Here is this month's YouTube Channel Profile as we're continuing our monthly spotlight of 1-3 randomly selected YouTube channels whose content is at least half devoted to local metal, hard rock, and/or punk concerts, and this time, I have drawn two channels due to the first randomly selected channel only having two distinct kinds of videos and five total, with a second channel only having one video period being added to fill things out. These reflect two talented local bands from almost a decade apart, and there's a lot of good stuff to see despite the low video counts, so here's what you should know!
Owner: Former Browbeat frontman Randy "Dutch" Vanderploeg, also known from his stints as a bassist with Caveman Morrison and a guitarist with Nikkfitt, and more recently as a vlogger with the YouTube channel Randy's Rides
Channel Timeline:Launched on March 12th, 2012; Videos uploaded that day and on May 15th of that year
Channel Summary:A personal use channel, Dutch only ended up posting five videos here, all posthumous uploads of original songs by his local hard rock band Browbeat, who had disbanded in April 2011. Why You Should Watch:Given the propensity for Dutch to take down band accounts after Browbeat's lineup & name changes (and ultimately, their dissolution), this is the most official extant source to check out Browbeat's original repertoire, and consider doing so, as they were an entertaining hard rock band who deserved more attention in their heyday! However, none of Dutch's work with Nikkfitt or other projects made this channel, let alone with their more familiar earlier lineups. If you want to see live concert videos of Browbeat (also known as Social Play for one gig), then our YouTube channel has some early 2010s examples.
Our Recommended Videos To Check Out:
Skeletons.: Four of Dutch's videos are of a circa early 2011 jam session for Browbeat's final lineup, with him on vocals & guitar alongside current Dealing Without bassist James White and Bear Hunters drummer Johnny Belanger (both were also bandmates in Caveman Morrison's last lineup and in the original version of Handsome Sandwich). The four videos are of Browbeat playing their original songs "Movin' On", "Days Gone By", their signature song "The Sound You Need", and in their most popular video, "Skeletons". Dutch even briefly explains the songs' meanings in the descriptions of each video! "Skeletons proper is a fun song with great bass work, and all of these songs have potential that I wish was realized on an album, especially as Dutch's singing is sort of buried in the mix throughout.
Brighter Day: The last video on the channel (and only one that is just an audio recording) is for Browbeat's song "Brighter Day", as set to a photo of this lineup live at the former Roosevelt Hotel. While the song proper is slower and more melodic, it may be the optimal way to actually hear the band, as Dutch's vocals are perfectly audible! I like them heavier, but it's nice to hear this in such good quality, and hopefully Dutch is doing well nowadays!
Owner: A member of 2016-2018 local blues/hard rock trio Electric Church, exact identity unclear
Channel Timeline:Launched on January 31st, 2018; Only video posted that day
Channel Summary:The official YouTube channel for Electric Church, just a single video was posted there before the band fell inactive by mid-2018, namely of them playing their original song "Muddy Water" at Odeno at Sault College in September 2017 during the college's reunion festivities. Featuring singer/guitarist Spencer Pine, bassist Elijah Nielsen, and since-relocated drummer Beau Whitfield, this video is well framed and showcases their solid genre base & talent levels nicely, and it's a shame that Electric Church didn't last longer in some form! More live concert videos from their run are extant online, including this 25 minute video from Shaw TV.
I hope you guys liked this month's YouTube Channel Profile! This series will return on or around November 26th when we look at just one randomly selected channel, but it's a doozy, as I have drawn YouTube user greetingsbychris' channel, featuring over 700 videos, primarily of major local concert fgootage! Watch for this next month, and stay tuned for much more on the site this week! Thanks everyone!
Continuing our busy final week of October 2021, let's focus in on prolific local/Thompson, Manitoba alternative/hard rock musician Mike Haggith's long awaited first live-streamed concert in over a year! Taking place live at 7:00 PM last night on Mike's Facebook page, this follows his fourteen #LockdownLive shows from March-August 2020 (plus the occasional live post-show), which primarily occurred weekly during the first pandemic lockdown, but Mike is planning to do his relaunched live-stream series on a monthly basis. In fact, Mike has already scheduled his next live-stream for Saturday, November 13th at 7:30 PM EST, complete with his old bandmate (and comment section all-star) Brandan Glew joining in to discuss The Din's run and recent posthumous activity, so keep that in mind! As for yesterday's live-stream, it runs for 85 minutes, but trust me, Mike has went longer!
