A LOT of these acts are not even close to being “ubiquitous” in Canada. Many of those acts are long forgotten. Paul Janz? Lee Aaron? Prism? Toronto? Nobody in CANADA knows if these people are alive or dead. Aldo Nova had one hit in 1982.
I don’t have much to add for Corey, but in KC we also get his “Never Surrender” played a lot. And other than “American Woman,” a few other songs present on the Guess Who’s Greatest Hits also make the rounds out here on our classic rock stations (“No Sugar Tonight/New Mother Nature,” " These Eyes," “Share The Land,” “Undun,” etc…). Finally, Loverboy is represented out here with “Turn Me Loose” and “Lovin’ Every Minute Of It” in addition to “Working for the Weekend”.
Depending on your age, you might recognize Dan Hill from his two most popular songs in the early '80s: " Sometimes When We Touch"-- the song which includes the famous creepy lyrics:
And sometimes when we touch
The honesty’s too much
And I have to close my eyes and hide
I wanna hold you til I die
Til we both break down and cry
I wanna hold you till the fear in me subsides
… and his duet with Vonda Shepherd (before her stint on Alley McBeal), “Can’t We Try”.
Glass Tiger had two semi-quasi-big hits in the mid-'80s: “. Don’t Forget Me ( When I’m Gone)” (their biggest hit), and “Someday” (not as big, but still recognizeable enough that I slapped my head when I found out who sang it).
I have no idea who Paul Anka is, but I think it’s hilarious that by “People of a “Certain Age”,” most would assume that meant older, and yet you included Nelly Furtudo (whom I know of because she was pasted all over the cover of YM and one or two other mags around 2001), and Sarah McLachlan who I consider very 90’s. I also like Gordon Lightfoot mostly because of my mother’s cds, but I didn’t realize the average person would remember him, nor that he is Canadian.
I also think Rush should be on the first list, but that’s just my opinion. Also the Tragically Hip aren’t that obscure, are they? I know of them and have New Orleans is Sinking on my computer, and I’m nearly five years younger than Lisa-Go-Blind.
The following are those on the list that I, in some way or another, recognize:
Alanis Morissette
Alannah Myles
April Wine
Avril Lavigne
Bachman Turner Overdrive
The Band
Barenaked Ladies
Blood, Sweat & Tears
Bryan Adams
Burton Cummings
Celine Dion
Corey Hart
Crash Test Dummies
Dan Hill
Five Man Electrical Band
Gino Vannelli
Glass Tiger
Gordon Lightfoot
Guess Who
Jann Arden
Jeff Healey
Joni Mitchell
k. d. lang
Klaatu
Loverboy
Men Without Hats
Neil Young
Nelly Furtado
Nick Gilder
Paul Anka
Rush
Sarah McLachlan
Shania Twain
Snow
Tom Cochrane
Tragically Hip
36 in all, which isn’t that bad considering my age, tastes, and the fact that I live nowhere near Canada.
Wow, somebody remembers! 
Naw, I’m just kidding. No relation to the band. But I have been asked before, so I thought I’d just forestall the questions.
Anyway, I have one addition, though, featherlou: Sweeny Todd, which featured (if memory serves) both Nick Gilder and Bryan Adams before their solo careers. They had at least one hit: “Roxy Roller,” which you can occasionally still hear on classic rock stations.
I don’t know about that. A lot of these artists are well-known, but not well-known for being Canadian. The artist on that list with the greates name recognition is probably Paul Anka.
It’s still a good idea, though. Anything that gums up the works of the major label marketing machines, and encourages regionalism in music is good, IMO. The fact that Loverboy, April Wine, Rush and Triumph are on that list does not completely undermine its reason to exist. I’d gone nearly 20 blissful years without thinking of “Gypsy Queen.”
My all-time favorite Canadian band:
Okay, I’l give you Blood, Sweat & Tears. We debated over their addition to the list. We also debated over Sweeney Todd - I think everyone knows “Roxy Roller,” but I don’t think most Canadians could say who sings it.
I also don’t agree with RickJay. Maybe radio is different where he lives, but we don’t go a couple of days without hearing a Toronto or Lee Aaron song on the radio here. And if you play Aldo Nova’s “Fantasy” at a dance, I would bet you five dollars that everyone there will be singing along with it. Hmm, maybe I should have done a thread to get consensus among the Canadians first. 
Oh, the CanCon discussion - I would like to modify my previous statement. I still fully support it, but it would be superfantastic if Canadian radio would play more than the handful of songs they jam down our throats as CanCon. There are millions of songs they could play; I would absolutely love to hear lesser-known Canadian artists and songs on the radio, rather than “Taking Care of Business,” “Tom Sawyer,” and “Summer of '69” (and “Watcha Do To My Body”) ad nauseum.
I think thats because Triumph at their peak with Allied Forces , was under heavy competition with a lot of music that was coming out, so they never really got recognized for having a more disctinctive style. I love them , but they never seemed to move on from being concidered ontario cottage rock. Rik Emmett should have moved on to a more solo career a lot earlier.
