Charlottetown first date on new tour by Hey Rosetta!

Newfoundland alternative rock band Hey Rosetta! is kicking off a mini-tour of the East Coast with a show Thursday night at the PEI Brewing Company in Charlottetown.

The band, which features Island resident Kinley Dowling on violin, has been off the road for several weeks, as frontman Tim Baker writes new material for the group's next project.

Speaking with CBC Mainstreet's Angela Walker, Baker said the break should make for a strong show Thursday.

"We're really excited to be back on stage, I miss it so much when we go into these long, gestative writing periods," he said.

"I miss my band, we get together and we work on new tunes, but it's such a bond, such a sweet family that we have, because you spend so much time together when you're on the road, everybody has the same sense of humour, we're all finishing each other's sentences, I miss that a lot. There's a lot of good times, great laughs."

Different set this tour

It's been two years since the release of Second Sight, which won the group four East Coast Music Awards.

Baker said that means it will be a different kind of tour this time.

They're fragile, little fledging things, these new songs, so I'm a bit nervous. Tim Baker

"We're going to do some old favourites," he said. "It's not really a tour of the last record, as much as the rest of the touring we've done in the last couple of years has been. We're mixing in some old stuff we haven't played in a really long time, some old favourites that always seem to get a good reaction, and we're going to dig into a couple of new tunes."

Charlottetown to hear it first

The band had a small debate about whether to play any new material in Charlottetown, Baker revealed, but it the end, it was decided that Charlottetown would get the honour of hearing the songs first.

"It's not like the old days of road-testing stuff, because everytime you play a song, everybody's got tapes on their phones, and it's on the internet forever," Baker said. "They're fragile, little fledging things, these new songs, so I'm a bit nervous, but I feel like I'm sure people are probably interested in what we're working on so we're going to try to unveil a couple here for the first time ever, I guess."

The show,with special guest Hannah Georgas, starts at 8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 20, at the PEI Brewing Company.

• MORE P.E.I. NEWS|Flooding in Prince County possible on Friday and Saturday: Environment Canada
• MORE P.E.I. NEWS|30 years and 100s of tonnes of food later: The Y's Men's Food Drive