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FYI

Maestro Fresh Wes, Skinny Puppy Win Polaris Heritage Prize

The following is another Billboard Canada story penned by Rosie Long Decter.

Maestro Fresh Wes, Skinny Puppy Win Polaris Heritage Prize

By External Source

The following is another Billboard Canada story penned by Rosie Long Decter.


Two influential '80s albums have won this year’s Slaight Family Polaris Heritage Prizes. Skinny Puppy’s Bites and Maestro Fresh Wes’ Symphony in Effect both helped bring their respective genres — industrial-electronic and hip-hop — to broader attention in Canada. The Heritage Prize designation honours their contributions to Canadian music culture.

Each year, a jury of experts selects one album for the Heritage award, while the second honouree is decided by a public vote. Like the annual Polaris Prize, the albums are selected with regard for their artistic merit, not their commercial success. Previous winners include Jagged Little Pill by Alanis Morissette, And Now The Legacy Begins by Dream Warriors, and Feist’s Let It Die.

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Maestro Fresh Wes' Hip-Hop Breakthrough Symphony in Effect

Symphony in Effect, the 1989 debut by Scarborough’s Maestro Fresh Wes, is this year’s jury selection. Released on Attic/LMR Records, the album went platinum in Canada and helped Toronto’s rising hip-hop scene get international attention. The album’s high-energy lead single, Let Your Backbone Slide, was the first Canadian Top 4 hip-hop hit and won the first Juno Award for Best Rap Recording. It was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2019.

While the Polaris Music Prize awards the best Canadian album of the year (this year's went to Debby Friday), the Polaris Heritage Prizes serve as a kind of critic’s hall-of-fame for albums released before the Polaris Prize was created in 2006. It's awarded annually to two classic Canadian albums. – Continue reading here.

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Blue Rodeo at The Kee To Bala.
Courtesy Photo

Blue Rodeo at The Kee To Bala.

Concerts

Nelly, Cypress Hill, Billy Talent, The Beaches Highlight Muskoka Venue The KEE To Bala's  2025 Lineup

A musically diverse group of major international and Canadian stars will take to the historic stage in Ontario cottage country this summer, including Billy Corgan, Shaggy, The Reklaws, Down With Webster and more.

A historic and popular music venue in the Muskoka cottage country region of Ontario for the past eight decades, The KEE To Bala was taken over by Live Nation in 2023, and the clout of the international concert behemoth has upped the ante.

That's evident in the bookings. Today (May 5), this season's lineup was announced, and it again features major international and Canadian artists as headliners. Heading the international names are R&B superstar Nelly, fast-rising young American country star Dylan Gossett, alt-rockers Billy Corgan and The Machines of God with Collective Soul, reggae hitmaker Shaggy, rock veterans The Wallflowers and hip-hop stars Cypress Hill & Ja Rule.

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