The Blues Can is a real neat "idea" but the execution may be less than awesome. Since the closure of The Eddy, there has been a void of a purely blues venue in Calgary. The Blues Can claims to fill the void, but only partially delivers.
The Blues Can makes some of the same old mistakes that countless lame Calgary bars / wanna be music venues make. Overcharging for drinks after happy hour is one. Juuuuust bloody well have at least one thing every night thats $3.50 or $4.00. Maybe become famous for $4 cans of Canadian all the time or something.
Also, an exorbitant cover charge gets boring. Charge $5 and book local acts who dont demand high guarantees but sound the same or better as the "well known" stuff, which is often generic crap anyway (Bill Dowey for example). Then..... once in a while charge $12 or $15 for someone whos ACTUALLY well known? DO you know what you could have charged for tickets if YOU had Johnny WInter when he came thru town last month?? A fortune if you had your act together man! :)
On one of my visits to the Blues Can, I nearly cried because there were no blues at all! Instead some kind of semi-basement-wannaa-be-pro "HEavy Metal Jam Night". Hahahah! There was no one there except the members of the "bands" LOL. Do some research, and you will find that pretty much every jam night thing in town is a fail, including this one :)
There ARE good things about The BLues Can though. The chef / cook is AWESOME and scratch makes some wicked grub. The menu is overpriced, especially for a blues bar. When the hell did a blues bar become a cartoon mockery of itself catering to suit and tie people instead of the depressed working class !!??
SO to summarise, I am on the fence about The Blues Can. I HOPE it fixes itself and becomes a success, calgary needs a blues venue!