Somewhere on a freeway just outside San Diego, Tyler Stewart recently sat in the back of his band’s tour bus. The Barenaked Ladies were stuck in traffic when The Blade reached the “If I Had A Million Dollars” drummer by phone.

“You might hear some engine noise,” he said with a laugh.

The Barenaked Ladies will perform Sunday at the Toledo Zoo Amphitheater as part of the band’s “Last Summer On Earth Tour.”

Just shy of three decades together has brought the Canadian rock band significant success, especially in 1998 when its song “One Week” peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and spent 20 weeks on the chart. It would not be surprising to see a group of people singing karaoke to “If I Had A Million Dollars” at any random bar; the song has logged more than 10 million streams on Spotify and is still included in the band’s set list.

“The fact [is] that people, as soon as they hear the first guitar notes of that song, they go crazy,” Stewart said. “They’re up in their seats, they’re dancing, they’re having a great time singing at the top of their lungs. For that reason alone that powers me through the song every night because people have such a great time during it. I always say it's almost like ‘If I had A Million Dollars’ isn’t our song anymore. It actually belongs to our fans. It's their song.”

November brought the release of the band’s 15th studio album Fake Nudes, 14 pop rock tracks that lyrically range from family issues to contemporary politics.

Indeed, the album’s title is a spin on the term “fake news,” something Stewart called an attack on journalism and the ability of social media to disseminate false information.

“It's a very zeitgeisty word right now. We just did a little play on it with Fake Nudes because that’s what we are. We're called Barenaked Ladies, we have been for 30 years but we're not. We're fully clothed, older gentlemen. It's the first time we've actually made fun of our name before anyone else could. It's a little self-deprecating and it's also currently, politically, and socially topical.”

The current political climate inspired tracks like “Lookin’ Up,” which includes the lyrics “Some people wanna take a high dive into a drink/Some people wanna watch the world swirl into the sink/Why would you argue ‘Is the glass half full?’/It's a mess.”

Another track, “Invisible Fence,” states “Some people just wanna build more walls/pretend there’s no hope/or peace at all/building them comes at a great expense/whether in your mind or wet cement.”

“There’s a lot going on right now people can be really upset and disappointed about,” the drummer said. “If you listen to the nonstop torrent of bad news, whether it's social media or CNN or Fox or whoever, you can get pretty down, but then you realize that in your own neighborhood there are great things happening ... or even for us on the road touring.

“[From] our fans coming to the shows we hear good stories. It's not all bad news. We were pretty conscious of that in the writing of the record. There are some good things to look forward to. Try to do good things in your own little backyard. You can start at your own house and spread to your city and to your country. I think we were writing a little bit about that.”

Other topics on the album include the challenges of raising a child with special needs in “Flying Dreams” and large amount of time spent continuing the band in “Bringing It Home.”

Keyboardist and guitarist Kevin Hearn’s father is also heard in spoken word at the end of the band’s song “Dusty Rooms.”

“To have him featured on the song is pretty special for us. It was interesting to hear song lyrics offset to music and spoken by someone who has a really good voice. Hopefully he doesn't become too big a celebrity and he can’t fit his head through the door,” Stewart joked.

Before Stewart ended the call, he started to explain some of the many things it takes for a band to continue playing music together for nearly three decades.

“It's not as easy as it looks, but you develop certain strategies along the way,” he said. “They all boil down to respecting others and having empathy for others in the band, giving them space and giving them time. When we're in a room together just laughing, joking, eating dinner, even on stage there’s a camaraderie which I think is rare for anybody to achieve in a group of people in their life. [What] keeps me going is the energy we have among each other.”

Contact Geoff Burns at gburns@theblade.com or 419-724-6054.

First Published June 21, 2018, 9:00 p.m.