Handsome Sandwich Updates & Videos From The Past Few Weeks!!

Here's the latest from local alternative hard rock quintet Handsome Sandwich, so what have they been up to as of late? Well, they're on the road right now for two shows in Southern Ontario, which started when they returned to Ottawa on Thursday night for a show alongside Ottawa pop punk band Holly Acres as part of The Overflow Brewing Company's "Indie Series"! That concert was plugged by Holly Acres in this "Reel" and by Handsome Sandwich in this short & vertical video (thankfully not a "Reel") on their Facebook page featuring the whole band outside of the brewery. They haven't posted on their Facebook page since, but hopefully that concert was a hit for all involved! The other (and better hyped) tour date this weekend will see the Sandwich head to Cookstown in Simcoe County tomorrow afternoon to open for Kill/Death Radio on Stage 1 at this year's Gussapalooza Music Festival, which should be a big one for them!

Only one other band at Gussapalooza tomorrow (past Go North Music Festival performers Propter Hawk) are familiar to me from past local dates, but they're playing on Stage 2. To promote tomorrow's concert, an unidentified band member was interviewed by Jenna Melanson of the music website Canadian Beats (who have heavily been promoting Gussapalooza), and you can read the full interview at this link. There, the band member talked about their music so far, how they sound (picture a mix of Paramore, The Foo Fighters, and Limp Bizkit?!), getting picked to play this festival, and their upcoming new material. While they have since clarified on Facebook that their seven new studio songs will be released as an EP, this interview again points out that "we are leaning toward a release of singles", implying that they could just post them individually on streaming services. Hopefully they are collected as an EP for convenience and mp3 downloads' sake!

Good interview, if with a lot of hypotheticals and unknowns given the Gussapalooza expectations angle of many questions, so check it out above! If you're wondering why Handsome Sandwich went three days between these shows, it's because Brandon & Johnny's folk/bluegrass side project The Golden Scoundrels joined them on tour, and they were booked for the Black & Bluegrass festival in North Gower (outside of Ottawa) tonight, where they played alongside past Whisky Barrel headliners Bastards & The Buzzards, among others. Nice to see the Scoundrels spreading their wings, and hopefully that show went well for all involved too! Now to a pair of new live videos from Handsome Sandwich's set at last month's Northern Vibe Festival in Ophir (definitely not the final one based on their Facebook page's latest updates!), and the first one uploaded from their Forest Stage set was a video of them playing their newer song "Change A Bit", so what can you see there?

Filmed by attendee Adam Willis and posted to Facebook on the Monday after Northern Vibe, this 65 second clip was shot from beside the Forest Stage, with a unique (if sadly vertical) vantage point of Taylor, Jesse, Brandon, Rafael, and Johnny rocking out, including some views pointing towards the night-obscured audience (and a nice bonfire!). I wish this was the full song and shot horizontally, but the audio quality and unique views sell it, so check out Handsome Sandwich changing a bit below!

Note as well that, in the description for the above video, they noted that "we have been lucky to play (at Northern Vibe) every year since we became a band". They're counting "since we became a band" as when Taylor joined in 2021, as I don't believe they played at Northern Vibe from 2017-2019 during their pre-pandemic run as a genre-less cover trio, but Poplardale Road has been a reliable end-of-summer locale for them since their relaunch! The other video from Ophir was officially uploaded to the band's YouTube channel, and while it was also shot by Adam, this is both the full song and in horizontal landscape orientation! The video has the band playing "Partyfuel" (officially all one word), and the song features Wyld Stallyns saxophonist Josh Norling, who previously played on "No Entry" on the band's debut album "Deconstructed". Note that, in the video description, Josh and ex-guitarist Mitch Sirie share in the writing credits.

This would seemingly be a strong hint that Josh will guest on this song on their upcoming EP, but I haven't seen that in firm writing anywhere. The "Partyfuel" video starts off with Adam filming from the lawn in front of the Forest Stage, but he makes the rounds to both sides of the stage and even on stage while the band & Josh are rocking out. The video quality is great, and you get some excellent angles of the Forest Stage that we don't normally see from publically uploaded Northern Vibe videos, so kudos to Adam for getting some excellent footage! I'll hold comment on the song pending our review of the EP (assuming it's not solely released as seven individual singles), but check out "Partyfuel" for yourselves below!

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

LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS (Tarnished), More Weekend Concert Previews, And New Videos!!

I hope everyone is having a good and not-at-all-unlucky Friday the 13th! Today's post wraps up this weekend's hard rock concert previews, including SHORT NOTICE LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS, but we do have new videos from a band whose show this weekend was seemingly cancelled. Here's what you should know for the rest of this weekend!

After a month off from the local stage, Sault Michigan hard rock/classic metal band Tarnished will play two shows TOMORROW NIGHT, namely a matinee at the Little Bear East Arena & Community Center in St. Ignace in conjunction with this year's annual Richard Crane Truck Show & Parade Of Lights, before heading back home to the Soo for a traditional nighttime show at The Merchants Bar! Apologies for the short notice on both gigs, Tarnished only announced them on their Facebook page this week. Tarnished were last seen in our coverage range opening for Heavy Lies The Crown outdoors in St. Ignace a month ago, with road trips to Grand Marais and Rose City in the interim. TOMORROW's St. Ignace show will see Alex & Josh (and Chris & Ron?) rock out during the truck show proper at the 275 Marquette Street arena, and they should provide a fun soundtrack to all of the quality trucks on display before that night's parade!

