Sara of Canadian pop duo Tegan and Sara gets her driver’s licence

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With a new graphic novel Junior High just released, and their 2019 memoir High School now a critically acclaimed streaming series, twins Tegan and Sara Quin currently have their hands full with more than just rocking out. Not to mention that Sara is also raising her young son, who’s just turned one year old. The duo broke out in the 1990s, and since then it’s been a whirlwind of touring, creating hits like Closer and Back In Your Head, and collaborating on massive projects like Everything Is Awesome from The Lego Movie. Somewhere in there, neither twin learned to drive.

Until now.

Why didn’t the Quin sisters get their driver’s licence before?

“Growing up in Calgary, getting a licence was definitely a big deal. But for me, it just wasn’t a priority. I had a lot going on,” says Tegan Quin, “I wonder now, all these years later, if I was afraid? Or didn’t want to have to get a job to pay for a car, or gas? It’s hard to say, but somehow, I dodged driving while I was young.”

The sisters have talked frankly and deeply in the past about the push and pull of being a twin, how it is part of their creative process — the ups and the downs. But you can sense Tegan’s pride in her sister’s accomplishment radiating out from a tweet posted from their official account in May.

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“It finally happened! Sara got her driver’s license!”

Being a rockstar is as much about not driving as it is about a garage full of high-dollar machinery. I’m not talking about Joe Walsh’s fictional impounded Maserati here — guitar virtuoso Jimi Hendrix quite famously never had got his licence. Which did not stop him owning two Corvette Stingrays, one with a 427 big-block V8 (he crashed the first one, which was blue).

Life as a professional musician trying to achieve commercial success means city living and plenty of touring. Tegan and Sara started their musical journey while only 15, and early success meant moving to Vancouver, more expensive and better served by transit than Calgary.

“I don’t have a strong memory of deciding not to complete the process of taking my drivers test at 18. I had finished driver’s education classes but had very little desire to be a driver,” Sara Quin says. “Around the same time Tegan and I began touring the world, and at 19 I moved to Vancouver, where cost of living (rent, food, etc.) made the idea of having a car, insurance and regular gas expenses, seem beyond reach. I then moved to Montreal, and then on to New York City.”

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MTV showed a promo in 2007 of Sara learning to drive some huge GM wagon in a New York parking lot, while Tegan says encouraging things like, “One of us is in charge here and one of us is a loser at 27 learning to drive.” The siblings’ dynamic has always been to get a dig or two in. But mostly with affection.

What motivated Sara to get her driver’s licence?

Getting a driver’s licence appears to be a lesser priority for today’s youth, or at least there are plenty of reasons not to. Cheap cars are basically extinct these days, insurance and fuel have never been more expensive (the Tragically Hip’s line “put 10 bucks in just to get the tank topped off” currently need only apply to a Vespa scooter), and graduated licensing is a more complex test than the basic driving tests of the 1980s or 1990s.

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However, the fan response to the tweet bears out what long provincial licensing wait times and packed driving school waitlists seem to indicate. In the pandemic, with limited travel available, a driver’s licence was one of the few freedoms. Young fans replied to Tegan and Sara’s post with their own desire to finally complete the process and get their own driver’s licence. The duo have long been queer icons, and the authenticity and openness with which they present themselves means their fans are often open too.

For her part, Sara’s primary motivation is the same reason as most people when purchasing a new vehicle for the first time.

“The birth of my son, Sid, finally tipped the scales,” she said, “I wanted to feel confident about playing an equal role in parenting and as equipped as possible to support him. I signed up for driving lessons two weeks before my road test, and crammed 10 hours of driving in.”

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Sara also notes, “I also found other drivers very respectful of me when I was in the branded car but when I practised in my own car, people were far less accommodating.” A reminder that a little courtesy on the road goes a long way — you never know what the situation of your fellow driver is.

Now what?

“Not having a licence has never been an issue for me but now that I do the choice feels like a privilege. I’ve never felt held back, but I do find myself imagining trips, or projects that might feel entirely new and different because I will be able to share in the responsibility of driving. Just being able to drive my damn self to IKEA will be fun!”

Flat pack furniture runs feels more grown-up than indie rock, the kind of thing millennials coined the term “Adulting” to describe somewhere around the time Tegan and Sara released Love You To Death. Further, Sara turns out to be a conscientious driver, always backing into parking spaces as it’s safer. But facing down your fears and not letting your ego be a road block? That’s basically pure punk rock.

“Trying something new, especially when a test is involved, is a huge obstacle for me in adulthood. I’ve always liked feeling good at things, and this process made me feel very vulnerable, even scared at times,” Sara says, “But, accomplishing the goal was a massive confidence boost and I immediately started to consider other ways to challenge myself. All of this really stems from becoming a parent, which was something I didn’t always believe would happen in my life. Once that seal was broken, I was excited to expand my life in other ways.”