Talk:List of bands from Canada

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Canadian music
This article is part of the Canadian music WikiProject (Discuss/Join).
Articles for deletion This article was nominated for deletion on August 29, 2007. The result of the discussion was No consensus.

Contents

[edit] ahem

why do we need this page here if this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_bands_from_the_USA
doesnt exist?? this list and the similar one from europe, is as useful as a list of every band ever. justify to me please, MobiusStriptease 17:17, 15 August 2006 (UTC)


Has anyone heard of The Dudes? A Calgary rock band. Someone add them

[edit] Is it time to clean the list up?

I dont think I'm exagerating when I say that a large portion of this list includes non-notable student bands who only have Wikipedia pages because most people don't care enough to delete them, even though Wikipedia discourages pages about student bands. But, is it time to go through this list and do some clean up? About 1/10th of the list is either links that go to other things or non-notable bands. I'd almost say that the list itself isn't needed because there is a Canadian bands category. -- Scorpion 01:56, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

I believe the following should nominate many of them for deletion. Most pages only have short bios, band members, and albums and a small list of local accomplishments. They all have very few pages that link to them. For example, The Pants Situation. Only this page links to it.

These are the groups from Alberta alone that appear to be non-notable:

And those are just the groups from Alberta. -- Scorpion 02:02, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

I recently did a CSD purge of nn's starting from the east coast.(still a work in progress). I am in full agreement on the bands you've brought up. AfD noms are a pain in the arse. These bands do not meet up to WP:BAND criteria and by that reasoning can be tagged for Speedy Delete rather than the drawn out AfD process. Anger22 (Talk 2 22) 02:19, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm trying to get an administrator to take a look at this page and perhaps that can do some speedy deleting. -- Scorpion 02:24, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Well, of all the groups I nominated, only 1 was actually deleted. The rest claim to have released a couple albus and thus are apparantly notable, and some random guy had been removing my SD tags. Some of them also have links to their album pages, which I also fully intend to go after. It looks like we'll either have to try a mass deletion nomination (and those usually fail) or nominate each article seperately. -- Scorpion 14:27, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Just to keep track of things easier, I made a subpage from my talk page so I can keep track of the bands here that should be deleted. You're help is more than appreciated. -- Scorpion 15:32, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Please familiarize yourself with Wikipedia's notability policies. While there's no question that some of the bands you've singled out here are problematic, you've also targeted several that are notable enough for Wikipedia per WP:BAND. Releasing one's albums on either a major label or a notable indie label is an automatic keep — Aaron Lines has released material on RCA and Chad VanGaalen has released material on Sub Pop. Having a member who has also been part of another notable band qualifies a band for inclusion; Reverie Sound Revue therefore passes because Lisa Lobsinger has also worked with Broken Social Scene. Coverage and/or airplay in national music media such as CBC Radio 3 counts, a criterion which Reverie, Captain Tractor and Shout Out Out Out Out all meet. I'm not disputing the other artists; there's no question that some genuinely non-notable bands have been flying under the radar. But you'd best familiarize yourself with Wikipedia's inclusion policies before continuing with this crusade, because not all of the bands you've targeted on this list fail our current policies. Bearcat 17:36, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I give up. No wonder Wikipedia is filled with non-notable articles. They don't qualify for speedy deletion, and if one wishes to go through the effort of an afd, they have to deal with socks and people spouting random policies. Fine. If having a hundred pages about bands whose accomplishments include "Headlined high school prom", then I give up. These groups are hardly notable and there are thousands of others who have achieved exactly the same thing. Most pages are started by the groups themselves (or their friends), but Wikipedia should be an encyclopedia and not an extension of MySpace. -- Scorpion 18:43, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I think the best policy is to keep personal emotions and opinions out of the debate. The guidelines for WP:BAND are very clear. If a band meets the criteria then there is no point in nominating them for deletion.
It should be noted that the above member is affiliated with Tetrix (band), a group I had unsuccessfully nominated for SD. It is very plain that the poster is associated with said group because they added a Tetrix-related image that the author claimed to have created and released into the public domain. -- Scorpion 21:10, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
If you come across an article that actually says the band's primary achievement was headlining the high school prom, then yeah, that's completely deletable. But if the article says that the band made the national campus radio charts, or used to have Neko Case as a member, or is in rotation on CBC Radio 3, or releases its records on Sub Pop, statements like that are significantly beyond the "high school prom" level of notability; those statements all meet WP:MUSIC as written. As well, Wikipedia has an explicit policy of assuming good faith; it is not acceptable to make assumptions about the identity of another editor just because they disagree with you. Please keep in mind that any remotely capable Wikipedia administrator knows how to recognize and evaluate sockpuppet votes; any remotely capable Wikipedia administrator knows how to assess the real consensus of legitimate users in an AFD debate. And by the way, Wikipedia policies aren't random; they're the very essence of how we keep Wikipedia working effectively in the first place. Bearcat 22:26, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Musicians listed by location?

