Another Local Video Showcase!!

I feel like it's getting tougher and tougher to cobble together content for regular posts on the SMS. Hopefully things pick up at some point before I have to think about spreading out our "at least one post every three days" guarantee! To keep things fair in this all-video post, let's go in alphabetical order by artist name, starting with some new videos from prolific local punk musician Dustin Jones, as shared onto SooToday this month! Much like he did during the first major lockdown last spring, a cover by him (on guitar) and his daughter Jett (on vocals) was posted on SooToday to share with readers as a point of inspiration, this time tackling Jordan Clarke's "Freaks". Fun performance for what it is, and they even included lyrics to sing along with in the article proper! I can't embed videos from SooToday's video host here, but luckily, their other new video from Dustin was merely shared from Tidal Records' YouTube channel!

A live performance from Mission Control Studios, this is of an original song called "For Now" that was newly uploaded yesterday, though it's not clear whether this is just a solo song or if it will end up being on The Rising Tide's forthcoming new album. This is definitely a folksier song, but I can see it being adapted with the full band if that is at all planned. Well performned and sung, and SooToday again has lyrics if you want to sing along, but give Dustin's video proper a look below!

Next up, I was recently alerted to a few new YouTube uploads from veteran local drummer Brian Egglesfield's YouTube channel in the past month! You may recognize Brian from bands like Tripod The Dog and Screwge, and the latter band are kinda the focus here, as Brian uploaded three videos credited to that band from Rotaryfest Stage 1 at Clergue Park back in July 2013! In case you don't have a 2013 program handy, this technically isn't Screwge, rather the Toronto jam rock band Ground Zero, who co-headlined the Saturday lineup that year. As detailed in this YouTube video's description, Screwge were active locally from 1978-1981, with some members later moving down south and playing with Ground Zero through 1993, and the latter band held a one-off reunion here with Saultites Frank Fazi & Shane O'Connell taking part (I'm not 100% certain on if Brian drummed.) Ground Zero proper aren't hard rock centric, but they did cover at least one heavier song!

Brian's Screwge Ground Zero videos include covers of ZZ Top's "Gimme All Your Lovin'", George Thorogood & The Destroyers' "Move It On Over", and as embedded below, both Rod Stewart's "Hot Legs" and Goddo's "Sweet Thing" (nice to hear some classic hard rock Canadian content!) Despite an unzoomed and often crooked camera angle, the audio quality is really good, and the guys have a good fan-friendly sound on these classic covers. There is more to touch on from Brian's YouTube channel from other bands, but check out his Ground Zero videos above and below!

Also, here's a new solo performance video from veteran local hard rock solo guitarist Mike Cliffe's YouTube channel a couple of days ago! His first non-Christmas carol upload here in almost a year, this is an apparent original song called "Persuaders" with him on guitar playing alongside pre-recorded backing instruments, though the video proper is replaced by an AudioFumes card for the last minute. Solid performance of this spacey prog rock number, so give Mike's newest video a watch below!

We'll close by heading south to Sault Michigan for the latest from local hard rock quartet Tarnished! Publically speaking, we haven't heard much from them this month in a musical sense, but a Facebook page posting on January 18th did hint that they were "hard at work". At least partially, this relates to non-musical endeavours, including a video of a planned side series called "Tarnished Talks", where band members (Alex & Josh in the premiere's case) talk about something, starting with what they love about AC/DC. As well, they launched another pilot for a "Tarnished Plays" series where band members play a video game together, with Alex and Josh playing Fortnite in episode 1. Sounds like a fun way to stay busy during presumed pandemic-influenced downtime, and they do have creative observations about AC/DC! Tarnished have also launched a Patreon page for fans to back them and crowd-fund future band endeavours, with exclusive content planned there.

Their only new Facebook video in the last couple of weeks featuring the band on camera is this 33 second clip of Alex & Josh thanking everyone for crossing both the 200 followers threshold on TikTok and 600 likes on Facebook. Not too substantial, but length-wise, it's par for the course for their TikTok page. I should really give their TikTok page more of a look re: the SMS, as most videos there are not shared to or re-uploaded on Facebook, and despite the short video lengths, there is a lot of exclusive videos to see. Stay tuned on that front, but give Tarnished's AC/DC discussion a listen below!

That's all for today, but stay tuned for a new post of some kind by month's end! Thanks everyone!