Ten years ago, iconic Canadian band The Tragically Hip recaptured the attention of a nation, first with the devastating news that lead singer Gord Downie had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of brain cancer, and secondly, despite the diagnosis the band went out on the road for what would become their final tour.
Their final show, in their hometown Kingston on Aug. 20, 2016, was broadcast by the CBC and watched by more than 11 million people. The intervening years have seen posthumous solo projects from Downie, as well as album reissues and archival releases from the band itself. Just last week, the band announced a live album documenting the Man Machine Poem tour.
Reflecting on the events of 10 years ago, which also included the release of Man Machine Poem, the band's best reviewed album in a number of years, I got myself thinking. Is there a fun way to look back on the work of Canada's most beloved band? And yes, they are Canada's most beloved band with many apologies to Rush and others.
So taking inspiration from one of my favourite social media accounts, which does voter-based bracket competitions for the best albums of a given year, I thought why the hell not? Let's dive in let's look at more than 100 of The Hip's most popular songs and decide which is the best of them all.
But how to set up a tournament like this, how to rank their songs? It seemed the only fair way to do this was to look at which of their songs have the biggest number of streams. Why does this work for voting? Well just because this song is popular does not mean it's their best. Sure Bobcaygeon, with more than 50 million streams on Spotify, will probably fare well in this tournament.
But there are other contenders that may prove dark horses in the competition. Courage, once seen as a standard bearer for the band and also recently featured in a campaign for the Terry Fox Foundation, is only the 10th most popular song they have. New Orleans Is Sinking is their third most popular song, but is it their best? Is it even their third-best? That will be left up to voters.
But again, why do this? Well, it's a lot of fun and who doesn't need a little bit of fun in this world, in this country at this moment? The tournament starts Tuesday, May 19. Matchups will run daily through my social media accounts. So please follow and play along. The song with the most votes move on to the next round and eventually we will crown a winner.
Want to get in on more fun? Until the tournament opens, you can get your predictions in on which songs will make their way through the bracket. Points are awarded for votes. The prize at the end? Bragging rights (Sorry.) Also, if you happen to have a song that you're particularly passionate about and you wanna make the case as to why it's the best Tragically Hip song, I want you to send it to me dbreakenridge@postmedia.com.
