The Road:

The drive from Calgary to Fernie was nice and sunny for most of the way and very scenic in its own way. We went straight down Hwy 2 through farm country, passing such metropolises as Nanton, where I had a great burger in a small hotel cafe. Other towns of note were Fort MacLeod and Pincher Creek. We rolled into Fernie about 6:30 and went right to the bar where Marcus was playing.

The gig:

The Brickhouse started life as a bank but has recently been converted to a pub. The vault is partially intact and makes up about half of the men's room. The show started about 9:30 and was to be a two set night.
The first set was about 50 mins. and like Calgary had some changes and improv solos tossed in. The crowd was a little shy at first, they seemed afraid to clap but by the end of the set they became more extroverted.

The second set started at about 11:00 but was only about 30mins. This was the best set in my opinion since there was a guitar change mid song. Marcus went from acoustic to electric and really started to fool around with the songs, lots of slide guitar and some very cool delay effect (with my loaned pedal). I may never play live but at least my delay pedal has had a chance to rock the house. If you happen to be in Fernie, check out the Brickhouse - they've got some good beers on tap and it is a cool little room.

The Aftermath:

Once we had packed the gear up we treated ourselves to a beer and had a chat with the bartender and one of the locals. 45 mins later we headed back to the hostel where we were staying. As we walked in the front door we were greeted by the owner who invited us to have a drink with him and some friends. We chatted and played some pool and drank and drank. A good time was had by all, I guess this is typical of an after party.....booze, pool, filthy language, some nudity. As I am typing this I'm hung over so I am going to lay down.

UPDATE:

Arctic will perform a free show at the SameSun Backpackers Lodge tonight, Sept. 21 at 9:00 pm. Be sure to check it out.

http://www.samesun.com/destinations/fernie/calendar/

See you later.

More Calgary:

No travelling today, just exploring the town. Maybe it's just me but this city seems really spread out.

The gig:

This was a good news/bad news gig. The bad news was that due to the unexpected rescheduling of the date from the 18th to the 19th many of our friends and fans couldn't make it, but the good news is that the crowd was the most vocal so far. The venue is called Karma and it had the smallest stage that we have encountered so far. With all the gear on stage it would have been hard to fit the rest of the band up there. Luckily this is a solo tour.

Since I am the only fan that has been to all the shows I noticed that this particular gig had more changes in it, more experiments. A little slide, a longer solo and some different intros all added up to a very cool set.

Marcus and I would like to thank the good folks at Karma for being able to reschedule the gig.