Two new, interesting, highly-anticipated albums have come out in the past week. One is the legendary Neil Young 1971 Massey Hall concert recording; the other is the Arcade Fire's "Neon Bible".
You may be thinking, what business do these albums have with this blog, or with Canada-U.S. relations, for that matter?
Well, for starters, both albums are from Canadian artists with international recognition -- and both are seen as being somehow particularly "Canadian".
The Arcade Fire are an eclectic, indie rock band from Montreal, and while their lead singer is originally from down south, most of the band members are Canadian. Neil Young was born and raised in Winnipeg and Toronto.
The Arcade Fire are pretty new on the scene, but they have rapidly ascended to 'indie superstar' status. At this moment, they could arguably be considered one of the biggest bands in the world. "Neon Bible", their current (and only their second) album, is #1 on the billboard charts in Canada and Ireland, #2 in the U.S. and the U.K., and #7 in Australia. Seeing major articles written about them in The Toronto Star and The New York Times Magazine ("One Very Indie Band," Sunday March 4th, 2007) has hammered this reality home: two years ago, they were a mostly unknown, funky, alternative art-rock group. Now, they are huge.
Why are they considered Canadian (or 'more Canadian' than other, less successful, Canadian artists)? I don't know. Maybe they aren't (chances are, many American fans of their music wouldn't take any notice of where they're from, unless they are expressly interested). But, being an avid follower of the Canadian music scene, I started listening to them two years ago, when their debut album "Funeral" began selling. Back then, they were being considered the next big (indie) thing in Canada -- and now, they are the next big ("indie") thing everywhere. So for Canadians like me, they feel like homegrown rock stars that have hit the big time.
Neil Young is a different kind of story; like many musicians of his generation (Joni Mitchell, The Band) when his career took off in the 1960s, hitting the big time meant moving to the U.S. and making his career as a musician there. Having lived most of his life in the U.S., he is probably just as often considered a classic American artist as a Canadian one. And because of his place as a major influence in the worlds of folk, rock, and singer/songwriting -- regardless of any nationally-influenced persona -- he retains a universal appeal.
But -- take Neil Young's work as an article of Canadiana, and you get a very different take on it.
When Neil sings the line, "Now I'm going back to Canada / for a journey through the past / And I won't be back till February comes" in the third verse of "Journey To The Past", you can hear the crowd at Massey Hall in Toronto swell with pride and applause.
And when The Arcade Fire's Win Butler croons, "I don't want to fight in a Holy War / I don't want the salesman knocking at my door / I don't want to live in America no more" (instead of the song's repeated refrain, "I don't want to live in my father's house no more") at the climax of "Windowsill", I am sure he is singing not only to the disaffected youth of America, but to a sentiment common among Canadians just north of the border.
And to tell the truth, there is a kind of pride in seeing this quirky, half-Canadian, art-rock collective attempting to take on such a cultural behemoth and a mammoth political foe.
Even if they are just a rock band -- it will be interesting to see how they fare.
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Adding to your thoughts about Neil Young, Liam, I think much of his appeal, especially in his early years, came from his status as an outsider to U.S. culture. Two of my favorite songs of his are "Southern Man" and "Alabama," because he describes the segregated South with an outsider's shocked disbelief. It's sobering. Now, being an outsider isn't necessarily a Canadian quality, but I think in this case, it is. Because his music captures a mellow, pastoral aesthetic familiar to Americans (it would be hard to imagine a Brit or an Australian writing the songs on Harvest), from just listening to the music, an American might say, "he's an insider." But then you hear the lyrics, and he's "from a new land." I think it heightened his capacity as a social critic in the U.S.
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