ANDREW SUTHERLAND
A&E REPORTER

Students who caught Classified’s performance at the Humber student centre might have recognized the East Coast rapper’s tune Oh Canada, appearing on TV Olympic recaps.
“CTV and TSN just both picked it up to use,” said Luke Boyd A.K.A Classified. “They’re going to do highlight reels of the Olympics every day – they’re going to use the song – so the video kind of got that on.  A lot of people will hear it that have never heard me before.”
Boyd shot the video for Oh Canada in late January, though the album the song is from, Self Explanatory, came out in April 2009.
“MuchMusic loved the video, they made it video of the week, so it’s climbing up the charts.  It’s kind of giving the whole album another cycle,” said Boyd.
Sales of the song on iTunes went up 350 per cent after the video was released, said Boyd.
The video features another recent Humber guest, John Dunsworth, who plays trailer park supervisor Jim Lahey on the popular Canadian television show the Trailer Park Boys.
The song pokes fun at Canadian colloquialisms and traditions.
“People see Canada and get stereotypical, think we finish every sentence with buddy or bye, and if it ain’t that it’s either dude, eh or guy,” raps Boyd in Oh Canada (not to be confused with the national anthem O Canada).
“It’s almost how we even poke fun at ourselves,” said Boyd.
“It’s just having fun with it, but at the same time, it’s got a message.  Be proud of who you are, we all have our little quirks.”
At the Feb. 1 concert in the Humber Students Centre, third-year culinary student, Darryl Johnson said he thought the video was a positive thing for Canadians.
“I think it was good to show us off,” he said.
With Classified’s increase in popularity, students who saw the show were fortuitous to have caught Boyd before his popularity lands him in less intimate venues.
“I’ve been booking entertainment here for about eight years and one of the keys is getting somebody right on the cusp before they break,” said programming director for the Humber Students Federation, Aaron Miller.
“This is an example of somebody we booked months ahead that actually got more and more popular.”