TOMORROW NIGHT'S show at The Merch will be their first at this popular local nightclub since May, and if you want a more standard night of hard rocking originals and old school covers, you know where to go! The truck show concert is at 2:00 PM TOMORROW (running until 5:00), while the Merch show is at 9:00 PM. Both events have no announced cover charge, and while the former is likely all ages, the latter is 21+. Visit the above links for more details on both of Tarnished's shows TOMORROW, and for a preview, here they are live at The Merch earlier this year!

Next up, let's head north to Sault Ontario, where local classic/hard rock cover quartet Double Down will rock The Esquire Club TONIGHT & TOMORROW NIGHT! With the venerable Second Line West nightclub resuming their live music schedule for the fall season, Double Down jumped on that, and will actually be playing there in two weeks as well as this weekend, so fans of the Syrettes, Brad, and Ric's hard rocking and varied covers won't want to miss out on their four shows this month! You can unleash the rhythm with Double Down tonight and tomorrow at The Esquire Club at 9:30 PM, these are 19+ events, and there is no announced cover charge. No frills to note here, just two solid nights of rocking covers from this talented collection of Griphook, Mojo, and That's Chester alumni, so don't miss out this weekend, and for a preview, here's Double Down live, and we'll have more from them soon!

Lastly for this weekend's heavier shows, let's return to the Eastern Upper Peninsula, where Sault Michigan hard rock quintet The Nameless will make their debut at Huck's Pub & Grill in nearby Rudyard TOMORROW NIGHT! This show did have question marks over it for a time, thanks to frontman Joshua LaCoursiere's recovery from a severe allergic reaction to a bee sting last month, but nowhere in the advertising for tomorrow's show is it said that he will be absent. The last update on his condition from the GoFundMe page to help his family was on August 27th, so fingers crossed that Josh's recovery has went on track or better, and that The Nameless' hard rock attack goes over well at the former Joe's Bar & Grill tomorrow! This one-night-only event has a 21+ age limit, 8:00 PM start time, and no cover charge. Visit the official Facebook event page for more details, and click here for their sole (and unembeddable) public video!

Today's post would have been rounded out by our preview of Sault Ontario southern hard rock trio Bone Yard 225's show at Shooters Downstairs Lounge tomorrow night, but that concert appears to have been quietly cancelled, as per it's removal from their website's concert calendar. A reason for the show being called off was not publically announced, but the band hasn't mentioned it since first announcing it on said calendar last month, and Shooters never confirmed the booking on social media. Hopefully all's well in Bone Yard's camp, and they are still advertised to return to Shooters for a one nighter on October 5th! I won't completely scrap them from this post otherwise, as they did post two videos from their "uncorked" show at The Water Tower Pub on August 30th onto their Facebook page on Tuesday! The videos (shockingly both filmed horizontally) include an acoustic cover of The 4 Non Blondes' "What's Up?", a favorite song of theirs to film.

I've never understood the appeal of this song among local bands (even for ironic reasons, given that so many bands tackle it), so yeah, keep it mind if you wanna know what's going on. It is a lively choice for a live audience, I suppose! Embedded below is their lengthy unplugged cover of The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Little Wing", which is a much better showcase of Greg, Alex, and Warren's skill set! The blue/purple lighting could stand to be dialed back a bit, but this is a strong performance for classic rock fans, so don't miss out below, and if you want to see them live, don't miss your local 225 plugged in at Reggie's next weekend!

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

The First Half Of This Weekend's Hard Rock/Punk Concert Previews!!

Another busy concert weekend is upon us, necessitating two posts to cover it all. As such, look for our previews of this weekend's Bone Yard 225, Double Down, Tarnished, and Nameless concerts in tomorrow's second preview post, so don't worry, they are coming! Now, here's what you should know, starting with a big punk show TONIGHT!

Leading off this busy weekend is the long awaited return of Pomona, California hardcore punk legends Total Chaos, who will headline TONIGHT at The Stellar Door under The Distraction! The second basement show at the former East Street barbershop, this space won rave reviews when The Ripcordz played there this summer, and hopefully the good vibes of a good old fashioned punk basement show continue for Total Chaos in their first local concert appearance since they rocked the former Oddfellows Hall fourteen years ago. Hardcore punk fans won't want to miss their established and newer original fury, so don't miss out tonight! Opening here are Ottawa "post street punk" band BALM Squad in their local debut, and they'll be a strong lead-off band with their hard hitting original sound, so don't bypass them tonight either! Surprisingly, this show does not have any advertised local opening acts.

Note that local/Barrie crossover thrash band Spades GT opened for BALM Squad in Toronto in July, and will open for The Exploited at two GTA shows this weekend, so the local connection goes further than you think! If you hadn't bought the limited $25 advance tickets by now, door admission is via a "$20 or pay what you can" setup, the Mikhal Muto-promoted concert starts at 9:00 PM. and this is definitely an ALL AGES venue (no alcohol, please respect the space). Despite being on a work/school night, this should be a great night of hardcore punk action, so don't miss out at The Stellar Door under The Distraction tonight, and here's Total Chaos live!