Mike starts by acknowledging how much fun the #LockdownLive shows were, and while he didn't 100% explain why he stopped doing live-streams for a year, he did acknowledge that this was kind of a pilot for the relaunch, and to show he's serious, he has a new microphone and a new 12 string guitar! For convenience, I'll timestamp the rough start times for performed songs, a'la my Metal Morpheus recaps, and yes, I will be doing more of those this week! His first performed song is a cover of The Killers' "When You Were Young" (3:10), which Mike follows by outlining how he got this guitar, and then he plays "Over Indecision" (8:35) from his upcoming studio album "Bridges". Next, Mike plugs the Facebook contest he held to give away a pre-release test pressing of "Bridges" on vinyl, with the winner to be announced later in the broadcast, though he warned us that it wouldn't sound as optimal as the final copies.
He also shows off the vinyl sleeve and record proper, so we know what to expect if you order that rather than a CD! Mike did address the very delayed release for the album, primarily chalking it up to the slow mixing process and getting it sounding perfect, and he plans to release it near the end of 2021, though updates are forthcoming. We next get two more performances of songs from "Bridges", including "The Nature Of The Times" (19:20) and "An Act Of Strength" (25:50), though during the bridge of the former, he plugs the share contest for this week, with the viewer who gets the most engaged Facebook share of the live-stream getting the right to pick a cover song that he has to play next week. After plugging his daily "Morning Jam" posts on Facebook, Mike asks for suggestions of artists to spotlight there, and promotes his still-to-debut album review series on his YouTube channel.
Next up, Mike plays "MorningStar" (34:30) from his newest album "If Ever Comes The Day", before discussing his guitar capos. The second half of the live-stream kicks off with the debut of a brand new original song named "Twist of Fate" (41:55), albeit slowed down from the planned electric studio version, and true to recent form, the song is very personal lyrically. He follows that with another new song "To Be With You" (52:50), which has aired on The Borderline Radio and previously been seen in performance videos, but is not posted online otherwise. After teasing his first planned album reviews for his soon-to-launch YouTube series in November, Mike covers "Alice" (59:15) by the New Jersey indie act Project Atlantic, as this song is on "Ghost Stories", an album Mike is planning to do a video review of. Passing the one hour mark, Mike draws for the winner of the "Bridges" test vinyl next...
...before playing one more brand new song entitled "I've Seen It Before" (1:06:25). Next, Mike shows off a CD copy of "Bridges" and hypes up the physical and audio quality, before playing one last song from that album, namely "Come On Home" (1:15:05). The live-stream closes with Mike discussing plans for the next episode and the idea of having regular guest musicians, with Jeremy Hannah planned for a future installment, while the winner of the share contest will likely be announced in a Facebook post as opposed to a post-show video. Entertaining live-stream overall, and a nice return to a highlight of last spring's lockdown, though some of the looser, more free-wheeling sensibilities weren't as prevalent, with less of an amusing array of viewer comments.
With Glew coming on as a guest next month, that should help, but with lots of album news and new songs, don't miss this live-stream at the above links, and stay tuned for the next one in just under three weeks! That's all for today, but stay tuned for this month's YouTube Channel Profile next!
Things have been quiet lately, but the SMS will be busier in the home-stretch of October 2021, and that starts with a new news post on this Sunday morning, including more new videos from a recent notable concert and leading off, a new album re-release, so here's what you should know!
As promised, defunct local power pop/hard rock trio The Din released the "deluxe edition" of their 2017 debut album "Give In To The Din" on multiple digital platforms yesterday, so what should you know about that? Early promotion for the re-release indicated that there would be 18 tracks, double the amount on the album in it's original form, and whether you expected this would comprise of an alternate version of each song or completely unreleased material, you'll be partially right on both fronts. Two of the nine songs are new in studio form, namely a demo version of the previously unreleased original "Differences" and a 98 second spoken word track named "Our Place In The Scene". The rest are pre-release variants of songs that did make the cut for the album, including an alternate version & instrumental mix of "Flux", first and instrumental mixes of "Potato (Should've Known Better)", a demo version of "Remember", ...
