Lopstock III Coverage (Part 5!!)

At long last, let's finally conclude our coverage of SooToday's live-stream from last month's third Lopstock concert at LopLops Lounge! For sake of convenience, you can read our posts on the first eight acts via clicking these links: Hannah Lindsay & Bold Noize, Jupiter Marvelous & Juliana Regan, Sawbé & Stoneburgh and The Hollow Heads, and Far From Fine & Handsome Sandwich. The ninth and penultimate act at Lopstock III was online page-less local indie/drone rock band Pointless, featuring ex-Treble Charger singer/guitarist Bill Priddle, his All The Tired Horses bandmate Robert Sartini (Pillory), Robert's old Id Iota bandmate Dustin Goodall (ex-Pixo Control) on bass, and Robert's old Peach Thieves bandmate David Peredun (ex-Ashes To Dust) on drums. Video footage resumes 6:26:17 into the 8+ hour live-stream, with Lopstock MC/promoter Brendan Garlick introducing their set.

Of note, Brendan said that attendees positively compared this year's Lopstock to the last one in 2015, he announced the winner of a surprise raffle for a Lopstock poster signed by all ten acts, and he kinda plugged Pointless on the basis of Bill's Treble Charger work while trying to be low key about it. Oddly, Brendan said that this is the "first time you can hear them in Sault Ste. Marie", despite Pointless having debuted locally in 2017. Their set started with two original songs not introduced by name (linked here and here), before playing a song named "Alright Already". Next is the Treble Charger deep cut "Forever Knowing" (from "Maybe It's Me"), which was the first cover at Lopstock since Juliana Regan's set four hours prior, Bill co-writing it in the first place acknowledged. The following two songs (linked here and here) were also unannounced by name, but the next one ("If It's All The Same") was.

Pointless must have been an exception to the "one cover per band" rule (this is Bill Priddle's band, after all!), as their last four songs were all covers. Next up was Pink Floyd's "Astronomy Domine", followed by another Treble Charger deep cut, this time "Drive", which was the last song on their last album (to date), 2002's "Detox". A false ending led to an abbreviated rendition of Guided By Voices' "A Salty Salute", before closing with Bill's signature Treble Charger song, "Red" (from both "nc17" and "Maybe It's Me"). Entertaining set that, while not leaning into punk given Bill's musical preferences, had strong musicianship, and his dry humour was present even if he didn't talk to the audience much between tracks, and I do appreciate that the drone/noise element was toned down from early Pointless gigs! If you like early and Bill-led Treble Charger, you should like Pointless' Lopstock set!

Lopstock III surprisingly ended with young local metal trio The BAG, in what I can only assume was due to scheduling needs for them/earlier acts, if not an intentional effort to put the heaviest scheduled band on last. They clearly had fans out for the long haul though, complete with official BAG t-shirts! Be advised that The BAG did not introduce ANY songs at Lopstock by name, so I apologize in advance for only having two original songs (their released singles) titled here. Their set opened with their debut single "Eccentric Refuge", followed by two more original cuts linked here & here. Fourth was their other single "Our Rock", before playing this fast & hard original, a brief instrumental, and, if you believe guitarist Spencer MacGillivray, "the punkiest song we've got". The BAG next played a brand new song that was written for Lopstock, followed by this slower & longer cut and another new song written by drummer Bradley Nixon.

Spencer, Austin, and Bradley finished up with a somewhat funkier original, and after Brendan offered some closing remarks, The BAG got to play an encore song, which was their cover of Motorhead's "Ace of Spades" (also not introduced by name, but everyone knows it). If you haven't seen The BAG live yet, then you'll get an in-your-face slice of metal here with lots of subgenre influences and a down & dirty intensity, and while I do wish that the guys would talk more between songs (how did they not introduce even ONE song by name?!), having The BAG around is a promising sign for the local metal scene! Overall, huge kudos to Brendan Garlick & Sault Noir for putting on such a huge concert (especially after an eight year hiatus for Lopstock), and while I don't know how the SooToday deal came together for the live-stream, the professional quality of the footage (with very few technical nitpicks) is great for home viewers who missed out!

Whether I knew the song names or not, every single individual song is linked in our five Lopstock recap posts linked above, so if you want to jump to a specific band or song, you'll know how (the bands are similarly timestamped on YouTube, if not the songs). There's obviously a lot to see here, but it's a fun watch for fans of modern original local music, so check out the entire Lopstock III live-stream below,and stay tuned for more news and notes on the site this week! Thanks everyone!