Next up, let's dive into musicians on the weekend cover circuit, starting with prolific local classic/hard rock singer/guitarist Tym Morrison, who will wrap up his summer 2024 arrangement at The Mike Case Memorial Stage outside of The Trading Post TOMORROW NIGHT before returning for another matinee  on SATURDAY at Misty's Fifties! As The Mike Case Stage only hosts live musicians seasonally, their live music schedule ends in early-mid September, hence why this is Tym's last Friday evening gig there of the year. If you like seeing Tym playing outdoors way down Great Northern Road, this is your last chance until (likely) mid-2025, so keep tomorrow's show in mind! If you prefer seeing him indoors and earlier in the day, his Misty's Fifties run continues until at least the end of the month, and we'll let you know if it gets extended at all. You can enjoy his unplugged classic & hard rock covers tomorrow at 7:00 PM and Saturday at 4:00 PM.

The Misty's show is likely 19+, and neither has a cover charge. For his outdoor swan song for 2024, tomorrow's Trading Post concert, we're looking at sunny-to-clear skies with temperatures at around 23°, so it should be a fine evening to wrap up the season's schedule with! Visit the official Facebook event pages linked here and here for more details, and for a preview, here's Tym live!

Also this weekend, former Haggith/Eclipse frontman Curtis McKenzie will hit the road just outside of town to play at the Rowdy Ranchers Horse Show at the Laird Fairgrounds TOMORROW & SATURDAY! This annual event is hosted by the local Rowdy Ranchers Round-Up horse club, and will see lots of family enterainment, vendors, and horse/pony shows and exhibits, so if you ride or just love horses, you might want to head out to Laird for all of the action this weekend! Visit the above links for more on the non-musical specifics. Curt will be the matinee musical entertainment during the day throughout the weekend, though he nor organizers have stated when exactly he's playing each night. On Saturday, there will be a nighttime headline band (pop rock cover quartet Lime), but given the formatting of this event, I hesitate to say that Curtis is "opening" for Lime. Regardless, the Rowdy Ranchers Round-Up is FREE & ALL AGES with gates opening at 8:00 AM.

Note that, according to Curt's Facebook page, he had been booked to play at The Dive Gastro Pub tonight but the show was cancelled, as the former Low & Slow had mistakenly double booked tonight's "Think It Over Thursday" gig (the actual performers there tonight are Aaron Lucas & Jeff July). Curtis hadn't announced a September 12th show in advance anyway, but hopefully we see him back at The Dive soon! As for the Rowdy Ranchers Horse Show, this may seem more like a country music-amenable event, but hopefully Curtis' hard rocking covers keep the good vibes going in Laird this weekend! See above for more details, and here's Curt live!

Finally for this weekend, we'll head back into city limits for local classic/hard rock cover quartet Generations' return to Jay's Piston Broke Pub TOMORROW & SATURDAY NIGHT! Last seen at the former Reggie's West early last month, these shows will be joined by Generations hosting Jay's weekly Thursday jam night tonight, so if such events interest you as a spectator or prospective performer, keep that in mind! It is worth noting that Generations frontwoman Valerie Powley does not take part in their jam nights, a'la Cameron Oliver missing Soundcheck's, but she will be back to sing all night this weekend, and the guys have teased having new Bob Seger and The Outfield covers to debut in their sets. Tomorrow and Saturday's traditional concerts (and jam night tonight) are 19+ affairs with no announced cover shows, and the normal concerts have 9:30 PM start times. Visit the above links for more details, and for a preview, here's Generations live!

That's all for now, but stay tuned for the second half of our weekend concert previews next! Thanks everyone!

Defunct Local Band Profile Series: Drayton Fever

It's now time for this month's Defunct Local Band Profile, and after a Sault Ontario summer for this series, we're spotlighting a Sault Michigan band to kick off the fall season! As always, this monthly feature looks at a randomly selected local metal, hard rock, or punk band from the past, in order to showcase and promote their run and accomplishments for modern readers, and it is quite fitting that this month's selection is a band who readers in the early 2010s will remember from releasing music on Friday the 13th, a date that returns this week! Here's what you should know!

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Drayton Fever

Hometown: Sault Ste. Marie/Paradise/Hulbert Township, Michigan

Genre: Thrash Metal

Lineup:

Doug Reed (Bludgeoned, Half A Man), all instruments

Audio/Video: Surviving media from Drayton Fever's run is only publically available on their label Werehold Records' YouTube channel, which features four songs that they recorded for Werehold's former Friday the 13th new music posting events in the early 2010s, as well as this clip of Doug recording "The Browning" for the Friday the 13th event in June 2014. An album called "The Longest Summer" was in pre-production at his old Half A Man bandmate Erik Rintamaki's own Hot Box Studios in Brimley, which would have had eight songs, but it was never completed as planned. A song named "Mary Kelly" was once streamable on their MySpace page as well. Here's the intended opening song for their album, "And On With The Killing"!

Info/Analysis: Active from around 2008-2014, Drayton Fever was the long gestating solo project from veteran E.U.P. metal musician Doug Reed, who signed to his Swampghas bandmate Jason Mills' now-defunct indie label Werehold Records in the latter half of their run. Updates through 2011 are largely gone thanks to MySpace's degradation, but Doug was working on "The Longest Summer" throughout the turn of the 2010s, describing the album as "a brutal collection of (my) life journeys & interests over the past 12 years in sickly brutal musical form, none of which is pretty". The album would have featured unspecified guest singers and drummers, and the songs on offer were influenced by bands like Exodus, Machine Head, Slayer, and Acid Bath. Drayton Fever only updated their Facebook page in 2012, and while they took part in Werehold's Friday the 13th new music events through June 2014, they were not involved in the series' mid-2010s installments, and likely fell inactive by 2015.

