Rum Ragged at The Velvet Olive in Red Deer

*need to get better pics at shows*

I kind of forgot about this blog and I'm a bit upset with myself about it because I've seen so many good shows since I've last used this that could've made for a good write up. My sincerest apologies for my absence to the 0 people that view these. But I really like writing, storytelling and sitting in coffee shops and stuff like that so here I am.

Thinking back on some of these great shows I missed an opportunity to write about, this was one that first came to mind. I was completely ecstatic when I looked on The Velvet Olive's site and saw that Rum Ragged would be playing in Red Deer soon. I knew it would be a great taste of home for a Newfie "Living in Alberta". The story of the night of the show starts off kind of funny. It has been an extremely mild winter in Western Canada and the night of the show was our first day of wet snowy downfall, which of course made everything quite slippery, icy and shitty. So I tried to stick close to the building so I could lean up against it when I needed, forgetting this would bring me to the wrong entrance. So anyways, I round the corner where there is two familiar looking fellas out for a smoke. I go to step down from the sidewalk where there happens to be a small slope of ice formed and I proceed to slip, fall down and viciously smack my left knee ( which was my good knee just before, already dealing with pain in my right knee) on the cold concrete. Before I even had the chance to lay there for a second, these two guys spring in to action to pick me up off the ground and rush to get the backstage entrance open so I could get on inside without any further incident! A great shoutout is in order for the by's from Rum Ragged who picked me up off the ground in Red Deer lol, made for a great story and I'm lucky because my girlfriend wouldn't have been able to do the same! My knee was hurting but gladly not enough that I couldn't stay for the show because what a show it was. The homesick feeling that the crowd clapping, dancing along and that these boys provided through a fiddle, accordion, guitar, tenor banjo and more was a feeling in my chest that I'll remember for a lifetime. Playing crowd favourites such as "lady's man", "Salt in his Veins", "Ghost in the fog" and "Barque in the Harbour" while providing us with some new tunes to sing along with that left the crowd equally as gleeful and homesick as I was. It's as close as a feeling that I could get to sitting in an Irish/Newfoundland pub I could find here in Central Alberta but hey if you know of others let me know!

The night started with the kindness of true Newfoundland fashion and ended the same way with another quick chat and thank you to the boys after the show before I was on my way home after a night that I'll always remember. Can't wait for the next show, I'll try to keep er on two feet next time!