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ref. my post in the Montreal thread, but wanted to "give back" by posting about Winlaw, BC, in the heart of the Slocan, a valley near Nelson and Castlegar. Winlaw is also known as Planet Winlaw because of its trippiness. Two eateries, a gas station/liquor store/grocery store, a bookstore, a hairdresser and a few other small businesses and eclectica and two really good restaurants, including one with a (bookable) stage and dance floor outside its vine-draped patio; an official population of about 300, unofficial including people tucked away in the hills or holed-up in the innumerable grow-ops in the area up to 2000, and also a key stop for travellers along Highway 6, which connects Castlegar-Nelson northwards to the TransCanada or northwest via Nakusp to the North Okanagan (at Vernon/Enderby).
Why am I telling you this? Well, stuck here as I was for a bit, somewhere between boredom and wanting some cold cuts and smokes I put a dish out in front of the gas station and "did my thing".....not great returns by city standards, but in a few hours each I made 35 and 30, on successive days. In Nelson, outside the regulated and heavily yupped Baker Street, I made only 10 beans, in Castlegar by the liquor store downtown I made 20. Not that I couldn't have done better in Nelson if I'd been on Baker Street, but I didn't have the $50 license needed (and you still get hassled with non-municipal staff people asking you "where's your busking license" as if they were cops; there's a $5 day license, though, but that's $5 I didn't have.....but I'm a big act/body who jumps and whirls around a lot while playing, or likes to, and with a huge voice and electric guitar/mini-amp - more rock than mellow-tranquilized playing (as one guy, Glenn Orr complained to me about what it was like to play there; having to soft-soap and dumb it down because it's a shopping district; all people want in places like that is aural wallpaper.....)
But Nelson's also "cold" and not the mellow,funky little burg it used to be; the funk is now commercial funk, the hippie types a bit too overdressed and the "new money" element have these dull/cold eyes they look at you with if you're not like them.......too bad, it had a rep as a great place.
So it's not the money differential between Winlaw and Nelson I'm on about here so much as the receptivity of the people in Winlaw, and that (providing it's not a fire act) buskers in front of Race-Trac Gas in Winlaw will at least have a good time and make some friends, as well as make a bit of cash (enough for a couple bottles vino, anyway); and while I didn't have much luck busking the picnic tables oustide Sleep is for Sissies, the cappucino-deli place nearby, the staff/management is welcoming and likes live music. Ditto the Cedar Creek Cafe, the fancy joint with the stage and all across the highway from RaceTrac, and while I never did figure out the arrangements on some nights they allow performers to put out a jug inside the dining room, or theoretically on the terrace, even using the stage.
And there's a great beach on the Slocan River nearby.
But the other Slocan towns, which aren't quite as funkadelic, aren't quite so receptive. Slocan City people liked the music, but as one woman put it "people here don't know what busking is" and they don't clue into why the hat/bowl is out there. Slocan Park, down the other way, I tried busking outside the Co-op (combined gas/grocery and more) and was told to "move on" by a nervous manager only after two songs. Didn't try farther down the valley as I know it to be more conservative overall, and it may be that farther up the Slocan at New Denver, and beyond at Nakusp on Arrow Lake, that front-of-liquor-store gigging could do even better. Kaslo, east of New Denver on Kootenay Lake and also near Nelson via the other side of the mountain range in between there and New Denver, is supposed to be really good for ambience and a small enough town that the pretentiousness and control culture of Nelson hasn't had a chance to assert itself.
If this was of interest, I'll submit posts on other smalltowns in BC as to where to try or why not to, and what places are like. And my standard advice to those coming to BC is to not assume that BC is all about Vancouver; anything but. Even Prince George and Quesnel, known redneck-fighting towns, turned out to be friendly and mellow and there's room for visiting street performers there. And people actually talk to you like a person, instead of assuming you're a crackhead......
Skookum1
Why am I telling you this? Well, stuck here as I was for a bit, somewhere between boredom and wanting some cold cuts and smokes I put a dish out in front of the gas station and "did my thing".....not great returns by city standards, but in a few hours each I made 35 and 30, on successive days. In Nelson, outside the regulated and heavily yupped Baker Street, I made only 10 beans, in Castlegar by the liquor store downtown I made 20. Not that I couldn't have done better in Nelson if I'd been on Baker Street, but I didn't have the $50 license needed (and you still get hassled with non-municipal staff people asking you "where's your busking license" as if they were cops; there's a $5 day license, though, but that's $5 I didn't have.....but I'm a big act/body who jumps and whirls around a lot while playing, or likes to, and with a huge voice and electric guitar/mini-amp - more rock than mellow-tranquilized playing (as one guy, Glenn Orr complained to me about what it was like to play there; having to soft-soap and dumb it down because it's a shopping district; all people want in places like that is aural wallpaper.....)
But Nelson's also "cold" and not the mellow,funky little burg it used to be; the funk is now commercial funk, the hippie types a bit too overdressed and the "new money" element have these dull/cold eyes they look at you with if you're not like them.......too bad, it had a rep as a great place.
So it's not the money differential between Winlaw and Nelson I'm on about here so much as the receptivity of the people in Winlaw, and that (providing it's not a fire act) buskers in front of Race-Trac Gas in Winlaw will at least have a good time and make some friends, as well as make a bit of cash (enough for a couple bottles vino, anyway); and while I didn't have much luck busking the picnic tables oustide Sleep is for Sissies, the cappucino-deli place nearby, the staff/management is welcoming and likes live music. Ditto the Cedar Creek Cafe, the fancy joint with the stage and all across the highway from RaceTrac, and while I never did figure out the arrangements on some nights they allow performers to put out a jug inside the dining room, or theoretically on the terrace, even using the stage.
And there's a great beach on the Slocan River nearby.
But the other Slocan towns, which aren't quite as funkadelic, aren't quite so receptive. Slocan City people liked the music, but as one woman put it "people here don't know what busking is" and they don't clue into why the hat/bowl is out there. Slocan Park, down the other way, I tried busking outside the Co-op (combined gas/grocery and more) and was told to "move on" by a nervous manager only after two songs. Didn't try farther down the valley as I know it to be more conservative overall, and it may be that farther up the Slocan at New Denver, and beyond at Nakusp on Arrow Lake, that front-of-liquor-store gigging could do even better. Kaslo, east of New Denver on Kootenay Lake and also near Nelson via the other side of the mountain range in between there and New Denver, is supposed to be really good for ambience and a small enough town that the pretentiousness and control culture of Nelson hasn't had a chance to assert itself.
If this was of interest, I'll submit posts on other smalltowns in BC as to where to try or why not to, and what places are like. And my standard advice to those coming to BC is to not assume that BC is all about Vancouver; anything but. Even Prince George and Quesnel, known redneck-fighting towns, turned out to be friendly and mellow and there's room for visiting street performers there. And people actually talk to you like a person, instead of assuming you're a crackhead......
Skookum1
