LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS (Kaonashi & The Apocalypse Afterparty) And Pillory Updates!!

Let's dive into some more news and notes on this Tuesday night, including two LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS for next month and a new concert recording and related notes, so here's what you should know!

A memorial concert for avid local music fan (and my ex-girlfriend) Victoria Childs will be held on Saturday, October 4th at Soo Blaster! Taking place roughly a month after her sudden passing at just 34 years of age, this concert (titled Riffs For Remembrance: A Memorial For Tori) will feature a very diverse mixed-genre lineup, with proceeds being donated to mental health charities. The event is being organized by Paul & Amanda Stanghetta of party metal trio The Apocalypse Afterparty, who were friends of Victoria's, so all the kudos in the world to them for taking the initiative to honour her, and in lieu of the now-closed Oddfellows Hall, Soo Blaster is a perfect place to host this show! The Apocalypse Afterparty (whose second bassist Mikhal Muto is a cousin of Victoria's) are your advertised headliners, but things shift wildly for the rest of the lineup, including veteran local country musician Leslie Cook.

Folk singer/guitarists Linsaey L.W. (who I've never heard of before this show was announced) and Gimiiwan Ikwe are also on board, with one more act to be announced. While Victoria was a punk fan first and foremost, she had wide ranging music tastes, and she would be very appreciative of all of the local musicians coming together in her honour next Saturday! This all ages concert has doors opening at 7:30 PM and admission is $5. There was no funeral for Victoria, so if you want to come out in her memory, do so next weekend, as she is very much missed by her family and friends, and it should be a fun night of local music! Visit the official Facebook event page for more on Riffs For Remembrance!

Next up, it'll be another Rosie metal night revival on Wednesday, October 29th at Jay's Piston Broke Pub, when Philadelphia hardcore quartet Kaonashi make their local debut! With a name meaning "faceless" in Japanese, Kaonashi bring a progressive and djent-laden original attack to their live shows, plus distinct vocals and a crushing overall sound that should pique many a local metalhead's interest next month! Calgary hardcore band Abrupt Decay (not "Abrubt Decay") are supporting Kaonashi on their I Wanna Go To Canada 2025 Tour, and their intense grind/math-influenced brutality will be a solid compliment on this night! Also joining the fray is Montreal post-hardcore trio Paresis, whose sparer and more screamo/alt-influenced sound will add an intriguing wrinkle to this pre-Halloween concert! Local support will come by way of local death/thrash metal trio Pillory, no strangers to opening for touring extreme metal bands this year.

A presentation of Thunder Bay-based Piss Hard Promotions, this 19+ concert has an advertised 8:00 PM start time, and admission will be $25, though I don't know if there will be advance sales of some kind or if that will be the door charge. Despite being on a work/school night, hopefully there's a strong turnout of metalheads for all of this brutal original metal action next month, so visit the official Facebook event page for more details!

Speaking of Pillory, here's a new live recording of them in concert, albeit audio only! This comes from their set at the Insurrection/Beguiler show at Soo Blaster on July 30th (which they actually closed), and drummer Bret Shuttleworth had a camera rolling, but due to sub-optimal camera placement, he opted to upload it as just an audio recording, though three songs from their set were filmed by Christopher Paci for his YouTube channel. Their first show with former Crimson Crusade frontman Devon Lucier on bass (since 2014), Bret only uploaded the first 22 minutes of their set, as technical issues relating to camera space and file size led to their closing songs ("Sculptor of Cadavers", "Exhaustive Incarnation", Sepultura's "Territory", and Black Sabbath's "Into the Void") not making the cut. As luck would have it, one of Chris' videos is of "Into The Void", so click here to give it a watch, but what is in Bret's audio recording from the night?

Their set began with their intro "End Of Small Sanctuary" (which is actually a cover from the Silent Hill 3 soundtrack), "Specimen Of Egotism", "Abhorred Apprension", "The Angst Of Existence", "The Passing", and "The Curse Of Eternal Sickness". It's worth noting that frontman Robert Sartini confirmed after "The Passing" that "all these songs (that) we've played for you tonight are off of our upcoming first full-length album", giving the album's title as "Old Stone", as far as I could tell. He said that they are looking to "have it out in October", and they hope to have a date for a CD release party soon, though I don't believe the Kaonashi show will be that. Good to get some more confirmation of the album plans, which they hasn't been super forthcoming about on social media beyond brief mentions, so stay tuned for updates as October draws nearer! As for the concert recording proper, fans will be right at home with the brutality here!

