Favorite Canadian Musicians: Guess Who (#3)

Tweet

Sunday morning, and I’m getting the hankering to run away. Don’t know if I will....you never know with me. One place I won’t run away to is Canada, because I don’t have a passport yet. I can still celebrate Canada Day with another favorite music act from our neighbors to the north. Here’s today’s act. #3: The Guess Who Oh, go on, guess who!!! I warned you when I used one of their songs that it wouldn’t be the last time they showed up. They still have a couple of visits to make, sorta, in forthcoming lists. The genesis of the Guess Who (no, not Genesis nor The Who) began in the early 60s as the Silvertones. A few name changes and the addition of Burton Cummings for keyboards and second vocalist later, they released a cover of “Shakin’ All Over,” which the Australian record label put out with the moniker “guess who?” This was the height of Beatlemania, and anything thought to maybe, perhaps, kinda be remotely related to possibly being the Beatles was gobbled up like dots in Pac-Man. (This happened again in the mid-70s, when Canadian band Klaatu released their first album. Rumors began to swirl that it was the Beatles under a pseudonym, and as a result a band with no other publicity hit the top 40 LP chart in America!) The Beatles, they were not; however, the “guess who?” stuck. Dropping the question mark (to the delight of ? And the Mysterians ), the Guess Who continued on a career that put them in the Canadian Music Hall of Fame (our Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is twiddling its collective thumbs in their induction, for some stupid reason). Randy Bachman left the band because of his religious beliefs (he became a Mormon after marrying a Mormon woman), later founding Bachman-Turner Overdrive (see band #10 on this list). The band that had the greatest success broke up in 1975, although original bassist Jim Kale and drummer Garry Peterson secured rights to the name “The Guess Who” and toured with a band by that name. (Sort of like when I saw “Blood, Sweat, and Tears”....no original members in the band!) What a collection of great hits they gave Canada, and the world! The Guess Who Formed in Winnipeg, Manitoba, 1962 One of my favorite Guess Who songs: