The first punk rock bands in Canada emerged during the late 1970s, in the wake of the US bands Ramones, The New York Dolls, and Blondie, and the UK band Sex Pistols. The Viletones, the Diodes and the Demics were among the pioneers, together with the Skulls (featuring Joey who formed DOA and Wimpy (Brian Roy) who led the Subhumans) from Vancouver, and Hamilton's Teenage Head, whose records and live shows earned them the nickname "Canada's Ramones". Vibrant local punk scenes sprung up in Toronto and Vancouver and other Canadian cities.
Early Toronto punk bands included the Viletones, the Diodes, the Poles, the Ugly, Cardboard Brains, the Dents, the Mods, the Secrets, ARSON and the Scenics, and these were followed by the Demics, Crash Kills Five, Stark Naked and the Fleshtones and L'Étranger, plus Hamilton's Forgotten Rebels and Teenage Head. In Vancouver D.O.A. and the Subhumans led a 1978-79-80 scene that included Pointed Sticks, Braineaters, Young Canadians, and the Modernettes. A few years later and many bands across Canada were carrying the punk torch, including Young Lions, Youth Youth Youth, Bunchofuckingoofs, SNFU, Dayglo Abortions, the Nils, Direct Action, APB, Nomeansno and Chronic Submission.
Two of the biggest early punk shows in Toronto were The Last Pogo at the Horseshoe tavern in 1978, featuring Teenage Head, the Viletones, the Scenics, the Cardboard Brains, the Secrets, the Mods, and the Ugly, and the Rock Against Radiation concert July 19, 1980 at Nathan Phillips Square, featuring DOA, Stark Naked and the Fleshtones, the Viletones, the Forgotten Rebels, plus Joe College (promoter of the show) and the Rulers.
Canadian hardcore punk also originated in the early 1980s. D.O.A. are known as the first Canadian hardcore band, and with the release of their album Hardcore '81 they set the standards for the style of music. [1] [2] That album title is considered to be the origin of the term hardcore punk. [3]
The punk tradition has carried on in Canada right up to modern bands like Fucked Up, The Salads, Alexisonfire, PUP, Cancer Bats.
The Rock Against Radiation concert on July 19, 1980, at Nathan Phillips Square in Toronto was considered a seminal event in the Canadian punk scene, as it brought together bands from the Toronto and the Vancouver punk scenes on the same stage for the first time. Featured bands included DOA, Stark Naked and the Fleshtones, the Demics, the Viletones, Joe College and the Rulers, plus the Forgotten Rebels (from Hamilton).
Gerald Richard Hannah was the bass guitarist for the Canadian punk rock group The Subhumans. Hannah was also a member of the armed revolutionary group known as the Squamish Five.
Bradley Grant Kent was a Canadian musician who played guitar with many of the early Vancouver punk rock bands, particularly Victorian Pork, the band which spawned D.O.A., Pointed Sticks and the Subhumans. Later he went to San Francisco to play guitar for the Avengers with Penelope Houston.
This is a timeline of punk rock, from its beginnings in the early 1960s to the present time. Bands or albums listed before 1974 are of diverse genres and are retrospectively called by their genre name that was used during the era of their release.
The Horseshoe Tavern is a concert venue at 370 Queen Street West in downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and has been in operation since 1947. Owned by "JC", Ken Sprackman, Craig Laskey and Naomi Montpetit, the venue is a significant part of Canadian musical lore. It is captured in the memories of thousands of concertgoers, and in books such as Have Not Been the Same.
Don Pyle is a Canadian record producer and musician, who has also been a member of multiple bands. Pyle is openly gay.
The Diodes are a Canadian punk rock band formed in 1976 in Toronto. They released five albums: Diodes (1977), Released (1979), Action-Reaction (1980), Survivors (1982), and Time/Damage Live 1978 (2010). They were one of the first Canadian bands to embrace this style of music and helped to foster the original core Punk scene in Toronto.
Subhumans were a Canadian punk rock band formed in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada in 1978.
The Viletones are a Canadian punk band from Toronto led by Steven Leckie on vocals. Other members from the original line-up were Freddie Pompeii, on guitar/vocals; Chris Hate, on bass guitar/vocals and Mike Anderson, (1955–2012) on the drums/vocals. The original line-up was active in 1976 and 1977, and thereafter featured Steven Leckie as the only original member, with various backing musicians.
Fringe Product is a defunct Canadian independent record label which was owned by Ben Hoffman. Genres on the label included punk, rock, metal, hardcore, death metal, industrial and electronic music. Hoffman was also proprietor of Record Peddler Distribution and The Record Peddler from the late 1970s to the year 2000.
The Last Pogo is a short film made by Colin Brunton in 1978.
The Skulls were an early Vancouver punk rock band, whose members would later found two of the area's bands: D.O.A. and The Subhumans. They toured heavily and issued a demo, but never released any albums.
Randall Desmond Archibald, better known by his stage name Randy Rampage, was a Canadian musician and founding member, bass player and vocalist of the hardcore band D.O.A. They are often referred to as the "founders" of hardcore punk along with Black Flag, Bad Brains, Angry Samoans, the Germs, Negative Trend, and Middle Class. Their second album Hardcore '81 was thought by many to have been the first actual reference to the second wave of the American punk sound as hardcore. Hardcore 81 included a fourth member of the lineup Dave Gregg.
d.b.s. were a punk rock band from North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. From their beginnings in 1992 to their eventual breakup in 2001, they gained popularity in the Canadian punk rock scene, and to a lesser extent, the U.S. punk rock scene.
The Scenics are a band from Toronto, Ontario, Canada, active from 1976 to 1982, and from 2008 to the present.
Canadian hardcore punk originated in the early 1980s. It was harder, faster, and heavier than the Canadian punk rock that preceded it. Hardcore punk is a punk rock music genre and subculture that originated in the late 1970s. The origin of the term "hardcore punk" is uncertain. The Vancouver-based band D.O.A. may have helped to popularize the term with the title of their 1981 album, Hardcore '81. Hardcore historian Steven Blush said that the term "hardcore" is also a reference to the sense of being "fed up" with the existing punk and new wave music. Blush also states that the term refers to "an extreme: the absolute most Punk."An article in Drowned in Sound argues that 1980s-era "hardcore is the true spirit of punk", because "after all the poseurs and fashionistas fucked off to the next trend of skinny pink ties with New Romantic haircuts, singing wimpy lyrics", the punk scene consisted only of people "completely dedicated to the DIY ethics". One definition of the genre is "a form of exceptionally harsh punk rock."
The Rock n Roll Rats are a Canadian punk rock group formed in 2009 in Calgary, Alberta. The Rock n Roll Rats are influenced by punk rock bands including The Ramones, The Forgotten Rebels, Teenage Head and The Misfits. This pop-punk quad plays three and four chord songs in a medium tempo and often puts the "hook" to their songs out front and centre. The Rock n Roll Rats do not align themselves with any specific ideologies or political views, instead writing songs about their love for Punk rock.
Cleave Anderson is a Canadian punk rock, alt. country, rock, pop, etc drummer. Anderson has played and recorded with several well-known groups, including Blue Rodeo, Battered Wives, Viletones, Sherry Kean, Forgotten Rebels, and the Beat Club ].
The Secrets were a Toronto punk rock band during the first wave of late 1970s punk. Their line-up consisted of Freddie Pompeii, Chris Haight (guitar), John Hamilton (bass) and Mike Anderson on drums.
The 'B' Girls were a Toronto punk rock band from the first wave of punk rock in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Where Toronto band The Curse was North America's first all-female punk band, the B-Girls were the second such band in Toronto.