Defunct Local Band Profile Series: Redefined

It's now time for this month's Defunct Local Band Profile! Once again, we're looking at a randomly selected band from our inactive band links, in order to spotlight their run and media for modern readers, and we're taking a trip back two decades this month! Bands whose heyday came in the early 2000s or earlier are often minimally represented on the internet nowadays due to less social media and bands' then-host sites closing, but we got lucky in this instance for surviving material, so here's what you should know on quite a notable band from this era!

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Redefinedr

Hometown: Sault Ste. Marie/St. Catharines, Ontario

Genre: Hard Rock/Alternative

Lineup:

John Barber (Parabol), vocals
Matt Sibilo (The Scary Uncles), guitar
Josh St. Amour (Gianni Gagoots), bass
Dan O'Shea (My Son The Hurricane), drums

Audio/Video: Redefined are known to have released one album, namely their Sault-era independent CD "Risk & Uncertainty" in October 2001, while the song "M.T. Bundies" from that album was later included on "Foggy Style Volume 1", a 2003 compilation CD of original songs from bands (local or otherwise) that played at the former Foggy Notions. After moving to St. Catharines, the band worked on a new EP for release in the fall of 2004, but the only new original song available nowadays is their song "Pitters" via this video on frontman John Barber's YouTube channel, one of three there featuring studio material loosely set to old camcorder videos of them (I do not know if that EP was released as planned). Here's John's video for "Face Down", as set to footage of an outdoor gig at Searchmont in 2003!

Info/Analysis: Launching in early 2001, Redefined rode the momentum of early local concerts and their album release to a victory in the Xtreme Band Slam battle in North Bay that December, earning them a trip to Canadian Music Week in Toronto in February/March 2002. while also playing shows opening for the likes of Not By Choice and Bucket Truck, and even playing at that year's Rotaryfest. The guys moved to St. Catharines in 2003 to further their musical career, while continuing to return home for gigs where possible. While down south, Redefined opened for bands like Theory of a Deadman and High Holy Days, while also returning to Canadian Music Week in Toronto in 2004, and getting some rock radio airplay. The band's last stated public activity on surviving pages & Internet Archive Wayback Machine backups was their headlining set at Hempfest in Ophir in August 2004, and they dissolved by the following year.

Redefined's run was before I got into local music full-stop, but their energetic brand of hard rock and alt-metal definitely helped them stand out, and you can see how they got wider notices as a band beyond the Soo! "Risk & Uncertainty" definitely had a heavy Tool influence, and while I'd have liked more variety on that album (let alone more guitar solos), it was a good harbinger of things to come, especially given members' later band work, especially in Danno's case! Fans of John's later bands will find the most to like from Redefined, but if you want to enjoy what they did for pitters, there's a surprising amount still out there 2 decades later, especially if you check out Oocities archives and such sources!

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I hope you guys liked this month's Defunct Local Band Profile! Next month in this series, we'll jump forward 2 decades for our next randomly selected band, that being inactive Half Past offshoot The Isolation Sessions! Look for that on or around June 10th, and for more news and weekend concert previews on the site very soon! Thanks everyone!