The Guess Who in Assinniboine Park, autumn 1972. From left, Bill Wallace, Kurt Winter, Don McDougall, Burton Cummings, and Garry Peterson.
It is probably appropriate that in these times a classic protest song has been recognized. The Guess Who's Hand Me Down World, it was announced this week, has been inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame. Written by late guitarist Kurt Winter, the rock track was a sneering, bluesy rebellion against the fat-cat contentment of an older generation. Marked by a simple descending chord progression and a bristling lyrical demand, the 1970 song was a followup to the band's previous hit, American Woman, itself a politically fuelled screed. "Anybody here see the sky weeping tears for the ocean," vocalist Burton Cummings asked rhetorically on Hand Me Down World, which reached No. 17 on the Billboard Hot 100. In salute to the song, the Sheepdogs (like the Guess Who, a Prairie band) have a recorded a new version of it, as part of the Covered Classic series co-sponsored by the Hall and CBC Music.
Brad Wheeler