Gord’s gift

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This article was published 05/08/2016 (3693 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The hottest ticket of the summer in Winnipeg is the concert no one wants to happen.

Rock concerts are designed to create a maelstrom of emotions, but rarely do they create such intense moments of irony as they will tonight when the Tragically Hip takes the stage at the MTS Centre.

It’s that irony that will make tonight so incredible. And yet so sad. And perhaps so cathartic.

So much will be celebrated tonight when the Kingston, Ont., group — love ’em or hate ’em, without a doubt they’ve been Canada’s band since long before singer Gord Downie’s dire cancer diagnosis was revealed May 24 — perform their classic moments of Canadiana.

Yet the evening has the potential to be one of the most bittersweet moments in recent memory.

It’s not going to be a funeral, nor will it have a funereal atmosphere. The Hip will take care of that; the group has created the soundtrack to countless Canadian parties from coast to coast to coast for almost three decades. The joint will be rockin’.

But it will be a farewell of sorts, and one quite different from countless rock outfits that threaten to retire but never seem to, such as the Who, or those who defy Father Time, such as the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan or Bruce Springsteen, who keep packing them in “night after night after night after night.”

No, in all likelihood — pray the Free Press will need to print a correction for this — this is the last time Downie and the Hip will perform in Winnipeg. That means fans ought to remember where they were when the group performs classics such as At the 100th Meridian, Wheat Kings or Fifty Mission Cap or whichever Tragically Hip song is your favourite (the group has been switching up the setlists for every show so far and tonight could play pretty much anything in their catalogue of songs).

So while listening to Hip songs this week will be a great warmup for tonight’s music, a look back at a couple of moments of history will help prepare for the emotional wallop the evening will bring.

Look back to July 4, 1939, when New York Yankees legend Lou Gehrig told the capacity crowd at Yankee Stadium that he was “the luckiest man on the face of the Earth,” despite being diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. It wasn’t a speech about his impending doom; it was one about his life, and how grateful he was to be living it.

Another similarly heartbreaking moment in history is a Canadian one, one so Canadian that, naturally, the Tragically Hip have commemorated it in song. Think about Sept. 1, 1980, when Terry Fox had to call off his Marathon of Hope — by that time it had pretty much become Canada’s Marathon of Hope, thanks to the way the amputee inspired the nation.

What an achievement it was to run a marathon a day from St. John’s, N.L. to Thunder Bay, Ont. What a sad day it was when he told the world the cancer he fought had spread to his lungs, his voice quaking as he gave his statement in front of TV cameras while on a stretcher.

Still, he vowed he would be back to finish his run. And when he couldn’t, the rest of Canada, the rest of the world, commited to finishing it for him.

In 1994, the Tragically Hip released the song Inevitability of Death, which includes the words, “Terry’s gift is forever green, it got me up, back on the scene.”

In many ways, the group’s Man Machine Poem tour has become its own version of the Marathon of Hope, giving Canadians another hero to rally around.

There’s more than just metaphor in “Terry’s gift.” The memories that Gord Downie and the Tragically Hip will add to tonight here in Winnipeg will keep them on the scene for years to come in the hearts and minds of their fans.

alan.small@freepress.mb.caTwitter:@AlanDSmall