Whether you saw Chris' videos from July 30th or not, the guys are at their technical death metal best here, with Devon fitting back in well on the low end, though the audio recording quality isn't pristine. Good stuff for extreme metalheads regardless, so check out (most of) Pillory's Soo Blaster set from July 30th below, and stay tuned for album updates! 

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

Woods Of Ypres Videos & Updates From Their Current Tour!!

Its time to update you Woods of Ypres fans with another post all about our local blackened doom quartet! As their North American "Pain & Piss" continues, I thought it was fitting to devote this post to updates from said tour, including their latest tour vlogs & blogs, a new concert video, and come concert reviews & photos! With that said, let's begin today's post!

Woods of Ypres' two most recent tour vlogs are now online at frontman David Gold's YouTube channel, so here's what you should know! Part 2 details their run through the American midwest, including their pre-drive rehearsal in Philadelphia (the Madden brothers' hometown), the "convenient" site of their dinner/band meeting, some nice highway drive footage, the trials of filling their flat tire on the way to Detroit, the interesting basement of their Chicago venue, an opening band from the under-attended Des Moines, Iowa concert playing an "unexpected" instrument, and the wait to actually see it in action! This second part of the vlog has NO Woods of Ypres concert footage though, so keep that in mind, but it's entertaining (especially the end!) If you want new videos of Woods of Ypres on stage, that's what Part 3 starts with, so hopefully that works! This part also includes some highway footage, the incredible rain in Illinois, an opening band from the Des Moines show playing a song with "odd" lyrics, and some insight into the turnout for that show. Part 2 has more entertaining tour happenings, but Part 3 has more concert footage, so make note of what each one has, but both are worth your time! Check the above links for more, and Part 3, but here's Part 2 of the tour vlog!



Also for new videos is a new clip of the band performing a song, but not all from one show! This is of Woods of Ypres playing their "Woods I" original "The Sea Of Immeasurable Loss", which was absent from their setlists in the "Woods IV" release tour, but is back where it belongs now! The catch here is that they cull the footage from multiple sources, including their concerts in Delaware, New York, and Massachusetts, and the piano performance of the song that Joel Violette played from the first part of this tour vlog! I find the piano clips slow everything down a bit, especially when they're not live on stage, but it's still a quality video that has the band in top form on all three of the included concerts! Check the video out below for some classic Woods of Ypres!



Now onto the print and photo side of things from the tour, and first, remember when bassist Shane Madden had a tour diary on Decibel Magazine's website for their summer tour last year? He's back at it with what's now termed a "tour blog" for this tour, only now on the amusing metal news site Metal Sucks! In what he terms as "The Manifesto", part 1 of his tour blog details the first chunk of the "Pain & Piss" tour, including the long drives, assorted tour happenings and quotes, and more! It's oddly written compared to his diary on Decibel Magazine's site, but it's thoughtfully written at the same time, so give it a look at this location! Also, a review of the band's concert in Worcester, Massachusetts is now online on the metal website Metal Storm, so click here to check it out! Their set only gets brief comments, but it's called "solid" with "discordant yet pleasing" combos, and the reviewer seemed to enjoy them! Also check the review out for remarks on the other bands, including headliners November's Doom!

We'll close with new photos from their shows, and actually, there's 7 photos of Woods of Ypres (well, 3/4s of them) at the Metal Storm review linked above, so check them out! Nice quality, though they are all black and white, and drummer Evan Madden's not included in the photos. Good shots though! If you're craving colour photos, or pictures with Evan visible, I have you covered, as 130 PHOTOS from the Worcester show are now visible at this location! Taken for the metal website Return To The Pit, these photos are great as well, and there's plenty of each band member at many angles, so check them out! That's about all for today, but stay tuned for my review of TONIGHT'S Roosevelt Hotel metal night, and I will see you guys there very soon! Thanks everyone!

Woods Of Ypres Videos, Interviews, And Tour Dates!!

Finally, here's that Woods of Ypres-centric post I've been hyping! I'll probably have another like this soon too, but this has some of the best of the recent news, including a new live concert video, some new band interviews, upcoming tour dates, and first, their latest tour vlog, so here's what you need to know!

