A SOLD-OUT crowd and countless Canadians on live TV watched the final concert by rock band The Tragically Hip, whose lead singer and songwriter Gord Downie has been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer.

    The band, an indelible part of Canada’s national identity with songs about hockey, small towns and Canadian literature, ended its 15-show “Man Machine Poem” tour Saturday night in its hometown of Kingston, Ontario.

    Thousands of fans — including Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau — watched the band’s final show at the Rogers K-Rock Center, the city where the band began in the early 1980s. The concert was also broadcast live on national TV.

    While The Hip became one of Canada’s most beloved rock bands, lasting success in the United States was elusive — outside of border cities like Buffalo, New York, where viewing parties of the concert’s Canadian broadcast were held.

    Despite being diagnosed with glioblastoma, the most aggressive cancerous brain tumor, in December, an energetic Downie was in fine form as he and his bandmates played an epic 30-song set loaded with hits and punctuated by three encores.

    Downie, who started the show wearing a metallic silver suit and hat with a “Jaws” T-shirt underneath, hugged and kissed his bandmates before they stepped on stage to open with “50 Mission Cap,” followed by “Courage (for Hugh MacLennan),” “Wheat Kings” and “At the Hundredth Meridian,” all off the 1992 breakthrough album “Fully Completely.”

    The Hip then segued into songs from their latest album, “Man Machine Poem,” before running through tracks from “Music @ Work,” “Road Apples,” “Phantom Power,” “Up To Here,” “Day For Night” and “Trouble at the Henhouse.”

    The show was closed out by fan favorite “Ahead by a Century.”

    (SD-Agencies)