Telephone & Address Concert Preview, SweetKenny Album Updates, Rotaryfest Notes, And More!!

With a special Wednesday night concert taking place TONIGHT, I threw a second post together today before we dive into weekend concert previews, so what's on tap? Some assorted recent notes, a few finds and notes relating to the newly released Rotaryfest schedule, and a new album release, but let's kick things off with that mid-week concert preview!

Local acoustic punk/grunge solo project Telephone & Address will return to The Gore Street Cafe TONIGHT as openers for Calgary indie/jazz rock quartet Fox Who Slept The Day Away to close the venue's Fortnight Festival! The Chris Shoust-led local solo act should be in good form with plenty of new and recent originals during this show, with Fox Who Slept The Day Away's soft, psychedelic originals sure to attract a good audience at the laundromat themselves, so give them a listen to see what you think also! This is the closing event for The Gore Street Cafe's Fortnight Festival, a two week sequel of sorts to the early-2016 Fishbowl Festival there, and with this being the only event this time around with a punk or hard rock act, it's great to see one just before the bell! Unless you already have a $25 pass for all Fortnight Festival events, admission is $5 at the door for tonight's ALL AGES event, which will start at 7:00 PM. Check the official Facebook event page & the above links for more details, and here's Telephone & Address live!

Next up, here's the latest from Dafter, Michigan solo hard rock musician Ken "SweetKenny" Sutton, who quietly released his 19th solo album "Gator's Bayou" onto his Bandcamp page on Monday! For the sixth time in his last seven studio album postings, "Gator's Bayou" is yet another instrumental album intended for use as a score in film, TV, or video games, which he says was inspired by 1960s and 1970s adventure films and cartoons. As well, his December 2015 compilation album "Comic Book!" is now available to the general public after previously being exclusive to paid yearly supporters on his Bandcamp page. It features 14 songs from prior SweetKenny albums, plus one exclusive original song ("Myra The Hunter") that isn't on any other release of his. Both are available for $7 via the above links, but can you expect a review of either on the site soon? For the latter, no, as precedence goes to original studio albums

For the former, we're leaning towards April's non-score album "In Your Face" for a review next, which could be as soon as next month, and assuming he continues releasing new albums at his fervent pace, we may only get to "Gator's Bayou" if "In Your Face" is delayed so far where it's not "new" anymore. In any event, check out SweetKenny's newest solo albums above for more of his prolific & varied hard rock originals and scores!

Also, I received my copy of Rotaryfest's program in the mail today (it's not online yet), and there's a few things to take away from it's Stage 1 & Stage 2 schedules that weren't previously online, so what should you know from the Sault Ontario summer festival? Thanks to the inclusion of pictures with most bands in the schedule, we can put faces to some of the newer and online pageless bands (like Jukebox Deluxe), but the most revealing picture of all may be the apparent album cover for Second Stage performers Gnaeus' upcoming debut CD "Meditations"! Though tiny and monochrome (I have a feeling the official cover is in colour), this confirms that the post-punk quartet completely discarded the original "Loomings" cover when they changed the album's name. Nice to see, so stay tuned for more on "Meditations" when announced! The program also confirms that Shaun Antler and Chelsie Parayko are back as the Stage 1 and Stage 2 directors respectively, and for what it's worth, the program makes no reference to the ongoing Stage 2 crowdfunding campaign.

And lastly, I've made the tough decision to stop classifying online pageless classic rock quartet RPM as a hard rock band in our primary SMS coverage. We had covered them as hard rock since their original Rock For Dimes set in 2013 based on reports at the time, but nothing I've seen since credits or describes them in our primary genre ranges (the program lists them as covering classic rock, blues, country, and top 40 pop.) That said, they're a talented band with a fan friendly sound, and be sure to check out Marcel, Dino, Ben, and Rob at Rotaryfest on July 16th at 3:00 PM!

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

• We have changed the link for local music/arts podcast 7L in our "Other Local Metal Links" from it's Soundcloud page to it's Facebook page, as the former is down or deleted. A reason hasn't been announced, but if 7L is done, it's a sudden move, as they had just posted a song by RedD Monkey alum Pete Mozarowski onto Soundcloud two weeks ago. For what it's worth, technical difficulties relating to broken equipment had kept full new episodes from going online since April. Hopefully 7L comes back, as Jordan and Teddy had a great thing going!
• This doesn't bear directly on the local metal scene, but it's worth noting: Former Gates of Winter bandmates Bryan Belleau and Brian Holmes will reunite on stage for the first time since (I believe) 2008 when Bryan and his wife, Fort Nelson, B.C. contemporary singer Melinda play an unplugged show at LopLops Lounge on July 30th, with Brian's local progressive rock band Machines Dream opening! Could there be an on-stage reunion between the two that night? Be there to find out, and click here for full details!
• Remember how we deleted defunct local music store Mister Disc from our "Other Local Metal Links" due to the deletion of it's Facebook page? Well, as it turns out, the Todd Gordon-owned store always had a Facebook group too serving very much the same purposes, including daily song dedications, so they are back with the "new" link! While I'm still not sure why the page was deleted, I apologize for not knowing about the Facebook group before!

That's all for today, but now stay tuned for weekend concert previews next! Thanks everyone!

The End Of Bring The Fallen & Much More News!!

Hey guys, here's one more post before we (likely) post our latest CD review, which I have penciled in for later tonight! In this post, we have lots of assorted stories, including a lineup change at an upcoming concert, a new page for an old CD store in Sault Ontario, news from Abstract, and some new audio material from a pair of solo artists named Mike. First though, here's some disappointing news concerning one prominent local band.

