Top 50 Canadian Albums Of All Time (50 To 41)
Friday June 30, 2000 @ 09:30 AM
By: ChartAttack.com Staff

50. BLUE RODEO Casino (Warner) 1990
"All I want in life is for Jim Cuddy to sing me to sleep at night — is that so wrong?" says Jane Tattersall, of Zomba Records, a diehard Blue Rodeo fan who's been "hooked" since Outskirts. While Tattersall was in university, her apartment was robbed. All of her CDs were stolen — except Casino.

49. SARAH MCLACHLAN Surfacing (Nettwerk) 1997
Sarah finally achieved international acclaim with this majestic, ethereal release. Haunting songs like "Sweet Surrender" and "Angel" are still heard hurtling through the radio airwaves after their reign in '97 and '98. There was no better soundtrack to my years of self-revelation in college. The most inspirational, poetic and brutally honest record of her career. — Debbie Bento, Chart reviews editor

48. BLUE RODEO Outskirts (Risque Disque) 1987
Blue Rodeo = Drowned rat. Or it least that's what it means for Chart writer Paul Gangadeen, who was soaked watching the band at Ontario Place shortly after Outskirts was released. "It was actually my first indoctrination into country music — I guess alternative country music. It was something really, really different from the '80s new wave... It seemed the most real, earthy tunes."

47. BRYAN ADAMS Reckless (A&M;) 1984
I bought it while visiting a friend in Austin, Texas one summer and we listened to the tape 50 times that week. It was loud, it was rockin' and it was just so much fun. I still play it 16 years later. It's a shame Adams has never really been able to capture that feeling ever again. — Adrian Bromley, JAM! music writer

46. GODSPEED YOU BLACK EMPEROR f#a# (Constellation/Kranky) 1997
I came upon this out of sheer chance — in 1997, I was the only Chart reviewer with a functioning turntable. The vinyl came with no song titles, no names, and most importantly, no preconceptions — just the thrill of discovery. Three years may be too soon to bestow classic status upon anything, but these infinitely mysterious orch-punk odysseys transcend such empirical measures, easily passing for an unearthed 19th-century industrial-age symphony as much as a clairvoyant transmission from a not-too-distant post-apocalyptic future. In a word, timeless. — Stuart Berman, music writer, Eye magazine

45. OUR LADY PEACE Clumsy (Sony) 1997
They've got something goin' on that's a little different from what stations have on the radio. Lyrically and musically it's a lot more mature than the stuff you hear on the radio — none of that three-chord stuff. — Aaron St. John, arts and entertainment editor, The Gazette (University of Western Ontario)

44. GODSPEED YOU BLACK EMPEROR Slow Riot For New Zero Kanada (Constellation/Kranky) 1999
Dark, intense and beautiful. They create instrumental soundscapes that slowly build into an incredible wall of sound.... One of the best live acts I've ever seen. I play them occasionally on my radio show and they consistently generate phone calls along the lines of, "What the fuck was that?! That was so cool!" — Ryan Bresee, CKCU (Carleton University) DJ and musician

43. NOMEANSNO Wrong (Wrong/Alternative Tentacles) 1990
It showed that punk rock could be energetic and stay musical... The first time I heard it, it grabbed me — it grabbed me by the nuts and shook me like a rabid pitbull. I guess everyone's got an album like that... PUNK-FUCKING-ROCK! — Stuart Green, contributing editor, Exclaim Magazine

42. MOIST Silver (EMI) 1994
"It kicks some serious ass," says Jennifer Gray, a long-time fan of Moist and Nettwerk fanclub co-ordinator. She still remembers running downtown to buy it. She later played it for a bus filled with jazz musicians. "We were all hooked instantly." Gray's still hooked — she runs Moist's fan club now.

41. 54-40 54-40 (Reprise) 1986
"They were the first ones from my scene that (went to) the next step — and they weren't crap," says Kevin Richards, Sony/ATV Music Publishing manager, recalling the punk revival in the '80s. "We were just blown away that the band could have the spirit and not turn into a rock spectacle."

This story can be accessed online at http://www.chartattack.com/damn/2000/06/3005.cfm