Canadian songs top earners abroad
TORONTO — Americans love Magic!, Brazilians are hung up on Call Me Maybe and Germans are still singing Hallelujah, according to data revealing which Canadian tracks generated the most money abroad last year.
SOCAN, the union of Canadian songwriters, tallied the royalties distributed to homegrown songwriters based on 2014 numbers, which include airplay and live performances.
In the U.S., the inescapable summer spritzer Rude by Toronto’s Magic! led the way, followed by Drake’s butter-smooth Hold On, We’re Going Home.
Some less-recent hits were also radio staples on the U.S. airwaves.
The Guess Who’s strutting American Woman — also notably covered by Lenny Kravitz — stood strong at No. 4, Bryan Adams’s Summer of ’69 placed sixth, and Tom Cochrane’s Life is a Highway cruised into the ninth spot.
Summer of ’69 managed similarly significant airplay globally, placing sixth in the U.K. and second in Germany, after Leonard Cohen’s signature tune Hallelujah.
Alannah Myles’s bluesy hit Black Velvet also showed surprising staying power across the pond, ranking as the fifth highest-grossing Canadian song in the U.K. and sixth in Germany.
In France, Claude Dubois’s Si dieu existe took top spot, followed by Corneille’s Sommets de nos vies and Sebastien Raimbault’s Laissez nous vivre.
Nickelback seemed to hold unique sway in Brazil, where its Far Away, How You Remind Me and Photograph occupied Nos. 4 through 6 on the chart. The divisive band’s Someday was eighth, and Savin’ Me rounded out the South American country’s Top 10.
Meanwhile, only Carly Rae Jepsen’s earworm Call Me Maybe managed true ubiquity across the five countries included in the study. The smash tune was the most lucrative song for a Canadian songwriter in Brazil, ranked third in the U.S., U.K. and Germany, and claimed the fourth spot in France.