Culture

Back to the blues: Blues Central's Frank Dahl is back in town promoting blues events

We last spoke with Frank Dahl in Feb. 2014. He was on the verge of selling Blues Central, the longtime Spenard bar famed for French dip sandwiches and live music. He said he planned to "ride off into the sunset" to a ranch in Tucson, Arizona, to pay attention to "the little things in life, my dog, my horses, raising roses."

"And that's exactly what I did," he added in a conversation at the Jewel Lake Kaladi Brothers coffee shop on Tuesday. "But I spend more than half my time here. I'm still an Alaska resident. I'll always be an Alaska resident."

He'll probably always be a blues entrepreneur, too. Dahl is in town this month as a consultant for Williwaw, a bar, restaurant and performance space in the old Covenant House location downtown. Though it's been open since summer, Williwaw will have its grand opening celebration on Sept. 18 and ultimately include a reincarnated Blues Central performance venue that Dahl thinks should open in another month.

Dahl has retained the name Blues Central Productions for his promotional activities. His work with Williwaw includes arranging a lineup of blues acts. The Williwaw blues series will kick off on Oct. 17 when Walter Trout performs.

The day after the Williwaw grand opening celebration, the Alaska Railroad Blues Train will leave for a two-day excursion to Seward and back. It's the 11th annual trip for the trip, organized by Dahl, and it regularly sells out.

The ride will feature live music by the Diamonds. "We'll have two bars on the train," Dahl said. "People bring their instruments and jam onboard."

Because it's a private train -- no passengers other than 200 or so blues fans -- it can slow down or stop as circumstances may suggest, a good view of wildlife, for instance.

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"One year we had a couple who wanted to get married in front of a glacier, so we stopped and everyone got off and we had a wedding," Dahl recalled.

In Seward the riders will be bused to the Pit Bar, which Dahl owns, for a bonfire and barbecue and more music from the Diamonds. They'll spend the night in Seward hotels and return the next day. "It's always quieter coming back than it is going down," Dahl said with a chuckle.

Asked about the current Anchorage blues scene, Dahl said he felt it shrunk after the closing of Blues Central, but with the opening of Williwaw and the new Blues Central, "hopefully it will be revived."

As he sees it, the issues confronting any current club operator have less to do with Alaska's thirst for live music than with liquor laws. Dahl arrived in Alaska in 1972 as the pipeline boom was creating a wild nightlife milieu that ran 'round the clock.

"The pendulum really had swung too far," he said. "We were too loose. But now it's gone too far the other way."

He cited regulations that have the alcohol industry feeling so nervous that identification is checked at local liquor stores even when the purchaser is buying nothing more than a bag of ice. (This actually happened to this reporter over the summer.)

"It's an invasion of privacy," he said. "I was buying a bottle of wine and the clerk looked at my license and said, 'Oh! Frank Dahl. That you very much, Mr. Dahl.' I don't want it being broadcast who I am and what I'm buying."

He spoke of putting a red stripe on the license of offenders, which he called "the Scarlet Letter Law," as a regulation that doesn't solve any problems. It is an attempt to limit sales to people who have drinking problems.

"But do the politicians really think that a chronic inebriate is so stupid as to go into a liquor store and show a license with a red stripe on it?" he asked. "They may be living on the street, but they're smart enough to use alternative ID or find other ways to circumvent the law."

Restricted bar hours are another example of "silly restrictions," he said. Until the 1980s Anchorage bars opened at 8 a.m. and closed at 6 a.m. When the law was changed requiring closing at 2 a.m. in most cases more patrons began "power drinking" -- taking several drinks in quick succession in advance of last call -- and having serious fights as numbers of intoxicated people poured onto the streets at the same time.

"They had that problem in England," he said. "So they said, 'Let's do something different. Let's go 24/7.' Now there was no reason for power drinking and people trickled out, which meant you didn't have bunches of people getting into brawls."

His Seward bar has a rougher clientele than is the case in Anchorage, he said. But since Seward has the longer hours, he doesn't experience any problems at the Pit Bar.

The indoor smoking ban has also put a wet blanket on the Anchorage bar business, he said. "When they were first talking about it, (assemblyman) Dick Traini told me, 'It's going to help your business.' He was wrong. Before the ban we'd have a full bar at Blues Central for lunch. After it passed we didn't even have 20 percent of the seats taken at the bar. I think it would behoove the state and city to be more sympathetic to the hospitality industry. We're the second-biggest industry in Alaska."

Worst of all, the regulations make saloon-going less alluring, he said. "I go to bars in Phoenix, Albuquerque, Austin and I see people having fun. I hear laughter and music. They don't have the police pushing their noses on the windows and watching them."

In contrast, a potential Anchorage bar patron is more likely "to buy a six-pack and a pack of cigarettes and go home and sit on the deck where they don't feel intimidated."

Dahl said he expects to continue dividing his time between his Alaska and Arizona activities. Among other things, he's an honorary commander of Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, a few miles from Tucson, where he takes charge of events like arranging a welcome-home party for hundreds of military personnel returning from Afghanistan.

The honor was something of a surprise, Dahl said. He was never in the military. "And I'm not like one of the leading citizens of Tucson. They did it because I'm a bartender, I guess."

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At the moment he's busy working with the parties behind what will be the new Blues Central. Despite his consternation over local beverage laws, his association with them keeps him active in a business he loves.

"I wouldn't stay involved if I didn't think there was a bright future," he said. "I was happy to sell the Blues Central liquor license to the new owners. They're good operators. The new Blues Central bought a lot of the memorabilia and historic photos from the old site. They even took off the old bar top and it'll be at the new Blues Central.

"By inviting me in to consult and keeping the name, they're showing a lot of respect. It's a real honor. I'll continue to do it as long as they want me."

Blues Train

Departs Seward on Sept. 19 and returns to Anchorage on Sept. 20

Tickets $279 per person, includes round-trip rail fare, drink tickets, barbecue dinner, one night hotel stay

Call 800-544-0552 or visit alaskarailroad.com for more information or to book.

Mike Dunham

Mike Dunham has been a reporter and editor at the ADN since 1994, mainly writing about culture, arts and Alaska history. He worked in radio for 20 years before switching to print.

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