...a first mix of "In Search Of The Perfect Moment", and an instrumental mix of "75". You can stream all 18 songs, new & old, on Spotify and Bandcamp, while the album will run you $7.99 on Amazon or $10 on Bandcamp in mp3 format. Full links for it's streaming/download locations can be found on The Din's Distrokid page. I won't comment on the deluxe edition yet, as this will very likely be reviewed on the SMS this week, but give the whole album a listen/purchase above, and stay tuned for news on when The Din's teased live album "Technically Live" will come out, let alone frontman Mike Haggith's first live-streamed solo concert in over a year tonight on his Facebook page!
Next up, here's the rest of prolific local concert filmer Christopher Paci's videos from Tuesday night's Buckcherry concert at Soo Blaster! Chris started uploading these on Wednesday night, well after his first Bad Chug video was uploaded that morning, but too late for me to include in our last news post on Thursday, which was auto-posted at midnight and completed the previous day. Starting with the headliners, Chris filmed five videos of the Anaheim hard rock quintet playing their set-opener "54321", "Hellbound", "Rain's Falling", "Sorry", and as embedded below, the end of their cover of Bryan Adams' "Summer of '69", followed by their own song "Crazy Bitch", which was extended to over 10 minutes via frontman Josh Todd introducing the band, bantering with the crowd, and covering a bit of Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Proud Mary" before the final chorus. This is all fairly common for this song live, FYI.
While I personally am not a Buckcherry fan, it's great to see them finally make up their May (and November) 2020 date here and tour Canada successfully without any visible illnesses throwing a spanner in the works! I'd have liked to have seen more masks on fans, especially given how packed the floor was for Buckcherry's set, but remember, vaccine passports were mandatory to enter Soo Blaster for this one. Audio has it's scratchier moments, but Chris had a good angle of Buckcherry, and they were on form compared to their Kewadin gigs from the 2010s, so check out all of their videos from Tuesday night above and below!
Chris also filmed three videos of opening local punk trio Redundant's first public concert set in over two years, including of them covering Johnny Cash's "Folsom Prison Blues", and an abbreviated 1:40 version of The Ramones' "Blitzkrieg Bop", but embedded below is them playing their own original "What Will You Do". Nice to see Justin, Andrew, and Rick back on stage after far too long, and they seem happy and in their element on these strongly done tracks, though note that Chris was on the opposite side of the stage for their set. Give these a look above & below as well!
Finally, Chris had one more video of local/Ottawa hard rock quartet Bad Chug to upload that didn't go up at the same time as his prior song of theirs, so here it is! Also featuring Aaron on lead vocals, it's a slower number (but still heavy) compared to their first upload from Tuesday night, and appeared to feature Jacob using a talk box for backing vocals, which you don't see here too often! Like before, I couldn't make out enough words to tell if this was an original or a cover. Chris' vantage point of the stage was better here, so Aaron is much easier to make out, but this is at the expense of Kyle, who was at least very active! Give Bad Chug's second video a look below, and hopefully we hear more from them soon!
That's all for today, but stay tuned for our recap of the aforementioned Mike Haggith's revived live-stream concerts tomorrow, but remember that you can tune in tonight at 7:00 PM EST on his Facebook page to watch it live first if you are so inclined! Thanks everyone!
We're back with a new news post on the SMS on this Thursday morning, and it includes one more teaser for a concert tonight at a technically private venue (organizers want fans to come though, and this may be the push you need!), plus the first public videos from a recent major concert, and leading off, a LOCAL CONCERT ALERT for later this month! Here's what you should know!
Revived Sault Michigan hard rock quartet 415E will return to The Hilltop Bar in nearby Sugar Island for a Devil's Night concert on Saturday, October 30th! This will be 415E's first publically advertised concert since playing at the same venue in February 2020, with guitarist Chris Hubbard publically working on his long-gestating solo project and his new band Rhythm & Brews in the interim. I'm not sure if 415E were just on hiatus during the pandemic or if Rhythm & Brews were functionally "replacing" them, but it's great to see 415E back, and with their pre-pandemic lineup intact! This includes singer Dave Menard, bassist Brett Blackwood (who played in Rhythm & Brews' debut gigs), and drummer Jason VanLuven joining Chris once again, as revealed in this 5 second "video" to promote the concert, though it's more of an animated poster than anything else, hence why it's not embedded here.
Hopefully 415E's hard rocking brand of covers get a strong reception from fans in Sugar Island next weekend, so don't miss out if you're able! Pre-pandemic Hilltop Bar events had 7:00 PM start times, there's no announced cover charge, and expect a 19+ age limit, and please respect & follow any social distancing and public health guidelines at the bar to ensure everyone's safety, especially over Halloween weekend. See above for more details!
Next up, and from what accounts I've heard online so far, last night's Buckcherry concert at Soo Blaster in Sault Ontario was a success, and a couple of public videos from it are now online to check out! One is a brief 15 second clip of the headlining Anaheim hard rock quintet playing their 2012 single "Gluttony", as shared by 705Live Sound Co.'s Facebook page yesterday afternoon. Not to be confused with dormant concert promoters Live705, 705Live provide sound at live events, and they were on hand in that regard last night, hence why their video is so far from the stage. Still, you can get a sense of the crowd numbers, and even with the vaccine passport mandate, it looks like a sizeable crowd came out! Fan heads do mostly block Buckcherry from view, but the overall quality is respectable despite the video's short length and lack of zoom. Give it a watch below, and we'll let you know if more videos surface!
The only other video I've found on a public source so far comes from new-ish local/Ottawa hard rock quartet Bad Chug's opening set, as filmed by prolific local concert filmer Christopher Paci for his YouTube channel, marking his first concert video upload since The Hair Scare Live in Sault Michigan in February 2020! We all know why it's taken this long for him to film anything else. No word yet on if Chris shot anything from Buckcherry or Redundant's sets (the Bad Chug video was uploaded early yesterday), but we'll let you know if anything else surfaces! The video gives us our first look at Bad Chug on a Sault Ste. Marie stage and with new second guitarist Jacob Quarrell (no comment on his attire), and on this song, it looks like guitarist Aaron Desmoulin is on lead vocals. Alas, the scratchy audio & steady cymbal hits don't help in my efforts to identify if this is a cover.
The song proper is an up-tempo hard rocker that has a little bit of a classic rock feel to it that almost reminds me of some horror punk. Not bad, but again, this isn't the clearest quality audio, so hopefully more footage of Bad Chug (at this show or otherwise) surfaces! Chris wasn't too far from the stage and he had a good vantage point of the proceedings, but Aaron is very hard to make out from the very bright stage lighting above him and his placement at the side of the stage. Give this Bad Chug video a look below, and we'll have more videos from this show when & if they goes public!
Finally for today, here's a trailer for tonight's Alien To The Ignorant concert at the private venue Mellow D's Underground, but this one isn't focused on the headliners, rather openers/venue hosts The Apocalypse Afterparty! Uploaded to their Facebook page on Sunday, this serves a double purpose, as while it promotes the concert (including finally giving away Mellow D's current address!), it also features 17 seconds of their to-be-released music video for their cover of Saul Williams' "List Of Demands (Reparations)". The video (shot by Spacebag Productions) shows the band playing in that very cramped room as we saw in prior teasers from the shoot, perhaps not a bathroom like I had guessed, but it is worth noting that The Apocalypse Afterparty appear to just be represented here by frontman Paul & drummer Amanda Stanghetta without a second bassist, which would 100% signal that Alice Rose has left the band.
A reason for her departure was not announced, but she had initially been absent on temporary basis as of December 2019, and The A.A. had enlisted uncredited bassists to fill in through last summer, but the video has the Stanghettas in full-on Death From Above 1979 mode as a two-person band. Hopefully all's well with Alice! The music video teaser is promising and shows Paul & Amanda getting an energetic, full sound out of this staple cover of theirs, and hopefully the full video is released soon! Give it a look below, and remember, the address for TONIGHT'S Alien To The Ignorant concert (also featuring the returning Bear Hunters) can be found within!
That's all for today, but stay tuned for more news and updates on the site soon! Thanks everyone!
