During Maple Leaf March, I recognize that I feature a lot of artists that haven't really been heard outside of Canada. They SHOULD be guilty pleasures everywhere, but in a lot of cases, they just aren't.
Today's artist is not one of those.
Alessia Cara of Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, has three top 10 hits in the US. This is one of them, hitting #8 on the pop chart in 2015. It is a huge body positivity anthem. It is, however, not your typical "you're beautiful just the way you are" anthem. It discusses cutting, depression, and eating disorders - all real things that affect so many people.
The video features real people struggling with all of these things - and if you look closely, you'll see another pop star - JoJo - among the real people, because being somewhat famous doesn't make these issues go away.
We found a pretty cool performance of this song, from the 2017 VMA awards. We love how Cara starts all made up and ends up without makeup or a fancy dress. It's quite neat.
Banx & Ranx are from Montreal. They are a producing/music-making duo who won the 2023 Juno Award for Breakthrough Artist - which is wild, because they aren't a new act, having created music for the better part of the last decade. They are multiple Grammy nominees.
Their music is modern and innovative, injecting Caribbean rhythms and music into a unique electronic sound. Their services are in high demand, with artists outside of Canada clamoring to work with them. Their music is catchy. This song is going to be your latest earworm.
Simple Plan are a power-pop-rock band from Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
Which means they are bilingual.
So, that means they do multiple versions of some songs.
Take this fun little song about travelling a lot and missing the one you love. This version, in English, was recorded with British singer Natasha Beddingfield - and was an international hit. The video was filmed largely at YYZ - Toronto Pearson Airport - and Toronto Sheridan Gateway Hotel.... but they want you to think it's a hotel in Chicago, despite the Westjet and AirCanada planes and Canadian flags everywhere. Anyway, it's a fun song.
True story - I've flown in and out of YYZ a lot. Great airport and I instantly recognized it.
This version is just like that version, except the female version is almost completely in French and sung by Quebec singer Marie-Mai. Also, Simple Plan sings some stuff in French, too - although not all the lyrics. I wonder if Natasha and Marie-Mai hung out together at all in that hotel room.
It is essentially the same song and same video.
Official version #3 of this song is filmed by the band in English at YYZ still, but Chinese pop star Kelly Cha is somewhere in China singing almost entirely in Mandarin.
Other than the Kelly Cha footage, it is essentially the same song and same video.
Official version #4 is..... completely in English, but this time, the woman is in Jakarta, Indonesia, because she is Tantri Syalindri, vocalist for the band KOTAK - who all seem to be hanging out in the room with her.
It is essentially the same video.
That's it for the official versions, but there is this French demo version we found floating around..... Vocals for the female part were provided by some obscure Canadian artist who seems to go by some French name with an œ in it.... something something Pirate.
Apparently, when Simple Plan performs the song live, they just find whatever female pop-rock vocalists happens to be standing closest to the stage. Here, they get Sierra Key, vocalist for the band VERSA (who at the time were VersaEmerge, standing in for Natasha Beddingfield.
For this Australian appearance, they partnered with Jenna McDougall from Tonight Alive on an acoustic version of the song. The two bands happened to be on an Australian tour together, so it made sense.
The band is still together. Most of these performances above are from 2011, when the song was new. This one is from 2022, in Montreal, and yes, it's the French version, and yes, that's Marie-Mai.
If you read what I wrote on Saturday, you know I think Jayli Wolf released one of the most important songs of the last decade.
This song is a little less important - but no less about indigenous and female empowerment. The song and video are both super dark.
But we're not going to talk about that.
We're going to talk about why Jayli Wolf is one of my most listened to artists on Spotify. It's not because I want to feel pseudo-Canadian guilt, or that I only listen to First Nations protest music. No, it's because this strongly emotionally-charged music slaps, and it slaps hard. She's a fantastic musician and a fantastic songwriter, and she paints a picture with her music and lyrics like no other artists is doing today.
The rarest of Americans. Of course, technically, they are - because they live in the Americas. We in the United States seem to think we have dominion over the term "American", but we really don't.
Anyway, this young bunch of punks formed in 2018 in Vancouver, and are gaining traction. This song is a truly a sad song - about a probable breakup. We've all been there.
Now here's a stripped down version of the same song. For literally any other song, I'd probably have just updated that original post with an extra video. Not this time. That post was too perfect and this song is too raw.
Canadian band Metric were nominated for a couple of them, including Group of the Year, based in large part on their 2022 album, Formentera, their first in four years (back to that in a second). This was one of the singles off that album, and it's something of a banger in its own right. While they didn't win, it's still an honour to be nominated.
Just because it took them four years to release anything new does not mean they didn't do anything. In 2021, they did this thing. That brought the band to an international spotlight once again, so it made a lot of sense for them to follow it up with something more than a limited pressing vinyl only greatest hits album (they did that, too).
Back to this song and not anything from a Michael Cera movie. This continues Metric's history of flashy, modern synth-rock, bringing a unique sound that actually works post-pandemic.
