The Mouse that Roared

By Mike Gange

The Top 100 Canadian Singles
By Bob Mersereau
Goose Lane, $35, 216 pages

In the year 1969, the U.S. seemed to be in the news for all the wrong reasons – race riots, inner city turmoil, and an unpopular war in Vietnam – all of which gave outsiders an impression that the U.S. was an example of a democracy gone wrong. Meanwhile, Canada was two years past its first centennial celebrations, with a swelling feeling of national pride, with radio and TV policies that promoted Canadian culture and with the beginnings of a multicultural strategy that would eventually be identified as a mosaic as opposed to the U.S’s melting pot. Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau said about that same time that Canada next to the giant U.S. was like being a mouse sleeping with an elephant.

It was into this setting that a band from the geographic centre of Canada recorded a song that would ultimately become the most recognized 45 RPM in Canadian music. “I don’t need your ghetto scenes, I don’t need your war machines, American Woman, get away from me,” sang The Guess Who in 1970.

The 45 RPM “American Woman” and the flip side “No Sugar Tonight” gave The Guess Who something that only The Beatles and Creedence Clearwater Revival can claim: a double A sided hit that topped the charts. This is the song that rates as the top single ever released in Canada, according to the latest book by Bob Mersereau.

The Top 100 Canadian Singles by Mersereau is a companion and a natural follow up to The Top 100 Canadian Albums, which was released a few years ago. As he did with Canadian Albums, Mersereau surveyed hundreds of music professionals in Canada to determine The Top 100 Canadian Singles. These are people from across the country who are involved somehow in the music business – some are musicians of note, while others are neophytes, some are DJ’s, some are music company executives and some prefer to be just identified as music fans.

The list of those involved in the voting for the best Canadian singles totals seven pages, but that kind of consultation and computation would be only the beginning for Mersereau, who works for CBC in Fredericton. In every case, he has gone back and listened to the music once again, then interviewed the band members or song writer to get some interesting tid-bits that might have been overlooked by other reporters. In the case of “American Woman,” reports Mersereau, the song came about by accident. The Guess Who was playing in Kingston, Ont., and a broken guitar string on Randy Bachman’s guitar forced the band to take a break and leave the stage. Bachman put on the new string, tuned it against singer Burton Cummings’ piano, and started cranking out the well known opening riff. The band members immediately came back on stage and more by instinct than design, filled in their own parts to the soon-to-be number one song.

Canadian literature often has a theme showing that one can never go home again, or that one never steps into the same river twice. Stories of successes in Canadian music have a common theme too. Hits happen by accident, but then when they do, everyone says “I was just thinking the same thing.” Repeatedly Mersereau’s stories of Canadian hits and the bands that made them have this theme. The Top 100 Canadian Singles features folk musicians, rock bands, solo artists and 12 piece jazz-inspired groups that managed to hit the top of the charts. They come from Kingston, Edmonton, Ottawa, Vancouver, Quebec or Halifax, and they managed to find a unique Canadian sound and message.

Mersereau’s book is not about patriotism nor is it a nationalistic call to arms. It is about recognizing singles that gained air play thanks to the innovations and talent of the song writer or performers. In a typical Canadian manner, Mersereau downplays the country, but gives us the back story leading to the success of the song. Many of these songs would have been a success no matter what country the band came from. Some were successes on U.S. charts, sometimes before they were given valid recognition in their home country.

There will be some dispute about the top 100 45 RPM’s, to be sure. Everyone will have one song or other he or she feels should be better placed in the list. Mersereau’s book is a snap shot in time, but it’s more than that too. It’s a forty year record of what Canadians felt passionate about. It shows that if they were seen to be the mouse in the corner, they were still going to make some noise.

Mike Gange teaches media studies and journalism at Fredericton High.