Full-on "metal" like this hasn't always been an easy sell in the E.U.P. (not that Werehold managed to release completed albums from their roster), but Drayton Fever were a solid and reliably heavy project that deserved to get bigger in this area! Doug is a talented multi-instrumentalist with a good ear for what works in thrash and groove metal on songs like "Beatnik" and "Fleshwork", and vocals were optimally deployed when used. It's a shame that Drayton Fever could never publically break through beyond one-off songs on Friday the 13th, but hopefully we haven't heard the last from Doug in some musical form or fashion!

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I hope you guys liked this month's Defunct Local Band Profile! For the first time in over two years, this series will have two bands featured in the next installment, as the first randomly selected project doesn't have much in the way of public details, so a similarly slight project was picked to fill things out. As such, look for our profiles of Sault Ontario metal solo projects The Shaner and Sir Hell on or around October 10th, and for weekend concert previews on the SMS next! Thanks everyone!

R.I.P. Dennis Becker (1953-2024)

I'd like to send our deepest condolences to the family and friends of former Sykotyk Rampage bassist Dennis Becker, who passed away on Saturday at the age of 70 after a long battle with cancer. His obituary is now up on SooToday, where it notes that he is survived by his wife Sylvia, two daughters, two step-children, his dog Lily, and his brothers Rutger, Paul, and Dirk, among his other extended family members. Dennis was also predeceased by his brother Terry, a musician himself who played guitar in bands like Phlashback. While there will be no funeral, a celebration of life will take place at a later date. Donations in Dennis' name can be made to the Sault Area Hospital Foundation Cancer Care Fund by way of An Evening At Hogwarts, and arrangements are entrusted to the Northwood Funeral Home. While arguably best known to SMS readers from his long association with his brothers Paul & Dirk's band Sykotyk Rampage, he has many other credits to his name dating back to the 1970s.

Dennis was among the members of Zak's All-Stars in the 1980s, and more recently performed with local blues musician Paul DellaVedova (including on his "Born With The Blues" CD in 2012), among other projects. Modern streaming credits on Sykotyk Rampage's 70 albums often seem very generalized, so I'm not 100% sure what material Dennis (a.k.a. "E'Or") recorded on, but he was involved with the masters of the crash in their early run and their first few albums in the early-mid 2000s, likely including 2006's "E'Or - Den" (fans may want to check out "Dirty Washroom Blues" from that album in particular, as Terry Becker guested on it!). Dennis' presence was still felt in the Sykotyk camp even this year, with "Sinned" being among the protagonists (all with band members' first names reversed) on their new concept album & comic book "Waerlogas Sagas 1", which will be reviewed here later this month.

I didn't know Dennis personally, but my mom was friends with Dirk and Paul dating back to high school, and I was very aware of how close the Becker brothers were throughout the years, on and off the stage. Dennis definitely came across like a good man who loved his family, and he was a talented musician from what I have heard. Having lost my mom to cancer as well, my thoughts are absolutely with Erin, Megan, and the entire Becker clan at this difficult time, and hopefully there are lots of positive remembrances to come from those who knew him. R.I.P. Dennis!

Spades GT Updates From June-July 2024!!

Blame a busy summer schedule for the delay here, but let's take time today to look at recent-ish updates from local/Barrie crossover thrash quartet Spades GT in this post! We left off in mid-May, with the former Jack Spades spending most of the rest of the month plugging their summer concert schedule, with their first show of the season being a headlining date at The Casbah Lounge in Hamilton on June 8th. The band claimed that this was "our first time" in Hamilton, and that is surprisingly true, though they did drop out of a planned set opening for Death Perception there in July 2023. Starting with this gig, Spades GT actually welcomed a second guitarist to their live lineup, namely Matthew "Fang" Voros, who fronts the Burlington psychobilly band The House Of Haunt (Spades bassist James Roy Daley has played with this band in the past). They have not said if Matt has joined the group full time, but he played at every show of theirs in June & July.

Spades GT's next show was on June 11th in their Barrie homebase, which was allegedly the "only Barrie show we('ve) got for 2024". This show saw them and two other bands open for the legendary Dayglo Abortions at The Queens Nightclub, in a make-up date of sorts for the planned Dayglo/Spades tour run in December that was cancelled after Murray "The Cretin" Acton underwent cancer surgery. Surprisingly, videos (let alone their vertical recap videos) were not posted on the band's Facebook page from either of these dates, but they would shoot one three days after the Dayglo concert! Spades made their way to Cornwall on June 14th, where they and ex-guitarist Jay Sarrazin's metal band Hellrager opened for Montreal hardcore punk icons The Ripcordz at La Maison Tavern. The recap video (still vertical but thankfully not a "Reel") was uploaded to their Facebook page on June 18th, so what is there to see here?

