Many Canadian bands have achieved great popularity and success outside of Canadian soil. Some bands are good, some bands are bad. But we here at MB know that bands that achieve mainstream popularity are almost always pure sh*t
! Among the bands that have found success are Nickelback, Billy Talent, Three Days Grace, and Sum 41. But for every Canadian band with a non-Canadian following, there are the bands who have not been recognized outside of Canada that get large amounts of radio play and exposure here.
I blame this primarily on the CRTC. For those of you that don't what that is, basically they are an organization that regulates the amount of MANDATORY Canadian content that TV and Radio stations must play. Because of this, bands who have little to no popularity internationally are propped up in the Canadian media as big, important, world-class acts.
So how will I assess a band's TRUE popularity? Simple: Last.fm listener count. Because Last.fm caters to users from all around the world, and especially people who download music and play it on their computer (ie. NOT radio listeners), it will be an excellent way to measure the popularity of a band. The bands that I listed above all have a listener count in the ballpark of one million (1,000,000) listeners, or more. Bands featured in this thread will have a significantly lower listener count. Oh, and they'll all suck.