Defunct Local Band Profile Series: The Red And Black & Stoned Ape Evolution

It's now time for this month's Defunct Local Band Profile, continuing our monthly spotlight of randomly selected local metal, hard rock, and punk acts of the past in order to spotlight them and their run for current readers! This month's installment is a double profile, as the first band only had minimal information online, so I randomly picked a second band, namely early 2010s Sault Michigan hard rock band Swayze Train, only to re-discover that I had announced their removal from our band links last year due to a lack of surviving public content (their Reverbnation page proves it), but forgot to actually delete them. Blonde moment! I picked the closest un-profiled & alphabetically adjacent Sault Michigan band with minimal info to fill things out, so here's what you should know on both!

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The Red & Black

Hometown: Garden River, Ontario

Genre: Post Punk/Grunge

Lineup:

Christopher Shoust (Telephone & Address), vocals/guitar
Damjan Binda (Spider Fingerz, F.F.B.), drums

Info/Analysis: Launched by former F.F.B. bandmates in August 2014, The Red & Black posted seven songs to their Soundcloud page & six mostly-shared songs on their Bandcamp page over the next three months. Plans were teased for a full length album, then a split release with Christopher's recently reunited punk duo Orange, but neither came to fruition. A planned live debut opening for The Whiskey Shits in November 2014 was cancelled, but they did play an unrehearsed impromptu set in June 2015, opening for Toronto doom metal band IRN at The New American Pub. Public updates did not follow, and the band dissolved by the end of 2015. If you know Telephone & Address' more aggressive, plugged-in material, then The Red & Black's raw, unpolished sound & Chris' distinct vocals on songs like "Talk Talk Talk" will be very familiar, and Damjan's drumming fit in well! Solid stuff for fans, hopefully we hear from both guys musically again!

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Stoned Ape Evolution

Hometown: Bay Mills, Michigan

Genre: Thrash Metal

Lineup: Stoned Ape Evolution never revealed their lineup publically and always wore masks on stage, not unlike prior Sault Michigan metal band Clownsack. Two of the band's four (later five) publically depicted members were John Napoletano and Melvin Willis, instrument roles unclear, though I believe John was the frontman. If you can fill in any blanks as to this band's lineup(s) and if it's alright to reveal them now, let me know!

Info/Analysis: Formed by early 2016, Stoned Ape Evolution sought to "bring a taste of a bigger metal band to a smaller area". Primarily seen at the Bay Mills Bands Together series of charity concerts in the mid-2010s, they debuted at Pickles Bar & Grill in Brimley in May 2016, and also played at that year's Rudyard Musicians Festival. Their final gig was an outdoor Bay Mills Bands Together event in September 2017, and the band otherwise shared memes on their Facebook page into early 2018 before quietly dissolving. Two public videos are known to exist from their run, including covers of Megadeth's "Sweating Bullets" in Rudyard and of Metallica and Megadeth songs in Brimley, and while I do think the vocalist was trying a little too hard to sound evil, they were technically sound and definitely unique for the E.U.P. in this day and age! Hopefully their members are still active!

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I hope you guys liked this month's YouTube Channel Profile! This series will return on or around October 10th when we look at another randomly selected band, this time back in Sault Ontario with inactive local "shield rock" band Swmapgut! Look for that in a month's time, and for more news and notes on the site next week! Thanks everyone!