19 Year Old Singer/Songwriter from St.Louis PEI Canada

Hey Rosetta’s first album in nearly four years represents the longest musical gestation in the band’s history. And for good reason.  

SECOND SIGHT began life as a clutch of new tunes, all penned by songwriter Tim Baker, many of them solidly road tested over three years of touring in support of SEEDS, the group’s 2011 Juno nominated, Polaris Music Prize short-listed album. 
Audiences across North America, Europe and Australia had responded well to the new offerings by the seven-member indie rock band from St. John’s NL and the new album seemed ready to go. But by May 2013, as the group headed into a Montreal recording studio to begin work with producer Marcus Paquin, problems quickly emerged.     
 
“There was no concept, no over-arching theme to the work,” says Baker. “We had enough songs for an album – but what was the album about? What were we trying to say as artists? How did these songs relate to one another?” 

Over the next 18 months, SECOND SIGHT would experience a rebirth – the search for the project’s vital lyrical connective tissue would lead to months of rethinking, re-recording and reassembling to tease out the common threads in Baker’s lyrics. In the end, the “problems” that pushed Hey Rosetta! temporarily out of the studio and back to the drawing board were, in fact, the very message Baker had been subliminally playing with all along. 

“I’d been thinking about potential, about the great promise within all of us that we never seem to fully realize. About shifting your vision slightly – moving away from our everyday, rational, denotative, left-brain thinking for a while and embracing a more suggestive, intuitive, animalist and ultimately more interesting ‘second sight’. 

These are the ideas that tie SECOND SIGHT together.  Baker had instinctually been exploring the album’s theme and unknowingly feeding it into the lyrics for a couple of years - the need to take a second look at life itself, to abandon assumption and pre-fabricated thinking, to work with dormant senses and fresh eyes. 
  
You hear it in the lyrics to Soft Offering (For the Oft Suffering). The song, Baker explains, “is all about morning coming to tear down the vision that the sweet, irresponsible, unscheduled hours of the night provides.”

You hear it in the album’s first single Kintsukuroi, its title drawn from the Japanese art of mending broken pottery with gold, producing a new object of beauty where flaws are highlighted, where brokenness presents an opportunity for rebirth and reimagining.
    
You hear it in Kid Gloves:
 
see the arches of paint
see the ocean of dust
see the colours arranged 
and hover over us
like when we were little kids
lifted into our beds
didn’t’ we see it then? 
Before we turned our heads? 

And then there’s the music…..
From the band’s birth a decade ago, Hey Rosetta!’s sound has been unmistakable – the strong pop sensibilities, the compelling hooks, the use of string instrumentation, the superb musicianship and Baker’s hauntingly distinctive voice – all compellingly delivered in both recordings and dynamic live shows that have become a trademark.  
“As a band, as musicians, they can do anything,” says Paquin. “They’re incredibly talented players and they’ve been playing together long enough that, if they decide to go in a direction, they can move in that direction. There really aren’t any limitations.” 
SECOND SIGHT is also an experiment with fresh contemporary sounds and the choice of Paquin as producer was key to that musical shift.  Known for his work with Arcade Fire, Stars and The National, he immediately connected with the band, musically and personally, and ultimately became a true collaborator.
 
“Marcus is great,” says Baker. “He has many different skills. He’s a talented engineer. He’s very committed, as we are, to capturing sounds and having them fit, having them match the song and match the band. He helped us use our traditional sound palette but also what we are excited about now. In the studio, he fostered an atmosphere of experimentation and trust – trust in ourselves – and it felt great. The guy had so much faith in us that we just had to go for it.” 

The result of that process, SECOND SIGHT, is a work of shifting musical textures, instantly resonant choruses and poetic depth, with a sound that Hey Rosetta cellist and all-round instrumentalist Romesh Thavanathan calls “warm, yet mysterious.” 
Baker likens the process to “swimming in a river of modern music”, and eventually moving with the flow of that river into uncharted musical waters.  SECOND SIGHT is indeed the result of the group’s second look at its own musical style – an offering that bleeds new influences into the trademark Hey Rosetta! sound. 
Says Paquin: “I feel like it encompasses a wider range of musical influences than what I’ve heard from them before. Tim’s lyrics have expanded. Musically and dynamically, this record has a very wide range. And Tim’s unmistakable voice is the glue that holds everything together.  They’ve tackled a wider range of styles and dynamics on this record – but in listening, there is still that distinctive Hey Rosetta! sound.“
 
SECOND SIGHT takes Hey Rosetta! fans on a journey of reinvention, a reimagining. of the music fans have come to love from the group, without completely abandoning the band’s signature sound.  Baker is confident they will enjoy the trip, and at journey’s end, "If you just trust in your own taste, what you want to do, what excites you, then your fans will come with you," he says.   "They can trust you. If you like it, and they like what you like, it's probably going to work out okay."

