Hedley (actually Hoggard) idolized by screaming fans

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This article was published 01/04/2010 (6003 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

They are called Hedley, but they may as well be called Hoggard.

Jacob Hoggard is the frontman, star and main focus of the Vancouver band put together in the aftermath of the 25-year-old’s self-imposed ouster from Canadian Idol in 2004 — a smart move considering there are no other Canadian Idols playing arenas these days.

The show launched the personable Hoggard into the spotlight, and three successful albums with his pop-punk band Hedley have kept him there.

They have become so popular they have graduated to the big rooms across the country, and on Wednesday the quartet — Hoggard, guitarist Dave Rosin, bassist Tommy Mac and drummer Chris Crippin — attracted 6,000 fans to the MTS Centre. Teenage girls made up the majority of the audience, outnumbering males by about five to one.

They were a vocal crowd too, screaming at every move Hoggard made. Through the band’s 90-minute set, he was in almost non-stop motion during the uptempo numbers, running around the stage, jumping in the air and spinning in circles like the world’s worst ballerina. A stage extension allowed him to get a little closer to his fans.

The band started the night with Cha-Ching, a humorous number about reality show contestants, which Hoggard had to know he would get called on with lyrics that include: "Line up all the Idols/Who paint on phoney smiles/Trying to ride the fast track for free."

They kept the energy going with the anthemic sing-along of On My Own and She’s So Sorry before they veered into a reggae vibe with Shelter. Hoggard then sat down at a piano for the ballads Perfect and Amazing.

After the nostalgic Old School, the band sat around a fake campfire with acoustic guitars and sang a few ballads including Gunning, Friends and a new song, Beautiful.

Then it was back to more high-energy material for the home stretch with Don’t Talk to Strangers, Hands Up, 321, which featured Hoggard venturing into the crowd and hugging some fans, and Never Too Late.

The band was the headliner of a four-band bill hand-picked for the Hedley crowd.

Boston quartet Boys Like Girls are ultra slick, write catchy inoffensive lightweight pop tunes, sing about teenage love and occasionally dabble with Auto-Tune for annoying effect.

They opened their 40-minute set with a snippet of the Black Eyed Peas’ I Gotta Feeling before kicking into Love Drunk, a catchy, infectious power-pop tune that happens to be the title track of their latest album and their best song.

The group played highlights from their two releases and had the crowd singing along a few times on singles like Hero/Heroine and The Great Escape and saccharine ballads like Thunder and Two is Better Than One.

Edmonton quintet Stereos were second on the bill and only played 20-minutes of their scheduled 30-minute timeslot, possibly due to issues vocalist Pat Kordyback was having with his microphone.

They could have even cut that in half. The group, who earned a record deal after winning a reality television show, specializes in limp pop-rock with a dance edge and relies heavily on Auto-Tune so Kordyback’s voice comes across as fake and processed. It’s as brutal to hear as it sounds on paper. Still, the crowd ate it up, waving their hands in the air for the single Throw Ya Hands Up and singing along to the ballad Butterflies.

Straight from the "whatever-happened-to" pile emerged Fefe Dobson to open the show with a half-hour set of hard-rock and punked-up pop. The Toronto artist is attempting to make a comeback after being dumped by her label in 2006.

rob.williams@freepress.mb.ca