Alfred

They have nearly a million listeners on last.fm and have played big outside-of-Canada festivals like Rock Am Ring if that says anything about their popularity.

__________________

Burning Down

Holy crap, Billy Talent has over 43 million scrobbles. Didn't think it would be that high.

music_phantom13

Neverest sounds like a crappy version of The Backstreet Boys or N'Sync. Also I don't know how people feel about Shwayze around here, I like him, but I feel like Stereo is Canada's failure at emulating him. I'm really sorry to everyone who lives there, we have some bad music on the radio but I just... I never understood before this thread. My condolences to you and your families.

Do bands like Wintersleep ever get any play? Or Arcade Fire? Or Stars? Because if you're going to play ridiculously obscure Canadian music because of some stupid rule, I feel all three of these and all of the other bands people brought up would be much better options. I have this thought Wintersleep might, because they're the most like what I hear on the radio here that I can think of.

Howard the Duck

I'm glad nobody has yet mentioned Rush and Neil Young.

starrynight

Neil Young has a whiney voice that lessens his melodies for me, similar to the singer for The Cure.

Howard the Duck

I *like* the Cure.

Burning Down

Sure, but he's a hell of a good songwriter though. The same could be said of Bob Dylan.

Zer0

Yeah Billy Talent are pretty big. They've been getting plenty of coverage over on this side of the puddle since they released their debut in 2003.

__________________

starrynight

I like his work with Buffalo Springfield the best. Dylan I probably like best in the 60s too.

As for The Cure, I like Lovecats and In Between Days but many of their songs just sound musically too similar and whiney. I don't get why some critics put them in their best albums of the year list all the time, they don't have enough variety to them.

But on the general theme of this thread you could take any country and pick bands that should only have been popular there. Middle of the road American rock bands for example.

Burning Down

I still have that album. I bought it when it came out - I was 13 and I haven't listened to it in about 8 years! One of my TA's in university went to high school with them.