YouTube Channel Profile Series: Alex Traynor

 To close another month at the SMS (I am off tomorrow for my birthday), here's this month's delayed YouTube Channel Profile, as we're again spotlighting a YouTube channel whose content is at least half devoted to local metal, hard rock, and/or punk artists and/or concerts, as randomly selected from our YouTube subscriptions! We're staying in the E.U.P. for this month's selection, courtesy of a very familiar local hard rock musician, so here's what you should know!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Alex Traynor (http://www.youtube.com/MrAlextraynor1)

Owner: Tarnished singer/guitarist & solo musician Alex Traynor, previously known from his work fronting Sault Michigan-area groups Banned and Traynwreck

Channel Timeline: Launched on September 30th, 2011; Current videos uploaded from July 2015 through April 2019

Channel Summary: The official YouTube channel for Alex's now-inactive solo project, it features the three music videos he made for his EP "Crazy World", plus a promotional video and an earlier cover song.
 
Why You Should Watch: While not the most amply stocked YouTube channel, it will be of high interest for fans of Alex's solo career, especially as Tarnished took on songs from "Crazy World" for their live setlist, while his early cover song is an amusing rocked-up take! Note that I am fairly certain Alex uploaded videos here in the channel's early years that have since been taken down. Also note that he has not posted official Tarnished videos here, as they have their own YouTube channel (as did Banned).

 Our Recommended Videos To Check Out:

Oops, I Did it Again (Cover): The earliest surviving video on Alex's channel (and only one not from his EP release cycle) is this audio cover of Britney Spears' "Oops!... I Did It Again" from July 2015, back when he was still fronting Banned. Set to assorted pictures of Alex with his guitar and his old Nightmare Before Christmas hat, the studio cover shows Alex's raw talent at his then-young age (he was 20 at the time), and while not over-the top in campiness or humour, covering a bubblegum pop song like this is a good sign that Alex doesn't take things too seriously!

Crazy World (Official Music Video): In the lead up to the release of "Crazy World" in March 2019, Alex made & released three music videos on his YouTube channel, starting with one for the title track the previous October, as preceded by a promo video teasing the final product. By far his most popular upload on the channel, the video features Alex performing the song while walking in the woods along a set of train tracks, meeting a mysterious fortune teller, and eventually falling victim to a curse of some kind. While definitely not Alex's heaviest original song, it shows his musical diversity well and would be an ideal live sing-along experience, so fans will take to it!

Jack O'Lantern (Official Music Video): The heaviest of the three "Crazy World" singles is the second one, "Jack O'Lantern", which takes strong musical cues from Avenged Sevenfold. It's a shame that this video wasn't released until February 2019, as it was clearly shot in October with a very seasonal motif, with Alex going to and performing at a Halloween party that eventually attracts creatures of the night as attendees to dance the night away. Well shot with effective use of Halloween party lighting and props, though I'd have tried to get more extras in costume to fill out the party. The song proper shows Alex's hard rock skills very well and his nicely developed vocals, but again, A7X vibes are definitely present here! Click here for the third music video for the near-ballad "What Everything Is Like (High Life)".

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I hope you guys liked this month's YouTube Channel Profile!  This series will return on or around June 26th like normal, when our newest random selection is YouTube user soanso77's channel, featuring six disparate videos featuring Sault Ontario punk veterans The Inner City Surfers! Look for that and much more on the site next month! Thanks everyone!

Defunct Local Band Profile Series: Alex Traynor

It's now time for this month's Defunct Local Band Profile, our monthly spotlight feature on one or two local metal, hard rock, or punk acts, in order to give them some deserved press for current readers, and as usual, bands are randomly selected! We're ending 2020 in the Sault Michigan area for a profile oin a talented musician that is still very much active, just in a band rather than solo nowadays. Here's what you should know!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alex Traynor

Genre: Hard/Alternative Rock
 
Hometown: Sault Ste. Marie/Kinross/Mount Pleasant, Michigan

Members:

Alex Traynor (Tarnished, Banned), all instruments

Audio/Video: Alex has released one studio album, namely his EP "Crazy World", which came out on CD and for digital download in March of last year, after being recorded in Mount Pleasant in the fall of 2018. Though this is his only studio output to date as a solo musician, he did write similar original material with his main local groups Banned and Tarnished, releasing an EP with the latter named "Down To The Wire" earlier this summer. Select videos of his solo concerts and in-studio covers can be found on Alex's Facebook page as well, as well as three music videos. Here is the official music video for his EP's title track!

