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The Tragically Hip Top Forty Countdown: Song Forty — Yanik from TorontoHey, it’s jD — and welcome to the very first official episode of The Tragically Hip Top Forty Countdown. Buckle up, friends. We’re kickin’ this thing off in true Hip fashion: with deep reverence, a little mischief, and a brand-new fan-turned-superfan.This week I’m joined by Yanik from Toronto — an opera singer, a self-confessed late bloomer when it comes to The Hip, and the creator of the Instagram gem Dance Like Gord. (If you’re not following that, fix your life.) His journey into the band’s music didn’t start in the ‘80s or ‘90s — it started in the wake of Secret Path and grew in tandem with personal loss, national mourning, and the unmistakable call of Gord’s later solo work.Together, we unpack what it means to fall in love with The Hip after the final tour. How the layers of Gord’s lyricism reveal themselves like old film negatives — better with time, stronger in grief, and loudest when things go quiet. We talk bro culture vs. art school snobbery, radio station trauma, and how one pandemic-fueled discography binge turned into a full-on spiritual awakening. Spoiler: He’s one of us now.Yanik brings humility, honesty, and some beautiful insights into the band’s evolution — plus a fresh lens on Now For Plan A that might just make you re-listen this week. Trust me.🎙️ Next week: We stay in the 6ix with Darrin from Toronto, whose Hip archive might actually be deeper than the Rideau Canal. He’s got receipts. He’s got tapes. He’s got stories you won’t believe. Don’t miss it.💬 Pull Quote“I was the snob who changed the station when Gord came on. Now I run an Instagram page dedicated to how he danced. That’s growth, baby.”👤 About Our GuestYanik from Toronto is a classically trained opera singer who’s making his way into the hearts of Hip fans one stage dive at a time. He’s the voice behind Dance Like Gord, a celebration of Downie’s magnetic stage presence, and a living reminder that fandom is about discovery — not seniority. When he’s not belting out arias or unpacking Man Machine Poem, Yanik’s building bridges between musical genres and keeping Gord’s spirit alive in new, creative spaces.📬 Get Involved🎙️ Drop your hot take: castfeedback.com/tthtop40📧 Send your Hipstory: tthtop40@gmail.com💸 Join the membersHIP by donating at buymeacoffee.com/tthtop40 — one time gets you in forever.📡 Follow + StreamSpotify | Apple | YouTube | dewvre.com/tthtop40Instagram: @tthtop40Facebook Group: facebook.com/groups/tthtop40💖 Support the ALS Society of CanadaWe’re raising $25K in honour of Matt Rona and the broader Hip community. Pitch in at buymeacoffee.com/tthtop40 and help us get there.📜 Transcript follows below.TTHTop40 - 6012025-05-23, 6:33 PMTTHTop40 - 601Artist: jDYear: 2025Transcript[0:00] Music.[0:16] It's J.D. here and welcome to the Tragically Hip Top 40 Countdown. It is my absolute pleasureto be here with you week over week where we're counting down 40 essential tracks by the hip thatyou selected with your very own top 20 ballots. I then tabulated the results using an abacus and apsychic ferret that only communicates in riddles about tax evasion. And that's how they always getyou. Rico, baby. Rico.[0:48] How will your favorite songs fare in the rankings? You'll need to tune in every week to find out.So there's that. This week, I'm joined by tragically hip super fan Yannick from Toronto. Yannick, howare you doing, man? I'm good. I'm doing great. How are you? I'm really good. I'm really good. Yeah,this is a lot of fun. So I want to welcome everybody to the first episode and I want to welcome youto the first episode. We're celebrating here because this is the kickoff. Of course. Yeah. Veryexciting. Thank you for having me. This is an honor. I'm happy to kick it off and with you. And likewe said before, no pressure, you know, it's just fun. That's right. We're just talking about our favoriteband here. We're just talking about our favorite band. All we need is a pint and a table between us,really. You know, totally. I mean, I've got a table in front of me. I've got a pint of water, if that works.I've got, yeah, yeah. Well, what do you say we get right into things? The format of the showbasically is going to be me talking to a guest about their tragically hip origin story. And I'm reallycurious to hear yours, Yannick, from Toronto. Yeah. Let's do it. Yeah. Should I just jump right into it?Jump right in. Okay.[2:03] Yeah. Well, my story, I guess, my hip story is, I would say, maybe an unconventional one,though I've realized by talking with people, by fans and with fans and whatnot, it's not a rare one. Iwas not really into the hip at all when I was growing up, when I was younger. I know, I know.Shocking. I came to them kind of later, more recently. Of course, kind of during their last tour, it wascovered everywhere and you could see it on the news. I was kind of forced maybe or encouragedfile:///Users/jd/Desktop/TTHTop40%20-%20601.htmlPage 1 of 9TTHTop40 - 6012025-05-23, 6:33 PMto learn about them. And I'm thankful I did.