It is always a struggle for me to choose what music to include and what to leave out every March. It is especially hard this year, when there are so many weekend days.
This is really the only time of year we post on Saturday and Sunday, and I try to turf lesser-known artists to those days - up and comers, if you will.
One of those up and comers is Maryze (her real name - Maryze Bernard), based in Montreal but originally from Vancouver, who released their debut album 8 in 2022. It took me a few listens to really get the alt-pop feel of the whole album - of which this song is an absolute centrepiece - but I'm in. I'm all in.
This song starts a little slow but build quickly, and the seizure warning is no joke. Directed and concieved by Maryze themself, the video is visually appealing and draws you in.
It took a while for Blonde to grow on me, but it did. Her solo catalog is eight albums deep at this point, and I'd put at least three of them in my top 20 of all time - Roses (easily top 5 and probably top 3), Perséides, En cas de tempête, ce jardin sera fermé - and the rest aren't far behind, including Blonde.
This absolutely stunning song, written by Béatrice Martin (who by now you should know is Cœur de Pirate), is the reason Blonde exists. It is a hauntingly dense and beautiful song that she was dying to record. Named for the plaza in Paris, it is a melancholy love song, and it sits smack dab in the middle of the album.
Voici Cœur de Pirate interprétant la chanson en direct et en beauté à l'Aéroport international Pierre-Elliott-Trudeau de Montréal. Est-ce une salle de concert insolite ? Bien sûr. Est-ce absolument magnifiquement réalisé ? Absolument. Ai-je utilisé Google Translate pour vous écrire ? Vous pariez que je l'ai fait.
Born in Toronto, and a Canadian citizen, Neil Young is an absolute national treasure. He was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1982 - 7 years before today's song was released.
This song, from Young's 1989 album Freedom, is one of his biggest hits ever, being both a Canadian chart hit and a US rock radio hit.... plus MTV loved this song, which you can't say about every song and video he made.
This song was something of a career revolution for Young, who subsequently toured to packed houses and released a live album - Weld - that was also a hit. Written by Young, it is absolutely a song of revolution.
The song was actually on the album twice. This acoustic version was also featured. They're both really powerful.
Young also performed the song live on Saturday Night Live in 1989, a performance Dennis Miller called the greatest ever for the show.
This is the REHERSAL.
It was so important to include Neil Young this month, and this song specifically, I moved Lights.
Anyone who knows me personally knows that I spent several months in Calgary, Alberta in 2019... and visited for a day in 2022 as well. I love the city. It was a great place to work and live and visit, and I would gleefully return.
Why am I spending time evangelizing Calgary?
Because today's Wicked Guilty Pleasure hails from Calgary. Formed in 1979, they got their start as Kiss's opening act in Vancouver.
Seriously. That was their first live performance.
An album followed in 1980, and their first single, released in 1981, was "Turn Me Loose". Mike Reno really sells the song - practically begging to do it his way or no way at all. It ended up being a Top 40 hit in the US (and a huge hit on rock radio in the States as well) and Top 10 in Canada. It also won the 1982 Juno Award for Single of the Year.
It would be their biggest Canadian hit (but by no means their only!), but they did a lot more in the US, where MTV embraced them.
And, yes, they are Canadian Music Hall of Famers - 2009 inductees - beating Shania Twain there by 2 years.
And yes, they are still together - after a brief hiatus in the late 80s, they reformed in the early 90s and never looked back.
And Mike Reno is older, but still commands the stage. That classic bassline is still there. The classic guitar is still here, more than 40 years after its initial release.
I don't think I've ever featured an artist from Nunavut.
Hell, most of you don't know where Nunavut is.
Riit is from a town in Nunavut called Panniqtuq located on Baffin Island, which is about 45 km. south of the Arctic Circle. For those who measure distance in screaming bald eagles instead of kilometers, that's about 28 miles. Nunavut is a Canadian territory, formed in 1999 when the Northwest Territories were split roughly along ethnic lines. Nunavut is primarily Inuit, who are a First Nations group that you may know by another name we're not saying.
Riit is the stage name of Rita Claire Mike-Murphy, who is a children's television show host. She hosted a show in English and Inuktitut called Anaana's Tent. Here's the Season 1 promo in English.
And here it is in Inuktitut.
We don't make this stuff up.
In 2017, she released her debut album, and followed it in 2019 with the critically acclaimed Ataataga - a 2020 Juno Award nominee - which included the lead single "quamajaupik". Her music is traditionally Euro-synth, except the lyrics are all in Inuktitut. Literally translated to "you are shining", this is a love song that preserves her native First Nations language, which is exactly her intent.
As part of the release of this single, Riit also had a performance for CBC Music in which she debuted this song.....
The performance is just spectacular, and that's why we're doubling up today and not pushing Riit's Maple Leaf March debut to 2025.
It's funny. We've been doing this Canadian music thing in March for four years now.
We've now had Carly Rae Jepson posts in three of them. The year we missed? 2022.
This song is from Jepsen's 2022 Juno-nominated album The Loneliest Time.
The video is absolutely hilarious, and the song is a bop (and hilarious in its own right) that should have been a hit everywhere.
We know from past experience that Carly Rae puts on a hell of a good show. Here she is in Montreal putting on a hell of a great performance of this banger.
Congratualtions to Charlotte Cardin on her multiple Juno Award wins.
I don't know as of this writing (I wrote this in February) whether she won last night or not, but, given all her nominations and critical acclaim, I'm going to bet she did. I'll edit this post if I was wrong (but I won't be).
(Edit:24 March - she won Pop Album of the Year. and one of the major awards, Album of the Year. She did lose Artist and Single of the Year - both to Tate McRae.)
This song was nominated for Song of the Year this year (one of her six Juno nominations, including two for the album 99 Nights). Written by Cardin, Jason Brando and Lubalin, this song is funky and has a strong R&B influence, with Cardin's husky voice carrying the track. The song is lyrically a little depressing - reminding me a bit of "Habits (Stay High)".
The song has been Cardin's biggest hit in Canada - her first top 10 entry - and she is absolutely an artist that deserves attention outside of Canada.
Could Charlotte Cardin be the Canadian Taylor Swift? Who knows, but this crowd is really into her performance.
I failed to mention earlier that Cardin is from Montreal, is of course still Canadian, and currently lives in Paris.
I mention this because, on her 99 Nights Deluxe release, which was mostly French, she included 4 extra songs.... and really, this was just 99 Nights plus her EP, Une semaine à Paris.
