Earlier this year, the Hip’s lead singer Gord Downie was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer.
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The Saturday night show was held at the Rogers K-Rock Centre in Kingston, Ontario, where the Hip started out more than three decades ago. The concert was also broadcast live on national TV.
The Tragically Hip paid tribute to all of Canada as the band wrapped up their 15-stop tour in Kingston, Ont., with lead singer Gord Downie including a shout-out to the prime minister, who was in the audience.
Despite being diagnosed with the most aggressive cancerous brain tumour, the singer was in good form.
The bluesy rock band is better known as The Hip, and Downie is known for penning paeans to Canadian life: about hockey and desolate small towns, about literature and the French explorer who named Canada.
“Thank you to the prime minister for coming to our show, it really means a lot to all of us”, said Downie, who was pictured by Trudeau’s photographer before the show embracing the prime minister. “But he’ll do it”, Downie told concertgoers between songs.
“There is a Canadianness that runs through them to the point where new citizens should be given a Tragically Hip CD after they take the oath”, said Alan Cross, a radio show host and music historian.
The nearly three-hour show in Kingston, Ontario, featured music from throughout the Tragically Hip music catalog – including fan favorites like Nautical Disaster, Bobcaygeon and Ahead by a Century, CNN partner CBC News reported.
Downie acknowledged the prime minister from the stage, referencing his work with indigenous First Nations people and saying he expected Trudeau to be in power for a long time. “Forever in our hearts and playlists”, the PM wrote.
Trudeau, who has said he enjoyed the Hip’s music during his high school and university years, tweeted his thanks.
The band’s biggest hit closed the show, “Ahead By A Century”.
They started as a college band working the local circuit and then took off, but their success across 14 albums was mostly confined to within Canada.
Downie gestured as if he was sketching a portrait of the teary audience as the band rounded out by guitarists Rob Baker and Paul Langlois, bassist Gord Sinclair and drummer Johnny Fay played the final notes of the song.
Before performing the song Fiddler’s Green, Downie appeared to reference the outpouring of support from fans following his glioblastoma diagnosis in December.
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They then embraced, stood arm-in-arm as the crowd roared, and walked off stage.
