LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS (Half Past & The BAG) Plus Two New EP Releases!!

Today's post is split between two topics: the first local metal album releases of 2024 and a pair of LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS for next month, so here's what you should know on both fronts!

Remember how The Esquire Club's early 2024 concert calendar lists a band named "The B" as playing there on Friday, February 2nd? Well, they're not a mystery, rather a misprint, as young local metal trio The BAG will return there on this night! Frontman Spencer McGillivray confirmed that they are The B(AG) via their Facebook group on Friday, in what will be their first concert set of the year and their first appearance at the Second Line West nightclub since March of last year. Not sure what took them this long to come back, but hopefully Spencer, Austin, and Bradley deliver the metal goods for west end fans next month! In a rarity for The Esquire Club, this show will have an opening band, namely local punk trio Vanity First, in their second show together in under a week, following the previously announced Distraction concert on Saturday, January 27th, so this could be a rain date!

It's not every day when you get a double dose of original-heavy bands on stage together at The Esquire Club, so don't bypass this show next month for metal and punk action! This show is a 19+ event with no announced cover charge and a 9:00 PM start time. See above for more details!

Next up, reunited local hard rock quartet Half Past will finally return to the public concert stage on Saturday, February 3rd on Shooters Downstairs Lounge! As you may recall, Half Past were briefly advertised to return at Shooters in August of last year, only for that show to be cancelled without comment from the band, but with six more months to dial things in, hopefully next month's show is a huge hit for their comeback! This will be Half Past's first public concert in over twelve years, last seen at The Rockstar Bar in October 2011, and will see Jordan Rains, Alain Fletcher, and Arthur Lacasse now joined by Al's old Skeyes of Seven bandmate Jonny Amendola (original drummer Chris Thompson passed away in 2021, not long after Half Past relaunched). Hopefully their modern hard rock cover attack is welcomed back to the stage with ease after such a long layoff next month!

Note that this show (as well as Mid Life Crysis' show last night and Bone Yard's one nighter next week) are all Saturday nighters, seemingly indicating that Shooters has ended the Saturday DJ nights that they began last fall (or moved them to Fridays?). Half Past take the stage at 9:00 PM on February 3rd, this is a 19+ event, and there is no announced cover charge. Visit the official Facebook event page for more details!

Also today, I apologize for the two week delay in this making the site, but local progressive metal duo Convergence released their second EP to their Bandcamp page on New Year's Day! Entitled "Dead & Dreaming", this was recorded at guitarist Brendan Christie's own Yellow Room Studios, and is the end result of what was previously uploaded as a single to Bandcamp, and features five songs (well, four and an intro track), including "The Ebb", which was briefly appended to their "One" EP from last year. That song features returning session drummer Cliff Aubut, but unlike on "One", no songs here feature vocals. Along with a couple of unembeddable "Reels", the former Kraken Mara did share the Facebook video embedded below of Brendan playing 47 seconds of the closing track "Awake" in studio, with the format and setting being fairly similar to much of their 2023 videos ("Reels" or otherwise). The EP costs $4.99 on Bandcamp, and can be streamed for free there too.

A review of "Dead & Dreaming" is not pencilled in for the SMS until at least April, due to our policy of putting a buffer period of at least six months between reviews of the same project's albums, to avoid any accusations of bias or favouritism (we only reviewed "One" in October 2023). At present, we have Bold Noize, Sykotyk Rampage, and Sell This! slotted for the next few months, but don't worry, Convergence are coming up in the spring as our bumper crop of heavier album reviews continues! I'll hold comment until then, but if you like djent-laden progressive metal, do not skip past Convergence's new material above & below!

We'll close today with one more album release, and while I was unable to go to the release party due to prior commitments, local/Winnipeg industrial/punk solo project Sell This! released their third album "Empires Everywhere" last night! The album did not turn up on the project's Bandcamp page until today, but it is an EP with five songs, including two instrumentals. However, two of the songs run for 8+ minutes, so this is a near-half hour listen front to back. The songs do feature percussion too, but project founder/cellist Pete Mozarowski is the only credited musician on offer, so I don't know if he drummed here, and/or if he had a guest/session drummer, let alone for their set last night at The Distraction. "Empires Everywhere" is on sale for $5 (a whopping 1¢ more than "Dead & Dreaming") and can also be streamed for free there. As alluded to above, I have this album pencilled in for an SMS review in March after Bold Noize and Sykotyk Rampage.

This is due to our continued new release backlog dating back to late 2022, and while I try to go in chronological order, this will leapfrog "Dead & Dreaming" despite being two weeks newer due to our six month anti-bias buffer period between reviews of the same artist's albums. Both are coming in the spring, but buy or stream both albums above, and look for more news and notes on the site this week! Thanks everyone!