The guitarist who became the first and second Canadian to top the US charts with two bands
Though their noisy neighbours downstairs dominate the majority of the conversation around North American music, Canada has gifted us with plenty of wonderful singers, songwriters and musicians over the years.
No conversation about Canadian music is complete without mentioning Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, Neil Young, Gordon Lightfoot, Alanis Morissette or four of the five members of The Band, alongside Shania Twain, Celine Dion, Avril Lavigne, Carly Rae Jepsen and Nelly Furtado. They’re all from The ‘Great White North’, but it’s not all been positive, for the country has also given us Justin Bieber, Rush, Nickelback, Drake and Arcade Fire over the years as well.
But I’d take a million Nickelbacks if it means we get to have just one Leonard Cohen.
There are a lot of names there, a lot of greats, but there is one important one missing; one artist who holds a rare rock-and-roll distinction and a place in Canadian music history.
Randy Bachman was the guitarist with The Guess Who, and played on their song ‘American Woman’ as they became the first Canadian band to reach the top of the Billboard Hot 100 in 1970 (some solo acts like Paul Anka, Percy Faith and Lorne Greene had previously achieved this on their own). You can hear Bachman playing those bluesy acoustic runs and riffs in the opening of the song, and it’s him playing that stunning slide between Burton Cummings’ vocal refrains, as well.
The Guess Who might well be able to claim credit as having a Canadian number one in America as well, as the B-side to ‘American Woman’, ‘No Sugar Tonight’, received just as much radio-play as the lead single, becoming a double-sided hit and also going to number one.
But while that might be something of a technicality, considering the songs were released not just on the same day but on the same discs, Bachman repeated the feat when he went to number one again with his new band Bachman–Turner Overdrive, with their 1974 single ‘You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet’, and in the process became only the second Canadian band to hit the top of the Billboard Hot 100 in the US (although, in the in-between years, again, some solo Canadian acts had done so, including Neil Young, Terry Jacks, Gordon Lightfoot and Andy Kim).
It wasn’t until 1989 that another Canadian band would scale the summit of the Billboard Hot 100 again, when Sheriff briefly topped the charts with the re-release of their 1983 song ‘When I’m With You’. Perhaps if they had recruited Randy Bachman to play guitar on the track, it would have been a bigger success sooner.
Only six Canadian bands have ever been to the top of the US singles charts: The Guess Who, Bachman–Turner Overdrive, Sheriff, Barenaked Ladies, Nickelback and Magic!, and Randy Bachman played in 1/3rd of them.