“Andrew Waite is a born frontman, that goes without saying, but it’s his songwriting craft that sets him apart for me. He’s been knocking at the door of success and I believe it’s his time to kick the damn door open. 100% rocking 100% attitude 100% given on stage. He just gets it and it’s a pure joy to watch live.” 
- Irish Mythen

Andrew Waite is a passionate songwriter, performer and educator who recently released his second award-winning album, Tremors, in 2018. His songwriting is honest, rugged, and evocative and he delivers a relentless and dynamic performance whether he is performing solo, duo, or with his full six piece band.

Tremors was released in September 2018 and was the recipient of the Music PEI 2019 Rock Recording of the Year, along with garnering nominations for Album of the Year and Solo Recording of the Year. Waite’s most recent single, “Faith” reached #1 on the East Coast Countdown in April 2019. Andrew’s songwriting and performance style is inspired by a range of artists including Dan Mangan, Glen Hansard and Bruce Springsteen. What sets Andrew apart is his ability to captivate audiences whether he is playing with his 6-piece powerhouse band, as a duo with his wife/saxophonist Nikki Waite, or singing solo and sharing stories with his acoustic guitar.  He has performed on the East Coast Music Association’s Breakout, Rising Star, Bluebird North and Rock stages and was also the songwriter chosen to represent PEI in the 2017 Atlantic Songwriters Tour. This tour, organized in collaboration between ECMA, APA and SOCAN, presented music from up and coming east coast artists at theatre venues across the maritimes and in addition to Andrew included Ian Sherwood (NS), Mike Biggar (NB), Jordan Musycsyn (Cape Breton) and BRDGS (NL). 
 
In addition to being a songwriter and performer, Andrew Waite is also a music educator who has been working with young musicians across Prince Edward Island for a number of years. He recently completed his Bachelor of Music Education from Memorial University, and runs a summer rock camp in collaboration with the Holland College School of Performing Arts in Charlottetown. Island Rock Camps (www.islandrockcamps.com) was founded by Andrew in 2014, with the vision of bringing professional musicians in as mentors and coaches for youth learning to play and write. He has also brought these workshops to festivals including Larlee Creek Hullabaloo (Perth-Andover, NB) and the PEI Jazz & Blues Festival.

Come along. Start the record. Sing along. Like you need the release to belong.

With sounds of distortion and velvet melodies, Stabbing Joy hits hard with piercing lyrics and catchy riffs. A Charlottetown based band, the group consists of five members spanning from PEI to BC. Carrying a full roster of passive-aggressive, guitar-driven power pop tunes, Stabbing Joy is here to entertain the people and spark a smile. The music is not only loud with shrieking guitar riffs, but the lyricism is constantly bringing you in sweetly only to rip you to shreds with attitude.

Since their formation in April 2015, the Atlantic String Machine have been taking the Charlottetown classical concert scene by storm. The group is made up of professional musicians with experience in performing all over the world who have recently joined together to present a wide array of music ranging from classical to jazz and pop. 

In the fall of 2015, the ASM was awarded a creation and production grant from the Arts Council of Prince Edward Island to facilitate the recording and production of their debut CD 'Lost Time'. The album was released in September 2016 and features the eclectic mix of programming for which the Atlantic String Machine has become known, including arrangements by its members of popular tunes, original music and well known classical works.

Lennie Gallant, an acclaimed East Coast songwriter with sixteen albums and numerous awards, released in June 2025, Shelter From the Storms, his first English album in seven years. The album reflects on the turbulent times we live in while celebrating the human ability to navigate through hardship with community, love and laughter.

Gallant’s iconic song Peter’s Dream was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, and one of his albums even traveled aboard the International Space Station, orbiting Earth 248 times—which Gallant jokes finally gave him “high rotation worldwide!” He has shared the stage with symphony orchestras and numerous artists, including Jimmy Buffett, who featured him as a guest vocalist and co-writer on his final album.

Lennie also performs with his partner, Patricia Richard, as the Francophone duo Sirène et Matelot. He has been honoured for his humanitarian efforts, and was appointed to the Order of Canada for his storytelling and songwriting.

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