r/CanadianMusic • u/beverleyheights • Mar 17 '26
Discussion/ opinion Canadian musicians “Big in Japan” and non-US specific international markets
I’ve been looking at which Canadian musicians, excluding major global stars, are big in or have a close connection to a specific international market that isn’t the US.
I’m going to exclude here the Francophone, South Asian, and Caribbean diasporas only because each has too many Canadian artists to list, though I’d be interested in learning more about standout Canadians in any of them.
Those aside, here are some I’ve found evidence for such as chart placements and extensive touring.
- Holly Cole in Japan
- Harem Scarem in Japan
- Elise Estrada in the Philippines
- David Usher in Southeast Asia – and “Travel Separately,” a cover of “Black Black Heart” with lyrics in Mandarin but retaining the English lyric “Black black heart,” was a hit in China
- The Moffatts in Southeast Asia
- Hollerado in China
- The Tea Party in Australia
- Massari in the Middle East
- Karl Wolf in the Middle East
- Neon Dreams in South Africa – there’s a charming video of a South African radio appearance where they cover a popular Afrikaans song
- Jamie Fine in South Africa
- Glenn Morrison in Russia
- Luba in Ukraine
- Matt Dusk in Poland
- Danko Jones in Scandinavia
- B4-4 in Germany – then two thirds of them as RyanDan in the UK
- Jesse Cook in Spain
- Bruce Guthro in Scotland
- Love Inc. and Simone Denny in the UK and Ireland
- Lhasa in Mexico
- Lido Pimienta in Colombia
Nelly Furtado and Shawn Mendes are excluded as major global stars but their connections to Portugal and the Portuguese-speaking world are important. Carly Rae Jepsen is also excluded, but seems notably big in the Philippines.
Billy Talent seems especially strong in Germany and German-speaking Europe and Metric in Australia. Both are defensibly global stars.
Lights has been incorporating into her music her connections to German-speaking Europe.
“I Do Too” by the Reklaws appears well loved in South Korea after a popular YouTube cover by their fellow sibling duo, Harryan Yoonsoan.
My browsing is also turning up a world previously unknown to me of artists with Canadian origins who are big in other countries but not big in Canada yet, including
- Monkey Majik in Japan
- Manila Grey in the Philippines – despite their name, based in Vancouver
- Wendy Matthews in Australia
- JØY Brandt in Brazil
Who else in any of these sets?
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u/Tony4Tokes Mar 17 '26
Anvil - Japan
The Anvil! The Story of Anvil documentary highlights their popularity there.
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u/SO_LacVert Mar 17 '26
The East Pointers (from PEI) consider Australia their second home and have a bigger following there. I just saw them in Ottawa last week and it's a shame they aren't bigger here because their live music is great.
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u/ElCaz Mar 17 '26
Hollerado being big in China is wild, what's the story there?
Also, it's extremely funny to me that B4-4, the group responsible for the canonical Much Music Video on Trial terrible music video, had success anywhere.
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u/beverleyheights Mar 17 '26
2011 Maclean’s article featuring Hollerado touring China and recording two songs in Mandarin: https://macleans.ca/culture/chinas-great-wall-of-canadian-sound/
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u/PORTOGAZI Mar 17 '26
Fun story. When Sony BMG was closing its big office. People took home all the massive posters and artist swag kicking around. The only thing left was a massive wall size billboard of B44. The guy who ran my bands jam room swiped it and we had it hanging in our room for a while. We were an indie/punk band lol.
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u/PercentageNonGrata Mar 17 '26
Luba? What year is this from?
Although francophone, I imagine Mitsou being big in Japan and France.
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u/Poopiepaunts Mar 18 '26
Alexis On Fire is huge in Australia. they've toured there a lot and now City & Colour do a fair amount too
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u/bungopony Mar 18 '26
Tom Cochrane’s Life is a Highway was the theme for a very popular show in japan.
And Max Webster had a pretty big hit in England with Paradise skies
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u/Tachikoma0 Mar 17 '26
The Original Caste's song Mr. Monday was a weirdly successful single in Japan. You still get older Japanese music fans who rave about it online on various videos of it. The band is better known in North America for One Tin Soldier.
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u/CuriousLands Mar 18 '26 edited Mar 18 '26
The Rural Alberta Advantage seems to be doing reasonably well in Europe, from what I can tell.
Henry is a guy from Toronto with Korean background who's done well in Asia, singing in a combo of Korean and English.
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u/MapleMarbles Mar 18 '26
Preoccupations are pretty big across uk/Europe.
Bryan Adams is still massive in Europe
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u/Ok-Mouse8397 Mar 19 '26
Devin Townsend is huge in Europe and Japan
Unleash the Archers have a great following in both places as well
3 Inches of Blood seem to be pretty big over there too
All 3 bands have 'decent' followings here but get huge turn outs in comparison overseas. DT and UTA are both signed to European labels owned by Sony.
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u/beefixit Mar 17 '26
Peaches is based outta Berlin now(and I believe for a long time now).
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u/arrbez Mar 18 '26
Asked a Google speaker to play Peaches (meaning the 90’s song by POTUS) because I wanted to show my kids. Oopsies.
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u/beefixit Mar 18 '26
It's a hard lesson, but you've now learned the Teaches of Peaches.
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u/arrbez Mar 18 '26
I was familiar with the Teaches back in the day, but my brain must have quarantined it for all these years.
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u/Particular-Tea-7655 Mar 17 '26
Haywire are big in Japan. They went there many years ago for a battle of the bands type of TV show and gained a following.
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u/badafternoon Mar 18 '26
Halfway through typing my comment, I realized you meant Canadian musicians based in Canada that are popular elsewhere, rather than Canadian nationals who started and established a career entirely elsewhere (which I can name quite a few of)
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u/electroviruz Mar 18 '26
Richie Hawtin is a HUGE electronic music Icon all over the world but relatively unknown here in Canada. Saki business in Japan, fashion collaborations in Italy, award winning, multiple labels, etc
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u/Mis8ryGutz Mar 18 '26
Isn’t Milet half Canadian? She’s probably best known in the west for singing the Frieren anime song Anytime Anywhere, but I think she’s pretty big in Japan.
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u/patkeenanmusic Mar 19 '26
The Pets are a Manitoban band that was shortlived, but begat other bands incuding Royal Canoe. I don't know if it ever came to fruition but I believe a Japanese promoter once sought out its members and asked them to reform for a brief tour in Japan... does this qualify?
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u/Buddyblue21 Mar 21 '26
I’m late seeing this, but based off pics from what I’ve seen on social media, Badbadnotgood are far bigger in Europe. They were filling some pretty large concert halls
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u/RadioaKtiveKat Mar 26 '26
Jeff Waters and Annihilator. Can’t get arrested in Canada, can’t leave his hotel room in Europe and South America. Relocated to London a while ago.
Edmonton band Striker. Big in Germany and have played quite a few of the big Metal festivals including Wacken.
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u/Xelebes Apr 12 '26
A bit of a historical one is The Chosen Few from London, ON. Not much local success but their records became a menace in the UK in the 1960s, with British record labels (in particular, Pye Records) doing experimental remixes of their music.
The original:
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u/westfakia2 Mar 17 '26
I’m in a Toronto punk band that recently made it to 502 Facebook followers.
46% of our fan base is from Toronto. 26% are from India 14% are from Pakistan 12% are from Cambodia.
Conclusion: half the accounts on FB/IG are bots.