Could there be anything more Canadian than Chris Hadfield singing a Tragically Hip song at a Canuck-themed bar?
Videos posted to social media showed the astronaut, pilot, musician and author performing “Bobcaygeon” at Grizzly Bar on Thursday night.
The Tragically Hip’s official TikTok account said the cover was “pretty ahead by a century,” playing off of another one of the band’s all-time hits.
Hadfield has been performing publicly for years, even while he wasn’t on Earth.
Back in 2013, he sang his song “Is Somebody Singing” aboard the International Space Station while he was virtually connected with Ed Robertson, the singer and guitarist from The Barenaked Ladies, and choir Wexford Gleeks. The performance was part of Music Monday, an annual event to highlight the importance of music education in Canada.
Grizzly Bar on Queen Street West officially opened to the public on Friday night and has branded itself as Toronto’s first Canadian-themed bar.
Co-owner Jessica Langer Kapalka and her husband Jason wanted to create a place where people could channel their patriotic pride, adding that it’s meant to be pro-Canadian, not anti-American or nationalistic.
“Canadianness goes beyond elections. It goes beyond whatever the current politics are. Being Canadian, it’s being part of a people. It’s being part of culture,” she told the Star.
The space is filled with iconic Canadian symbols, from vintage hockey skates to Team Canada memorabilia to prints of TTC streetcars. In the video, Hadfield is on stage in front of a wall of Canadian flags.
Even if he’s not hanging out at Grizzly Bar, the astronaut appears on the gallery wall of Canadian heroes alongside icons such as Terry Fox, Celine Dion and David Suzuki. He is also featured on the menu with a custom drink named after him.
The Hadfield cocktail is a sweet, creamy dessert cocktail with a cookie dough ball inside. The drink has an “experiential” component, Langer Kapalka said; you drink it while wearing noise-cancelling headphones, which will play Hadfield’s performance of David Bowie’s “Space Oddity,” which he played while on the International Space Station. One hundred per cent of the bar’s beers, seltzers and wines are Canadian, Langer Kapalka said.
With files from Marisa Coulton and Trish Crawford