Recent edits removed the solo artists who were on this list, in keeping with the article title. This raises an issue: We have a list of Canadian bands by location, and we have a List of Canadian musicians which is bands and solo artists listed alphabetically, but I could not find a list with solo artists arranged by location. If that does not exist, one proposal would be to have a new list (i.e., Canadian solo artists by location). Another would be to alter this list so that it would be for both bands and solo artists. Any thoughts? --Paul Erik 01:33, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

How about we just change this list so that it's sorted alphabetically? Then, there's less chance of having bands mentioned twice. -- Scorpion 01:35, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
I could see the advantage to that. I find, though, that there is some value in being able to look up quickly which groups or artists are from a particular city or province... if I were considering improving the article Music of Prince Edward Island, for example. An alphabetized list is less useful to me. --Paul Erik 05:44, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
Once again, there is the problem of bands being listed multiple times. Nickelback used to be listed as being from 5 places in 3 provinces. -- Scorpion 05:50, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

A few ideas: Perhaps the description at the top could specify if the location is to indicate where the band got their start, or where they are currently based. Or we could note that it could be either, and in that case it may be okay to have a few of them listed in two different locations. (5 is too many! You are right.) Also, I would be glad to keep an eye on the list to help make sure that when a new entry is added, the band is not already listed somewhere else on the list. Anyway, as you can tell, my preference is to keep this as a list by location if at all possible, because I think an alphabetic list is less useful. --Paul Erik 01:26, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Persoanlly, I think an alphabetic list is more useful because then people looking for a certain group know exactly where to look. But, if you want to keep it by location, then it's fine with me. -- Scorpion 01:32, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Well, I suppose I could do a variation of what I initially proposed and create a new list altogether, List of Canadian musicians by location, which could include both solo artists and bands... or any ideas for a better name? "musicians and bands"? Would other people find such a list useful/interesting or is it just me? --Paul Erik 06:03, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I should also add that Bearcat has now turned this into a much more comprehensive list. Impressively done! And I recognize that would have been much more difficult to do if this had remained as a list by location. --Paul Erik 21:19, 4 March 2007 (UTC)
I crossreferenced the list by the various musical group categories to expand it. I would, however, note that I haven't entirely finished xrefing it against the following: Category:Canadian rock music groups, Category:Canadian indie rock groups, Category:Canadian indie pop groups, Category:Canadian heavy metal musical groups, Category:Canadian alternative rock groups. So if anybody wants to help out, there are still some outstanding names to be added from those lists. In the longer term, though, I think it would be helpful for each band to have its genre, location and years of activity listed next to it, possibly in a table format. I have to go out shortly, but I'll try as soon as possible to post a short sample table here on the talk page so you can see what I mean and we can discuss whether it's worthwhile or not. Bearcat 19:01, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
I think it might be more helpful for locations to each have their own "List of musical artists from (Wherever)" list, each of which could combine both bands and solo artists. A single combined Canada-wide list by location would be very difficult to navigate and/or maintain, I think. Plus it's more helpful for people who are looking for information on a particular location's music scene — a more general audience might not necessarily know what city a particular band is from, which is why I don't think that type of organization makes sense on this list. But for the people who are looking for a list structured in that way, a specific List of musical artists from Vancouver would probably be more helpful than a Vancouver subsection on a cross-Canada list. Bearcat 19:01, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Table suggestion

Here's a sample of the kind of table I was thinking of. Since this is just a sample, I've chosen a few bands at random instead of doing anything comprehensive.

Name Genre Location Years Active
AIDS Wolf noise rock Montreal 2003 - present
Cats Can Fly New Wave Toronto 1982 - 1988
Corb Lund and the Hurtin' Albertans country Edmonton 1995 - present
The Gandharvas alternative rock London 1989 - 2000
Ox indie rock, alternative country Vancouver, Sudbury 2003 - present
Sloan indie rock, power pop Halifax, Toronto 1991 - present

My idea is that rather than a single table, we would do a separate table for each letter (or range of letters) so that one could continue to use the table of contents to reach specific letters rather than having to scroll through.

Thus, I submit this for questions:

  1. Is this worth doing?
  2. If it is, are there any modifications or changes we should consider before going ahead with it?
  3. If not, are there any other ideas for how we can improve the organization of this list?

— Bearcat 22:29, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

It's a great idea and looks very ordered. My only 2 thoughts are: A) Genre listing are such a heated debate on Wikipedia...putting them right out there in the middle of a simple list opens up the possibility of edit wars on what should otherwise be a straightforward listing and: B) When a table is involved a little more scrutiny from regular Wikipedia editors is required because new entries from newbie editors occasionally(usually) end up in f**k'd up formatting. This list is hawked well enough that my second thought may not be an issue. My 2 pennies anyways. 156.34.216.230 22:41, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
I agree; that table looks great. In my month or so of editing, I have noticed that there is a lot of editing (edit warring) of musical genre, yet it also seems to me to be an essential piece of information for browsing a list like this. --Paul Erik 03:46, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
I like the table. Also what is the thought about making this a "category" so that it can easily be linked at the bottom of each bands page like other categories. I'm a newbie and can'f figure out any other way of doing it. Also, regarding The Pursuit of Happiness. While "The" is common in so many band names and thus normally alphabetized based on the first letter of the next word, I feel that in this instance since a) it is a semi-satirical comment on the American axiom of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness adn b) the the band often calls itself TPOH and never POH the proper filling is under "T" - my 2 cents.
I'm not sure what you mean about the category; there are already numerous "Canadian musical groups by genre" categories, so you're not suggesting anything we don't already have. Regarding TPOH, I frankly think we have to be consistent about how we handle the word "The" in band names; most people wouldn't understand why we were treating TPOH as the sole exception to the "The" rule, and it would thus create excessive difficulty in keeping the list properly organized. Bearcat 04:31, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
While we're at it, is there really any need for lists of bands from provinces? -- Scorpion 05:18, 11 March 2007 (UTC)