LOCAL CONCERT ALERT (Scarkazm), New Album Updates, And More!!

In what may be our final news post of 2021, I have lots of updates from a trio of December album releases from local bands (one brand new, two with new details), plus a new music video of sorts, but leading off, we have a concert preview/SHORT NOTICE LOCAL CONCERT ALERT to take stock of! Here's what you should know!

A relatively quiet New Year's concert weekend for heavier bands in the Soo area will still net a couple of gigs in Sault Michigan TOMORROW & SATURDAY NIGHT, as Traverse City metal trio Scarkazm will end 2021 and ring in 2022 at The Rapids Lounge at the Sault Michigan Kewadin Casino! Apologies for the short notice on SATURDAY'S New Year's Day show, Kewadin never advertised it on their entertainment page for The Rapids Lounge, but Scarkazm confirmed that they are playing twice this weekend as usual via their Facebook event page for the latter. Venue advertising seems to focus on the New Year's Eve party trappings tomorrow, and given that December 31st is a Friday this year, that would normally bode well for partying to send the year out! Alas, we're not in a normal year, so if you do come out tomorrow (or SATURDAY), please use common sense and follow the casino's public health guidelines.

Last seen at The Rapids Lounge in October, Scarkazm's brand of original metal and covers should be a fine way to celebrate the holiday, so don't miss out on the party tomorrow or the more relatively standard concert on SATURDAY! Both shows have no cover charge, 21+ age limits, and 9:00 PM start times. Visit the above links for more details, and here's Scarkazm live!

Next up, we have another new local album release to take note of on the SMS, as defunct Sault Ontario hard rock/power pop trio The Din's third live album was released yesterday on their Bandcamp page! Entitled "Technically Live", this is the almost complete set that The Din played at The W.W. Baldwin Auditorium at The Tech on August 12th, 2016 as part of their release party for their debut studio album "Give In To The Din", and now that the album is out, I can confirm that the audio was a soundboard recording and not taken from Shaw TV's video of the concert. As previously teased in his live-streamed concert last month, the album features all nine songs from the original release of "Give In To The Din", plus the usual live "75" intro "Leamington, Ontario", the then-unreleased "Differences", and four outside covers. The live album does not feature frontman Mike Haggith's solo song "Of Cars & Criminals", which directly preceded "Flux" in the concert proper, but you can watch Shaw TV's footage of it at this link.

No word on why "Of Cars & Criminals" didn't make the cut, but an acoustic version was on their first live CD, 2016's "The Din Does Laundry". On Bandcamp, you can buy "Technically Live" on a "name your price" model (if you so desire, you can download it free), but CD copies will run you $10 on Kunaki, which has been Mike's go-to service for physical albums this year. As I just reviewed the deluxe edition of "Give In..." on the site in October, I can't review another Din album until April at the earliest due to my 6 month anti-bias buffer rule, but a review is in the cards for the second quarter of 2022! Buy or stream "Technically Live" at the above links!

Also, this is more cleaning up the obvious from two other new album releases from this month, as both defunct local punk band Room 206's newly re-released 1994 album "2 Innies & 1 Outie" and St. Ignace, Michigan metalcore quintet Heavy Lies The Crown's full-length self-titled album are available to buy in mp3 format, with expanded ways to hear them on streaming services too! I alluded to these in yesterday's review of the former on the SMS, but I haven't discussed these in a proper post yet. If you're too late to buy a vinyl copy of "2 Innies & 1 Outie" or don't buy/collect vinyl records, you can still hear the remaster on Spotify, YouTube, and Amazon Music, while digital download copies are for sale on Amazon for $9.49. Heavy Lies The Crown's new album was on Spotify from the get-go, and while it's not presently streamable on YouTube, it is also on Amazon for the same price!

Yes, you can stream the H.L.T.C. album on Amazon Music also, but that digital download version on the Amazon store is what unlocks it for our first album review of 2022! I don't historically review free stream-only albums, and if physical copies aren't imminent, there has to be at least the option to pay for downloadable files, rather than exploit a streaming service and hope for a good ad revenue return. As only one of the two has a full YouTube stream, here's Room 206's album opener "My Trip"!

Finally, here's a Christmas surprise from local independent label Blood Shed Productions' YouTube channel, namely a music video for 2012-2019 grindcore duo Rotopsy's fan favourite song "Cops N Moms"! The label's first upload in seven months, the video syncs up the typically (for them) song with assorted clips of Dylan & Tyler performing live at both concerts and jam sessions. Nothing is stated regarding a possible Rotopsy reunion, for the record, and the song proper is from 2014. Not badly edited, and this is definitely one of Rotopsy's more accessible tracks, so fans will wanna give it a watch below!

That's all for today, but barring any more late notice New Year's weekend shows, we'll end the year with our 2021 retrospective post, so look for that tomorrow! Thanks everyone!