Cory Marks Concert Videos & Northern Vibe Festival Lineup Updates!!

Before we begin this post, I wanted to apologize for missing a late concert cancellation on here, as classic/hard rock cover trio Dodge This dropped out of their planned Beck's Bar show on Saturday night. A reason for the cancellation wasn't announced, but Beck's Facebook page only confirmed the news at 10:00 PM that night, after the show was to have began. Hopefully all is well in Dodge This' camp, and that we see them again on stage soon!

Today's post otherwise takes us to updates on an upcoming concert festival, but first, here's some long overdue videos from North Bay country/hard rock musician Cory Marks' last two shows here! This first one is actually from his Machine Shop gig in September of last year, and I think this one slipped me by until now because it was uploaded as a "Shorts" video (a.k.a. YouTube "Reels"). While it is brief and vertical, at least you can embed it on external websites and play it in a background tab! This actually comes from the YouTube channel of Ben Bullett Mortlock, who was a session guitarist in Cory's live band, and it features 56 seconds of footage from that night, including arrival at the venue, and black & white soundcheck clips. All of this is set to the studio version of Cory's song "Whiskey For Sale". I say this a lot for highlight videos, but I hope the raw footage of this gets uploaded at some point!

Beyond my usual complaints about vertically framed videos, the quality of the video footage here is great (I couldn't tell you if the audio matches up), with lots of strong angles of the band, venue, and fans, so hopefully someone is sitting on the fuller (and maybe not vertical) raw materials? Kudos to Ben for this "Short" regardless, so give it a watch below!

Next up, let's transition to Cory's third local concert, a special acoustic event at the Canadian Bushplane Heritage Centre in June as part of the Hope Air Day charity initiative for improving remote health care access in northern communities. This intimate event (which had free admission) was actually live-streamed by the Hope Air Facebook page, but alas, I wasn't able to cover it here as hoped due to our busy existing summer schedule. Facebook now has a 30 day time limit for hosting and viewing live-streamed videos, unless they're re-uploaded or converted to regular videos prior, which Hope Air did not do for the Cory Marks concert here, so it vanished from Facebook around July 6th. We're not completely stuck in terms of covering it now though, as attendee DJ Chris Mat uploaded two videos from that night to his YouTube channel! One is of local folk musician Matthew James, who replaced The Dust Covers on short notice for unannounced reasons as the opening act.

Cory's 1:41-long video features him covering Bryan Adams' "Cuts Like A Knife", another good sign towards his country/rock crossover appeal if you weren't familiar with his rock radio crossover singles already. I get the sense that Chris zoomed in a lot, but you see what you need to see for Cory's one man performance here, and he sounds good on this domestic rock classic, so give it a look below, and apologies again for not being able to cover the full live-streamed concert in time! Hope Air is a great charity, and I hope the local festivities helped their goals and promotion in the area! 

Lastly for today, here's some clarifications and updates re: the lineup for the Northern Vibe Festival in Ophir over the August 23rd weekend! Like last year, organizers are posting individual promotional images for the musical performers on their Facebook page on a sporadic basis, and one is a brand new addition to the lineup, namely debuting alt-rock/punk quartet Spun Out! Confirmed for the festival on July 11th, the band features former Caveman Morrison vocalist Dean Duguay and former Half Past/Winkstinger bassist Ryan Disano, alongside a guitarist named Joe and a drummer named Jamie. I am not 100% on their identities, not aided by the lack of an online page, let alone the horror movie effects on their first band photo, but it will be neat to hear how they sound! I don't know who, if anyone, Spun Out are replacing at Northern Vibe, but seven of the Forest Stage bands on the tentative April lineup have yet to get a Facebook promotional image at press time.

Regarding the advertised Tool tribute band, they are not a Parabol reunion, nor are they even local. They are Avessel, a joint Tool/A Perfect Circle tribute band from Sudbury, who will be making their local concert debut off Poplardale Road in three weeks. Avessel don't have a website or social media page beyond Instagram, but what I have heard points to a strong take on songs from Maynard James Keenan-fronted bands, so don't bypass them! Lastly for updates on advertised bands, the rap performance by Soundsxvad isn't a renaming of Fvksxvad, rather a one-night-only merger of MCs from that collective as well as Sound Syndrome. Apologies for any confusion from our initial coverage of this year's lineup, and thanks to members for clarifying on Facebook! Time will tell if there any other lineup adjustments, so stay tuned for more updates on the lineup and who exactly is playing on what day when things come out, and we will keep you posted!

