Photo: Press

Indie rock duo Japandroids paid tribute to Canadian icon and Tragically Hip frontman Gord Downie at a show in downtown Toronto earlier this week. Downie, who passed away on Friday following a courageous battle with brain cancer, was much-beloved as a titan of the Canadian music scene.

Currently on tour down the eastern seaboard, Japandroids delivered a characteristically sweaty and high-octane performance of The Tragically Hip’s 1995 single ‘Nautical Disaster’, the third single from the bands’ critically acclaimed 1994 LP Day for Night, during their show at Massey Hall.

Good Downie’s death has rocked Canada, with countrymen as diverse as Feist, the Toronto Maple Leafs and even Prime Minister Justin Trudeau making very public their grief and loss at the Hip frontman’s demise.

Trudeau broke down in tears live on television, and was unusually effusive in his praise for a politician remembering a rockstar: ‘We are less of a country without Gord Downie in it.’

Japandroids, whose music has been dubbed ‘one part classic rock, one part punk’ melds classic rock influences including Bruce Springsteen and (also recently-departed) Tom Petty, with punk rock licks hinting at the Replacements and Hüsker Dü. Formed in 2006, the band won international acclaim thanks to debut LP Post-Nothing in 2009. Their sophomore effort, Celebration Rock (released in 2012), was honoured by Rolling Stone magazine it as one of ten ‘Coolest Summer Albums of All Time’. Spin named them them Band of the Year, 2012.

Japandroids' Tragically Hip tribute is certain to go down well with their fellow countrymen, thousands of whom also gathered earlier this week just up the road on Toronto’s Nathan Phillips Square to perform a mass choir rendition of Downie’s old hits including Wheat Kings, Bobcaygeon and Courage.