The Northwest Updates, Plus New Christmas Cover Videos!!

Before we get into today's post, I wanted to apologize for a missed concert to preview on here, as local classic/hard rock cover quartet Soundcheck actually played at Jay's Piston Broke Pub last night. This one-nighter was only announced on Jay's Facebook page on Thursday, and the band has not posted on their Facebook page in three weeks. With the local concert calendar being very quiet given that today (Christmas Eve) is a Saturday, I frankly wasn't expecting any heavier bands to announce shows this weekend, but hopefully there was a decent turnout at the former Rosie last night, and I'd have covered this show had I heard about it prior!

Today's post is mostly video related, including two seasonal offerings as we near Christmas, but we'll start with a charitable update for an upcoming post-Christmas concert, namely the Northwest/Gambit show at LopLops Lounge on Wednesday! Our proper preview of that show will hit the site early next week, but on the 15th, the headlining indie/punk quintet announced that they would be holding a charity drive for St. Vincent's Place that night. If you bring non-perishable food items or hygiene products with you, you'll basically save $5 on admission (the ticket price is otherwise $20), so you'll either get in for $15 or you'll get $5 back if you bought yours in advance. In response, LopLops will match all donations by giving $5 apiece to St. Vincent's Place. Wonderful idea, and especially at a screwy time of year for many, so hopefully lots of money and food is raised for the needy at St. Vincent's Place on Wednesday night!

The charity drive is also addressed in this new SooToday article by Chris Belsito yesterday, which also looks at The Northwest's busy 2022, from high profile live dates to their EP release to their airplay on radio and during televised NHL games over these past 12 months. Frontman Wayne Watkins is quoted in the article, where he praises the grants that the band has received from the Ontario Arts Council, as well as the assistance that they have received from Cultural Industries Ontario North towards mentorship and networking in the Canadian music scene. Wayne teased that The Northwest already has "voice memo demos" for what they hope will be a full length studio album next, before closing by plugging Wednesday's concert. Strong promotion that points to what should be a big year for The Northwest, so click here or above to give it a read!

To cap off the Northwest portion of today's post, they did post a few new videos onto their Facebook page (mostly text-heavy "Reels" to promote the concert/food drive), but the only actual video (uploaded on Wednesday) features Wayne and guitarist Greg Callaghan plugging the show while also wearing ugly Christmas sweaters. Fellow guitarist Mike Yakasovich is also present, but says nothing, which isn't anything new if you recall prior speech-heavy Northwest videos. Good and light promotion for the festivities on Wednesday, so check it out below, and see more recent updates and content from The Northwest above!

 

Next up, here's another new Christmas carol covers from former Brain Tuel guitarist Zach Reid's YouTube channel! He has clearly been in the Christmas spirit since I shared his acoustic guitar rendition of "Christmas Time Is Here" on the SMS last week, as he has posted eight more carol covers there since! These include versions of "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas", "Silent Night", "I'll Be Home For Christmas", "I Saw Three Ships", "Greensleeves" (a.k.a. "What Child Is This?"), "Silver Bells", "Somewhere In My Memory" from Home Alone as a "Short" video, and as embedded below, the Canadian standard "The Huron Carol". These quiet, intimate acoustic carol renditions might be just what the doctor ordered with the snow still coming down in the Soo area tonight, so give them a watch above & below!

Finally for today, here's one more video to watch by the fire... as it literally has one! As you may recall, Sault Michigan classical metal band Theatre of Night released their new/revised Christmas album "Dreams of Winter" on December 2nd, and it has made its way to YouTube for free streaming twice. Once is via the automated YouTube channel hosting select studio material for YouTube Music, but the other is in one batch video on their official YouTube channel as set to a 56 minute video of a yule log on the fire! All 14 of the new/re-recorded songs are present in order as seen on the album (and timestamped in the description), so this will surely be the most metal yule log video you'll watch this year, at least as far as local bands go! Looping it to run longer aside, the only thing I'd have changed would be to make the video in full widescreen, as having it in square Instagram dimensions seems counter-productive. Check it out below!

That's all for today, but I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas, and I'll catch you back on the site on Monday or Tuesday! Thanks everyone!