00's Canadian Music

A monthly exploration steaming from songs that hang on the far walls of my mind and beg to know where the musicians are now.

[canmusic]

Melanie Doane

Another childhood radio frequent listen. I remember hearing the hit songs Adam's Rib, Goliath and Still Desire You

In interviews Melanie says she always planned on becoming a music teacher. But as life happens, she ended up doing theater first in Halifax then in Toronto. It was through this experience that was the inspiration for her debut album.

Shakespearean Fish was released in 1996 and only in Canada. A folksy album offered the singles Tell You Stories and My Sister Sings. The former featuring a collaboration with one of the singers of the Barenaked Ladies. She was also associated with Blue Rodeo and Dayna Manning in backing vocal recordings and or backing live vocals.

Her next album, Adam's Rib was released in Canada and the US a few years later in 1998. It was a commercial breakthrough for her and has the singles Adam's Rib, Waiting for the Tide, Goliath, and Happy Homemaker.

It is cool to hear the fiddle in the song Adam's Rib and feeling for the Celtic east coast influence sprinkled through the album as a whole. The instrumental Mels Rock Pile is a lovely display of that.

Another song off the record was Can't Take My Eyes Off You that was featured in four different TV show series including Buffy the Vampire Slayer. What sounds like a captivating slow burn turns out to be a love letter to a TV.

She released her third album You Are What You Love in 2003. More polished even still yet experiments with some different sounds. The turntables surprised me. The standout single is Still Desire You. I have a hard time sinking my teeth into the album otherwise unfortunately.

Melanie Doane independently releases A Thousand Nights in 2008 featuring cover songs inspired by her newfound motherhood. The single Songbird from the album features long time musical friend Jim Cuddy from Blue Rodeo.

Melanie did begin teaching music via the ukulele around 2009 through a program she started.

In 2011 she independently released her final album Emerald City. Which seems like a theatrical nod to her first album's name. The album feels like a small coming of age which reflects in her children's aging and a personal divorce.

Throughout her career, her brother Creighton Doane has collaborated via drums, guitars, and songwriting.

Where is Melanie Doane these days? Mostly likely still teaching music via the ukulele for the TDSB.

[canmusic]

Kim Stockwood

This was pretty young when I heard Kim Stockwood. I remember her songs played often on the local adult contemporary radio station. I had actually only seen a music video by Kim Stockwood for the first time on YouTube in 2023.

Her first of two major record label releases was Bonavista released in 1995. But re-released the following year to feature the song You Jerk to help foster record sales. It's a fun playful song about coping with an ass. It can be seen as the song you might best recognize with the artist. Though I had heard many other of her songs on the radio at that time.

Other songs from that record that I remember were She's Not In Love as well as Enough Love. The album as a whole works with some different sounds including a folk/country theme in sound and latter in theme.

Her next album was titled 12 Years Old, released in 1999. The album has a greater production budget I would say. The first single was called 12 Years Old and I would sing along with the chorus as at the time I was 12 years old 😃. The single had two music videos one being the electronic Boomtang Boys remix.

After watching You Jerk music video I laugh a bit to myself when I see the black boa returns for the second album cycle in 12 Years Old. A fun little Easter egg maybe.

But as I dive into Kim's albums I do see for this contrast in fun upbeat maybe even camp themes along with more mature lyrics and tone.

The second single from 12 Years Old is You and Me which features a theme of emotional longing and feeling lost within that. The music video features a portable DVD player which reminds me of my current age 😄.

Her next project was called Shaye. A pop group featuring other Atlantic Canadian musicians Tara MacLean and Damhnait Doyle between 2003 to 2009. They released two albums and had a four part mini series around the making of their second album.

Though she has always had a through line of where she came from incorporated into all her releases, her next release would be her back to roots and back to basics. In 2011 Kim Stockwood released Back to the Water featuring mostly covers of vocal-centered folk songs from Newfoundland. She has local bands callaborate and has Damhnait Doyle join with singing and song writing. The release is delivered without pretence and feels like a carefree passion project as she steps away from the limelight of earlier successes.

Where is she now? It's not clear. She is said in a 2016 interview that "I'm trying to figure out what I'll do next with my life, like, maybe I'll go back and do my master's, maybe I'll write a book, maybe I'll go to cooking school. I'm obsessed with the news and politics, so maybe I'll go do a political science master's, I don't know. Or, maybe I'll do some more singing and writing."

[canmusic]

B4-4

When I think back to this group I think of their videos Get Down and Go-Go on MuchMusic and how 00's those frosted tips and that seashell necklace were.

Looking up their debut album('00) I was surprised to see that Simon and Milo (James McCollum and Jason Levine) from Prozzäk produced 5 of the tracks and wrote the lyrics for Get Down (and their other singles Go-Go, Everyday, and Endlessly). Makes me think about how interconnected the Canadian music industry can be.

Also didn't know they went on to release a follow-up album as it was never released in their native country. I'm curious why that was, I'm sure there is a story behind that.

Listening to the sophomore album('03) it seems to have some different elements like undeniable Micheal Jackson styled vocals in Bad Girl and spanish guitar in Señorita and Player(Your My Ecstasy).

The twins of the group formed RyanDan and released a self-titled album('07) with classical meets pop sound. The album charted in the top 10 in Canada and UK Billboard. A lot of credits for the album are UK based so it may have been recorded there.

RyanDan released a second album('14) with seemingly little information or promotion online.

Ohad, the other member of b4-4 had left the group to start a line of Bluetooth headphones that converted to in-ear to stereo speakers in one device in 2008. A Kickstarter campaign starts and ends in 2016 and appears to be the start of the end of Boomphones

RyanDan also provided songwriting and/or music producing for Toronto area artists like Dan Talevski and artists on CP record label including Mia Martina and Danny Fernandez

Where are they now? The RyanDan twins run a dog boarding business in the Greater Toronto Area while Ohad is now a co-founder and CEO of his own prefab house company based in California.

[canmusic]

Brattt Pack

I remember watching Brattt Packs music video for Carousel and then Senorita on MuchMusic in early 00's. I likely had the video recorded on my VHS tape. Not sure if this was before the Napster/CD burning era. But I did like the group and it brings me back to being a teen.

According to Discog.com there was no full length album or EP. I was surprised and figured with making music videos to promote themselves that they would be wanting to sell a body of work.

The video for Carousel filmed at Woodbine Mall in Toronto with an interesting feature of Young MC (of "Bust a Move" fame from 1989).

The two Brattt Pack singles were released through Popular Records Canada. The person who engineered their tracks, worked at the label but also released some of their own music under the name The Sound Bluntz. The lead singer of Brattt Pack wrote the song "(Maybe you'll get) Lucky"(2007) for them. The song has an interesting feature of the singer of Madison Avenue.

Where are they now? The lead singer and songwriter of the group also wrote songs for other artists. There was a handful of released songs with Demetri Gountounas' writing credit for the year 2020 but little else now.

[canmusic]

Shiloh

in 2009, i kinda remember this singer on muchmusic. "operator, operator, don't call me back ill call you later..." an anthemic outsider youth jam.

out of curiosity I looked up Shiloh only to find out she was actually canadian 🇨🇦. apparently had went on a 10 year hiatus that involved a public domestic and mental health issues between her and a YouTube streamer.

2019 saw the release of a new name "lyldoll" and new album "1993" with an urban sound.