Bone Yard Concert Previews, Plus Recent Live Concert Videos!!

As promised, let's cap off this weekend's known hard rock concert previews today, with some live concert videos featuring some very familiar faces to round things out with, so here's what you should know!

Local southern hard rock trio Bone Yard will return to the public stage for concerts at Shooters Downstairs Lounge TONIGHT & TOMORROW NIGHT! After spending the past month playing at private gigs and via an oddly un-promoted Sudbury road trip (unless that was cancelled), these will be Bone Yard's first truly public gigs in the Soo since the Canada Day long weekend, and their first stops at Shooters since playing there in late June. Fans may recall that Bone Yard similarly had a public dry spell late last summer as they plied their trade at private bookings, so it's good to see Greg, Alex, and Warren back at it in a normal sense, and their hard rocking selection of covers should draw a good crowd! Yes, their infamous Bone Yard alcohol shots will be available. Tonight & tomorrow's shows are 9:00 PM affairs with 19+ age limits and no cover charges. See above for more details, and here's Bone Yard live at Shooters earlier this year!

Next up, here's some new videos from local classic/hard rock cover band Generations' Facebook group that we have yet to address on the site! As you may recall, the Jus' Chillin successors debuted at The Water Tower Pub two weeks ago alongside Flat Stanley guitarist Tony Kajnar as a temporary fill-in, and videos were posted from that one-nighter the following day, with drummer Tony Santoro posting two videos shot by an uncredited attendee from a sharp side-stage vantage point. These are covers of David Wilcox's "Riverboat Fantasy" (with bassist Pierre Anthony on lead vocals) and Alannah Myles' "Black Velvet" with frontwoman Valerie Powley singing, and both come through well on the audio front! Tony K. slots in well with the band, and Valerie's vocals are predictably strong on "Black Velvet", but the daytime glare from the windows of the pub is very sharp (the filmer should have waited until nightfall in order to negate that).

And yes, these are vertically shot, which is rarely ideal, but at least zoom is used to focus on everyone at different points. As covered on the site in our first weekend concert preview post for this week, Generations returned to the stage as part of yesterday's Downtown Street Party on Queen Street East, where they and Bookclub played on the so-called March Street Stage, but unlike the Darsombra show there in June, the bands played facing Queen Street rather than the OLG building (only natural given the event). For this gig, Generations welcomed back Smokehouse's Michael Yurich (who sat in with them over Rotaryfest weekend) as their guest guitarist, and Tony Santoro's wife Dawn filmed their cover of Linda Ronstadt's "Blue Bayou", which is embedded below. Sadly, this video is also vertical, not helped by slightly jittery camerawork, but Dawn picked a spot to film with everyone in view and stuck with it.

Musically, everyone sounds fine on this classic rock ballad, and it is nice to see that the weather held up too, if with a bit of wind. Give Generations' newest concert videos a watch above and below, and stay tuned for more news, updates, and media from them when it rolls in!

Let's close with a video that will be a partial preview of our continuing Lopstock III live-stream coverage (resuming this weekend), namely a video of Treble Charger singer/guitarist Bill Priddle's online page-less indie rock band Pointless! Now, this band isn't punk or hard rock-centric (Bill was largely against Treble Charger's shift to pop punk on their last two CDs), but they do in fact cover Treble Charger songs that he sung lead on in their live dates. He took Pointless on the road for rare Southern Ontario gigs in June, where they opened for Juno Award winning Toronto alt-rockers Rusty and Sudbury punk trio Lightmares (who you may recognize from all three Oh!No festivals in the late 2010s, plus a 2018 date at LopLops). Attendee TheViolentVegan filmed Pointless' set for YouTube, and their set included covers of two Treble Charger deep cuts, namely "Forever Knowing" (song #3) and "Trinity Bellwoods" (as their closer).

Bill is joined in Pointless nowadays by Pillory frontman Robert Sartini on guitar, Id Iota/Pixo Control alum Dustin Goodall on bass, and ex-Ashes To Dust drummer David Peredun (Robert also plays in Bill's cover band All The Tired Horses). Hearing some familiar Treble Charger songs is nice, especially compared to some of their more drone-leaning originals, but of course, we'll have a much closer (and multi-camera) look at Pointless from their Lopstock set next week. Kudos to TheViolentVegan for capturing Pointless' 35 minute set at The Corktown Irish Pub in Hamilton two months ago, and give it a watch for yourself below!

That's all for today, but stay tuned for this month's Defunct Local Band Profile next! Thanks everyone!