Ace Frehley, Vaegon, and Pridefest Loud & Proud Concert Previews!!

Alright, it's time to finally conclude our previews of this weekend's hard rock, metal, and punk concerts in the Twin Saults and surrounding area! Thanks to Rotaryfest, this weekend is always super busy, but there's a huge show in Michigan's E.U.P. to look at in this post, along with two special Sunday concerts north of the border, so here's what you should know for this weekend's uncovered heavier concerts!

We'll pick things back up with the main event in the Eastern Upper Peninsula this weekend, as the '80s Rock Invasion descends on St. Ignace TOMORROW NIGHT outside of their Kewadin Casino! If you love hair and glam metal, you will definitely want to make the hour's drive south for this huge outdoor concert, headlined by original Kiss guitarist Ace Frehley in his first local date since rocking Sault Michigan way back in 2009. Fans will surely get a full set's worth of Kiss classics and Ace solo hits like "New York Groove" and "Shock Me" tomorrow, so if you're in the Kiss Army, brace yourselves! Also playing up here for the first time since 2009 is Los Angeles hair metal band Great White (the version seen in St. Ignace in 2017 was the now-defunct splinter version led by ex-singer Jack Russell). Guitarist Mark Kendall and most of their classic lineup are keeping the Great White train rolling!

With hits like "Once Bitten, Twice Shy" and "The Angel Song", don't miss their return! Las Vegas glam metal quartet Slaughter will also make their local return in their (at least) fourth concert in our area, last seen here via an indoor headlining date at the St. Ignace Kewadin in 2019. Mark and crew still have the goods, so look for hits like "Fly To The Angels" and "Spend My Life" tomorrow evening! Classic-era Guns N' Roses drummer Steven Adler and his solo band will make their local debut tomorrow with a set full of GNR hits from his run in the band, so fans will want to see his talented band bring those songs to life tomorrow as well! Opening are all-female Minnesota hair metal band Vixen (of "Edge Of A Broken Heart" fame), who notably switched out singer Lorraine Lewis for former Headpins/Trans-Siberian Orchestra vocalist Rosa Laricchiuta after this concert was announced.

Rosa has a very strong voice (as fans of La Voix know), so don't be late! Also, Steven Adler's band starred in the third and final Friday shoutout video on Kewadin's Facebook page to promote this concert, which notably has all of his band members trading off for the plugs. Results are inconsistent, but it's neat to see everyone involved! No shoutout videos from Ace or Vixen that I am aware of though. This all ages concert takes place tomorrow night at 6:00 PM, and tickets remain on sale at this link, at the in-person box office, or at 1-800-KEWADIN. Tickets are still on sale in rows 13-15 ($95), rows 16-30 ($85), and in the general admission lawn area ($65). Weather-wise, 9&10 News is currently calling for partly cloudy conditions at 68-76° Fahrenheit tomorrow night with partly cloudy skies, so the bands should beat the potential rain forecast for much of tomorrow afternoon (that's new information in the forecast for you Rotaryfest-goers).

Incidentally, the St. Ignace Kewadin will also welcome Sault Ste. Marie classic metal/hard rock band Tarnished to The Northern Pines Lounge tomorrow night at 9:00 PM, so if you wanna keep the Hair Scare going after Ace's set ends, head inside the casino! Still surprised that they didn't have Tarnished as local openers for the big concert when they'll already be there tomorrow. If you love hair metal, St. Ignace is absolutely the place to be tomorrow night, so visit the above links for more on this stacked lineup of bands, and for a preview, here's Ace Frehley in the Soo last time out!

Next up, let's head north to Sault Ontario for two big concerts taking place on SUNDAY, starting with this year's Loud & Proud family fun day as part of day #1 of this year's Sault Pridefest! This annual (pandemic aside) event moves from the Bushplane Museum to the Roberta Bondar Pavilion for an afternoon of family friendly entertainment, including vendors, kids games and activities, refreshments, and much more! Unfortunately, advertising for Loud & Proud's band lineup has never been consistent, as they often don't even mention the scheduled musicians on social media, this year included, but this year will feature three musical acts alongside unspecified drag performers. The acts in question are headlining local party metal trio The Apocalypse Afterparty (who only confirmed their involvement on personal Facebook accounts), singer/guitarist Gimiiwan Ikwe, and the previously confirmed hard rock quintet HeadFirst opening. Thanks to Mikhal Muto from The A.A. for filling in the blanks!

