LOCAL CONCERT ALERT (Clusterfolk Music Festival), A Local Album's Video Review, And Much More!!

I have another news post for you guys on this Tuesday evening, which dives into a notable LOCAL CONCERT ALERT regarding a festival's surprise return, but in this case, not because of the pandemic! Also, we have a video review and some new updates from a prolific local musician to cap things off, so here's what you should know!

Local classic/hard rock quartet The Uncanny Valley will return to The Rockstar Bar on Saturday, April 23rd for the return of the Clusterfolk Music Festival! Some readers may recall Clusterfolk as a folk/indie-leaning outdoor concert back in 2010 & 2011, but prominent local musician/promoter Jackson Reed has resurrected it this month as a hybrid youth-centric virtual & concert event, in conjunction with the NORDIK Institute, various grant funds, and 180 Projects on Gore Street, as per this SooToday article by Lisa Dobrovnik earlier today. Clusterfolk in 2022 will primarily give young Northern Ontario musicians exposure and experience for promoting themselves via the gradual release of newly recorded music videos on the official Clusterfolk page on 180 Projects' website. These videos will premiere on the Clusterfolk page each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday through April 20th, with the aforementioned concert closing the festival on the 23rd, and black-and-white teaser photos from the video shoots are also posted there.

The Uncanny Valley are the advertised headline act at the ClusterFolk concert, and while their inclusion may seem like an outlier for Clusterfolk, keep in mind that RedD Monkey were on the 2011 lineup. Note that The Uncanny Valley have not confirmed their involvement in the festival yet (they haven't played live at all so far this year), but they are advertised in official festival materials. Other artists playing on the 23rd include newer local indie pop rock band Jupiter Marvelous (featuring Caroline Divine and Vol. alumni), Sudbury indie rock musician Will Powers (whose music video for "Proof" was the first to go live yesterday for the festival), and indie/folk sibling duo Distich. These acts and four more will have music videos premiering for Clusterfolk this month, with the other four including indie rock trio Xeno, solo artists Gabrielle Dumas & Storm Rausch, and a joint video from Jackson Reed and Jupiter Marvelous' Jacob Quarrell.

A schedule wasn't announced for the music video releases, but tune in tomorrow to see whose drops next, and we'll definitely let you know when The Uncanny Valley's premieres! The concert proper has an 8:30 PM start time, a 19+ age limit, and a $10 entry fee at the door. This should be a fun concert for indie and folk rock fans to enjoy some rising young talent, especially with pandemic restrictions still hopefully much lesser, and it will be interesting to see how Clusterfolk III does in its grand return! Visit the official Facebook event page & the above links for much more on the involved bands & the festival proper!

Next up, remember how local/Thompson, Manitoba solo musician Mike Haggith has long teased a new YouTube series where he'd do video reviews of albums he liked? Well, it finally premiered two months ago on his YouTube channel under the name Mike's Spin, and the first review is of "Ghost Stories" by the New Jersey indie act Project Atlantic, who Mike likes so much that he's covered them in his live-streams. However, if you want something from a local band, Mike had you covered yesterday for his second video review, as he took a look at late lamented post-punk quartet Gnaeus' only album "Meditations", from way back in August 2016! After a cold open where he comically tries to cover "Lovers", he gets into the review proper, which runs for 11 minutes, and it starts with summative thoughts of the album before running through the album's progression front-to-back.

While Mike highly praises the songs, he next criticizes the production quality and how it doesn't feel crafted to Gnaeus' strengths, but from a fellow musician with his own ample studio experience, he will pick up on things that many fans won't. As such, the review is definitely in two halves, and while he loves the songs, he gave "Meditations" a 7/10 due to his production thoughts. I do think Mike should have credited Aaron, Matt, Brad, and Brendan by name to promote their talents and work, but this was a well reasoned and critiqued review of a strong local CD from a band who broke up too soon, so give it a watch below!

Finally, here's the latest from Mike's old Strange Coyotes bandmate Chase Wigmore's Facebook page! On March 20th, the folk punk/extreme metal standout revealed that the back catalog albums he uploaded to his Bandcamp page are all now "pay what you can" deals after previously being posted with the draft $7 price. To his credit, Chase did say that he encourages downloading "most of 'em" for free, but for the ones that he's most proud of, he did express hope that you'll pay something for them if you liked them. The post made it sound like he had now uploaded all of his old albums there for sale, but there are missing releases from his solo profile, most notably the majority of albums he put out during his 12 EPs of Christmas series from 2018-2019. Still, 24 albums is nothing to shake a stick at, and fans of his will find a lot to like and experience on Bandcamp for whatever amount you want to pay (or you can stream them there too!)

He also clarified that his teased new album "Sonic Apocalypse" is still in the works, and will hopefully come out before the actual apocalypse (no word on his long delayed "A Kid Named Todd" rock opera though). Let's close with a new video from two weeks ago, featuring Chase covering The Mountain Goats' "No Children", which makes good use of his distinctive clean, rapid-fire vocals & some oddly grand escalating guitar work! However, the video quality looks like a 15 year old webcam, which is unfortunate. Still a fun performance, so give it a look below!

That's all for today, but stay tuned for more news and notes on the site in the days ahead! Thanks everyone!