Today's post is devoted to previews of two notable mid-week hard rock/metal concerts in Sault Ontario, one well over a year in the making, and the other featuring a lot of intrigue for it's cryptic locale and touring headliner, with both also featuring local openers we haven't seen in a long time. Here's what you should know!
The biggest Sault Ontario hard rock concert of the pandemic era will finally take place TOMORROW when Anaheim, California hard rock quintet Buckcherry will make their fourth local appearance (and first in this half of the Twin Saults) when they headline at Soo Blaster! This concert was originally scheduled to take place way back on May 13th, 2020 before everything went topsy turvy in March of last year, forcing a postponement to November 11th, and then ultimately to tomorrow night, but barring an imminent COVID outbreak, this show is taking place! Buckcherry are definitely in Canada and they have been touring across country all month, so fingers crossed! Well known rock radio staples from hit songs like "Sorry", "Lit Up", and "Everything", Buckcherry are touring in support of their new CD "Hellbound", so expect lots of familiar songs and new cuts in their first local stop since 2019's outdoor Kewadin Casino gig with Pop Evil, and before that, headlining Dreammakers Theater shows in 2011 & 2012.
This will also be Buckcherry's first local appearance since Billy Rowe replaced Kevin Roentgen on lead guitar last year. Amazingly, the local support acts remain unchanged since last spring, and they will include punk trio Redundant in their first public concert set since they opened for The Cancer Bats at Soo Blaster in August 2019, as far as I can gather. Obviously, it's great to see Justin, Andrew, and Rick back on stage after over two years, so don't be late for their familiar punk attack! The other opening band is local/Ottawa hard rock band Bad Chug in their long-delayed local concert debut, but they were previously active in Ottawa dating back to 2016! In case you're unfamiliar, their lineup features guitarist Aaron Desmoulin, bassist Kyle Dube (who was quietly re-added to their lineup anew), and drummer Matt D'Ettore, plus local folk singer/guitarist Jacob Quarrell as their newest member.
I'm not 100% sure if Jacob will play the same roles in Bad Chug (they credit him as "bender"), but readers may be familiar with his acoustic solo sets, previously under the project name Shit Creek Survivor. Bad Chug's mid-2010s Ottawa material had a solid carefree hard rock base, and it will be very interesting to see how they do in 2021 with in a new city, so find out first tomorrow night! Promoted by the Ottawa-based Diamond Mine Agency in their first major local booking with heavier bands, tickets are still available for $39.99 + taxes and service fees on Eventbrite, so click here to get yours online in advance! I presume you can also pay at the door, and yes, tickets bought for Buckcherry's 2020 dates will be accepted tomorrow. Everything starts at 8:00 PM, and unfortunately, this is a 19+ event. And as recently usual, attendees must show vaccine passports at the door to get into Soo Blaster.
Given the size and anticipation for this show, it's more important than ever that attending fans please mask up, follow social distancing guidelines at Soo Blaster, and use common sense to keep everyone safe, and thusly ensure that we get more concerts like this in the short term. Admittedly, I'm not a Buckcherry fan, but it's great to see that at least one of the COVID-postponed concerts is finally taking place, and hopefully Josh and crew deliver a fun set of up-tempo rock hits for fans tomorrow night, complete with local openers we haven't seen on a public stage at all in the 2020s! Visit the official Facebook event page for more details, and for a preview, here's Buckcherry live in Sault Michigan in 2019!
Finally for today, here's a special preview of a technically private concert taking place THIS THURSDAY NIGHT, but organizers are treating this as a public event, just with the venue being given out on request if you want to come out. The show in question will see Saskatchewan post-hardcore trio Alien To The Ignorant make their first ever local concert appearance when they headline at local party metal band The Apocalypse Afterparty's re-opened and relocated private venue Mellow D's Underground! Alien To The Ignorant's brutal hardcore sound and none-too-serious approach to their promotion should serve them well to attract an audience on Thursday, so don't miss out if you can come out on a work/school night! Local death metal quartet The Bear Hunters will play their first concert set in over two years on Thursday, which will also be their first live appearance since releasing their album "The Dead Testament" last fall, so hopefully they shake off the rust with their brutality!
