LOCAL CONCERT ALERT (Soundcheck), Weekend Concert Previews, And More!!

Before we begin this weekend concert preview post, just a heads up that this weekend's Double Down concerts at Jay's Piston Broke Pub have been cancelled due to "unfortunate circumstances", as per their Facebook page on Monday. The band has not elaborated as to why they have withdrawn, but hopefully all's well in their camp! Double Down will be replaced at Jay's by two different bands, namely online page-less dance rock cover trio All Over The Map (featuring Pointless alumni) tomorrow and pop rock cover band The Sidekicks on Saturday night, so keep these changes in mind for your weekend concert planning!

This post otherwise looks at most of the weekend's hard rock concert previews, but due to the amount, we'll save our preview of Project 906 and HeadFirst concerts for tomorrow's post. We'll lead off in Sault Ontario with a SHORT NOTICE LOCAL CONCERT ALERT, as joining their already announced gig at The Esquire Club TOMORROW NIGHT, local classic/hard rock cover quartet Soundcheck will indeed be playing there on SATURDAY NIGHT too! Apologies for the short notice, I only learned that Soundcheck (well, most of them) were indeed playing on SATURDAY via personal Facebook postings earlier today, and they nor the venue have publically confirmed anything. From what I can gather, Soundcheck originally were only advertised for tomorrow because singer/guitarist Cameron Oliver will be unavailable on SATURDAY (I'll hold on why given that things aren't publically stated but it's nothing serious).

Despite their ample experience playing jam nights without him, Soundcheck have reportedly found a ringer! Again, I'll hold on revealing the guest singer's identity here because there hasn't been a public announcement by Soundcheck or The Esquire Club, but the singer is a known commodity who has fronted bands in the past. We'll update this if a public confirmation is made, but this singer is very talented, so Soundcheck are in good hands for the night! Tomorrow's show with Cameron and SATURDAY'S show without him are both 19+ affairs with no cover charges and 9:30 PM start times. See above for more details, and for a preview, here's Soundcheck live!

Next up, let's head to St. Ignace, Michigan, where Traverse City metal trio Scarkazm will return to The Northern Pines Lounge at their Kewadin Casino branch TOMORROW & SATURDAY NIGHT, but that's not all from them in the first quarter of 2024 in our area! Scarkazm posted Facebook event pages for currently scheduled shows through early May on their Facebook page (albeit still insisting on giving each individual night its own event page), and they will be back at The Rapids Lounge at Kewadin's Sault Ste. Marie branch on Friday, March 29th & Saturday, March 30th! On both accounts, this weekend's shows and next month's will be Scarkazm's first of the year at either E.U.P. locale, so hopefully Adam, Dave, and Jeff will kick off 2024 on the right foot tomorrow and/or Saturday for their Yooper fans! You can take in their hard rocking covers and originals at 9:00 PM with no cover charges and 21+ age limits, as usual for their Kewadin gigs.

Also, I do profusely apologize, as Scarkazm are actually playing TONIGHT (as in, RIGHT NOW) as well, marking the second straight year that they've been booked to play a special Thursday nighter during the  the Labatt Blue UP Pond Hockey Championships at nearby Chain Lake (the St. Ignace Kewadin hosts some events during the weekend). I caught this in time last year, but alas, not in 2024, but I hope to be more on top of things next time! Hopefully Scarkazm have a great triple header in St. Ignace, so see above for more on this weekend's shows and next month's in the Soo, and here they are live in concert last year!

Today's other preview is of a one-nighter on SATURDAY NIGHT, namely Sault Ontario southern hard rock trio Bone Yard's return to Gateway Casino! As usual for their gigs here (and at the Water Tower Pub), this will be an unplugged concert (or as they like to call it, "uncorked"), so if you want to take in some acoustic covers and/or miss The Bearded Lounge, head downtown to Sault Ontario's casino for all of the action! If you'd rather see Bone Yard with electric instruments, they don't have a traditional concert that's not acoustic booked until next month, but you technically don't have to wait that long, as tonight was actually the beginning of a new weekly jam night series that Bone Yard are hosting at Reggie's Place! Bone Yard are no strangers to the conceit, and Reggie's was looking into doing the jam night thing last year with the now-defunct Nostalgic Band, so this should be a good fit!

Like with Soundcheck's Thursday jam nights at Jay's, I will not be treating Bone Yard's jam nights as "concerts" for our purposes due to their unpredictability by design, as guest musicians can heavily sway what fans will hear, either from atypical song choices or from outright replacing the house band. At least here, no regular band members will be sitting out on Thursdays, but still, keep these in mind if you want to jam with/in place of Bone Yard! As for Saturday at Gateway Casino (which traditionally does not host live music on Fridays), expect a 9:00 PM start time, 19+ age limit, and no cover charge. Visit the above links for more details, and for a preview, here's some new videos from Bone Yard's Facebook page! These come from their traditional concert at Reggie's this past Friday, with one featuring them covering Ozzy Osbourne's "Crazy Train" as their set closer (technically a birthday-influenced encore).

The live-stream also includes the tail end of The Tragically Hip's "Blow At High Dough" at the very beginning. Alas, this is vertically shot, but believe it or not, the other video from this concert (uploaded early the next morning) is not! It's rare indeed to see Bone Yard filmed horizontally in an official upload, but that's what we get here in this 2 minute clip of them covering Don Henley's "Dirty Laundry", and doing so with a gritty hard rock edge that the original lacked! Normally, I'd have jumped all over the longer Ozzy cover to embed here, but I can't resist this one being in landscape orientation, so give both a watch above and below, and don't miss the "uncorked" Bone Yard show on Saturday!

That's all for today, but stay tuned for our HeadFirst and Project 906 previews (and more) next! Thanks everyone!