Sault Ontario death metal quintet Bring The Fallen have officially disbanded. Frontman Josh Stephney announced this on his personal Facebook page yesterday afternoon, and just in case there was another side to the story, I confirmed the news with guitarist Dan Souliere via e-mail. He basically told me that the band's members are going to focus on personal matters that have made it difficult to devote time to the band, though some members do have some musical plans for the future. This sort of confirms rumours we've heard over the past few months that Bring The Fallen were close to disbanding, which coincided with some notable concert drop-outs during that span. What this means for their still-unreleased debut EP isn't known, but a release for it seems very unlikely now. This is very unfortunate news, especially given their talent and local success! Since their debut as The Undead Warriors in the spring of 2009, Bring The Fallen have had a lot of notable successes, including three Battle of the Bands victories out of four attempts through last spring, and playing a number of high profile concerts over the past two years! I consider them one of the bands that kick-started our growing death metal scene, and when they were on their game, with the full band present, they were hard to beat!

Be they The Undead (Brown Pelican) Warriors, Necropolis, Silent Plague, or Bring The Fallen, these guys gave us some great death metal over the past two years, and I'm not alone in saying they'll be missed! I'd hoped they'd stay together, especially after their successful Rosie show on April 14th, but maybe this will be the best option for the time being. Best of luck to Josh, Dan, Andrew, Nolan, and Travis in the future, and here's hoping they get back into the scene soon!

Well, that's a downer, but how about some good news to turn things around? This might work! There's been a band change for THIS THURSDAY'S Roosevelt Hotel metal night, so here's what you need to know. Local classic metal quartet Late & Loud have replaced State of Misery on the lineup for this Thursday's metal night, in what will be their first ever concert at The Rosie! A reason for the switch hasn't been given, but don't worry, State of Misery will be back out there the very next night at The Oddfellows Hall for the Dead & Divine show! For Late & Loud, this will not only be their first Rosie concert, but this will be their first Dismembertainment show of any kind, and it's actually their last concert until the summer, as drummer Josh Hatherly confirmed with me that the band's taking a two month break after this show. Nice to see them back out there, they were very good at The Sewer Swampstravaganja! Also, you may notice a few firsts at the metal night on Thursday besides Late & Loud's presence, as it will mark both Sativa Rose's first Rosie concert of 2011, and the first 19+ show for Changing Waves' current lineup! So head out to The Roosevelt Hotel for a different taste of metal this Thursday, and click here for more details!

Thirdly, here's some new solo songs from a pair of Sault Ontario solo guitarists named Mike! One is from Mike Cliffe, and it's his new song "Ruthfull Aggression"! This was honestly inspired by a comment I made about his last song "Goth-O-Funk" not having "ruthless aggression", though with a name alteration for it's sound. Interesting track, it has some circus-sounding riffs to start, some heavy atmospheric work, and some well performed "ruthfull aggression"! Mike continues to show his talents on this song, so visit his Reverbnation page to hear that and more of his solo material! The other solo Mike with a new song is Bear Hunters/Skull After Betrayal guitarist Mike Vincent, who uploaded a new solo song amusingly titled "Peanut Butter & Jam Sandwich" onto his Reverbnation page as well! It's a slower, but heavy song, but it does get very repetitive. The drums are luckily not as much of a detraction as they were on "Cheese", and the song, if expanded on, could be a great base for a fuller track! Mike should diversifiy it a bit so lessen it's repetition, but it's an improvement! Check the above links for more on both Mike Cliffe & Vincent's solo projects!

Fourthly, here's the latest news from Sault Michigan hard rock quartet Abstract, who've made some big waves in recent months, especially given their young ages! One update is that the band have launched an official website! Started earlier this month, it features some basic band information, a bunch of photos, and some assorted other stuff. It's not too full yet, but give it a look at this location! As well, six photos of the band from a recent talent show at Soo Middle School on March 25th were posted by Mike McKee onto The Soo Evening News' website at this location, so give them a look! Nice to see some newspaper coverage for an event like this, and my apologies for missing it! Abstract actually took 1st place at this show, so congratulations to them! Check the above links to give the photos a look, and the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 7th, 8th, and 13th photos are from their set. Is it odd that the sound guy is BEHIND the band when they're playing? For more, check out their official Facebook page, and stay tuned for updates on Abstract as I hear them!

Finally, do you guys remember when Sault Ste. Marie had a number of music stores? (albums, not instruments.) Now, we just have HMV and The Rad Zone, but we used to have a lot more than that, and one such CD store now has a posthumous Facebook page! So, who out there remembers Mister Disc? In operation from October 1988 to July 1999, this Great Northern Road record store was owned by Saultite Todd Gordon, who's since carved out a career as (believe it or not) a screenwriter in the Boston area! But for over a decade, Todd ran Mister Disc, a fondly remembered music store which is now on Facebook! Photos from the interior and exterior of the store are included, and they show off some cool posters, music selections, and even some innovations that later music stores hadn't adopted yet! Mister Disc was before my time in a respect, as it closed when I was 10 years old, so I was too young to really be into the music scene as I am now, but I do recall this store from my childhood. It looks like it was a great store, I wish I was my age now in the 1990s to enjoy this store at it's peak! I'm not the person to sing it's praises and talk about it though, check the Facebook page to look back at the good old days when music stores weren't as endangered as they're becoming!

That's all for now, but stay tuned for our review of Clownsack's newest EP "Funny Farm" later today! Thanks everyone!