Every year the Canadian Finals Rodeo imports specialty anthem acts. This year the high-octane Sweet Tequila is the featured headliner at Buckle Hall, the CFR’s official party headquarters.
Led by St. Albert’s Randy J. Martin, the five-piece spiked in popularity after their YouTube single release Rough and You Like It attracted more than 120,000 hits.
The upshot was a singles deal with European CDF Produzione and ongoing negotiations with a major Canadian label, Martin said.
One of the most in-demand bands in Western Canada, Sweet Tequila has toured and opened for A-list artists such as Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Dwight Yoakum, Emerson Drive and George Canyon.
“The band has a lot of equity in the marketplace. It’s really the kind of business where you have to acquire a certain amount of notoriety to be successful,” noted Martin.
Rarely performing in the Edmonton region unless it’s a fair, festival or the CFR with a capacity of about 3,000 people, Sweet Tequila spends the bulk of the year touring.
After 10 years covering thousands of kilometres and releasing three albums, they’ve developed a wide-ranging and loyal fan base.
“The band has travelled through every little town and it’s very organic in the way the band has grown. We deliver a rock-country edge with male-female vocals. The brand has been around a long time and we’ve become known as Alberta’s best party band.”
In addition to Martin, the five-some is rounded out with Shalisa Liesch (lead vocals), Roger Arsenault (bass), Randy Rink (guitar) and Dennis Boisvert (drums-percussion-electronics.)
Sweet Tequila has pre-produced four songs for the next album and “one way or another” the band plans to release an album in January. And in early spring, plans are in the works for the video Hit Train.
“It’s a story about an abandoned old train that gets turned into a club. Where I come from in P.E.I. all the train tracks got ripped up and all the trains were abandoned. There’s one train out in the woods and the storyteller says it’s become a club where the laws don’t apply. They make moonshine and it’s as redneck as it gets.”
Sweet Tequila performs Saturday, Nov. 9 at 10 p.m. The Buckle Hall is at the Edmonton Expo Centre. Admission is $10.
