Haven't listened to any of Bryan Adams's music at length for some time, but I played "Summer of '69" recently and thought it was pretty good, honestly. I liked it as a kid but hadn't thought of it for a while. It's preferable to a lot of what passes for indie rock. You could throw it in a playlist between The Replacements and Aimee Mann and it wouldn't sound out of place. More to the point, compared to the music of other Canadian bands, like Barenaked Ladies and Nickelback, it might as well be The fuckin' Go-Betweens or The Feelies.

Canada has birthed like 5 of my favorites. At this point the conversational connection to Geese is seasonal migration.

A couple years ago I had this idea rattling around my head about writing a juke box musical with Bryan Adams and “Run to You”, “Summer of ‘69” and “Heaven” would be the 3 songs that define the romantic narrative arc of it. I got a little hung up on how Run to You, a song about his mistress, is positioned and where that would take the third act.

He was kinda like the Canadian Bonnie Tyler with those emotive power ballads.

Darkness cover band playing The Bedlam in Goliath.

I was thinking for a week who this dude reminds me of. And there you have it!

twelvepoint wrote: Fri Jan 30, 2026 7:39 am A couple years ago I had this idea rattling around my head about writing a juke box musical with Bryan Adams and “Run to You”, “Summer of ‘69” and “Heaven” would be the 3 songs that define the romantic narrative arc of it. I got a little hung up on how Run to You, a song about his mistress, is positioned and where that would take the third act.

Couldn’t “Run to You” be in Act I, in which Adams is stuck in a deeply unsatisfying relationship, when his true love is actually his mistress?

Or you could structure it like FW Murnau’s silent film classic, Sunrise, where the mistress is the Woman from the City, who tempts Adams away from his simple, Canadian life with promises of jazz and dancing! Eventually, his true love helps his rediscover his true nature, his roots (“Summer of 69”), and their love returns (“Heaven”).

Not sure how you’d go about the whole scheming-to-murder-his-wife part, or the part when she’s lost in a violent aquatic storm, but Adams has a deep catalog. Surely he covers those themes somewhere.

Wood Goblin wrote: Fri Jan 30, 2026 10:20 am

twelvepoint wrote: Fri Jan 30, 2026 7:39 am A couple years ago I had this idea rattling around my head about writing a juke box musical with Bryan Adams and “Run to You”, “Summer of ‘69” and “Heaven” would be the 3 songs that define the romantic narrative arc of it. I got a little hung up on how Run to You, a song about his mistress, is positioned and where that would take the third act.

Couldn’t “Run to You” be in Act I, in which Adams is stuck in a deeply unsatisfying relationship, when his true love is actually his mistress?

Or you could structure it like FW Murnau’s silent film classic, Sunrise, where the mistress is the Woman from the City, who tempts Adams away from his simple, Canadian life with promises of jazz and dancing! Eventually, his true love helps his rediscover his true nature, his roots (“Summer of 69”), and their love returns (“Heaven”).

Not sure how you’d go about the whole scheming-to-murder-his-wife part, or the part when she’s lost in a violent aquatic storm, but Adams has a deep catalog. Surely he covers those themes somewhere.

Just making sure you know that Bryan Adams was 10, maybe 11 in '69, so maybe it's not about the year but something else, apostrophe notwithstanding.
Also worth noting that Bryan Adams and noted creep Ryan Adams have the same birthday.

As you were.

Krev wrote: Fri Jan 30, 2026 8:25 am He was kinda like the Canadian Bonnie Tyler with those emotive power ballads.

Don't think I'm gonna "run to" defend anyone's "emotive power ballads."

That's a blindspot as I head toward fifty, and I'd like to keep it that way.

Neil Young’s dad wad a famous sportswriter, by the way, as long as we’re talking Canadians. Rich parents.. it happens. It kind of is a strike but I think it’s one of those things that gets obliterated if they’re any good. Unless you are Thom Yorke’s kid or something, then you have no real chance in that business except as a favor. Richard Thompson’s son is quite good though, at least judging by the live Leonard Cohen cover I always listen to… speaking of the Wainwrights. Willie Nelson’s son also has a great song I always listen to.

it was Heavy Metal that turned me into a Cameron Winter defender (which, by the way, has logged on). I did have to wrassle with it a bit, but it’s stuck. Its not really a contest for me but my wife is way, way into the band so if we’re in the car together it’s Geese.

I still think it means a lot that that album took off the way it did. And like it or not, it is as valid as anything else that’s been coming out and isn’t really like anything else going on, including Geese. The comparison to Plush earlier was the only one I felt that was close to the mark beyond any surface level comparisons, but even then that is such a specific, niche time and place sort of reference that it’s hard to make very deep comparisons to.

So credit to CW for that - we know things like pianos, acoustic guitars are so culturally loaded that it can bring all sorts of associations we don’t want. Since I started making different music I’ve been sort of half keeping an eye from straying too close to that fucking singer songwriter world, but when the form works for something different, it works, even some people are always just going to stop at hearing a white guy singing with acoustic guitars and stuff. Can’t help that but I can swing for the fences.

By the way, I bet no one ever called David Tibet, son of an english diplomat, a singer songwriter. Graham Parsons. Alex Chilton were, but they also came from Means.

Listen to it or don’t but there is much worse music made by much richer, much worse people that is way more pernicious than these kids.

I don't know why we're talking about Canada but Sloan and Constantines are two of my favorite bands ever, in that order.