Ryco, What town/bar were you playing at in Alaska? I played all over the place up there in the early 80s had the time of my life.
That was "The Landing Strip", Juneau. Out by the airport which was actually a few miles out of town. Closer to the township of Mendenhall.
Here's another great white north story:
The worst thing that could happen to a cover band was be sent a long distance to a club that was "just changing it's format".
This happened twice in my experiences.
The first time it happened when my band was sent up to play "Tony's" on Kodiak Island, Alaska in the dead of winter. We got up there to learn the bar "was changing over" and we were to be the first band to play in a bar that was, until the week before, a topless club.
Kodiak Island was populated about 1 female for every 10 guys, and maybe 20% of the female population was white or deemed desirable to a sober male.
When the regular clientele came in the first week they weren't happy to see their girls replaced by a Top-40 band. We had a female in the band (now my wife), but she her nipples remained covered - even after the too many repeated requests.
There was an established rock club called "The Beach" (IIRC) down the street that hired full production showbands from California. We were a hokey little green Seattle band, which was probably why we got the gig. The club probably wasn't offering our booking agency much money while they experimented with their format change. The agency was therefore going to provide them with a naive rookie band just starting out in their stable.
The gig was 6 hours, six nights a week. We made some good friends and had some good times. The band down the street would come watch us on their night off and we'd go watch them on ours. No band car so we had to take taxies the two miles to and from the club. One night came home to find the front door had blown open and a four foot snow drift had blown into the living room. Also the pilot light in the gas heater had been blown out so it was 20º inside. Nothing was taken. The stove didn't work, but the neighbors let us cook in theirs - for a little while anyway. We played the basic six weeks, no extension.
The second time I experienced the "changing format" was the first gig after getting back to Seattle from Kodiak. The agency next sends us over to Great Falls, MT. We drive I-90 east over The Rockies in whiteout blizzard conditions most of the way, it's still winter after all. We get to the club and it has the wild west theme. Talking to the owner he says "he's changing format from country wesetrn over to rock" and, yup, we're the "first rock band in."
When the regular clientele came in the first night they were none to happy to hear us playing rock and New Wave songs. They didn't throw things, but had us play Hank Williams's "I Can't Help It If I'm Still in Love with You" over and over. It was the only country song we knew and that was because Linda Rondstadt had a version ou at the time.
The next day the owner came to the motel that served as band quarters and said "Well, maybe I made a mistake" and fired us. He was nice about it. Gave us $100 a piece and gas money for our vehicles to get us home.