Notably, this will be day #2 of HeadFirst's early release of physical copies of their debut EP "Head Trauma", so if you didn't buy one tomorrow at Rotaryfest for $15, here's your second chance before the wide release next week! Loud & Proud is FREE & ALL AGES, and runs Sunday afternoon from 1:00-4:00 PM. The current weather forecast calls for partly cloudy weather with a high of 23° and no chance of rain, tent acknowledged. If you want to celebrate Sault Pridefest and LGBTQ+ awareness with some entertaining live bands, head down to the Pavilion on Sunday for all of the fun! Visit the above links for more details, and here's The Apocalypse Afterparty live!

Finally, this very busy Rotaryfest concert weekend ends with an extreme bang at Jay's Piston Broke Pub on SUNDAY NIGHT, as they basically revert to The Roosevelt Hotel for the night to host touring technical death metal bands from out west! In their local debuts, metalheads can enjoy Edmonton's Vaegon and Vancouver's Exterminatus on Sunday, and both are sufficiently brutal in their own ways, and your faces will melt if the summer humidity didn't do that already! Do check out both Vaegon and Exterminatus' original groove-inflected material on major streaming services, they'll be a good antidote if you've been wondering why the Soo hasn't had a lot of death or extreme metal bands in the 2020s so far (promoter availability, venue closures, local bands' own evolution, and the pandemic all helped in that). Local openers on Sunday are young local metal trio The BAG in their first show in three months before heading to Leeburn next week.

The guys have been busy in studio as of late, and released a teaser of their new original song "Suckatit" (no spaces) as a "Reel" on their Facebook group yesterday. I can't embed "Reels" here, but the clip is at least framed in post-production to fit the vertical dimensions. Ripping speed metal number in this jam session phase, and the dog definitely seems to be into it, so check it out above! Admission is $10 at the former Rosie on Sunday, this is a 19+ event, and it starts at 8:00 PM. Work/school night or not, definitely consider coming out to this show if you want to encourage Jay's/The BAG to bring more touring metal bands here! Visit the official Facebook event page for more details, and here's Vaegon live!

I believe that is now officially all for the Rotaryfest weekend metal, hard rock, and punk concert previews! We'll be back at it this weekend with more news and notes in all likelihood, so look for much more news and notes on the SMS in the coming days! Thanks everyone!

LOCAL CONCERT ALERT (Vaegon), New Videos, And More Recent Updates!!

Before we begin today's post, I wanted to apologize for missing local classic/hard rock cover quartet Generations' one-nighter at The Water Tower Pub this past Saturday for coverage on the site. While the venue never plugged the show on social media, drummer Tony Santoro plugged it thrice on their Facebook group between June 5th and that afternoon, all of which passed me by at the time. I apologize again and will do better to keep tabs on their updates, but hopefully it was a big hit, and don't miss Generations at Rotaryfest next month, especially with the schedule coming out this week! Now, here's a LOCAL CONCERT ALERT, new videos, and much more from Sault Ontario in the last while!

Remember the era of Roosevelt Hotel metal nights in the early 2010s? Well, we're getting a return to the good old days on Sunday, July 21st, as the former Rosie (now known as Jay's Piston Broke Pub) will host touring extreme metal bands that night! Both making their local concert debut, the bands in question are technical death metal bands from western Canada, including Edmonton quartet Vaegon as the headliners alongside Vancouver quintet Exterminatus, who are touring Canada on the Particle Eclipse Canada Tour (named for Vaegon's newest EP). It's not hyperbole when I say that this will be the heaviest show to take place at Jay's/Reggie's West since The Rosie was sold in 2014, and between Vaegon's intense original material and Exterminatus' Cannibal Corpse-reminiscent sound, both containing groove metal elements, extreme metal fans should be right at home at 306 Korah Road next month, especially on Rotaryfest weekend!