This recap video is an "extended cut" running for almost five minutes, which is more than welcomed! It features Spades arriving at the venue, checking out the interior, hanging out with the guys in The Ripcordz and Hellrager, and writing out their setlists, before we see very brief footage from the concert proper, and without any live audio from the bands (this isn't shocking for these recaps, but still). The video ends with the guys praising the gig and hitting the road. I still kinda wanna see raw (and horizontal) video of full songs, especially given Matt's presence, but this was a fun and well edited highlight reel for fans, so check it out for yourselves below!

Also in the fallout of the Ripcordz show in Cornwall, drummer Tyler Reiner starred in this Facebook video from June 16th where he wished everyone a happy Father's Day, hyped up how well the Cornwall gig went (they even consider Cornwall to be a "second home"), and they plan to come back there even heavier and faster next year. He also heavily hyped Duck Tape (a young Cornwall punk band) for their encouraging opening set. Not a lot here of a directly local relevance, but you can tell that everything went well at La Maison Tavern in June, so check this clip out below!

The band next played live in Toronto on July 11th when they opened for fellow Saultite Andrew Kiteley and his Oshawa hardcore punk band Random Killing at The Dance Cave above Lee's Palace. This show also featured Ottawa punk band BALM Squad, who will make their local debut at The Stellar Door under The Distraction this Thursday when they open for Total Chaos (preview forthcoming). The Toronto concert did not get the recap video treatment, but attendee Miles LeBlanc's extensive photo album from The Dance Cave was shared by Spades GT on Facebook, and he got some excellent shots throughout the night, so don't bypass them! The following day, Spades returned to Spiderfest in Meyersburg for the first time since 2021, which will be familiar to Jack Spades-era fans, given that they made the pilgrimage there annually for a number of years while still fully based out of the Soo! The guys opened for the likes of The Ripcordz, Random Killing, and The Bunchofuckingoofs there on July 12th, and while photos were shared on Facebook, there were no videos.

Unless stuff from their June-July gigs were belatedly posted to social media in the ensuing months, that's two months caught up for Spades GT's recent activity! When we pick things back up with J.D., Daniel, James, and Tyler (and Matt?), it will be in late August after they took a month+ off from the stage, so stay tuned for all of that soon! Thanks everyone!

Northern Vibe Festival Videos From Mike Haggith & The Dirty Mystics!!

I've put this off for too long as it is, so here's coverage of public videos from two bands that played at last month's Northern Vibe Festival in Ophir! Before then, we have some promising news about the Poplardale Road festival's future, as 2024 might not have been the final installment as organizers had hinted at in advance. A poll was posted on their Facebook page on Tuesday where they were asking if supporters would attend a fundraising event featuring bands and/or DJs that would help raise money to improve the band-centric Forest Stage. They wouldn't float that idea if they weren't hoping to return in 2025, after all, so speak up there if you'd come to or perform at such an event! Now to videos from that weekend, and while we're not going in performance order here, I did want to highlight Sudbury psychedelic hard rock trio The Dirty Mystics first, as Northern Vibe IX was their first ever public concert in any location!

Yes, a non-local band made their debut in our neck of the woods, which is neat! While they have teased that "more videos & music from the show are coming soon", they definitely had their own cameras (note the plural) rolling for their set, and you can see brief multi-camera footage of their Saturday evening set below courtesy of their Facebook page. It's just 9 seconds long and overlaid by text, but it's certainly better than nothing, so give it a watch below, and hopefully some much longer videos from their Northern Vibe set turn up soon!

Perhaps aided by paid wifi being offered to attendees this year, there are a few more public videos than normal to check out from this year's Northern Vibe, and most substantially of all is a full concert video from local/Barrie alt-hard rock musician Mike Haggith and his Big Finish Band! Before then, I should finally address their full-set video from last year's Northern Vibe Festival, which I hinted at in May when Mike posted a song from it on Facebook, but the full multi-camera livestream from Chalykoff Studios was finally uploaded to his YouTube channel at the end of that month. No word on if the interview that Mike's band recorded with Chalykoff Studios last year will ever see the light of day, but last year's full concert (shot across five cameras) is now fully available! Remember, Mike's band then featured Jacob Quarrell on bass, and only included current guitarist Elly McWatters as a backing vocalist on the last two songs.

In his first public concert after his freak knee dislocation at last year's Rotaryfest, Mike and crew played (in order) "All You Do", "Hot & Cold", covers of Gnaeus' "Lovers" & Bruce Springsteen's "Atlantic City", "MorningStar", "Missing" by The Din, "Love Will Light The Way", "I've Seen It Before", a cover of Bizotic's "Subway Delay", "The Nature Of The Times", and "Twist Of Fate". I won't go into great detail on the set proper (I already did last year from its single camera live-stream), but the footage here is excellently shot and edited, so kudos to Justine and crew for putting in great work to make Mike's set last year look this good! Check out Mike & The Big Finish Band's 2023 Northern Vibe set below!

Now to this year's Mike Haggith concert in Ophir, which he posted as a "delayed live-stream" on his YouTube channel on August 27th, as poor data coverage on Mike's end led to it being posted after the fact. This is a single camera video, but Chalykoff Studios was on hand once again, and multi-camera footage like last year will eventually go online when complete (though remember that last year's final copy was only posted on YouTube in May). Mike's band (now including Gnaeus' Matt Fronzi on bass) played another 11 song set, this time as the Friday night co-headliners. Interestingly, Mike did not play guitar at all at Northern Vibe, which would seem to be a huge endorsement of Elly's increasing guitar abilities! This year, Mike and crew only played original songs (not even a Din cover), and their set started with a brand new song of Mike's entitled "Brand New Day", which blended directly into his existing track "Back Away Slowly".

