THE TRAGICALLY HIP 95-TRACK MIX CD | #HI54MIXCDS on MOUN.TOWN/FM
I recently (summer 2021) did a proper deep dive thru all 14 of The Tragically Hip's studio albums so I could officially figure out what my official subjective album rankings would be... and a part of that process resulted in the creation of a massive mix cd featuring 95 of my fave Hip songs. This is that mix cd.
If you grew up in the country that flies the maple leaf flag, especially if you are cursed enough to be over 30 years old (in this economy?!), The Tragically Hip probably hold a very special place in all the parts of your body that are able to pick up on musical frequencies. This is because, especially in pre-internet times, when EVERYBODY listened to the same few radio channels, the Hip were on the collective airwaves A LOT in Canada.
There’s a bunch of reasons for their heavy rotation (Canada has rules about playing a certain amount of Canadian artists, pre-internet radio stations loved playing the same artists/songs over & over again, etc) but the main reason is the indisputable fact that The Tragically Hip have a A LOT of great songs. I mean, their stretch of records from 89-98 truly is iconic. Even if you’re not from The North.
And I remembered that discography run as being very good, but, re-listening back, I was even more impressed with the consistency of top shelf quality and just how many songs actually got decent radio play in the 90s. Add in the fact that the Hip never really caught on outside of Canada, unlike a world-renowned Neil Young or Joni Mitchel, it kinda makes one’s weird shared-border pride/love for them swell to rarefied levels if you grew up north of America. Plus, Gord was an absolute gem of a human (and his energy in the mainstream is greatly missed during these times).
And since I am of the age to have come of age during pre-proper-internet Canada, not only did I live thru peak-Hip era national airwave times, but I also missed out on a lot of their post-2000 stuff as I was travelling & living in other countries after high school + not listening to the radio at all because the internet was so new and shiny and so much better for music discovery (although I did make it back to living in Canada for the teary eyed national goodbye as Gord graciously prepared for exiting life stage left with one final live-streamed-across-the-country show) — which kinda makes me a perfect candidate for wanting to go thru all of the The Hip’s studio albums to figure out what my subjectively scientific album rankings would be. Also, the topic of fave Hip albums kept coming up in conversations, and I was feeling like I hadn’t properly done the homework to be able to officially say what mine is (although my hunch about Phantom Power turned out to be correct).
Well, I’ve now done the headphone homework.
And in that process of chronologically listening to all 14 of The Tragically Hip’s 1987 - 2016 studio albums, I used the ‘heart’ button on Spotify to highlight every track that my music blogging ears deemed as ‘HI54 Approved’ (ie. something I would include in a mix tape or mix cd), which I was originally just going to use to help figure out which albums had the highest ‘nice songs’ ratio for my personal album rankings, but I quickly realized that I was going to have enough liked songs to be able to put together an amazing 95-track playlist of ‘tragically hits’ that I could also include in the MountownFM programming I mess around with over in the British Columbia mountain town I live in.
So, long story short, here is that awesomely hip 95-track Tragically Hip mix cd (songs are in order of what makes a good mix cd and are not ranked)…
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And it would probably be a good idea to press the "like/follow" button over on Spotify so you can listen from top-to-bottom and then come back and throw it on shuffle whenever you feel the urge to get your Hip on. And maybe pass the playlist on to your Hip-loving friends & family (or, even better, pass it on to one of the many people out there who have yet to be properly converted as Tragically Hip appreciators).
As for my official The Tragically Hip album rankings, well, through a subjectively scientific process of what my ears like the most on both a full album listen + songs I’d most fight for including on a massive 95-track Tragically Hip mix cd that still required me to have to make tough cuts to keep at 95… here’s the results as of July 2021:
Please feel strongly encouraged to share your favourite Hip albums/songs/memories in the comments below or out on the socials (I’d be especially interested to hear of any songs you can’t believe I didn’t include), but, MOST IMPORTANTLY, just go listen to that Hip playlist because it’ll make your ‘heart for the hip’ grow 3-full sizes, no matter how big you think your hip heart size is right now.
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And I HOPE YOU HEAR A FEW THINGS YOU LIKE ENOUGH TO GO INVEST MORE TIME WITH BACK IN YOUR PERSONAL ORBIT, BUT IF YOU FIND YOU’RE ACTuALLY IN THE MOOD FOR A DIFFERENT MOUN.TOWN/FM SOUNDTRACK THAN THE ONE ABOVE, have a flick thru this carousel of HI54 MIX CD programming & give a listen to whatever catches your fancy:
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OR SEARCH “MOUN.TOWN/FM” ON SPOTIFY TO BROWSE THE FULL COLLECTION OF #MOUNTOWNFM PLAYLISTS (BECAUSE THERE’S MORE THAN WHAT THE ABOVE CAROUSEL CAN HANDLE — AND EVERY ACCOMPANYING BLOG POST COMES WITH AVAILABLE-ON-BANDCAMP EMBEDS/ARCHIVES)
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And if you’re looking for something related to all of the above, but also different:
[you can also find some of the accompanying Tragically Hip music videos, like the one above, over on HI54's ongoing 'all day music videos' rotation FM/TV].
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And here’s hoping this year we’ll be better than the last \m/
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JEREMY / @HI54LOFI
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