The two new Heritage Prize winners were announced at 9 PM at the 2025 Polaris Concert & Award Ceremony, which took place at Toronto’s Massey Hall on September 16.
The Polaris Heritage Prize is a hall-of-fame critics prize and public support campaign celebrating classic Canadian albums created before Polaris began in 2006. Like the Polaris Music Prize album prize, winners and nominees of the Heritage Prize are albums of the highest artistic distinction, without regard to sales or affiliations. Each year, one album is selected by a public vote and one by the Polaris Heritage Prize jury.
Grab That Gun, this year’s Heritage Prize public vote winner, was released in 2004 and was Vancouver-based band The Organ’s only full-length album. Featuring a dramatic indie rock sound, the album topped the charts at Canadian campus radio stations for two months that year and included the singles “Brother” and “Memorize the City.”
Jane Siberry’s 1985 album The Speckless Sky received its Heritage designation via jury vote. Siberry’s third album included the singles “One More Colour” and “Map of the World (Part II).” Notably, “One More Colour” has been covered by the likes of The Rheostatics as well as Sarah Polley, who recorded a version of it for the film The Sweet Hereafter.
The Organ’s Katie Sketch provided the following statement:
“Winning the Polaris for Grab The Gun is a wonderful surprise. This record would not exist without the talents of Paul Forgues and the late Todd Simko, who poured countless hours into every song on a shoestring budget. Paul recorded most of the tracks in the back of an unfinished office space, and Todd mixed the album in his garage studio. We are deeply grateful to everyone who continues to listen, and to those who stood with us in a time when queerness was ridiculed and shamed. We also acknowledge that the landscape remains hostile towards trans people and we urge Canadians to protect our most vulnerable. ank you! Thank you! Thank you!”
Jane Siberry provided the following statement about The Speckless Sky:
“Forty years later, I still feel like a baby musician, still inching towards my prime. The songs on my new recording, Thicket, are about struggling to become more conscious, that darn ego, dogs, Atlantis, dogs and joy. So, nothing has changed really. I am grateful to be a musician, sweating a privilege to be a musician and possibly of service. Thank you to everyone, whoever you are, whatever you are doing. May whatever lights you up be your compass. Helping each other remember our original beauty, innocence and joy. Joy to musicians world-wide.”
There were 12 albums nominated for Heritage Prize consideration this year:
Choclair – Ice Cold
The Constantines – The Constantines
Franck Dervieux – Dimension M
Do Make Say Think – Goodbye Enemy Airship, The Landlord Is Dead
Doughboys – Crush
Dubmatique – La Force De Comprendre
Mort Garson – Mother Earth’s Plantasia
The Organ – Grab That Gun
Propagandhi – Today’s Empires, Tomorrow’s Ashes
Rascalz – Cash Crop
Jane Siberry – The Speckless Sky
Strawberry – Brokeheart Audio
Heritage Prize balloting was officially opened on August 5 and closed on August 21. Music fans were able to vote once per day to support their favourite albums. This was the first time Heritage Prize winners have ever been revealed during the annual Polaris concert event. In previous years, the Heritage Prize winners were announced in mid-October. This adjustment was one of many Polaris undertook this year as part of its 20th anniversary celebrations that also included the launch of the SOCAN Polaris Song Prize, the Polaris Festival and the Polaris Submission Portal.
This year’s Heritage Prize jury included Michael Elves, Phyllis Grant, Peter Hemminger, Lise Hosein, Omar Husain, Nancy Lanthier, Antoine-Samuel Mauffette Alavo, Mack Meyer, Rosheeka Parahoo, Blayne Smith and Dylan Hudecki. Forty-three albums have received Heritage Prize designation since its introduction in 2015. Past winning albums include Eric’s Trip Love Tara, Feist Let It Die, Harmonium L’Heptade, Faith Nolan Africville, and Neil Young After The Gold Rush.