And yes, The Apocalypse Afterparty themselves will perform in a rare live appearance that isn't purely a private house party, so what musical shenanigans will the Stanghettas be up to with their up-tempo brand of music? Be at Mellow D's Underground, wherever it is, to find out! There is no advertised cover charge for this concert, which has a thankfully early start time of 6:00 PM, and inquire with The Apocalypse Afterparty and/or Paul & Amanda for the address in case they never publicize it. Vaccine passports must be presented upon entry, and please use common sense re: social distancing. Visit the above links for more details, stay tuned for more updates, and here here's Alien To The Ignorant live!
That's all for today, but stay tuned for more news and notes on the site this week! Thanks everyone!
After a bit too long of a delay, let's try and get caught up on some more recent episodes of Metal Morpheus, the weekly metal-centric series on local internet radio station The Borderline! After the punk installment last month, host Josh Amendola took a break from subgenre-centric episodes for a few weeks, but he returned to metal as a result, starting with episode #12 on Sunday, September 19th where he looked at (mostly) solo guitarists known for shredding. In other words, expect lots of technical and complex guitar skill here, especially as the usual theme song was severely abbreviated, and the episode proper runs for over 70 minutes! After outlining what shred guitar is all about, Josh first sets up pioneering rock guitarist Jeff Beck's 1975 song "Scatterbrain" (0:05), before truly getting into shredders with a look at Yngwie Malmsteen's Rising Force's "Marching Out" (7:15), which is not on Spotify, but I think it was slightly abbreviated on The Borderline.
Next, Josh looks at Joe Satriani via his classic instrumental "The Mystical Potato Head Groove Thing" (11:40), followed by one of his proteges, Steve Vai with his song "Natural Born Boy" (17:40), and then with Tony MacAlpine's "Edge of Insanity" (22:10). Former Megadeth guitarist Marty Friedman follows with his song "Dragon Mistress" (26:50) though Josh did stumble his words a bit in setting up this track. Of course, you have to follow Marty with his Cacophony bandmate, the highly inspirational Jason Becker, with his song "Eleven Blue Egyptians" (32:25), which Marty guests on. The second half of the episode begins with one of Josh's favourite virtuosos, namely the late jazz fusion guitarist Shawn Lane, via his 1992 song "Illusions", which is noton Spotify (39:05). Josh speaks over the intro of this song, and is barely audible as a result, which has occurred in some prior episodes.
Staying in a jazz fusion vein, Josh next plays late British guitar legend Allan Holdsworth's song "Above & Below" (45:50), followed by the prolific & eccentric Buckethead's ambient rock song "Beyond The Knowing" (51:45), which is also not on Spotify. We steer back into metal territory next with Rob Zombie/ex-Marilyn Manson guitarist John 5's solo song "Damaged" (56:45), before finally hitting this week's local musician at the latest point they've ever been introduced in a Metal Morpheus episode. On this week, Josh shone a spotlight on prolific local musician Tym Morrison via his instrumental song "Souls of Serenity" (1:00:20), which you can find on his 2006 "Solo Project" CD. This extended episode ends with it's only band (second if you count Yngwie's Rising Force), namely the instrumental progressive metal supergroup Blotted Science (1:05:45) with their more recent song "A Sting Operation IV: Omitting Eyes".
Entertaining episode once again, and I like how Josh gave every musician here some sort of biographical segment, possibly aided by all but one or two of the songs being from solo acts. You can tell that he was a genuine fan of many of these shred guitarists already, especially when he touched on jazz fusion late, but if he has to introduce certain songs over-top of their beginnings, I wish he'd fix the audio levels so we could hear him easier. Josh has settled into a good groove though, so click here or above to hear this and more episodes of Metal Morpheus, stay tuned for our recaps of episodes #13 and beyond soon, and listen to episode #16 live tonight on The Borderline at 9:00 PM, or on-demand after the fact! That's all for today, but stay tuned for our previews of two big concerts on the site next! Thanks everyone!
Here's a new news post for your Thursday night reading, and it includes some assorted topics from recent days, a new video, the latest from a prominent local band, and unless something super short notice turns up in the next couple of days, previews of the only hard rock concerts announced for this weekend in the Twin Saults. For what it's worth, we'll be previewing Tuesday's Buckcherry concert on the site on Sunday or Monday, it's a little early yet to do it today. Now, here's what you should know!
