Beck Sisters head out on tour, despite baby on the way

P.E.I.'s Beck Sisters, Rachel and Amy, have been one of the most talked-about Island groups since representing the province three years back in the first-ever CBC Music Searchlight competition.

Since then, they released the well-received album Run, but haven't be able to follow up with audiences outside the Maritimes that have learned about their music.

That's because they just haven't had the time, but they've finally put together a tour of Eastern Canada which begins July 6.

Even now, the timing does seem suspect — that's because Amy is seven months pregnant.

We had to build in some rests.- Rachel Beck

"I've been feeling really good so far, and this is something we've been wanting to do for a while," Amy told Angela Walker, when the duo dropped by the Mainstreet P.E.I. studio.

"A lot of people do say, 'I saw that you were going on tour, are you crazy?' I go, 'Maybe a little bit,' but I think it should be fun."

Logistical nightmare

It's something her sister knows all about, as Rachel has three kids of her own, all under the age of six.

"It's a logistical nightmare with all these pregnancies, truthfully," said Rachel.

"Because I just had a baby 15 months ago. So you have to sort of plan. Our album came out, and then I had a baby shortly after.

"We've been trying to plan these trips, but you have to book them pretty far out, so ya, we just finally made it happen, but there's just a lot of moving parts. And we both work full-time during the school year, so that's another thing to consider, but it's finally happening! Yay!"

The tour starts in New Brunswick, and then takes them to halls in Ottawa, Toronto and London.

Downtime crucial

Normally musicians plan out these tours so there are as few open nights or breaks as possible, but in this case, the sisters have done the opposite.

"Planning this particular tour for us, we made sure to build in a little bit of downtime," explained Rachel.

"Because obviously Amy's not going to want to spend eight or nine hours in the car everyday, or be in the car and run on the stage. We had to build in some rests and time."

Despite the extra passenger, Amy's pleased they could finally figure out a time to tour.

"Expanding our audience is one of our main objectives for sure," she said. "It's going to be our first time playing shows in Ontario, so we're looking forward to that. We have had some radio play in different parts of Ontario, but to actually go play live shows I think will be good."

Searchlight still helping

They've yet to capitalize on that Searchlight success in other parts of the country, where it got them some lasting recognition.

"Definitely, it absolutely did," said Amy. "It was a good way to kick-start the whole thing, and everybody remembers it. The other day somebody said, 'Was it last year you guys were in Searchlight?' Nope, it was three years ago."

Expanding our audience is one of our main objectives for sure.- Amy Beck

The sisters even have some new songs to try out on this tour.

"We're going to workshop a few of our new tunes that we have, and finish things off on a real positive note before we take a little break for Amy's baby," said Rachel.

"Then we're going to be doing lots of writing and pre-production work for our new album."

They're hoping to get into the studio to record that next spring, with the album coming out by fall 2017, or early spring 2018. Unless, of course, there's another pregnancy.