Local support will come by way of young metal trio The BAG in their first announced show in three months, and if Facebook comment replies are to be believed, they were key in getting this show booked. Not an extreme metal band, but Spencer, Austin, and Bradley will set the tone well! This 8:00 PM and 19+ concert has $10 tickets, presumably available at Jay's and through BAG members. Visit the official Facebook event page for more details on the brutality hitting Jay's next month, so metalheads can party like it's 2011 or so all over again!

Next up, here's the latest from local hard rock trio Bullet Train, who posted their newest at-home demo single to their YouTube channel two weeks ago! After a few weeks of teasers hinting at new material, they delivered with "Profit", which also has a music/lyric video giving us our first look at real (if monochrome) video footage of Cory, Bones, and Anthony on camera performing in this project! AI imagery also alternates with the performance clips, and sticking close to their past songs/videos, this one is very much focused on current issues, specifically the belief that it's more profitable for pharmaceutical companies to medicate illnesses than cure them. I am not qualified to comment on stuff like this, so I'll leave that to people who are, but fans of Cory's old bands like Sense of Truth will like the chugging riffs and melodic vocals on display, though I'll leave any analysis of the lyrics for others. Check out "Profit" for yourselves below!

Also, here's the latest from local hard rock quintet HeadFirst, who return to the stage at Go Skateboarding Day on Friday, but this is very different. As you may recall, Shooters Downstairs Lounge hosted their first annual karaoke talent quest competition last summer, where ex-Re:Born singer Elly McWatters won the $1,000 first prize and a trip to Las Vegas. We don't actively cover 100% karaoke events here, but I did note last year that local classic/hard rock cover quartet Soundcheck had signed on as the judges for the event's duration. This year, Shooters have changed things up by enlisting rotating guest judges, and for night #1 on June 9th, the judges were most of HeadFirst! Everyone except guitarist Liam Dinsmore and drummer Anthony Boudreau headed to the Dennis Street nightclub to judge the competition, and they actually filmed the MC's introduction and the first singer for their Facebook page!

Again, I don't cover karaoke-only events here, but as HeadFirst filmed this and are featured on camera, I thought I'd at least acknowledge it. The video features singer Vix Vikken covering My Chemical Romance's "I Don't Love You", and while Vix didn't advance to the top 25 on their first shot, paid registrants can keep auditioning until the top 25 is filled out, so there is still time for Vix to match their top 12 run under a different name last year. Emo and pop punk fans will like the strong vocal cover here, so check the video at this link! I can't embed it here, as Facebook content matched the "I Don't Love You" backing track.

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

 

• Sporadically-heard-from local metal band Chronic Demonic made their first post about real band activity since 2022 on their Facebook page on May 31st, where guitarist Kevin Powe (ex-Fitswitch) revealed that he's "jammin' with my unnamed 3rd project" that also includes drummer Jonathan Harvey (ex-Gates of Winter), and he floated the idea of playing a joint show with all three of his bands. He didn't give the identity of the second band, but it could be the inactive Frightlight, who dropped out of a planned reunion set at the Northern Vibe Festival last year. It'd be great to see Chronic Demonic finally play a full concert, but visit the above links for more info!
• After seeing their album "Deconstructed" nominated for Outstanding Engineer (Dustin Goodall) at this year's Northern Ontario Film & Music Awards, local alt-hard rock quintet Handsome Sandwich will hit the road for Sudbury next Friday to play at that night's Soiree d'Ambiance Artist Showcase at Le Studio Desjardins, one of multiple Northern Ontario showcase concerts taking place that weekend around the awards ceremony. Handsome Sandwich and North Bay punk band Peach Pact will be opening for Thunder Bay folk rockers The Honest Heart Collective that night. Best of luck to Handsome Sandwich and Dustin next weekend!
  
• Local metal concert promotion agency Heavy North Entertainment has relaunched after a six year hiatus! Ran by former Them frontman Tyler St. Amour, the company has been plugging events from other promoters in recent months, but confirmed on their Facebook page earlier this month that they are booking events for this year and next year, and are "pleased to be working" the It's The Pits Festival from Piecing It Together Shows in Leeburn this weekend. I don't know to what end Tyler is involved in It's The Pits, as it's not metal-centric like in H.N.E.'s early-mid 2010s heyday, but it's great to see him back promoting concerts in the Sault area!

 

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