Info/Analysis: A steady young presence on the Eastern Upper Peninsula cover band circuit with his 2011-2019 classic/hard rock group Banned, Alex launched his own solo project in the spring of 2017. Much of his early updates were Banned-related aside from a few studio cover videos, appearances on 1230 WSOO, and an early demo of "Crazy World", before he moved to Mount Pleasant that fall. In the summer of 2018, Alex began a run of solo acoustic concerts both in Mount Pleasant and at The Signatures Lounge at the Soo's Kewadin Casino branch. After the recording cycle and release of his EP, and a couple of Friday Sessions appearances on The Four on 9&10 News in the spring of 2019, Alex kicked off his pre-pandemic run of regular matinee gigs at Biggby Coffee. His last advertised solo concert was in Mount Pleasant in June 2019, after which he moved back to the Soo, dissolved Banned, and launched his current hard rock band Tarnished.

Alex's solo output has taken a backseat in favour of Tarnished, though that band took over the Biggby arrangement, while also playing songs from "Crazy World" in their setlists. In that sense, Alex is still very active as an original musician, and Tarnished don't stray far in sound either, but Alex's solo EP was a good harbinger of what was to come from him in a full band, with his melodic voice, strong guitar skills, and ambition present on all 5 songs! Follow Tarnished to see what Alex is up to musically nowadays!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I hope you guys liked this month's Defunct Local Band Profile! This series will head back to Sault Ontario to kick off 2021, as our next randomly selected band will be inactive 2010s outsider punk/folk project Telephone & Address! Look for that on or around January 10th, and for a new news post by Sunday! Thanks everyone!

YouTube Channel Profile Series: JoeNiemi17's Channel & Alex Hemy

Here is our last monthly feature post of the summer months, namely our latest YouTube Channel Profiles! This series looks at 1-3 YouTube channels featuring content at least half devoted to local metal, hard rock, or punk bands or concerts, in order to spotlight them for modern day readers and hopefully encourage views and subscriptions. This month's randomly selected channel only had two distinct kinds of videos (4 total that are relevant to the SMS), so I randomly picked a channel with only one surviving video to round things out with, and as such, each channel deals with a local solo musician from each side of the Twin Saults! Here's what you should know!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

JoeNiemi17's Channel (http://www.youtube.com/joeniemi17)
 
Owner: Former Analog Deficiency & Hoist The Sails bassist Joe Niemi

Channel Timeline: Launched on July 14th, 2010; Videos uploaded in October of that year

Channel Summary: Joe's channel features five videos, including two of him in solo bass performances and two videos a major Kewadin Casino concert. His last upload is of a pipe flooding at his then-school, which is his most viewed video, but has no music content.
 
Why You Should Watch: Give this channel a watch to see some of Joe's guitar skill from a decade ago, plus live footage of 10 Years' local set! The last video will primarily concern fans of fail videos or students who remembered the pipe incident. Note that this channel has not visibly been used since 2011, in case that changes your mind on subscribing.

 Our Recommended Videos To Check Out: 

Analog riff: Joe's main usage of his channel came late in his progressive metal band Analog Deficiency's 2009-2010 life span, and accordingly, one of his two performance videos is of a riff for a planned original song, as filmed to test his new iPod. It sounds promising, and Joe was a solid bassist, though both Analog Deficency and their successors Hoist The Sails struggled to break out of the Sault Michigan market, which hasn't been easy for extreme metal acts in the past decade. Joe's other performance clip is of him covering Lamb of God's "Laid To Rest" (and pretty well, I might add!)

Waste land - 10 years: This channel's two concert videos are from the Sevendust-headlined show at The Dreammakers Theatre at the Sault Ste. Marie Kewadin Casino on October 18th, 2010, but Joe did not film them or openers Since October & Anew Revolution. Rather, he filmed co-headlining Knoxville, Tennessee hard rock band 10 Years playing a minute of "Shoot It Out", and in his most popular music upload, their biggest hit "Wasteland". The quality and angle aren't bad for these ironically 10 year old videos, and the vertical resolution isn't too bad given where he was in the crowd! See more videos of 10 Years from their 2018 show here with Seether at this link.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alex Hemy (http://www.youtube.com/alexsguitarcovers)
 
Owner: Former Ashes To Dust guitarist Alex Hemy

Channel Timeline: Launched on May 20th, 2012; Only surviving video uploaded in April 2020

Channel Summary: Alex created this channel to feature his solo guitar covers, which initially were in a hard rock/classic metal realm before increasingly getting softer, albeit better produced with backing tracks, and even featuring vocals on occasion. Unfortunately, Alex has deleted or privatized all of his old videos, which is a shame, as he is a very talented musician! His only video left is his new cover of "Driving Rain" by Slash featuring Myles Kennedy & The Conspirators (with the original song as backing), and it's well handled and heavier than we were seeing from him in the videos previous to this one! I'd have used the alternate camera angle well before the 3:37 mark though. Hopefully new (or old) covers of Alex's surface down the line!


