Last week, the usual complaints about the Grammys appeared the day after the show. The awards went to big sellers and performances featured strange combinations of old-timers and new stars, leading purists to feel that the music business is continuing to forsake art for profit. Nostalgia for the ‘old days’, when music was good, drives the grumbling against that geared towards teenagers, usually considered the primary target demographic of the big labels.
And I agree, to some extent. Eminem’s anger is forced and insincere; Justin Bieber lacks anything interesting besides a mildly comical hair flick. Most songs on the grocery store soundtrack are made up of canned riffs and annoying vocoder effects. But there are a few who are proving that the craft of creating new, interesting music is alive and well.
Now that I am a music prof in Toronto, the offspring of some of the great Canadian musicians I grew up listening to are attending university and taking my classes. At some point in my time at York University, Jim Cuddy’s (of Blue Rodeo) son Devin came through t