The 43 minutes-long set continued with "An Act Of Strength", followed by the two new original songs that debuted at Rotaryfest, namely "I Really Hope This Gets To You" and "No Love". The rest of the set was made up of existing originals, starting with "Hot & Cold" (one of just three songs carried over from Northern Vibe 2023). After introducing the band and acknowledging this being the potential final year of the festival, they played "From The 55th Parallel", "Carousel" (after Elly switched guitars), "The Nature Of The Times", "All The Best", and finally, "Twist Of Fate". Strong set for fans of Mike's substantial solo career, and this band definitely had these songs down well, including Elly in her first full set in Mike's band (she didn't play guitar on three songs at Rotaryfest). Good energy and well shot from this stationary angle, even if the multi-camera mastered footage is still to come! I did notice that Mike didn't say much between songs though.

Perhaps they were trying to cram as much as they could into a 45 minute slot, or they were behind schedule with The Golden Scoundrels waiting to close, but if you want to see Mike talk to the fans, check after "Hot & Cold" and during the end of "All The Best". If you love Mike's Thompson and Barrie-era original material, you'll definitely want to check out these lively rock renditions below, and we'll let you know when Chalykoff Studios' pro-shot multi-camera footage eventually goes live!

Yes, we will have Handsome Sandwich's new video from Northern Vibe in an upcoming post, as well as Mike Haggith's lengthy video interview from last month, so stay tuned for those and much more on the site as September continues! Thanks everyone!

LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS (Exit 808 & Handsome Sandwich) Plus More Weekend Concert Previews!!

As promised, we're wrapping up this weekend's known hard rock concert previews in today's post, but to lead off, we have some LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS on both sides of the border on the exact same day later this month, so here's what you should know on this Friday night!

Local alt-hard rock quintet Handsome Sandwich will open for Montreal power pop veterans Dany Laj & The Looks on Saturday, September 28th at... the Fraternal Order of Eagles? Yes, this show will be taking place at the Eagles Club at 246 Wellington Street West, a locale that has sporadically hosted concerts in the past, but this is the first time that Aerie 3991 has crossed the SMS' radar. It will be very interesting to hear how this Steelton locale does hosting this concert, and if it gains similar repeat usage after this month! Last seen at the Northern Vibe Festival, this will be Handsome Sandwich's first show in Sault Ste. Marie city limits since the Poutine Feast, and yes, I will be covering their Northern Vibe video (and more from Ophir) in an upcoming post! In their original run as a cover trio, Handsome Sandwich opened for Dany Laj & The Looks at The Rockstar Bar in November 2017, so it is neat to see them back at it seven years later!

While not a hard rock band, Dany & crew will be familiar to local concert-goers from their five local dates here in the 2010s (last seen at the former New American Pub in November 2019), though they did withdraw from 2021's Northern Vibe Festival in the interim. The Looks have a fun & upbeat sound with lots of genre flourishes, and it will be good to see them back in town! Promoted by Piecing It Together Shows (the former Dryer Fire), this ALL AGES show has an advertised start time of 7:00 PM. Tickets cost $15 (up from $12 in 2019), and you can buy them at this link, while the door price will jump to $20. Visit the above links for all of the details on what's going down at the Eagles Club in three weeks!

Next up, we'll head to Sault Michigan, where local hard rock sextet Exit 808 will play their first show of the fall on September 28th as well, but in their case, it's a special charity event! The double vocalist-led group will headline A Night Of Music at Three One Three on Ashmun (the former Back Door), which is an annual fundraiser event for the Hospice of the EUP (basically Sault Michigan's equivalent to ARCH), as sponsored by Team Century 21. Exit 808 will be joined here by three acoustic singer/guitarists, namely Gabe Menard (who I am not familiar with), veteran country musician Paul Perry, and Project 906 frontman Billy Bernier, who has been playing more solo gigs this year. Supporting your local hospice (ARCH or the EUP's) is always a wonderful cause, and I do hope that there's a great turnout at Three One Three in three weeks for this stacked lineup of local talent!

A Night Of Music has a 7:00 PM start time and a $10 cover charge (proceeds all go to the hospice), and while an age limit wasn't stated, note that Three One Three has three distinct spaces for hosting events, and I'm not sure which will have the concert. Visit the above links for more details on Exit 808's hospice fundraiser later this month!

Now let's move to the rest of this weekend's known public hard rock concert previews, and we'll stay in the E.U.P. for new local hard rock quartet Unfortunate Sun's headlining date TOMORROW NIGHT at the annual Stalwart Agricultural Fair in Goetzville! This event doesn't seem like the most SMS-amenable event going, but their predecessors Fake Chow (whose lineup is identical aside from the bassist) played at the farming/agricultural expo outside of Pickford last year, so calling up their new project does make sense in that way, though Unfortunate Sun have been publically promoting their rock bonafides moreso than Fake Chow did on social media. The guys will be the featured musicians for tomorrow's final day of the Stalwart Fair, and if you want full details on the livestock and farm equipment activites and competitions this weekend, click here! Their set will be under the on-site pavilion.