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 I hope you guys liked this month's YouTube Channel Profiles! Next month in this series, our random selection has given us a channel that can stand alone, namely defunct local classic metal band Project 421's official channel! Look for that on or around September 26th, and for a new news post tomorrow! Thanks everyone! 

Tym Morrison's Newest Live-Streamed Concerts, Plus More Assorted News!!

After a quiet stretch, we're back on this Tuesday night with a post mostly devoted to recent live-streamed content from a prominent acoustic solo musician, but we do have some assorted updates to round things out with. Here's what you should know!

Local hard rock singer/guitarist Tym Morrison held his 36th & 37th live-streamed concerts on his YouTube channel on Thursday and earlier today, so what should you know regarding these at home shows? Starting with episode #36 from Thursday, this took the place of his cancelled Motley Market concert that same evening, and was back at his usual home setting. Tym didn't elaborate on why the Motley Market shows were scuttled, but it doesn't sound like it was his call. Starting later than normal due to vehicle maintenance, Tym's set begins about 3 minutes, and features covers of Ed Sheeran's "Thinking Out Loud", Eric Carmen's "Hungry Eyes", Amanda Marshall's "Dark Horse", Roxette's "Listen To Your Heart", Foreigner's "That Was Yesterday", Berlin's "Take My Breath Away", Toto's "Hold The Line", Frozen Ghost's "Dream Come True", Supertramp's "Breakfast In America", Coolio's "Gangsta's Paradise", ...

...Roxette's "It Must Have Been Love", Amy Holland's "Shooting For The Moon",Yes' "Owner Of A Lonely Heart", Jim Croce's "Time In A Bottle", Ludwig von Beethoven's "Piano Sonata No. 14", White Lion's "When The Children Cry", Tom Petty's "Free Fallin'", The Beatles' "Here Comes The Sun", Little Texas' "What Might Have Been", Extreme's "More Than Words", The Beatles' "Blackbird", and The Eagles' "Desperado", before oddly closing with his Spanish guitar instrumental. Another solid set filled with familiar and more recent additions to his extensive setlist, and fans of Tym's vocal and guitar talents will be right at home as usual! That said, there were some video lag issues in the second hour, and we just heard eight of these songs in the previous Thursday's live-stream at the Motley Market (remember, he did not play an at-home show that Tuesday.) However, he did play one this Tuesday, which just wrapped up and is embedded below, so what can you see here? After more of a delay than on Thursday, tonight's show began about 9 minutes with covers of "Blackbird" again, ...

...Carly Simon's "Nobody Does It Better", and three more repeat songs from Thursday ("What Might Have Been", "Free Fallin'", and "When The Children Cry"), before addressing some private gigs he played over the previous weekend. Next, Tym tackles Garth Brooks' "The Dance", seguing right into a lengthy original instrumental, which he demonstrates some tentative lyrics for afterwards. The covers resume with Kansas' "Dust In The Wind", Mason Williams' "Classical Gas", and Eric Clapton's "Tears In Heaven", before he played his own original instrumental "Into The Light Of Darkness". Afterwards, Tym covered Chicago's "Hard To Say I'm Sorry", Blue Oyster Cult's "(Don't Fear) The Reaper", Loverboy's "Working For The Weekend", The Stone Temple Pilots' "Plush" & "Interstate Love Song", before closing with another original instrumental. Despite the familiar start with four out of five repeat covers, this episode got it's own flavour over time!

With lots of instrumental sections and guitar demonstrations for viewers, this episode was informative and entertaining, and without major lag in the visual department, so Tym's fans should be happy with the final product here and on Thursday! Give both live-streams a watch above & below, and stay tuned this Thursday for his likely next at-home concert!



