What started as an attempt to break the Guinness world record for the longest-running concert has become a game of cross-border musical chicken, and neither venue looks ready to blink.

On St. Paddy’s Day, the Earl of Whitchurch Pub in Stouffville kicked off what it hopes will be a 16-day-long continuous concert, potentially the longest multi-musician concert in history.

But they’re facing some stiff competition from a coffee shop in Detroit, and the Americans have a nine-day head start.

“It’s become sort of a Canada versus U.S.A. thing, like gold medal hockey in the Olympics,” said Kevin Ker, the man behind the Canadian bid for the record. “There’s a pretty big bet on the line.”

The American bid for the title started on March 9 at AJ’s Café. The time to beat — currently held by an Irish pub inside the Mandalay Bay casino complex in Las Vegas — is 372 hours and 10 minutes.

Read more:16-day-long concert planned for Stouffville pub guns for Guinness World Record

The Detroit attempt has a long history behind it. The city has held the title three times — 2009, 2010 and 2011. It started as an attempt to raise awareness about the flagging auto industry in Motor City, and the jobs that could be lost as a result.

Ker’s project is much younger — he pulled the whole thing together in about a month, lining up hundreds of musical acts to fill all the hour-long slots between March 17 and their goal, at least 16 days later.

But things might go on much longer than that.

On Friday Ker shared the airwaves in a radio interview with his American counterpart AJ O’Neil, and the two struck a wager — to keep the concerts going past the 16 day mark until one of them finally collapses in exhaustion.

“If I lose, I have to go to Detroit and sing the American national anthem at a Tigers game,” Ker said. “If we win, he’ll come here and sing “O Canada” at a Blue Jays game.”

The rules to the contest are simple:

• The concert must run continuously

• Each song must be at least 2 minutes long

• No performer can return to the stage within an hour

• No more than 30 seconds between songs

• No more than five minutes between musical acts

• No single song can be repeated within four hours

• There must be at least 10 (conscious) audience members at all times

For a town as sleepy as Stouffville, that last one is proving to be a bit of a struggle, Ker said.

According to provincial liquor laws, the Whitchurch must close down at 3 a.m. until the morning rush hour and for a few hours, at least, the patrons can’t legally drink booze.

Friday night was the Stouffville crew’s first graveyard shift, and Ker said it was touch and go for a while.

“It was scary there for a moment. We were down to about 12 people,” said Ker, who only got two hours of sleep himself Friday night. “We had one guy who passed out in a booth, so he didn’t count.”

But the organizers ordered pizza, guzzled coffee, soldiered on.

“Right now we’re running on adrenalin. We knew the first couple days would be just crazy,” he said.

George Bigelow, owner of the Whitchurch, invited local insomniacs to stop by and help out.

“We need people to come out in the middle of the night. If you can’t sleep, if you’ve got nothing to do, come on out in the wee hours, watch some music,” said Bigelow.

By breakfast time Saturday morning, the pub was starting to fill up again, and the music was pumping.

And the bands were still playing on Sunday afternoon.

Bigelow estimated that 1,500 people had witnessed some part of the show at that point.

In order to satisfy Guinness’s rules, Ker and his team have strict evidence guidelines they must follow. The whole concert is being recorded with time-stamped video, and extra security cameras mounted downstairs at the bar and upstairs by the stage keep track of the audience size at all times.

The whole thing is also being live-streamed at epidemicmusicgroup.ca, which offers an added bonus.

“Once we hit eight days, we’ll also break the record for the world’s longest live-streamed concert,” Ker said.

Along with bragging rights, the event is also raising money for 16 charities — a different one each day.

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