Riverdale star KJ Apa's session with Saskatoon's The Steadies sends band into stratosphere

What started as a normal gig turned into a night Earl Pereira will never forget.

On Saturday KJ Apa, star of hit Netflix series Riverdale, jammed with Pereira's band The Steadies for half an hour onstage at Guilt & Company in Vancouver.

"It was epic," said Pereira, lead singer of The Steadies. "It was so good. I had a good feeling he was going to hold his own up there, which he did, and then some."

It all started when they invited Apa's friend, the bar's sound tech, up to sing. Pereira noticed Apa in the crowd and asked him to come play with the band. Then he asked him to come back.

"He was having so much fun," he said. "I was like, I want to get him up again, because when he wasn't playing, he was up in the front row dancing and smiling and singing along,"

While one might imagine The Steadies were doing Apa a favour, it turns out Apa really wanted to get up on stage. 

"He was shy to ask us," he said. "Apparently he's been rejected every time every time he's asked bands to play with them at that venue."

A few days later, Apa posted an Instagram video of his set. Since then, it's been aired on celebrity entertainment show TMZ and has been viewed one million times.

"I was looking for the television version of the story and all these links started popping up," he said. "They were all talking about our band."

Things went so well, they've reached out to the actor to guest star on their upcoming album.

"We were going to get a couple of special guests, singers, rappers, friends of ours in Vancouver to sing on the record anyway" he said. "I think that could be a good time to have him come play."

The Steadies play in Moose Jaw at the Crushed Can on Boxing Day.