Finally for today, here's three assorted shorter news items from the last while, and as usual, these are in alphabetical order by artist or venue name:

• I have moved Sault Michigan hard rock solo musician Alex Traynor to our inactive band links due to a year's inactivity. As you may know, Alex has been busy focusing on his band Tarnished since last summer, and has not publically discussed new solo work on his Facebook page since playing an acoustic gig in Mount Pleasant in June of last year. Tarnished share a lot thematically with Alex's solo original material, and hopefully they find continued local success!
• Also, I have moved Sault Ontario country/punk quintet The Billy Bastards to our inactive band links, as it has been a year since their last Facebook page update as of Saturday. While The Billys haven't played a public concert set (stags & does don't count) since 2015, they had been working on new original material for a tentative fourth CD as of 2018, and released their "Bathe In Whiskey" album on Apple Music last spring. Personal Facebook postings have hinted at Billys plans in the past year, but hopefully the guys return to public activity at some point down the line!
• SooToday's Darren Taylor covered the impending re-opening of Reggie's Place on Queen Street East via this article on Saturday! New owner Randy Lapossie (in his first business venture of this kind) was interviewed for the article, where he talked about his memories of Reggie's, why he bought the tavern, and what is and isn't changing there. The article didn't elaborate on the initial closure last fall, but the fire and break-ins were acknowledged among it's "troubled story of late". Reggie's Place re-opens on September 1st, and country rock cover quartet Bone Yard will be the first band to play there over the September 11th-12th weekend.

 
That's all for today, but stay tuned for more news and notes on the site shortly! Thanks everyone!

More Solo Performance Videos From Local Guitarists!!

We're back with even more videos on the SMS today, and we're picking things up with Tym Morrison's fourth live-streamed concert, though this one is not on Twitch. Rather, this 2 hour set was streamed directly on his YouTube channel last night, so if you were hoping to see his acoustic home concerts on a more familiar and accessible platform, this should be preferable. Also, there's no 13+ minute wait at the start of the video for things to actually begin, and I can link individual songs by title, so this is easier all around! In order, Tym begins by covering Amanda Marshall's "Trust Me (This Is Love)", Bryan Adams' "Everything I Do (I Do It For You)", Imagine Dragons' "Radioactive", and Roxette's "It Must Have Been Love", before briefly pausing to adjust a side door due to the heat. When he returns, Tym tackles Coolio's "Gangsta's Paradise", Supertramp's "Breakfast In America", Jim Croce's "Time In A Bottle", Yes' "Owner Of A Lonely Heart", Cheap Trick's "The Flame", ...

...his own Spanish guitar instrumental, Phil Collins' "One More Night", Radiohead's "Karma Police", 10cc's "I'm Not In Love", Tom Petty's "Yer So Bad", A-ha's "Take On Me", Journey's "Lights", Oasis' "Wonderwall", The Romantics' "Talking In Your Sleep", Ed Sheeran's "Thinking Out Loud", Supertramp's "The Logical Song", Tears For Fears' "Mad World", The Beatles' "Here Comes The Sun" & "Blackbird", Amanda Marshall's "Dark Horse", and another solo instrumental, before closing with the first half of Metallica's "Fade To Black". As usual, Tym's guitar and singing abilities are on point and as consistent as ever, especially given the warmth in the room last night! That said, I can't blame you if you got deja vu watching this, as he was using the lyric book from his first two Twitch live-streams. Only four covers were making their series debut last night, and he did every cover from the second live-stream again except "Lady In Red" and "(I Just) Died in Your Arms".

The repetition may not be to some viewers' liking, but this video is way easier to watch and share, so that may counteract things if you don't like Twitch. Give Tym's fourth live-stream concert a watch below, head straight to individual songs above, and look for the likely next installment on Thursday!



We'll close today with some solo performance videos from guitarists we haven't seen on a local stage in quite some time, starting with former Brain Tuel guitarist Zach Reid, who has posted three solo covers onto his YouTube channel in the past year and a half! Since Brain Tuel fell inactive in 2009, Zach has moved out of town, and fans of his old alt-punk band may be surprised to see the trajectory of these solo cover videos. One's a vocal/guitar cover of Bright Eyes' "First Day Of My Life", which will be the relative closest in tone for Brain Tuel fans, but the other two are classical guitar renditions, including Claude Gagnon's "Les Blues Des Grenouilles" and as embedded below, Agustin Barrios' "Julia Florida". These cover videos are largely spare and intricate, but Zach's growth and maturity as a musician is on full display with these three performances, though fans of his old local band work may be surprised upon listening. Give Zach's solo performance videos a watch above & below!



Finally, here's the first new solo performance video on former Ashes To Dust guitarist Alex Hemy's YouTube channel in over a year! Sadly, Alex has deleted all of his prior videos from his channel, leaving just this new rendition of "Driving Rain" by Slash featuring Myles Kennedy & The Conspirators. That said, it's nice to see him tackle a heavier song than we were tending to see from him in the mid-late 2010s! Alex is playing guitar only alongside the original song, and his skill level s still solid, so old local fans of his will be at home here! That said, why is the alternate camera angle only used in the last 30 seconds? Give this a watch (while you can) below!



