Just like in the song, “ Shanghai’d in Shanghai”, “I woke up groggy and my sight was smoggy”. It was 7:30 in the morning and we weren’t sitting in a hotel looking at Moscow through the wine. It was Moose Jaw and in the Casino parking lot, but it was still through the wine; even then it still looked ugly. We were Shanghai’d in Moose Jaw and just wanted to get to North Battleford. At least it wasn’t 50 below.

Got to North Battleford at 11:30am after a painful drive and crashed in a motel this time. We got up at 5:00pm and then we got up. Ha. We were soon up, showered and ready for yet another night out. This Rock’n’Roll life sure is tough, but someone has to do it.

Arrived at the Gold Eagle Casino at about 7:30. This place was built on Indian land and it appeared that all the employees were native. What a great bunch they were. So friendly, so happy, so nice, so polite.

The support band, Trace 44, from Price Albert were pretty good. They played from 9:30 to about 11:00, which was quite a long set for a support band, but it wasn’t Nazareth so everyone carried on with their own business.

This venue was sold out like all of them so far, except for Trochu. The smaller the venue the better the show and there were only 500 people in this place, although there was plenty of room so it wasn’t going to be shoulder to shoulder like it was in Edmonton, but we were sure heading for a good drunk like Edmonton. That bit I knew. I didn’t care because there was no work tomorrow and we didn’t bring the car. We just had to navigate half a mile to the motel.

The dry ice machine was working it’s little heart out on stage to give this venue a nice affect, like in Edmonton. I love the smell of dry ice, it brings back memories of all those concerts I went to as a teenager in Liverpool, back in the 70’s. Yeah that’s right, I’m still there now and I always will be. It’s a time and a place that molded me!

Back to the show now, enough digression for now, but I just may go back there again. We couldn’t go back stage tonight because there wasn’t one. Literally, there were just 2 doors and 2 rooms filled with equipment. No problem, we were here to see the boys perform. Nazareth finally came on at 11:30. We stood back from the stage by about 20 yards this time, albeit for the first 3 songs only. As they started playing “This Month’s Messiah”, Frances and I were at the stage and singing along with Dan. What a fine voice he has. The sound was so crisp tonight and probably the best so far. Phil and the crew are masters at this, but it’s still a treat. Wait a minute, does the sound get better with the more I drink? Na, but I was feeling very good by now and even managed to get some superb shots of the guys, even after we pissed away $90 on booze. Erm, we kinda did start too early again.

Yet another brilliant performance had already come to an end, but we didn’t want to end yet so we stuck around, hoping to see the guys. It’s amazing the respect we get when we were our guest passes. People thought we were with the band since we were the only ones with Nazareth tee shirts since they had run out of them during the trip through Saskatchewan and the only other people with these tee shirts were the crew. Go-go hung out with us after the show so she could maybe meet the band and get some autographs, but the guys were on the bus already and just wanted to get to the hotel. It was raining pretty heavy by now too and I just wanted to get back to our motel and crash for the night.

Woke up groggy and my sight was smoggy, this time in a motel, almost like the song, and it was still raining. We had the most disgusting breakfast ever at Humpties. The coffee was like dish water and the food was so gross that we couldn’t finish it. We then set off to find a Timmy’s before heading to Regina. What’s a day without Timmy’s.

Dave (a.k.a. Hollis Brown)
Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow.
Don't walk behind me, I may not lead.
Just walk beside me and be my friend.