LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS (Banned), Recent Pixo Control Activity, And Much More!!

Believe it or not, this is our first news post since Friday, partly due to my own schedule and a slower general news spread in the fall, but with October now upon us, and Halloween approaching closer and closer, that will definitely change! To start our news catch-up, we have a bunch of assorted recent notes, an apology-laden write-up on a local band's September activity, and to kick things off, LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS for next month, so here's what you need to know!

Kinross, Michigan hard/classic rock trio Banned have confirmed two new regional concert weekends for next month! The guys will return to The Runway Bar in Hessel for the first time in three months on Friday, November 14th & Saturday, November 15th, while they'll make their first appearances at the Dondee Lanes in Sault Michigan of 2014 the following weekend (November 21st-22nd), so if you've been hoping for some new non-Kewadin gigs from the Traynors and Wayne in our area, there you go! These shows were confirmed on Banned's Facebook page on Sunday, and join upcoming dates in Drummond Island, Gould City, and Engadine over the next few months, plus previously announced Kewadin Casino gigs. Banned's Hessel and Soo shows next month are both 21+ affairs with no announced cover charge, and while they'll be on at 9:00 PM at The Runway Bar, their Dondee shows have an earlier start time of 8:00 PM.

For more details, check the above links! It's great to see Banned continuing to rock some consistent dates (and add some new non-Kewadin dates to their fall schedule), so stay tuned for more, and if you're up for the trip, go see Banned in Drummond Island next weekend!

Next up, have you been wondering why we haven't covered The Pixo Control on here yet this fall? To be completely honest, I hadn't seen much from them since The Emergency Festival, but blame my Facebook news feed for not posting what they did last month on my wall, as I just realized yesterday that we missed two unique concerts of theirs over the past month. In the midst of songwriting, the local alternative hard rockers played a set at the Soo's first annual Pridefest on September 7th at The Roberta Bondar Pavilion alongside solo sets by Ryan Seabrook & The Wild Iris' Jake Rendell (source here), before joining local indie acoustic trio K.I.C.K. and other artists at the MS Norgoma (yes, the boat-turned-museum) on September 19th for the second annual 46th Parallel, Music, Art & Media Festival, even making the poster. Very unique setting that you can check out courtesy of Local2's video coverage of this cool event (though The Pixo Control aren't featured), while Pridefest is a great cause itself, and it's awesome to see the LGBT community coming together for an event of this calibre in the Soo!

Still, the fact that we missed a month's worth of updates from The Pixo Control is inexcusable, especially for such a promising young band (let alone one of the few "heavy" bands in the Soo with over 1,000 Facebook likes), so our sincere apologies for what we missed over the past month! I'll try my best to make sure we're more on top of their news and notes, and hopefully we see the guys on the local stage again soon! Stay tuned for more! 

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

• Local death metal rockers The Bear Hunters have confirmed that the booklet for their debut album "Eternal Hibernation" will have lyrics for each song. Great news for fans, especially if some find it hard to discern Nik's growling, so keep that in mind for the release next month! Our source is the band's Facebook page on Saturday.
• Local goregrind solo project Crucify The Whore will apparently join fellow local metal bands AlgomA, Bad Back, and The Apocalypse Afterparty in Toronto on October 16th for their "Northern Horde" concert there, marking C.T.W.'s Southern Ontario debut as well. This is a huge opportunity for Tyler, hopefully everyone shows Toronto what the Soo's made of! Our source is The Apocalypse Afterparty's Facebook page.
• Local post-punk quartet Gnaeus have begun a new studio recording session of some type, as per their Facebook page's newest photo on Sunday. Just an outlet to record a new original song or two, or is this something more? We'll let you know if we hear anything!
• Local promoter J.D. Pearce's promotional Facebook group is already teasing some 2015 concerts, including a new Dayglo Abortions show in May, his involvement in co-promoting the second annual Das Bunkerfest (more on that in our next news post), and in a surprising development, a full Fistmagnet reunion show in June?! If you enjoyed Garry's guest turn with Destroilet at Hardcore Homecoming, you'll definitely want to pay attention, so stay tuned for updates! No word yet though on next month's teased Whiskey Shits concert.
• A local musician named Jordan Leach is looking for a singer, guitarist, and drummer for a new downtown-centered punk band that he's starting. He'd prefer a female singer, and it's assumed that he's the bassist in the band, who would cover some indie and metal songs as well. Practices would be between Friday & Sunday, and if you're interested in trying out, message Jordan at this link or via his Musicians Wanted Facebook group post on Monday!
• I've deleted the short lived Redundant predecessors The Quims from our inactive band links due to the recent deletion of their Facebook page for unannounced reasons. Active briefly in late 2010, The Quims had planned to play "raunch hillbilly redneck rock n' roll", but fell inactive before forming Redundant as a more typical punk band the next year. Stay tuned for more from the Redundant camp as we hear it!
• In case you saw recent live videos of That's Chester at a private wedding gig in the Elliott Lake area and were hoping to see them on the site, then I can't help, as drummer Ric Datson had to pull them from his YouTube channel due to copyright complaints. Disappointing, but maybe he can try posting them on Facebook? For reference, the videos were covers of Supertramp and AC/DC songs.
• I've replaced the link for defunct local goregrind trio Tomgrindy in our inactive band links due to the quiet deletion of their Facebook page, but luckily they're still on Reverbnation for all you Blood Shed Productions fans! We won't get into the details of their split and falling out though.

That's all for now, but stay tuned for another news post far sooner than this one was, and for this month's "Where Are The New Albums?" post TOMORROW! Thanks everyone!