Outlander-ish Experience: Six weeks, 14,000 km, one band’s remarkable journey across Canada

For six weeks in the summer of 2025, the four bandmates that make up Rubber Tire Peep Show hit the open road for a 23-town, cross-country tour culminating in the renowned Ottawa Blues Fest.

Talk about a rock n’ roll fantasy. This is their story of a remarkable journey in a Mitsubishi Outlander.

Before you can roll down the windows and blast BTO’s Roll On Down The Highway, you have to load gear; so we lugged four amps, three speakers, four guitars, two keyboards, an eight-piece drum kit, crates of our limited-edition vinyl records, and hundreds of band t-shirts into the Outlander’s surprisingly spacious trunk, and kissed Toronto goodbye. We set our sights and GPS north, buzzing at the excitement of the adventure that lay ahead.

As we drove our first 1,500 km, the sprawling beauty of Lake Superior was matched only by the warmth and hospitality of the local communities in Timmins, Wawa and Thunder Bay. To our surprise, our first three shows saw a line up full of people waiting to greet us with a handshake, kind words and - more than once, in true Canadian fashion - a place to stay.

Our first 10 days included a drive across the prairies and a quick stop in Winnipeg to pick up our keyboardist, Liam. We were still early in the journey, but with three of us already fighting each other for leg room, all I can say is thank goodness for the Outlander’s third row seating, which, at one point, allowed the mid-size SUV to accommodate seven of us.

Every good road trip is defined by its pit stops, and we made certain to squeeze the most out of our cross-Canada adventure. We stretched our legs via regular Spikeball tournaments in local parks, filled our bellies with numerous deli visits (shout-out to Maltese in Thunder Bay and Shawarma Blady in Winnipeg), and even popped into Liam’s childhood home in Regina for a home-cooked meal. As we headed further West, we stopped in downtown Calgary to collect our next bandmate and brother-in-rock, Max.

Once we crossed into B.C., a sense of familiarity washed over us. I lived in Fernie B.C. for a while and had seen my fair share of shows at The Northern, their local venue. Playing there held a special electricity, and our excitement as we took the stage was palpable. Rumour has it, there may have been some crowd surfing.

The weeks went by, and the monotony of touring became our metronome: drive, arrive, load in, sound check, jam out, set down, load out, lie down, wake up, and do it all over again. Show after show, whether we were playing for 14 or 140, collapsing back into the Outlander at the end of the night was our version of coming home. We settled into our designated spots and abided by the unspoken rules of the road; I drove the night, Max took the morning shift. Liam was in charge of snacks and Daveo controlled the Apple Carplay. Across the grandeur of shifting Canadian landscapes and gritty gas stations, the Outlander’s Dynamic Sound Yamaha Ultimate system quickly became our fifth band member, lulling us with Boy Golden, Sierra Ferrell, Bahamas and Waxahatchee on sleepy morning drives, and blasting Bachman/Turner Overdrive, Little Feat, The Band and Zeus to get us fired up and locked in on the way to the venue.

As we approached the end of tour and our ultimate destination of Ottawa, we were losing steam; but our Mitsubishi Outlander wasn’t. Steady as she goes, we left the misty air of Tofino and headed back towards Ontario. Despite our road-weary bones, we knew that all we had experienced had prepared us for what was to come. After six weeks of playing for ski bums, truckers and townies, in music halls, dive bars, surf camps, legions, listening rooms and everywhere in between, we were itching to get to Ottawa and join a line-up of legendary artists.

Bluesfest itself came and went in a flash: the hospitality of the crew, the dozens of folks who came from all over to cheer us on in the crowd, and the realization that we were following in the footsteps of so many of our musical heroes made the whole thing surreal. Once the adrenaline had worn off, we looked across the stage at one another, and couldn’t help but laugh. I know we were all thinking about our crazy trajectory, and the countless hours of rehearsals, shows, kilometres, and sheer willpower that led us here.

In hindsight, tour life isn’t as glamorous as Almost Famous makes it out to be. Four guys, six weeks, tens of thousands of kilometres of rocky, root-filled Canadian terrain puts a lot of things to the test; namely, our patience and the Outlander’s Super All-Wheel Control (S-AWC) system reassurance. Between sleep deprivation, leg cramps, brotherly quarrels, and a general longing for your own bed, pulling off a tour of this magnitude takes more than just will. You need a dependable crew with complementary strengths; a car with S-AWC that can stand up to rapidly changing environments, both emotional and geographical; and of course, “grace, too.”

We set out as a small Canadian band with big ambitions. While our lofty goal was met, I think I can speak for the whole band when I say that our takeaways from the Summer of ’25 spanned farther and wider than any of us had imagined. We came back tired, shaggy, and accomplished, with more than 14,000 km on the odometer, a superior road trip playlist, and a checkmark on our collective bucket list. But as I lay in the bed I had longed for on that first night back, I realized we had returned with something much greater; a renewed reverence for live music and its power to create community across the country.