This is a recap of the past 18 months of the search for CIA, as visualized by the changes to the 'Leads' tab of the Masterlist.

First, a brief rundown of how leads are categorized:

• Newly added leads are tagged as "Newly Added" and generally posted near the top of the 'Leads' list.
• More often than not, information is found that allows a lead to be classified as some degree of unlikely. Primarily, that classification is based on genre:
  • Bands that are the right genre, but differ from CIA's band in some notable way (style, voice, instruments used / not used) are typically categorized as "Less Likely".
  • "Unlikely" bands are usually not new wave, but a different (but still related) subgenre of rock music.
  • "Very Unlikely" bands are generally completely mismatched to CIA's genre (for example: jazz, blues, hardcore punk, heavy metal, folk, etc.).
  • In addition to the genre-based classification, if a band is particularly notable (if they have a Wikipedia page for instance), that band is moved one category lower (for example "Less Likely" → "Unlikely" or "Unlikely" → "Very Unlikely").
  • If the evidence for a given band's genre classification is particularly weak / circumstantial, that band is moved one category higher (for example "Very Unlikely → "Unlikely" or "Unlikely" → "Less Likely").
  • Lastly, a band may be marked as some degree of unlikely if they broke up too early (1983 or earlier) or formed too late (1985 or later).
• Leads requiring more information to rule on, or those that remain unknown to us after a diligent search are tagged as: "Searching"
• Bands that seem to be a good fit (right genre, not notable, Ontario bands that were active at the right time) are tagged as "Promising Lead"
• As u/Successful-Bread-347 noted in this recent post, anyone may contact band members (or other leads) who have not already been contacted. We ask that you let us know here or on discord. We will then mark the lead as "In Progress"
• Any time a band member is contacted and denies knowledge of "CIA", their band is marked as a "Contact Rule Out"

The Past 18 Months:

• The current iteration of the Masterlist began in January 2025 with 140 total leads. This consisted of 114 unchecked leads gathered from listings in the Toronto Star from Newspapers.com and leads previously discussed on discord. One prominent group of leads at that time was a couple dozen bands that played a benefit for Ryerson's campus radio station, CKLN, at Beverly Tavern in 1984. The initial version of the list also included 26 contacted bands (many of which were contacted by u/richfromhell - see his Dec 2024 r/Lostwave thread).
• After the Masterlist was promoted on r/Lostwave in March 2025, additional leads came in, progress was made marking unlikely bands as 'unlikely', and the total number of unchecked bands shrunk to about 100.
• In June 2025, CIA's synth was identified as a Korg Poly-800 by u/technomanuel. The fact that the Poly-800 was likely unavailable prior to late 1983 has allowed us to classify bands that broke up prior to that point as 'unlikely'.
• Work on the initial group of leads really ramped up in July, 2025, when we managed to get the number 'unchecked' bands down to 23. This was accomplished by conducting enough research to mark 100 bands as 'unlikely' and increasing the number of contact rule outs to 67.
• Thanks to the Toronto Gig Database, January 2026 saw hundreds of bands that played the Toronto venues, The Cabana Room, Beverly Tavern, Larry's Hideaway, and The Turning Point added to the list.
• In February 2026, u/Successful-Bread-347 contacted the author of the Toronto Gig Database, Bruce Marshman, and acquired previously unpublished gig listings for the El Mocambo, resulting in hundreds more bands being added.
• Starting in January 2026, u/LunaTeaaa analyzed over 1,000 bands that u/Successful-Bread-347 had added to the 'Comps Analysis' tab of the Masterlist. This month, the most promising of those bands were added to the 'Leads' list.
• Other bands recently added are:
  • new wave and rock bands from Hamilton
  • bands listed on a defunct website called punkhistorycanada.ca
  • bands that competed in various battles of the bands (such as the 1984 Burlington Battle of the Bands)
  • bands from Fanshawe College's Music Industry Arts program
  • bands which were to be included in a planned compilation album of Hamilton bands
  • known bands from CFNY's Great Ontario Talent Search
  • and many more...
• Presently, there are over 1,600 total bands - about 500 of those are still in the 'newly added' / 'searching' categories, and 11 have achieved 'Promising Lead' status. As always, we welcome any help in generating new leads, researching leads, and/or contacting band members!