THE DRAKE FACTOR
Toronto the centre for talent
Everybody’s working for The Weeknd. To find — or be — the next one, that is.
As the 2017 Juno Awards prepare to hit a high note April 2 in Ottawa, the country’s most popular artists seem bent on global domination. No country can field a foursome with as much recent chart-topping success and buzz as Justin Bieber, The Weeknd, Drake and Sean Mendes. The latter three lead this year’s Juno crop with five nominations each.
“We are only a country of 35 million,” says Alan Cross, a Canadian music historian and radio host. “We are punching far beyond our weight.”
It’s no coincidence that three of Canada’s big four are from Toronto.
Call it the Drake factor. This is Toronto’s It moment. The socalled Centre of the Universe is living up its backhanded nickname for once — at least when it comes to serving as a breeding ground for superstar musicians.
Maybe Drake puts it best with his lyric, “Blew up and I’m in the city still.” Sure, the hip-hop star has a home in L.A., but he maintains property in Toronto and serves as its unofficial pop-culture ambassador in the flesh, in the studio and on social media. Ever the tastemaker, Drake’s online endorsements are also widely credited with launching The Weeknd’s ascension.
“Drake made it cool to be Canadian,” says Stephen Carlick, Exclaim! magazine senior editor. “Drake put a metropolitan spin on what it means to be Canadian. Ten years ago, people wouldn’t have been thinking, ‘I wonder what cool things are happening in Toronto.’” The city has become a must-visit international tour stop on par with New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Mexico City, Carlick says.
That international attention has extended to Canadian artists. The Weeknd’s album Starboy was ineligible for this year’s Grammy Awards (though a shoo-in for 2018), but he performed with Daft Punk during the broadcast. Meanwhile, Bieber’s Purpose contended for album of the year and Drake took home two Grammys.
Canadians don’t often “toot their own horn,” Cross says, but Drake’s songs often reference his hometown Toronto and its neighbourhoods — a common practice among U.S. rappers. Drake even picked up the city’s edgy moniker, The Six, derived from its common major area codes. All of which is has elevated Toronto — and by extension Canada — in the eyes of talent scouts, record labels and A&R teams.
“The music industry has a herd mentality,” Cross says. “If they found The Weeknd in one city that has been ignored by the … (global) market, they think, ‘What else could I be missing?’”
The hunt is on for the next Canuck breakout. What comes after The Weeknd? The answer is complicated, Carlick says. Canada’s current famous foursome all come from “incredibly different origins.”
Mendes and Bieber rose to fame via Vine and YouTube, respectively — truly coming out of nowhere. Drake had early public profile as an actor before launching a music career. The Weeknd (a.k.a. Abel Tesfaye) was a Toronto enigma who essentially went from zero stage experience, and releasing an R&B mix tape that developed a cult following, to co-writing tracks and performing on Drake’s album Take Care.
As The Weeknd told Rolling Stone in 2015, “I will always be thankful — if it wasn’t for the light (Drake) shined on me, who knows where I’d be.”
Drake’s OVO Sound is a safe bet for potential future breakouts. The Toronto label’s artists regularly factor in Drake’s recordings: Majid Jordan co-wrote Drake’s Hold On, We’re Going Home, while PartyNextDoor did the same for Rihanna and Drake’s Work.
The key is to get a coveted “featuring” spot in a popular track’s credits. Toronto-based songwriter and producer August Rigo is another one to watch. He’s written for everyone from Chris Brown to Bieber.
Carlick identifies a small, second tier of Canadian musicians with a chance at becoming megastars: The soulful Alessia Cara of Brampton, Ont. (“if she breaks in the United States”); Grimes (a truly “unique voice”), dvsn (an R&B duo on the OVO label); alternative rock band July Talk, and indie-pop darlings Tegan and Sara (whose “organic” career growth is steadily climbing). “A lot of these (people) are one single from blowing up,” Carlick says.
He describes a third tier of acts ready to advance a rung to that second tier. Torontonians are firmly entrenched on this larger, “harder to predict” pack featuring Lydia Ainsworth, Daniel Caesar, Weaves, the genre-bending Zaki Ibrahim and Dilly Dally, a 2017 Juno nominee for alternative album of the year.
Canada has established mainstream rock bands like Nickelback and Billy Talent — not to mention an indie phenom in Arcade Fire — but Cross predicts the time is ripe for a new, big Canadian rock band to “establish itself as an international force.” He points to a small group of bands hovering just below that level of success, including Arkells, Mother Mother, Young Empires and the Strumbellas.
The Canadian awareness surrounding Drake and The Weeknd has helped turn a magnifying glass on every major city in their home and native land, not just Toronto.
It’s easier to spot a big fish in a small pond, and industry eyes are focused north of the border. Cross sees the bilingual music scene of Montreal as particularly ripe for talent picking.
But genuine global superstardom still requires a consensus, Cross cautions, adding that traditional cultural gatekeepers like radio and major music labels are greatly diminished in their power and influence.
Music fandom is highly personal, and people are increasingly listening to music within their own online “echo chambers,” he says. A helping hand — or tweet — from the likes of a Drake, Bieber or The Weeknd can still make all the difference in the world.