Saturday, June 7, 2025

Local Metal/Hard Rock Video Showcase!!

After escaping another busy weekend concert preview run, we have a new news post for your Saturday morning, and it mostly covers new videos relating to local artists and concerts, with related information therein. With all of that laid out, here's what you should know!

I hope to cover last night's Cory Marks concert livestream on the SMS soon (I have to, given that they have a 30 day lifespan now!), but to promote the event, the North Bay country/hard rock musician actually got interviewed on CTV News Northern Ontario on Tuesday! If you missed that night's newscast on cable/satellite (or channel 2 OTA), CTV News' YouTube channel uploaded the segment, which was anchored by Tony Ryma, who was a former Sault Ste. Marie city councillor before moving to Sudbury to work on the former MCTV News there. The interview is more about Hope Air, the remote health care access charity that put on the local concert last night at the Bushplane Museum (on Hope Air Day, of course). Only the last question was directly about the concert, which Cory (who recorded the interview in Sturgeon Falls) revealed there was "a pop up acoustic set". Maybe that helps explain why this didn't get a lot of promotion as a concert?

While Hope Air Day is understandably prioritized over Cory's music (though I guess he played a Hope Air Day concert in Timmins last year too), promotion for both on local network television would have been huge, and hopefully eyeballs watching CTV News Northern Ontario on Tuesday made the point to come downtown for the free concert! Check out the full interview segment below, and stay tuned for more public content from Cory's acoustic show last night, livestream or otherwise!

Next up, remember how local/Barrie alt-hard rock musician Mike Haggith was tapped to sing "O Canada" at a couple of Barrie Baycats baseball games last summer, only for rain delays to get in the road? As you may recall, Mike did successfully sing the national anthem on June 13th, but that game was rained out after a few pitches, before Mike eventually did the honours at a game that went ahead in full on August 1st, and I surprisingly never talked about that on here. You can watch that particular Intercounty Baseball League game (which saw Barrie beat the Welland Jackfish 5-4) at this link, and Mike is introduced 6:05 into the livestream. It was a fine rendition, Mike put his voice to quality use on a big stage (well, diamond), but there were some audio dropouts after he finished, so there's an awkward silence on the video that likely wasn't there at Athletic Kulture Stadium. Kudos to the Baycats for bringing Mike back after Mother Nature got in the way!

Incidentally, the Baycats won the IBL championship last fall, so belated congratulations from afar on their playoff success! They also beat Welland in the finals, and the two teams also faced off on Thursday for another game where Mike was the anthem singer! Dressed even fancier this time, Mike's performance is just as good as his two stints last season, but in this game (full livestream here), the audio doesn't drop out after he's done singing, so we can hear the P.A. announcer's copy about Mike at the end. While the Jackfish got their revenge by beating Barrie 4-3, hopefully a good time was had by all in attendance! Mike uploaded just the anthem from Thursday's game to his Facebook page, so give it a watch below!


Also today, here's our first public videos of local hard rock quartet Sylo's current lineup! The band debuted new second guitarist Owen Middleton when they opened for Derev at Soo Blaster on May 23rd (itself their first show since Eli left for university last fall), and they posted two brief videos from their set to their Instagram page in the following days. Unfortunately, both are vertical (not even square), but you have to be used to Instagram video limitations on that platform. The band has promised that "full length footage (is) coming up soon", implying that longer videos are coming to a platform that will host them, but I haven't seen it anywhere obvious yet. One of the videos focuses on Owen playing during their cover of Black Sabbath's "War Pigs" with drummer Jakob Fice-Lesage "switching up in the middle of the set", as noted via on-screen text. I don't think that the text was needed, but viral content creation, I know. 

The purpose is to make light of Jakob's change in fills, and Owen got a good laugh, but hopefully we see fuller video of this cover soon! Embedded below is Sylo playing their original song "War Times", and while I wish this was the full song and not shot vertically (you see very little of Owen and Jakob here), it's a strong performance of Sylo's earliest and best known original song! Good stuff, but hopefully we do see the long-form videos that Sylo teased. Give these two Instagram clips a watch above & below!

Finally for today, newer local industrial metal solo project The Realignment Project posted four more lyric videos from their sophomore EP "The Frustration Sessions" onto their YouTube channel last month! One is for "Static" (which Matt had teased in a Facebook "Reel" in April), but "Minor Outburst", "Fireside", and "Stupid" also got the lyric video treatment. There is not (currently?) a lyric video for the closing song "Medicated (A Spade Is A Spade)", but remember that two songs from their debut EP "Afterthought" didn't get lyric videos either. I'll hold comment on the songs until our review of "The Frustration Sessions" in August, but give these new industrial rock songs a listen (with lyrics) above & below!


That's all for now, but stay tuned for more news and notes on the SMS next week! Thanks everyone!

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