We'll start today with a pair of concert previews for Sault Michigan, as Traverse City metal trio Scarkazm will make their long awaited return to the E.U.P. with concerts at The Rapids Lounge at the local Kewadin Casino TOMORROW & SATURDAY NIGHT! These will be Adam, Dave, and Jeff's first concerts in our neck of the woods since February 2020 for extremely obvious reasons, and it's great to see Scarkazm's hard hitting blend of covers and originals back at a Kewadin venue after 20 long months, so if you've missed them in the pandemic era, here you go! If you can't come this weekend, they will be back at The Rapids Lounge on New Year's Eve. As usual, these are 9:00 PM concerts with 21+ age limits and no cover charges, but please honour and respect any public health and social distancing guidelines at the lounge and/or casino. Visit the official Facebook event pages linked here & here for more details, and here's Scarkazm live!
Next up, here's the latest from local hard rock band Tarnished, who have yet to reveal the identity of their apparent new bassist on social media, but they haven't been idle as of late! Following their short notice concert in Gould City (outside of our coverage range) on September 25th, the guys hit the road for Grand Rapids this past Saturday for a headlining concert alongside opening acts from that area with quite the imagery, if the poster on the Facebook event page is any indication! Hopefully the concert was a success and that they made some new fans in the Lower Peninsula! As well as sharing a previously posted 2019 concert video of them covering Van Halen's "Eruption", Tarnished's other recent post was to acknowledge that their music video for "Metalyn" won the fan vote for Best Student Music Video at the Soo Film Festival last month. Congratulations to Jay and Tarnished for sure, and stay tuned for more from their camp!
Also, let's head north to Sault Ontario for a brief new video from local party metal band The Apocalypse Afterparty's Facebook AND TikTok page! Yes, they're now on the latter service, but on TikTok, they also post some personal content not related to the band, and anything musical has been double-posted to Facebook anyway (both Paul and Amanda appear to have admin controls on there). On September 24th, The A.A. shared a video of them jamming a Lorde cover as only they can, with just the Stanghettas visibly performing, but Paul drops in an impromptu "simple dimple" dance, parodying a recent viral challenge on TikTok. Myself, I don't get it, but I'm also not on TikTok to know what trends there. Still a silly and light-hearted moment in between a solid rendition, so give it a watch below, and remember their private gig at Mellow D's Underground next week, more info forthcoming!
Finally, here's three assorted shorter news items from the last while, and as usual, these are in alphabetical order by artist or venue name:
Local author George Case (arguably best known for his books about Led Zeppelin) has released a new book called "Takin' Care of Business: A History of Working People's Rock 'n' Roll", which explores the influence of rock music on the working class as it relates to populism and the evolution of political affiliation trends. I don't get into politics on the site unless explicitly related to local concerts/original songs, so I hesitate to elaborate on this line of discussion, but it's an interesting topic of debate! Click here to read Frank Rupnik's SooToday article on the book from last week, and click here to buy George's new book (and more) on Amazon!
After being closed for almost three years, The Tech has re-opened under new ownership! The former Lakeway Collegiate/St. Mary's College building had been repurposed as a multi-purpose events center in the fall of 2015, but it quietly closed in February 2019. A handful of concerts (like the annual mental health fundraiser The Sky's The Limit & The Din's debut CD release party) were held at The W.W. Baldwin Auditiorium on-site, and given that former local concert promoter/musician Jeremy Hannah is involved in The Tech's revival, could more shows happen there in time? Stay tuned for updates, and learn more at their new Facebook page!
I have deleted late 2000s Sault Michigan acoustic hard rock band (and Shift side project) Wild Fate from our inactive band links, as their page was hit by the slow decay of publically viewable photos on their MySpace (and only surviving online) page. I have found that MySpace pages have been liable to lose pictures as time progresses, further eroding anything that made MySpace worthwhile, but it is what it is. Hopefully Joey and Amy are doing well nowadays!
That's all for today, but stay tuned for more news and notes on the site this weekend! Thanks everyone!
