Socialised Canadian Music
October 24, 2005 3:48 PM   Subscribe

CBC Radio - Canada's publicly-owned broadcaster, has some amazing websites devoted to Canadian musicans of all varieties. Check out NewMusicCanada for the main database of artist information and streaminig music (realplayer). For alternative tunes, check out the weekly podcast hosted by Grant Laurence at CBC Radio 3. Or, you may prefer Folk, World , or even Country music . Of course, being a bilingual country there's the francophone music site too. And finally, if you'd like to see some live Canadian music, you can check out CBC's Concert listings. Soon, check out CBC Radio 3 on Sirius Radio Canada!
posted by SSinVan (17 comments total)
 
Dude, where have you been?
posted by bobloblaw at 4:07 PM on October 24, 2005


What? I checked if these had been posted and they hadn't. I've been going to these sites for years, but thought I'd share 'em. I can't seem to find anyone else who knows about them
posted by SSinVan at 4:09 PM on October 24, 2005


My band on NMC.
posted by Quartermass at 4:35 PM on October 24, 2005


Corrected francophone music site link.
posted by blue_beetle at 4:40 PM on October 24, 2005


The advertised site is ".fm", but the .ca works too.
posted by SSinVan at 4:49 PM on October 24, 2005


Didn't know about the Roots site. Thanks! (I did link to Just Concerts about a year back, though. The search function on MeFi just sucks is all.)
posted by dobbs at 4:53 PM on October 24, 2005


The sad thing about this post is that it was made at least six months too late. By that, I mean that CBC Radio 3 wasn't always just a podcast; before the CBC brass shut it down and "revamped" it, Radio 3 wasn't very much of a radio station at all; what Radio 3 was really doing was putting together a weekly arts and culture magazine, done entirely in Flash. From a technical standpoint, it was amazing; to date, I haven't seen a better Flash implementation. From a content standpoint, the playlist accompaniment was superb, and the stories were eclectic and interesting. Even the visual arts interludes—essentially a gallery of a particular young Canadian artist's works—were interesting. In short, Radio 3 was something the rest of the CBC could've taken some lessons from: it was relevant, insightful and unique.

Having talked to one of the minds behind several of the CBC's internet sites, it's clear the mothership didn't know what to do with R3; taking the "radio" part too literally, they canned everyone at R3 and asked them to re-apply for more standard radio positions; R3 expanded its radio presence at the expense of its online content. The experiment was over, and by all indications but one, it was a success.

It's scary when a publicly-funded and owned publication that's able to prosper on a small budget, rake in new media awards left, right and center, and develop a dedicated core audience that the CBC has traditionally had trouble reaching, the college-and-beyond crowd, still can't survive to see year three. Yes, justconcerts and newmusiccanada are still up, but they never reached the same heights as CBCR3, and were never as ambitious or as focused as R3 was. So when you visit the still-great CBC sites from the FPP, just remember that what we have now is but a shell of what once was.
posted by chrominance at 5:26 PM on October 24, 2005


Those who've enjoyed CBC Radio 3 will be saddened to know that host Alexis Mazurin died last Thursday. He was 27.
posted by 327.ca at 5:30 PM on October 24, 2005


But CBCRadio3.com is getting relaunched this fall, as well as becoming an XFM station... not exactly killed off!
posted by krunk at 5:33 PM on October 24, 2005


Where's Boards of Canada? Oh, right, they're Scotish...
posted by afx114 at 5:57 PM on October 24, 2005


I wish the dedicated Radio 3 station was on regular radio, too, as I don't have sat radio. I've been a dedicated listener every Saturday night for a long time now.

327, wow, thanks for pointing that out. I hadn't even heard. He was one of my favourite radio personalities.
posted by synecdoche at 6:53 PM on October 24, 2005


Although the CBC has been discussed plenty of times here in the past, this can be a timely reminder since the lockout by management was recently settled and all programming has gone pretty much back to normal, although the fall launches have been delayed.
posted by myopicman at 7:03 PM on October 24, 2005


Where's my Brave New Waves podcast, that's what I want to know. I'm in the US now and miss it dearly.
posted by picea at 7:53 PM on October 24, 2005


chrominance and krunk - I SO hope that the old CBCR3 site will be back up. It was truly amazing, and I sent them several e-mails to tell them what I thought.

It was young Canadian art at its best - literary, photographic, musical (radio 3).

For anyone interested in what we are talking about, you can go to CBCR3.com and click "Magazine Archive". Appropriately, the soundtrack of the archives is The Weakerthans, The Last Last One.

It is so sad that we'll soon have to pay for our taxpayer funded music station! I wonder if the artists will get anything???
posted by SSinVan at 12:40 AM on October 25, 2005


I think if CBCR3 was really relaunching in its previous form, I would've heard something through the grapevine by now—a lot of people would be excited about any such reincarnation. More likely, the relaunch will merge some of the other CBC satellites (NMC, JustConcerts) into a giant Canadian music database and hub.
posted by chrominance at 1:34 AM on October 25, 2005


Just seconding the need for a Brave New Waves podcast! Growing up in Detroit we could get Windor's CBC station and I can say (with only a bit too much hyperbole) that Brent Bambury and Patti Schmidt are what got me through high school. I miss tuning into the CBC...
posted by verysleeping at 9:37 AM on October 25, 2005


Oh, Canada!
posted by thrakintosh at 5:53 AM on October 26, 2005


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