What do hockey fans and fans of rock music have in common? They always bring the energy.
Before Sunday’s Heritage Classic in Edmonton, The Beaches will have a chance to experience that energy from both fanbases in one sitting.
The Canadian rock band is headlining the SiriusXM Canada Pregame Concert at Clarke Stadium, located near Commonwealth Stadium, where the Edmonton Oilers will host the Calgary Flames later in the day.
“It’ll be a good opportunity to play for a different crowd,” said guitarist Leandra Earl. “The sports world is not so different from the music world, but I don’t think they intermingle as many times, so it’ll be cool to have newer fans, just people who wouldn’t regularly hear of our band before.”
Earl is a hockey fan and supports her hometown Toronto Maple Leafs (“Matthews and the boys,” as she put it), and even though her team isn’t in the Heritage Classic, she’s excited for the game Sunday.
“It’s really cool to have the Flames vs. the Oilers because Jarome Iginla was one of my favs when I was younger, and now obviously (Connor) McDavid is the best, so it’s just iconic,” Earl said.
Guitarist Kylie Miller -- also from Toronto -- said the band has already been to multiple sporting events together, so they know the excitement that comes with it.
“We love going to sporting events,” Miller said. “To be playing for a bunch of people who are so excited about the game, it’s going to be a super electric experience.”
The band recently came out with its second album, “Blame My Ex,” which is also its first independently produced album. The album’s lead song, “Blame Brett,” went viral on social media during the summer and currently has more than 19 million streams on Spotify.
Among the millions of internet users playing the song in their videos were famous rockstars like Demi Lovato and Blink-182, which Earl and Miller said are some of their idols in the music industry.
“That was such a wild experience,” Miller said. “It’s one of those things where you don’t really know when a certain thing is going to stick or if something is going to go viral. When that song took off, we were all totally shocked.”
“It’s been a dream come true,” Earl added. “It’s been wild to see how far ‘Blame Brett’ has reached. I think so many people relate to it.”
The band currently is on tour around Canada and the United States, which will run until March of next year, with many of their shows already sold out. The Heritage Classic is squeezed into their busy schedule, sandwiched between a show in Montreal and a show in Kingston, Ontario.
