We got in to Brandon pretty late, found a room and headed downtown to the Double Decker Tavern for the evening. Vancouver locals Adaline (who shared the bill with us at our kickoff show) and Dan Mangan were playing as part of the WCMAs, and I knew so many people there I thought I was back in Vancouver. They both played great solo sets to a packed room, and it was nice to kick back and have some beer and pub grub with familiar faces.

We slept late, trying to catch up on sleep after the late night in Saskatoon. Joey investigated the giant waterslide but found it to be too plagued with kids. We ate breakfast in the sort of motel restaurant that includes Cheez Whiz as a menu item ($0.30 for a side order). Marcus and I had tea with Luka from kerfmusic.com, a Calgary-based digital distributor, who were in town for the WCMAs, and then we headed off to the ‘Peg.

Our show was at the Cavern again, where we’ve had some epic shows in the past. James Brown, who books the venue, is still a great character and now sports a mohawk. He appears to be made of wire, and bounds easily up and down the treacherous back steps during load-in like he’s on the surface of the moon. The openers were a new semi-local band called The Incentives, a friendly bunch from Winnipeg Beach, who put on a good show and brought a decent crowd out. Because there was already some dancin’ going down, we started with You Coming Down extended dance remix and played mostly upbeat stuff.

We had a great night despite a few random quirks and hiccups here and there. The most bizarre incident of the night, though, was something only I was privileged enough to witness. There was an extremely drunk guy staggering around in front of my section of the stage, clinging to his drink and occasionally sipping it through a straw. While I was on keyboards in War of Ideas I glanced at him just in time to notice him starting to drool into his half-full glass… and then slowly, gradually, he started quietly puking more and more into his drink, right on the dance floor, as if nobody would notice. In the meantime he kept swaying around, half-dancing, half-falling. I started laughing and just about lost it - it was the most ridiculous thing, I had tears running down my face, and though I was petrified that he was going to fall over and spill the contents on my keys, I could not stop laughing, I could hardly play. Finally I think he realized his retching could not be contained in half a glass of rum & Coke, and he practically crawled to the washroom. That was the last I saw of him.

Speaking of the washroom, Marcus tried to do me a favour by writing “The bass player in ARCTIC is single” on the chalkboard in the mens’ room. It might have been my imagination that I was getting a few more looks than usual. Then again, maybe nobody was actually using the mens’ room because of a drunk barfing guy laid out across the floor… who knows.

Anyways, we had a lot of fun - I like playing Winnipeg. Even though there’s always some crazy times (such as, there was a huge fight at the bar next door when some guy punched a girl in the face and a bunch of other guys taught him a lesson), there’s always an enthusiastic crowd that isn’t afraid to dance. Thanks everybody.

Marcus: 2
Rob: 1
Kirsten: 2
Joey: 2