The Tragically Hip: A National Celebration

If you're a Hip fan: You know. You know.

Watch this beautiful man, sick as a dog, jump around on stage and do what he does best while you fall to your knees and cry.

He forgets lyrics, he nearly passes out a couple times, and he dances around that stage like he's trying to reach the upper rows; and you just know, it's one of the greatest performances every recorded.

Prepare to have your mind blown. In a musical industry that weighs its successes in dirt, watch a band worth it's weight in gold, lay down the most memorable event in Canadian history. Sorry, Mr. Douglas, Mr. Crosby, Mr. Henderson, Mr. Trudeau, Mr. Gretzky: We have crowned the king.

Frankly I'm a little shocked that after all this time there's only one review in here for this DVD. The Hip was, by any reasonable definition, probably the most iconic Canadian band ever, eclipsing Rush's claim to that title, in part due to their insistence on retaining Canada as their base of operations, while Rush pretty much moved to L. A. for the most of the band's active existence. The Hip also ensured that every song they recorded was credited to the entire band as songwriters so that every band member had an equal share of the royalties, embracing another typically Canadian democratic principle of fairness and loyalty. And perhaps even more so, because through the 37 years of the band's existence, they remained good friends.

This concert is a hard one to review dispassionately, because, as we all know, this was the band's last kick at the can, and Gord passed away less than year later. Nevertheless, I think it's not an exaggeration to say that it shows the band at their best, and the audience (filling the Kingston arena and outside in the parking lot, and by live video across the country as well) responds in kind.

Here they plow through virtually every major and minor hit they had in their three and a half decades, and they mean every note and every syllable. In other words, they kick ass... Still, it's sad to see that Gord, who wrote so many of the song lyrics, needed teleprompters scattered around the stage in order to remember the words, an indication of the toll his disease was already taking on his cognitive abilities.

Bur you'd never know just by listening. He sang every song with enormous conviction, the band rocked, the staging was impeccable, and they crowd (which included Prime Minister Justin Trudeau) loved every second. Thanks, guys, for all the music, and RIP Gord Downie.