The Stalwart Fair goes down at the corner of Sand Ridge Road and 28 Mile in Goetzville, with an 8:00 PM start time for Unfortunate Sun's concert proper. This is absolutely an all ages festival, and admission is $5 a person. In case the pavilion is exposed to the elements, we're looking at cloudy weather in the mid-low 50s Fahrenheit (around 11° Celsius), but it is not expected to rain. Visit the above links for more details on the Stalwart Fair and Unfortunate Sun's concert tomorrow, and here they are live!

Finally for this weekend, we'll head back north to Sault Ontario, where local southern hard rock trio Bone Yard 225 will go "uncorked" for another acoustic show at Gateway Casino TOMORROW NIGHT! While fans have seen Greg, Alex, and Warren multiple times since in both electric and non-electric settings, tomorrow's one-nighter will be their first at the downtown casino in three months. If you want to enjoy your local 225's unplugg.... "uncorked" stylings at a familiar downtown space, then definitely keep this show in mind! Bone Yard are not playing anywhere public tonight, and this is their only acoustic show of the month (your next chance to see them live is next Saturday at Shooters). Tomorrow's show has a 9:00 PM start time, no cover charge, and a 19+ age limit. Visit the above links for more details, and for a preview, here's Bone Yard 225 live!

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

The First Of This Weekend's Hard Rock Concert Previews!!

For the first run of weekend concert previews of the fall season, we have too many shows for one post again, so while things will quiet down, not necessarily right away! Due to the amount, our previews of Saturday's Bone Yard 225 and Unfortunate Sun shows will be in tomorrow's news post, along with potential late notice confirmations. Now, here's what you should know to kick off this weekend in Sault Ontario!

We'll start with this weekend's main event in scope, as North Bay country/hard rock musician Cory Marks will return to The Machine Shop for his second local headlining date TOMORROW NIGHT! Fans may recall seeing Cory at the same venue in July of last year, impressing attendees with his cross-genre blend of original hits like "Outlaws & Outsiders" and "Blame It On The Double", and with more big guest-laden originals to come on his upcoming album "Sorry For Nothing", hopefully country and hard rock fans find a lot to like from this rising talent once again tomorrow! This show is truly running it back in every respect from last July, including the local openers, as classic/hard rock cover quartet Silent 9 will return to kick things off! Last year, they actually made their public concert debut opening for Cory, and with a year+ of shows under their belts, hopefully things are bigger and better for their Machine Shop encore!

Yes, Silent 9 are double booked tomorrow, and we will preview their Esquire Club gigs this weekend at post's end. This all ages concert has an 8:00 PM start time, and tickets will again run for $35 at this link and presumably at the door. Hopefully Cory's return is bigger and better than last year's despite the wide similarities from July 2023 to now, and his wide appeal in sounds should translate to a good audience! Visit the above links for more on tomorrow's concert, and here's Cory live last year!

Next up, let's look at some of the other heavier-leaning weekend cover concerts ahead, starting with local classic/hard rock solo musician Tym Morrison, whose weekly arrangements at The Mike Case Memorial Stage outside of The Trading Post TOMORROW NIGHT and on SATURDAY at Misty's Fifties march on for another installment each! In the former case, this will be the penultimate show of 2024 for Tym at the outdoor stage at The Trading Post, as it operates seasonally, so if you like seeing him way down Great Northern Road, you're running out of chances for 2024! If you'd rather see him indoors or earlier in the day, his weekly run of Saturday matinees at Misty's continues through at least the end of the month, so keep his west end return in mind for this weekend as well! You can enjoy his unplugged hard rock hits with no cover at either venue, with The Mike Case Stage show being all ages at 7:00 PM.

Saturday's Misty's Fifties show is a 4:00 PM matinee with a likely 19+ age limit. Weather-wise, we are looking at a cool night by the standards of Tym's gigs at The Mike Case Memorial Stage, with 9&10 News calling for just 9° temperatures during showtime. There is also a 30% chance of rain in the 8:00 PM hour (Tym's concerts here generally run for two hours), so if you are all concerned about the temperatures or possible rain throwing a wrench into the proceedings, keep tabs with Tym on social media for updates. Visit the official Facebook event pages linked here and here for more information, and for a preview of these shows, here's Tym live!

Also this weekend, local classic/hard rock cover quartet Double Down will go west for shows at Jay's Piston Broke Pub TOMORROW & SATURDAY NIGHT! Fresh off of their private(?) Ojbway Park booking this past weekend, these will be Double Down's first stops at the former Roosevelt Hotel/Reggie's West since adding Beej Syrette on guitar & vocals. As best as I can tell, this should be a standard weekend for Beej, his cousin Joel, Brad, and Ric's brand of classic and hard rock covers, so don't miss out on all of the action on Korah Road this weekend! If you can't make it out, Double Down will literally double down with two concert weekends this month at The Esquire Club, including next week. Tomorrow and Saturday's Jay's shows are 19+ affairs with no announced cover charges and likely start times of 9:30 PM. Visit the band's Facebook page for more details, and for a preview, here they are live in concert last year!

