, spoken-word flop. And yet, strangely, we have a soft spot for it.
Video: “Rocketman”
Some of us have warm memories of Corey from high school dances. Others just like the sound of a guy singing through his lip. We dislike “Never Surrender” enough to put it on the list, while still acknowledging it’s kind of great.
Video: “Never Surrender”
The songs couldn’t be cheesier, with hard-rocking titles that hardly matched the whitebread suburban roots of the band members. But in a country short on anthems, songs like “Raise a Little Hell,” “We’re Here for a Good Time,” and “Boys in the Bright White Sports Car” have become undeniable Cancon classics.
Video: “Boys in the Bright White Sports Car”
He’s got the sort of treacly voice and maudlin songs that make you wish he’d stayed holed up in northern New Brunswick, far, far away from impressionable female listeners.
Video: “Helene”
Snow’s breakout hit was an instant classic (and earned him a Jim Carey spoof on In Living Colour), and yet, somehow, the “leaky boom boom do-o-own” has aged terribly. Go figure.
Video: “Informer”
Years before Miss Morissette was doing unmentionable things in a theatre, she was just “Alanis,” a teeny-bopping synth-pop princess. We actually can’t watch this single for more than ten seconds – reason enough to bury it without a tombstone in the Cancon boneyard.
Video: “Too Hot”
It’s hard to work up any great venom for “Harry Houdini,” and yet the BCB staff consistently voted it down. Perhaps our disdain was aroused by the video, which looks like a hallucination wrought by absinthe and Benadryl. Almost puts one in the mind of escape, doesn’t it? Video: “Harry Houdini”
This is arguably the most saccharine of Bryan Adams’ raspy love songs, and, after the release of the film Robin Hood, it was everywhere. All we remember of the video is Adams and his band standing in a mossy, mist-swept forest, making soft eyes and belting it out. Where’s a vigilante’s arrow when you need one?
Official video: “Everything I Do (I Do it For You)“
The worst thing about Céline Dion’s heartbroken power-theme from Titanic was its ubiquity. You could no more get away from this song than you could a toothache. Most Canadians acknowledge that there is something uniquely annoying about Céline, and this song tramples our souls more than any of her others.
Video: “My Heart Will Go On”
Hands down our staff pick for the worst Canadian single ever. Annoyingly simple chord progressions, a deeply irritating lead vocal, and double-dorky lyrics, Nickelback has ascended a Matterhorn of badness. We’re blaming the band’s success on the United States. Thanks, guys.
Official video: “Far Away“