That's all for now, but stay tuned for more news and notes on the site soon! Thanks everyone! 

The Full Recap Of Mike Haggith's Newest #LockdownLive Concert!!

Single-post topic to end the weekend with, as local/Thompson, Manitoba solo artist Mike Haggith live-streamed his twelfth #LockdownLive concert onto his Facebook page last night! This episode was subtitled "The Windsor Connection", and was centered around his band output in the late 2000s before enrolling in college in the Soo. We did discuss some of his Windsor bands on the SMS way back when in our old series on out of town bands from local musicians, but a lot of this aspect of Mike's career will be foreign to many readers. If I can source relevant links to the bands and songs on offer, I will let you know! After outlining the contest where the winner with the most engaged share of the video picks the mandatory cover for next week, Mike opens by playing "I Love You Anyways", which he famously wrote in a dream at the age of 6, before including it in two of his Sault-era albums, early Din setlists, and in #LockdownLive III a few months ago.

Afterwards, Mike calls a special guest, namely Dylon Rabidoux, who fronted his 2005-2012 stoner rock band S.C.A.R. (short for Sick, Carnivorous, And Rebellious), and the guys reminisce on the good old days, including lots of discussion about their last album, 2010's "13th Circle Of Hell". Once Dylan hangs up, Mike dives into S.C.A.R.'s songs "Green Peace" & "Quiet, It's The Rainforest" (with surprise Bob Dylan pastiche at the end), a mash-up of Eazy-E's "Boyz-N-The-Hood" & "Nobody Move" that they amusingly played live (as inspired by Windsor's Daniel Rush Band), and their original "Fraction Of A Second". If you are curious, you can hear the three above original songs on S.C.A.R.'s Facebook page in studio and/or live form. Next, Mike moves to his 2010 alternative/experimenal rock band The Thorns, who gave us his next song, "As Memories Fade Away", which Mike re-recorded solo on 2011's "Suspended Animation", and you may have heard on #LockdownLive VI.

Similarly to his chat with Dylon earlier, Mike calls his old Thorns bandmate Jeff Morrell, who played bass in that group, while Mike was on lead vocals & rhythm guitar. We get lots of reminiscing about their band work and high school once again, but there is an odd break in the show when Mike has to retrieve his cat Luna from an excursion to his apartment's laundry room, deal with his neighbour's dog Chico, and then find his other cat Artemis! Once that seven minute intermission concludes, Mike returns to #LockdownLive proper, where he performs the Thorns originals "A Quarter Mile At A Time" and "A Nightmare On Reed Street", the latter prefaced by a story of him getting the actual Reed Street sign from drummer Tyler Colley when he went back to Windsor for Christmas in 2014. The latter song is on The Thorns' Soundclick page, but not the former, despite 32 songs being uploaded there. He closes this section by summing up this band's short but eventful lifespan

The final Windsor band looked at here was Mike's 2007-2009 rock band The Air, who are very obscure for social media and surviving online materials nowadays. Mike performs their original songs "The Alberta Cheese Wagon" (yes, he explains the title), a shortened version of "Clockwise", and "Exit" to wrap up his look at his hometown bands. Mike ends the show by covering Elton John's "Your Song", as nominated by last week's share contest winner Brandi Martel, and given that this was a straight-forward, sincere choice not meant to troll Mike, we do get a pleasant, non-jokey rendition here. It's up to you to determine what approach you prefer, but he handles this cover very nicely! Mike gave closing remarks afterward to sum up each band in hindsight, hyped #LockdownLive XIII this coming Saturday, which will be his "quarterly report" episode looking back at the first 12 episodes.

Strong and informative #LockdownLive installment, especially if you weren't familiar with his Windsor music, and you do hear the potential that he'd carry into his local and Thompson solo and band work! Of course, much of this music is not representative of his maturity and talents nowadays, but I think he picked some good songs here! That said, could we get another #LockdownLive episode devoted to one of Mike's old bands again, perhaps The Strange Coyotes or the acid jam-era Din? Give #LockdownLive XII a watch below, and stay tuned for more news this week! Thanks everyone!