We'll close this preview post by coming full circle with the aforementioned Silent 9, who will kick off the fall season for both themselves and The Esquire Club TOMORROW & SATURDAY NIGHT! As noted above, the classic/hard rock cover quartet debuted at Cory Marks' show here in July 2023 and will resume that role as his local openers tomorrow night! Unlike last year, they are double booked, and will mosey on down to the west end after their Machine Shop set to play their first traditional nightclub concerts of the fall, after taking the summer off aside from festivals and private events. Hopefully the rush of opening for Cory on the big stage sets the tone well for Jess, Ryan, Paul, and Steve's normal headlining dates on Second Line West this weekend! Their Esquire Club shows are at 9:30 PM with no cover charge and 19+ age limits, and it doesn't look like they'll have a delayed start time at The Esquire Club tomorrow night (the Cory Marks show starts at 8:00.)

Whether you saw Silent 9 during their festival/private summer or are well acquainted with their weekend bar circuit gigs, their blend of hard rocking and fan friendly covers will be a welcome sight tomorrow and on Saturday, so keep both the Cory Marks show and their own headlining dates in mind (and they now have official band shirts on sale!). Visit the above links for more details, and for a preview, here's Silent 9 live!

That's all for today, but stay tuned for our Bone Yard 225 and Unfortunate Son previews (and more) next! Thanks everyone!

Heavy Lies The Crown Updates & Videos From Last Month!!

It's been almost a month, so let's catch up on what St. Ignace, Michigan metalcore band Heavy Lies The Crown have been up to in recent weeks! When we last left H.L.T.C., they were preparing to headline the second annual 2nd Street Music Festival on August 10th in their hometown (an all too rare public gig of theirs that is truly "local" for SMS purposes). A "Reel" (unembeddable here as ever) was shared to their Facebook page during the event featuring a few precious seconds of Hannahville death metal band Ghidora's opening set, though it seemed to have been more to focus on headbanging fans. When we previewed the 2nd Street Fest on the SMS last month, I did warn of a 30-40% chance of rain in St. Ignace that night, and unfortunately, those odds didn't swing in the outdoor event's favour, as it did rain during the concert. In spite of the weather, the show went on, and hopefully everyone had a good time! Before getting into videos from that night, there is a big lineup change to address.

On August 13th, the band revealed on their Facebook page that guitarist Nathan Switzer would be leaving the band again after their show in Grand Rapids on August 23rd. In that post, they referred to Nathan as "our filling (sic) guitarist", despite never visibly referring to Nathan's return as temporary until then. Nathan initially returned to replace Ted Olson on guitar in March, and while things definitely seem amicable with him, remember that he does still live downstate, which may complicate things re: availability for shows and practice and whatnot. Hopefully he stays active in music in any event! The band has brought on Alpena-based musician Kaycee Mason to replace Nathan going forward, who followers of H.L.T.C.'s gigs may know as the drummer of the metal band Katharsys Theory, who they have shared the stage with multiple times for gigs in the Northern Lower, most notably the annual French Road Bash.

Kaycee is better known as a drummer, but how is he as a guitarist? We can see a glimpse in the public videos shared on Heavy Lies The Crown's Facebook page from the 2nd Street Music Fest! If you want to see Kaycee with the guys (after reportedly learning their set in just a week & a half), you can see him guesting with them on "Choke" in this clip. From what I understand, Kaycee was filling in for Nathan for this concert, but signed on as the full replacement after how well things went, though given that both are currently bald, you'd be forgiven for not knowing something changed without reading the band's posts! Also, frontman Brandon West's hair is shorter than ever! Sadly, while not a "Reel", it runs for just 20 seconds, was shot vertically, and is very dark, but things sound good while they last! A better look can be seen in videos shared from attendee Veiruz Grimnirson's personal Facebook page, so what did he film that night?

One clip runs for just 9 seconds and features a moshing attendee during H.L.T.C.'s set, but embedded below is a horizontal (if partially sideways) 3+ minute video that features Kaycee leaving the stage to rock out with attendees on the lawn. Given how wet and slick the stage looks after the rain, I don't blame him in the slightest! I do wish the crowd was bigger (and that it hadn't rained), but the first local gig with Kaycee and Blaze in the fold seemed like it went over well for the enthusiastic metalheads in attendance, and their ferocious original sound is shown off well in Veiruz's video, so check it out for yourselves below!

Cycling back to the August 13th post that announced their guitarist switch, Heavy Lies The Crown finally acknowledged the departure of drummer Jaxon Massaway there. According to the band's post, Jaxon (who was replaced by Blaze Beairl in July) "left to travel the country for a little bit", but will be coming back to the band when he returns, albeit switching to guitar when he does. This would restore H.L.T.C. to a quintet for the first time since Christian Thanasiu left in March 2023, but we don't know when Jaxon will be back in Michigan yet. I do hope to talk about Jaxon's original music in an upcoming post in any event! Interestingly, Heavy Lies The Crown said that they are "in our second phase" in this post, even though this is the (by my count) seventh live lineup that they've had since forming, with Brandon as the only constant. Heavy Lies The Crown next played live over the August 23rd weekend, starting when they opened for Glassfield in Grand Rapids.

We'll touch on what happened there and at this year's French Road Bash in Alpena (Kaycee's official debut as their permanent guitarist) the next day in an upcoming post, but hopefully this single-band post helped us get caught up on what Brandon, Christian, Blaze, and the new/old crew have been up to last month, and that doesn't even include the teased new song that they wrote when Nathan came back (entitled "These Walls"). Stay tuned for much more from Heavy Lies The Crown on the site soon, and for weekend concert previews on the site next! Thanks everyone!