Nickelback Lead List Of Musical Inductees For Canada's Walk Of Fame

As if Nickelback weren't already an easy enough target, it will soon become even easier for music critics and other non-believers to walk all over them.

Nickelback are one of eight inductees named on Tuesday to Canada's Walk Of Fame. The new additions will put the total up to 109 honourees who have stars embedded in the sidewalk on the north side of King Street in Toronto's theatre district. CTV will televise the official induction ceremony on June 9.

To be eligible, nominees have to be Canadian or spent their formative years in Canada, to have had an impact on the country's cultural heritage, and to have been doing what they do for at least 10 years.

While Nickelback are the only inductee who got the nod purely based on music, the other seven also have musical connections.

Goalie Johnny Bower, who backstopped the Toronto Maple Leafs to their last Stanley Cup victory in 1967, had a novelty radio hit called "Honky The Christmas Goose."

Actress Jill Hennessy used to busk in Toronto subway stations, which is almost as big a claim to fame as playing Tim Allen's wife in Wild Hogs.

Film producer/director Ivan Reitman's credits include Animal House and Ghostbusters, which both had successful soundtracks. I'm sure that many of you have shimmied along to "Shout" or asked the musical question, "Who ya gonna call?"

Actor/writer Gordon Pinsent wrote a musical called The Rowdyman and was a member of the honourary advisory board for the Newfoundland Symphony Youth Orchestra.

Actress Catherine O'Hara sang a memorable version of "Day-O" in Beetlejuice and appeared in the folk music mockumentary, A Mighty Wind. She's also the sister of singer/songwriter Mary Margaret O'Hara, who offered to sing back-up for me during a Living Elvis Karaoke performance at Toronto's Horseshoe Tavern a few years back. She also kissed me at another Toronto club, Lee's Palace, last Friday. There was no tongue.

Wheelchair athlete and spinal cord research fundraiser Rick Hansen wheeled his way across Canada and 34 other countries as part of his Man In Motion World Tour that began on March 21, 1985, a night when my friends got me really loaded for my 19th birthday during a Stratford, Ontario pub crawl.

David Foster wrote the song "St. Elmo's Fire (Man In Motion)" in Hansen's honour and, despite it being pretty horrible, John Parr scored a #1 U.S. hit with it.

News anchor Lloyd Robertson began his career on radio in Stratford, where he also dated my aunt. I'm sure that he must have sung sweet nothings into her ear at some point.