Declan
I know less than a third of them, but I don’t listen to a lot of music. I don’t own a stereo or have a radio in the car so what I get is from hanging around friends and family.
I was gonna ask the same thing! I only listen to one of the bands in the OP’s list, but I also listen to Sloan.
I know about 2/3rds but we will never forgive you for Celine. That was an evil thing allowing her out of Hell to torment us.
Jim
Ones I’ve never heard of…or at least I don’t recognize the band name. I may have heard some of their music but didn’t know the artist’s name.
I’ve heard of about 80% of the artists mentioned. The more current the acts, the less likely I am to know them (I’m 44, and find I’m almost as clueless about current pop as my Mom was about Led Zeppelin).
Thing is, many (maybe most) of the acts cited had only 1 or 2 big hits in the U.S. I’m curious how “ubiquitous” they are in Canada.
Alannah Myles had a smash hit here with “Black Velvet.” but has pretty much disappeared from view in the USA. Is she still a huge star in Canada?
Dan Hill’s “Sometimes When We Touch,” was a blockbuster, but I can’t think of any other hits he had in the USA since. Is he really still a huge star in Canada?
Aldo Nova had a uge hit with “Fantasy,” but I haven’t heard of him since? Has he actually had big hits in Canada lately?
As for the CanCon rules, I wonder how similar rules would go over in the US. I mean, a classic rock fan can easily listen to his favorite radio station for an hour and hear nothing but foreign acts (AC/DC, Beatles, Cream, Def Leppard, ELP, Genesis, Elton John, Led Zeppelin, Jethro Tull, Pink Floyd, Rolling Stones, Rush, Scorpions, U2, Steve Winwood, Yes). Maybe WE need an American Content rule, to give homegrown rock acts a sporting chance!
I’ve never heard of:
On the other hand, I’m aware of probably less popular (in Canada too)Canadian bands like:
Beneath Augusta (love them, wish they sold the CD in the US)
Metric (Eh)
Broken Social Scene (hit or miss)
Death from Above 1979 (hit or miss- “black history month” is fantastically catchy)
Arcade Fire (boo! hiss!)
Royal City (like everything I’ve heard so far)
Spirit of the West (okay)
The Tea Party (okay…but why like 10 years between singles in the US?)
The Paper Cranes (like 'em)
Stars (no thanks)
It would amuse me if a Canadian doper copped to not knowing one or more of these
What about Corky and the Juice Pigs? I wish I could get any recordings of their stuff.
Again, no, no and no. Aldo Nova had little success after “Fantasy” and got more into producing. Alannah Myles did some lingerie modelling or something. Dan Hill’s still back in the 70s, isn’t he?
Most of the bands listed in the OP are no longer producing records, or if they are nobody’s buying them. The last I heard of Larry Gowan he was playing strip malls and weddings. He’s a nice guy, though.
Oh, scratch these two from my list of “don’t knows.” I know both of the songs astorian mentioned. I even like the Black Velvet one.
Odd, I counted exactly 37 artists that I had heard of, the same as two other posters! Maybe not the same ones, however.
Another few that I think would be classified as one-hit wonders in the US:
Gino Vanelli –I Just Wanna Stop (Well, maybe two-hit if you include Living Inside Myself)
Jann Arden – Insensitive
Burton Cummings – Stand Tall
Leonard Cohen is mostly known by music enthusiasts, but I think he had at least a minor hit with “Suzanne”, although maybe more people know the Judy Collins version. And I’m pretty sure more people have heard the Aaron Neville version of “Bird on a Wire” than his own version.
And I would have included Gordon Lightfoot in the “people even non-musicians know” category, I can think of a number of his that are still being played on the oldies stations – Sundown, If You Could Read My Mind, Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald among others.
‘Stand Tall’ was the only single of his to crack the American top 10, but he had five more singles that charted in the top 100: “I’m Scared”, “My Own Way to Rock”, “Break it to them Gently”, “You Saved My Soul”, and “Takes a Fool to Love a Fool”. In Canada, all of these songs were monster hits, and Cummings was one of the biggest artists of the late 70’s.
Of course, he had more success as the lead singer for the Guess Who.
Looking at everyone’s list of who they have never heard of, it seems to me that the one artist most deserving of more attention in the U.S. is Colin James. He was (and is) absolutely huge in Canada. His new album, “Limelight” is great. It’s very much Van Morrison influenced, including a good cover of ‘Into the Mystic’. He’s a fantastic guitarist who was mentioned in the same breath as Stevie Ray Vaughan back in the early 80’s - helped in part by Vaughan asking him to open for him and speaking of him as the next guitar hero. His music is heavily influenced by the electric blues.
If you’re interested in that kind of music, check him out. Songs to look for:
*Voodoo Thing
Five Long Years
I Just Came Back
Chicks N’ Cars and the Third World War
Why’d You Lie
Cadillac Baby
National Steel
Saviour
You can go to AllMusic and hear clips of all of them.