For many years Canada has been at the forefront of the indie rock scene. So much so that, without you noticing, many of the albums you consider modern, relevant examples of the country’s music culture are actually long past their prime. Just like you! So check out our ranking to see which of the albums you still regularly listen to will hurt you the most to see it described as a classic.
10. Sloan – One Chord To Another (1996)
The first album to be produced on Sloan’s record label and the only one to win the band a Juno award for best alternative album, One Chord To Another features the one Sloan song everyone knows: The Good In Everyone. But we all know Sloan has been around forever. And they’re like your older brother’s indie band. You’re too young to really appreciate old-school albums like this. You like what the kids are into.
9. Tegan and Sara – The Con (2007)
The fact that you heard about Tegan and Sara when their songs started appearing on Grey’s Anatomy would make you feel old if you’d ever stopped listening to Tegan and Sara or watching Grey’s Anatomy. Hard to get back into your head when they’ve never left.
8. The New Pornographers – Twin Cinema (2005)
For all the hype Toronto’s Broken Social Scene gets its Vancouver’s indie supergroup The New Pornographers that has been much more consistent in putting out catchy, inventive rock songs for the last twenty plus years. It’s never a bad time to listen to any of their albums, but especially 2005’s Twin Cinema, whose first 3 songs alone are better than most bands’ entire catalogue. And now that you’re ancient you can just imagine that when the band sings ‘use it tonight’ they’re reminding you to apply your haemorrhoid cream.
7. Arcade Fire – The Suburbs (2010)
Arcade Fire had already blown up in Canada thanks to 2006’s Funeral, but this was the album that made them stars in the U.S. – they even beat Kanye for album of the year at the Grammys, prompting a lot of confused hip-hop fans to wonder who the fuck this band The Suburbs were. And maybe its timeless themes about nostalgia for youth and the reality of adulthood help you deal with the fact that when this album came out you were a young single person living downtown, and now you’re rapidly approaching middle age while living in: you guessed it.
6. Metric – Fantasies (2009)
Wait, this commercial break through featuring banger songs like Help I’m Alive, Gimme Sympathy and Stadium Love is almost 15 fucking years old? Shit. Now I’m feeling fucking old too.
5. Feist – The Reminder (2007)
The Reminder finds the Broken Social Scene singer feeling disconnected from the world, channeling her rootless lifestyle into beautiful songs that tear your heart open and repair it in breezy 3 minute bursts. And if you wanted proof that we are no longer living in the same era your musical tastes are stuck in, remember that Feist got famous because 1,2,3,4 was used to sell iPod Nanos. When was the last time you saw an iPod Nano in the world?
4. Sam Roberts – Love At The End Of The World (2008)
We don’t know if the kids ever learned how to dance to rock and roll, but we do know that now when you go dancing your joints hurt for two days afterwards. Sam Roberts music has always felt like a Canadian summer anthem, and this album is no exception, even when he’s singing about Detroit in 1967. By the way how are your RSPs doing?
3. City And Colour – Sometimes (2005)
The non-screamer from Alexisonfire showed a very different side of his musical abilities with this acoustic album about longing. Longing for home while on the road, longing for an end to a nasty fight with his partner, and longing to share his voice with the world. The single Save Your Scissors was even catchy enough to give Dallas Green the opportunity for a breakthrough slot at the Much Music Video Awards, which is a sentence so old-fashioned it may as well have contained the words ‘malt shoppe’ ‘stickball’ or ‘home ownership’.
2. Stars – Set Yourself On Fire (2004)
The beauty may be ageless but you are not. And as you listen to Calendar Girl while staring at your facebook memories because you still use facebook think about this: you listening to this album in 2023 is the equivalent of your parents listening to Phil Collins 1985 album No Jacket Required the year Set Yourself On Fire came out. Feel that.
1. Broken Social Scene – You Forgot It In People (2002)
That’s right. The album that defined your tastes, opened your world and introduced you to numerous artists whose careers you continue to follow was released in 2002. They were still making Lord Of The Rings and Harry Potter movies. Jean Chretien was still Prime Minister. We only kind of hated Donald Trump. The world was different, and so were you. Namely because you were much, much younger. At least KC Accidental still fucking slaps.