Yes, we're starting with the local blackened doom quartet's latest tour vlog, which was so long, it's in four pieces! Frontman David Gold uploaded the band's tour vlog from their Toronto concert on March 13th onto his YouTube channel last week, and here's what you need to know! Part 1 shows the process of making coffee, the band's "merch bag ritual", their pursuit of pancakes for breakfast, whether they lost a piece of their van or not, lots of (partly sped-up) driving footage, their arrival at The Mod Club in Toronto, before starting with concert footage 7:12 into the video, and that's how Part 1 ends. Part 2 & Part 3 continue with more concert footage straight through, so if you want 20 minutes of great video footage of Woods of Ypres on stage, from multiple camera angles, give them both a look! The footage from Woods of Ypres' set ends 1:18 into Part 4, but afterwards, you'll get to see the band's merch table in Toronto, moonshine tasting in Koreatown, Joel Violette's banjo skills (on Woods songs, no less), what David's alarm clock sounds like, and the band's trip to the bank. Not bad at all, nice to see a longer vlog this time around, ensuring much more video footage of Woods in action! Check all of the above links for more, stay tuned for the next vlogs from the United States, and here's part 1 of the Toronto vlog. The links above will send you in the right direction for the rest!



As well, here's a new concert video (coincidentally, also from Woods of Ypres' Toronto concert! YouTube user balsor12 uploaded this video on Thursday onto his YouTube channel, and it's of Woods of Ypres playing "Everything I Touch Turns To Gold (Then To Coal)"! Now, yes, you can see high quality footage of this song in Part 2 of Woods' tour vlog linked above, but unlike on there, this is the full song! Video quality is predictably not as good, notably being very dark & with a mysterious purple line on the right side of the video, but the audio's not bad! A bit muffled, but everything worth hearing comes through! Check out the new video below, and of course, I'll have more as they become available!



Thirdly, here's some new Woods of Ypres interviews! I have one audio interview with David Gold from Vision On The Net, but it's not loading for me, so I'm gonna feature it in a later post. One audio interview I can load and tell you about is this one conducted by Mind Over Metal writer Matt Longo with David Gold, which clocks in at over 24 minutes long! The interview features David discussing his roles in Woods of Ypres, the transition from black to doom metal, the status of what is now "Woods 4.5", David's love for Crowbar, his Kuwait employment last year (including some fake breakup talk) and the metal environment in the Middle East, The Northern Ontario Black Metal Preservation Society, Woods of Ypres' future plans, and more! Good interview, with lots of well detailed answers, though David's audio is very low and there is some choppiness with the reception later in the interview. If you wanna check it out, click here! Here's another interview too, a written interview with David Gold by the metal website Xplosive Metal, so click here to check it out! Though covering many of the topics from the above audio interview, this one features David mentioning more about the Earache Records signing, the "Woods IV" writing process, notable concerts and memories from the last 9 years, the future of black metal, and much more! Well worth a read too, so check the above links for more, and stay tuned for more Woods of Ypres interviews very soon!

Finally, the band has announced a pile of new tour dates for their "Pain & Piss" tour! Though I won't go through them all due to the amount, and the fact that many of you might not be as interested in shows you can't easily attend, there are some notable shows here to mention! The new dates range from May 5th in Philadelphia during their next American tour leg, through June 8th in Charlotte, North Carolina following their Western Canada tour leg, which swings through the Southern United States back to the East. The closest of the newly announced shows is on May 11th, when Woods of Ypres play in Detroit for the first time ever at The Magic Stick! It's been a long time for that to happen, and I know some of you drive to the Detroit area for concerts, so hey, keep it in mind! Two days later, Woods of Ypres will hit Des Moines, Iowa for a concert on the night of the Hallows Die concert at Foggy Notions that Woods of Ypres were originally scheduled to headline. Given that we now know the tour routing for early May, I think it's a safe assumption that they dropped out of the local show due to it making more sense route-wise to play a show between Chicago and St. Paul, Minnesota (itself replacing a cancelled Thunder Bay gig) rather than backtrack to the Soo for one night. For all the current Woods of Ypres tour gigs, click here, or check out our out of town concert listings on your right!

That's all for now, but stay tuned for a big news post later today! Thanks everyone!