[2:51] And then since then, it's kind of been a love story since. But yeah, so definitelyunconventional, I think. And interesting that I'm the one maybe kicking it off. But yeah, I told myselfI'd chat with you and I would not be ashamed of my own unique story. No, of course not. I want toknow, though. I want to start at the start. I want to know... What the process of hippicizing yourselflooked like. You know, people listened to Getting Hip to the Hip a couple years back, and theyheard me indoctrinate Tim and Pete.[3:36] What did you do to, you know, get it in your blood? Yeah, yeah, no. I mean, it was, like Imentioned, it was not, even though I'm Canadian like you, And it seems like it's in our blood, justlike Tim Hortons, but it wasn't in mine, I guess, growing up. And I remember even listening to, in myhigh school days, undergrad, when I would drive around, I would turn on the local classic rockstation. And even sometimes, you know, and I'll be honest with you, I would change station ifGord's voice would come on. What? I know, I know. And, you know, I told you I'd be honest, butthere was just something about, I guess I was, I mean, I've thought about it since. I was definitelykind of a snobbish little kid.[4:32] I was starting to study classical music in my undergrad. I think I was, you know, my head was,though I do come from a rock background. I was really into the 70s stuff and the 60s. But there wasjust something about, I don't know if it's kind of the culture that was presented around maybe thehip, this kind of, you know, the people often quote the bro culture that came. And I really didn'tidentify it. What I did identify with was that lyric in Fireworks where he said, you didn't give a fuckabout hockey. Well, that resonated with me because that also wasn't really in my blood. But I'vealways been kind of more of an artist than a sporty person.[5:19] But so my only exposure to the hip was through the radio, and it just kind of sounding like,you know, not that impressive to me maybe at first. And my head was full of these ideas about whatart was and what I was into the progressive rock stuff. So I had kind of, bigger ideas of what, youknow, the theatricality of it all. Anyways, fast forward some years, you know, to their last tour. Andthen I finally had the chance to kind of see what they were about, to see Gord perform, to see theband performing through video footage that was.[6:05] Circulating all over the news. And I had realized I'd never even taken the time to, you know,even YouTube, a performance of them.[6:14] Yeah. Yeah. Which is, which I don't have, I think that's my, you know, biggest regret in lifefile:///Users/jd/Desktop/TTHTop40%20-%20601.htmlPage 2 of 9TTHTop40 - 6012025-05-23, 6:33 PMwould be to not have given them a chance earlier, but I'm thankful that I have since. And, and, andyeah, I've, I've kind of discovered more of, and, and I've discovered, discovered more, but alsodove deep. What does the deep dive look like what it what did it consist of like what record did yougo to first sure yeah yeah um uh i guess the first well like i mentioned i we we connected we we weconnected through your your last podcast discovering downy and that one uh resonated with me ifound interesting because uh because of the concept of it people uh guests discovering GoreDowney's solo career, coming in as hip superfans and for me it was kind of the reverse of coursewith the last tour and then the work he did afterwards The Secret Path and all the work around thatI kind of got into his music through his solo work so after I kind of took the time to really the.[7:35] Soak in The Secret Path and what it was all about. Then I fell in love with the rest of hisdiscography solo stuff and was kind of flirting a little bit with the Hips discography a bit more.[7:53] Especially the more recent stuff, I was seeing kind of the evolution of the sound that they hadThat was maybe a bit more in line with my tastes at that point, a bit more alternative, a bit moremaybe, yeah, especially Now for Plan A, especially the final album. Those kind of spoke to me atfirst, and then getting to know their work and what they were all about, then I kind of jumped in. Andthe pandemic, early pandemic, was a time for me to discover. I told myself I would go through myfavorite artists' discographies or artists I wanted to learn more about. So they were one that Idecided to binge kind of from the beginning.[8:38] And then that's when, yeah, I kind of saw the whole arc of their work. And since then, yeah, Ihave not stopped discovering and listening and just enjoying it.[8:50] There is such a treasure trove of video on youtube have you have you accessed some of thatnow to see some of these live performances oh totally yeah yeah now i'm just you know eating it upall the time uh and and especially like i mentioned if i had even just taken the chance to do ayoutube search earlier on i would have seen what they were all about live and i feel A lot ofdiscussions that I have with hip fans, it's all about the live performance, right? It's that energy thatthey brought, the kind of showman that Gord is or was. And I was being in love with the theatricalityof rock and roll. I if I had just given that a chance I would have noticed oh you know he's just likeJim Morrison he's just like David Bowie he's he's you know Peter Gabriel all those people that Iloved he was his own version of that and uh and so now yeah now I'm soaking it all in I love hisstage craft I love his the way his unique way of performing and uh and yeah of course the thegetting to see the final concert as well in Kingston, you know, that's one that I often go back to sinceit was released and yeah, just always YouTubing what I missed, I guess.file:///Users/jd/Desktop/TTHTop40%20-%20601.htmlPage 3 of 9TTHTop40 - 6012025-05-23, 6:33 PM[10:17] It's nice that you can do that though. It's so nice that you can do that. Totally. This is thebeautiful thing about art. Like it doesn't always get context.