Bleeker may hail from an area known for cold weather, but the Toronto band spent the past month making American audiences sweaty, rocking crowds while on tour with Sublime with Rome, The Dirty Heads and Tribal Seeds.

The band released an EP earlier this year, titled Erase You, and the latest single is the high powered “Highway.” Through coming up in Canada’s rock scene, Bleeker’s had more than their fair share of experiences with highways, and some of those stories are here in these 10 things you should know about this up-and-coming band.

They Had a Name Change, and It Makes Perfect Sense

Bleeker used to be known as Bleeker Ridge. Why’d they lose the Ridge? Frontman Taylor Perkins explains, “There were two sets of brothers (in the band), and we grew up on Bleeker Street, and Ridge Avenue. We don’t have the Ridge brothers anymore, so we just made it Bleeker.”

They Recently Completed a US Tour

Bleeker was on the road for the entirety of July with Sublime with Rome, The Dirty Heads, and Tribal Seeds.

Perkins says of the band’s live show, “We used to have all this crazy gear, and we had to tow this giant trailer, and all this crap, but we’ve slimmed everything down to a basic, straightforward, rock n roll show. No gimmicky crap. We’re just playing the music we want to play, and we have a lot of fun every time we play.”

They Once Used a Box of Honey Nut Cheerios as a Snare

Even the most experienced Foley artist would be impressed by some of Bleeker’s recording accomplishments, which have included using a box of Honey Nut Cheerios as a snare and using a bathtub as a kick. “I basically just stomped on the tub three times,” Perkins remembers, “and I used a cereal box, and a toothpick shaker, as a snare, and it worked out. You gotta use what you have.”

The Cereal Box and Bathtub Sounds are on Their EP

“(They’re) on ‘I’m Not Laughing Now.’ That was one of the really really shitty demos I recorded, but that song, for some reason it stuck around for so long. I sent it away, and we wanted to recreate how crappy it was, because that’s kind of what made it a cool song. We took samples from the original demo ... and we actually used it on the record.”

'Erase You' is an EP That was Six Years in the Making

“We’d taken all these really really good song parts that we’ve had for so long, from now back to a span of five or six years ago, and we’ve taken all those things that have stayed around, and stuck around, and finally recorded them,” Perkins says of the EP. “It’s not like we wrote it in a month. It’s like we wrote all these things in the span of six years.”

Touring Canada Isn’t Easy

Bleeker came up through Canada’s rock scene, and that’s not as easy as just hopping in a van and taking a quick drive to a venue. “Touring Canada, you go through eight, nine hours to the next show. We just did our Canadian tour from Edmonton to Niagara Falls, and there was no downtime. We had to play, we had to drive, and that was pretty much it.”

Touring Canada in the Winter is Even Tougher

While Canada does have a warm west coast, Perkins points out driving through the less hospitable areas in the wintertime, and dealing with both excessive snow and impressive mountains, isn’t exactly a job perk. “You can’t sleep because it’s so terrifying to drive through the mountains.”

They Once Drove for Nearly Two Days Straight

“We did it in 46 hours straight once,” Perkins remembers of a particular journey through Canada. “Usually I think there’s like three main drivers, and you switch off. It’s what you have to do.”

The Band Had to Get Creative During a Gas Emergency

“We had to syphon gas out of cars once,” Perkins admits.

The band’s van had run out of gas in Northern Ontario, which he says isn’t necessarily all that surprising, “Because there’s only like three gas stations, and most of them are card locked, so you can’t use them.”

With a gig scheduled for the next day, Perkins says they were stranded in “small town Canada, at like three in the morning.” He remembers they found a car, and then cut a hose off of someone’s house to syphon the gas. He notes they made sure the hose and car were owned by different people, saying, “You can’t totally ruin someone’s day, just half ruin it.”

Perkins adds he knows an apology is in order. “Hopefully they read this, and we can say sorry. We ruined somebody’s hose, and stole someone’s gas.”

Their Beer of Choice Isn’t a Canadian Lager

“Honestly, we really only drink Busch tallboys,” Perkins admits, “and we don’t buy them in small cans, because that’s not how that works.”