Playing With the Queen of Hearts

Sometimes, there's not a whole lot that goes on in an Alaskan town when the temperatures start to drop, the amount of daylight begins to dwindle, and everyone waits for more snow to fall, so you can imagine my excitement when I read in the newspaper on Friday that Juice Newton was going to be giving a concert in Fairbanks on Monday night. Juice Newton! She is one of my all-time favorites, so I knew I had to go.

Juice was only one of the acts that night. Gary Puckett (yes, of Gary Puckett and the Union Gap) was also playing. It was a fund raiser for the Fraternal Order of Alaska State Troopers. Playing in the local hockey arena, the crowd was a little sparse. Poor advertising? I don't know, but the fact that I didn't find out about it until three days before makes me think...yes. At any rate, showing up ten minutes before the show was plenty of time for my friend Ellen (who was lucky enough to be in town from Delta Junction) and me to find seats in the fifth row. We could have even sat in the second row, but that seemed awfully close.

Juice was great! Unfortunately I forgot my camera, but oh well. Playing acoustic with a couple of fellow band members, Juice had a great sense of humor, could still carry a tune, and just generally rocked the house. Highly entertaining! I even got her autograph between bands:


When Gary Puckett took the stage, I realized why Ellen and I were pretty much the youngest people in the crowd. Let's see...how do I put this. I guess I'll just say that I don't think I really appreciate music from the late 60s and felt that I needed to leave a little early. Maybe I would have liked him more if I was in a lounge in Las Vegas, and he was opening for Wayne Newton or something. Who knows?