Photograph by Matt Barnes
Tyler Stewart loves where he sits on stage during a Barenaked Ladies concert. “It’s kind of like being the goalie on a hockey team,” the drummer/vocalist tells Cincinnati Magazine in a recent interview. “You get to watch your friends work really hard, and sometimes they succeed and sometimes they fail, but at the end of the day you’re there. You are the last line of defense. If people are going to dance, they need a beat.”
Stewart and his BNL bandmates have been providing a gratifying backbeat for decades via massive pop hits such as “One Week,” “Pinch Me,” the still irresistible “If I Had $1,000,000,” and the ever-popular Big Bang Theory theme song. And on June 10 that backbeat will unite Stewart, vocalist/guitarist Ed Robertson, bassist/vocalist Jim Creeggan, and keyboardist/guitarist/vocalist Kevin Hearn on the stage at PNC Pavilion alongside opening acts Fastball and Guster.
“We’re going to call it ‘The Last Summer on Earth’ tour until it actually is,” Stewart says with a laugh about the multi-platinum-selling Canadian band’s summer tour that kicked off June 3 in Atlanta. “It started as a joke in 2012 because of the end of the Mayan calendar. It’s funny, but every few years or so there’s some cataclysmic thing, whether it’s Y2K or the election of certain people. I mean, the world is always going to end at some point. So I think we’re hedging our bets.”
But no matter how the world continues to evolve, Stewart says that he and his bandmates still live for playing live. “The communion of like-minded individuals all singing and celebrating together is obviously deep in everybody’s souls, but I feel like every year that I do this I’m more and more grateful to be able to do it,” he says. “I feel like this is what I’m supposed to be doing. This is what I was put on the face of the earth to do. There’s no feeling like it. Honestly, it’s the highest of highs.”
So too is the opportunity to come back to Cincinnati, as the city has always been a place Barenaked Ladies members have loved. “Cincinnati is always been a great place for us, whether we’re taking a long leisurely bath at Skyline Chili or we’re hanging out with Les Nessman,” says Stewart, jokingly referring to the beloved WKRP in Cincinnati character.
And they certainly haven’t forgotten the shows they did through the years at the Taft Theatre downtown. “I remember just wondering how on earth a backstage could possibly be that dusty,” Stewart recalls with an ever-present chuckle. “But seriously, we have a nice relationship with Cincinnati, and we wouldn’t change that for anything.”
The band itself, however, has gone through some changes as of late. They’re evident not only over the course of their new digital EP, In Flight – Carry On (a remake of sorts of their 2023 album In Flight with all-acoustic instruments) but will also become evident on stage with the addition of mandolin, banjo, and violin.
“I think the essence of this band is acoustic,” Stewart says of the changing sound textures of late. “We were formed in a living room, really. One of the big challenges for me in the early days was playing quiet enough as a drummer so you could hear all the vocals and all the acoustic instruments. And I think we learned a lot about harmonization and group interplay by playing quietly. I think that’s where our band is most comfortable playing.”
Stewart says he and his mates would live their lives on stage playing this music forever if it wasn’t for tour buses and traveling, something his 14-year-old daughter and summer tour traveling companion happens to adore. “I’ve always said that if we could get her enthusiasm for traveling on the tour bus and spread it out through the whole band, we’d all be in this for another 20 years.”
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