[10:30] Um, that it was conceived in, you know, it doesn't always get to have the context that it wasconceived in is what I'm trying to say. Let me try that one more time. My voice is going, it doesn'talways get the context that it's conceived in. Sometimes it could be years later that you discoverthis art and you bring with it your own, you know, unique perspectives and, you know, voila,suddenly you've just got this great, uh, like I said, treasure trove of work to go through. Yeah,absolutely, for sure. And I think, I mean, of course, the story, I keep going back to the year of thefinal tour, but for me, that was a pivotal moment. You know, it was my first taste of them, the firsttime I saw them, but it was also, you know, the year that we lost, I think it was the same year asPrince, David Bowie, that same year. And even personally, I have an aunt who got diagnosed, re-diagnosed, I guess, with cancer that year, around that same time. So I think that the kind of publicgrieving or the public kind of the way that.[11:43] I could see this artist and this band going through it together and so publicly and so willing to,you know, to fight, but also celebrate life and what they've done, that really resonated with me. andit helped me. And then to just hear him talk about all of it, Gord, that last Peter Mansbridgeinterview.[12:11] Is just so touching and moving and heartbreaking, but also just so inspiring. Yeah, goodchoice of words.[12:24] I agree. There's something about.[12:28] That vision I have of Gord wearing the First Avenue hat, you know, the, the, the jean jacketthat just looks so fucking cool. Yeah. Um, he's just a different version of Gord. Uh, then like I wasinspired by him as an artist growing up. I wanted to be, you know, he was my hero. Sure. Um, buthe became a different sort of hero as I got older and that's the hero that I envision now. You know,that late version of Gore, that guy who showed up on Peter Mansbridge and was inspiring to awhole different set of people in a whole different context. Totally, totally. And how beautiful as wellthat, and if the listeners are, I'm sure you have watched the recent documentary. I was just going toask you about that. Okay, okay. But I'm sorry, I was just going to say how beautiful that throughouthis career, throughout their career, the band changed with their age, right? They grew up. We got tosee them. Their music grew up. Their music matured. Their music changed. Uh and and and assad as the end always is um how inspiring how how kind of amazing that we kind of got the chanceto have this kind of full cycle with them yeah i don't know.file:///Users/jd/Desktop/TTHTop40%20-%20601.htmlPage 4 of 9TTHTop40 - 6012025-05-23, 6:33 PM[13:55] You know they they there's that expression you know we were born in the right time youknow sure like we got to it we were born we lived at the same time that he lived and that was Thatwas really great. And it does make you wonder how he'll be remembered, how his legacy will beremembered, you know, generations down the road. Yeah, yeah. And the bands as well, like fortheir importance in Canadian culture and in some cases people, you know, identifying with them toa very deep degree, far more so than hockey and Tim Hortons. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah, exactly.And those are also things that make us unique and that are worth celebrating, for sure. We kind ofembrace those as part of our identity. But I think, yeah, the fact that the only thing in life that reallybrings us that is common is taxes and death, as they always say. So yeah seeing them kind ofembrace that and celebrate that really was to me kind of my way in then I was like okay this bandis, serious art I really was sleeping on them and did not give them a chance early.[15:15] Unfortunate that it had to take this tragic moment but, I guess it was tragically hip after all. Idon't know.[15:27] It was bound to happen at least once in 40 years. Yeah, I guess. So you may as well get itout of the way in the first one.[15:36] Yannick from Toronto, I'm curious about the record that you go to when you're looking forthat art. You mentioned before Man Machine Poem and now for Plan A. Let's exclude those twofrom this equation. And what's sort of your go-to right now? Yeah, yeah. I mean, like any goodartist, you know, it's, there's, the beauty is kind of the variety of it all. I think in the moment, if I haveto answer in the moment, I've been kind of more into Rhode Apple, fully, completely ki…
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