EDMONTON — They’ve booed, they’ve complained, they’ve even thrown their jerseys on the ice in sheer frustration – it’s no doubt the past few seasons have been tough on Oilers fans. But one Sherwood Park native, who now calls New York home, is taking a different approach. He’s using his skills as a songwriter in hopes of rallying Oilers fans together.
Charles MacEachern, 31, came up with the idea for his song “We Will Rise” while visiting family in the Edmonton area about a month ago. While in the City of Champions, he couldn’t help but notice the beating the copper and blue were taking from their fans.
“It’s pretty hard to ignore it,” MacEachern said via Skype Sunday afternoon. “Especially when you’ve been away from the city for a long time, it’s kind of hard to ignore that uproar that’s going on.”
Instead of joining in, the life-long Oilers fan decided to put pen to paper.
“I’ve been doing a lot of songwriting recently and I decided why not just try to do a huge anthem and try to rally fans together and kind of play the other side of it,” said MacEachern.
“Let’s just try to make it through these tough times together. We shouldn’t be quitting on our team.
“I moved to New York in 2007 in aims of being a performer and a songwriter and as much as I’m successful here and I’m creative and doing what I love, I still haven’t reached my goals of reaching larger audiences and ‘making it’ as it were,” he continued.”I’ve been hearing many ‘noes’ for five years and no one’s given up on me, and the Oilers have had ‘noes’ for five years and people are giving up on them.”
READ MORE: Oilers’ head coach calls out fan who threw jersey on ice
The song starts out with MacEachern asking, “How many times we gonna hear, about that fan who quit this year? Hands up saying he was through, bailin’ on our copper and blue.”
“How many times they disappear, yet quickly turn up when we cheer. They always preach to know it all, but always wait to watch us fall.”
Instead of turning their backs on the team, MacEachern encourages fans to get their sticks back on the ground.
“Let ’em come, let ’em say, this team is done let’s walk away. Let ’em say they’re ashamed, let ’em walk out in the middle of the game,” the chorus sings. “Let ’em think this is it, ;et ’em bang the glass and spit, ’cause in this old hockey game, we don’t need ’em. I’m still believen’. I’m never leavin’.”
WATCH: Charles MacEachern’s We Will Rise
MacEachern wrote the song for the city of Edmonton and hopes it will reach all Oilers fans. He wrote the majority of the song while on a flight from Edmonton to Toronto. MacEachern recorded the song shortly after in Nashville and filmed the music video with his roommate once back in New York.
If you want to learn the words and sing along, MacEachern also put together a sing-along version.
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