Know Your Enemy

"From their name pulled from Hollywood movies to their cassette cover art, Viet Cong are men who want to be cool. They’ve shown they don’t want dialogue, they don’t want to engage compassionately with community. If this is indie - if this is punk - it could be the indie and punk white Canada deserves: hollow, deaf, and self-motivated. Whether or not the boys’ management decide to flip the name at Polaris, for me their legacy will still represent a group of careless white men who were given a platform by a careless white industry - and music community - as will their Polaris shortlisting."

Viet Cong may be on the verge of major recognition, having been nominated for the Canadian equivalent of the Mercury Music Prize, but it seems that most of the focus in the build-up to Monday's awards ceremony has been on the rumbling debate and discontent over their choice of name, for which they've been taking flak from fellow musicians like Hooded Fang's April Aliermo. So it's no great surprise that they've just announced their decision to bow to the pressure and change it - the right move, even if it comes too late for critics like Aliermo.