That's all for today, but stay tuned for more videos and updates on the site soon! Thanks everyone!

LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS (The Wyld Stallyns & Soundcheck) And Weekend Concert Previews!!

It's time to dive into another weekend of concert previews at the SMS, and barring any late notice confirmations, I think we have all of this weekend's hard rock shows covered here, along with a new video and possible lineup changes for a band scheduled for this weekend. Here's what you should know, starting with LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS, some on SHORT NOTICE!

Local classic/hard rock cover quartet Soundcheck will return to Reggie's West for concerts TOMORROW & SATURDAY NIGHT! Apologies for the short notice, I should have added these to our concert calendar before now, as they are part of the band's 2019 concert calendar on your right. Now that we have 2020 shows listed on the SMS, let's add their other announced 2019 shows from there to our calendar today, as Terry, Travis, Paul, and Glen will also rock The Reggievelt on December 13th & 14th (following a private gig the previous Saturday), before ending the year(?) at The Esquire Club on December 27th & 28th. Of course, there are more shows than this to come from Soundcheck (Toystock comes to mind), but help beat some of the early winter blues TOMORROW & SATURDAY at the former Rosie! All of these shows have 10:00 PM-ish start times, 19+ age limits, and no cover charges. Visit the above links for more details, and here's Soundcheck live!

Next up, local acoustic hard rock trio The Wyld Stallyns will provide the musical entertainment THIS SATURDAY NIGHT during The Whiskey Barrel's 1 year anniversary celebration! Again, apologies for the short notice, this event was only announced via the venue's Facebook page this past Saturday, and the band proper has not acknowledged their involvement on their own Facebook page at press time. Yes, the Gore Street restaurant, nightclub, and acoustic venue has already been open for one year, and SATURDAY'S festivities will be a way to celebrate the milestone, with The Whiskey Barrel's ownership mingling with fans and patrons all night, and hopefully there's a great turnout for all of that alone! Of course, most of The Wyld Stallyns' 2019 concerts have been here, so they are a great choice to rock out for the occasion on SATURDAY! The Stallyns will be on at 8:00 PM, I'd expect a 19+ age limit, and there will be no cover charge. Visit the above links for more details, congratulations to everyone at The Whiskey Barrel on the anniversary, and here's The Wyld Stallyns live there!



Moving to previously announced concerts, let's take a brief detour over to Sault Michigan, where local hard rock band Tarnished are advertised to continue their regular "every Thursday" run of acoustic matinee concerts going TODAY at Biggby Coffee! It is worth noting that, in Biggby Coffee's latest advertising of this arrangement on their Facebook page, they said that "every Thursday, Alex Traynor from Tarnished plays right here", implying that Josh Fair is no longer joining Alex regularly for these gigs. For what it's worth, Josh wasn't visibly featured in this series as early as October 24th, while in a Facebook page post teasing Tarnished's upcoming Mount Pleasant shows next week, Josh wasn't tagged along with the band members, yet ex-Lift The Broken guitarist Nathan Webber was. Has there been a quiet lineup change? We will let you know if anything is 100% confirmed wither way, but hopefully nothing bad happened with Josh, he is a talented guitarist in his own right!

As usual, today's Biggby Coffee matinee is at 12:00 PM with no cover or age limit. Visit the above links for more from Alex/Tarnished, and for a preview, here's Alex live at the Ashmun Street coffee house last month!



Finally for today, let's tackle the latest acoustic concerts from Sault Ontario hard rock singer/guitarist Tym Morrison, who will return to Gliss Restaurant TOMORROW & SATURDAY for another pair of matinee gigs in his long-term arrangement there! Note that his planned Thomson Farms Cider & Winery concert today has been cancelled, despite still being advertised on his Facebook group. Tym's personal Facebook page confirmed that, and the mill's Facebook page was calling last week's unplugged shows "one last barn party", but no word on if the November 14th gig was cancelled or an erroneous listing. That said, fans have a warm, fully indoor location to see Tym at downtown this weekend, so if you want some unplugged hard rock covers at supper time, you know where to be! Both Gliss shows are 6:00 PM affairs with no cover charges or age limits, but mind the locale. Visit the official Facebook event page for more details, and for a preview, here's a brand new video of Tym in action at Thomson Farms!

Filmed at an undated Wine Barn show last month, this is a cover of A Great Big World's "Say Something", which is a surprisingly modern cover in his repertoire. The 24 second video is well recorded, but the square dimensions and flickery lighting won't be to everyone's preference. Give it a look below, and don't miss Tym at Gliss this weekend!



That's all for today, but stay tuned for more news and updates on the site soon! Thanks everyone!