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Brendan Canning's King West
Toronto Life
|July 2025
The Broken Social Scene co-founder takes us on a tour of his favourite spots
BRENDAN CANNING has lived in the same King West heritage worker’s cottage for 30 years. “I started renting one room,” he says. “Ten years later, I bought the whole thing.” The neighbourhood has since exploded, most notably with jumbo developments like Portland Commons and the Well now surrounding his little house. Canning has been busy too: Broken Social Scene has a new doc on Crave and plays History later this month, followed by gigs in Ottawa, Saint John and Ireland. He'll also soon drop a new pop album with his girlfriend, the singer and pianist Cynthia Tauro. Here are his King West go-tos.
For British beats
KOPS RECORDS
“I'm a DJ who never buys digital music, so record shops are integral to my life. I frequent different record stores for different types of records, and I first came to Kops when I was in my reggae and northern soul phase. The owners are British, so every time their football club, Leeds United, wins a match, they have a sale.” 395 Queen St. W., kopsrecords.caFor hardcore hardware
This story is from the July 2025 edition of Toronto Life.
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