LOCAL CONCERT ALERT (Viscera), The Second Downtown Street Party Preview, And More!!

Here's a new news post on this Wednesday morning, which includes a LOCAL CONCERT ALERT for next month and a clarification on what's airing on one of our two local rock radio stations, while this post also serves as a bit of a soft launch for the busiest weekend of the year around these parts via a preview of a big outdoor concert tomorrow night. Let's get things rolling!

Sault Michigan hardcore punk trio Viscera will play their next local gig on Saturday, August 22nd at Three One Three On Ashmun! Announced via their Instagram page on Monday as part of this concert calendar (also confirming a new return to Marquette on August 1st), the local date will see Viscera headline at the former Back Door, in what is being branded as from "Soo Tang Records". Is that Viscera's own in-house promotion agency, and is Soo Tang for the children? Viscera made their local debut at Three One Three in March, and for their encore there, they are looking for support bands, so if you're interested in hopping on this bill, message their Facebook page or above for more information! This concert takes place at 7:00 PM, it is presumably 21+, and while admission fees aren't given yet, the March show there (which featured Marquette metal band PonyWorm) cost $10 in advance & $15 at the door.

While we're on the subject, Viscera released their first ever music video to their new YouTube channel on June 6th! Their first studio original song since adding bassist Chris Lovins to their ranks, this is entitled "Chinga La Migra" (Spanish for "Fuck Immigration"), which sets the tone for a politically charged anti-ICE music video, though it's more of a lyric video, as you don't see Bob, Chris, or Mitchell on camera. In your face with strong opinions that will especially resonate with many Yoopers, and it leans into hardcore punk well, though the slower, more melodic choruses kinda stunt the momentum. Give it a watch/listen below, and stay tuned for more from Viscera and their Three One Three show next month soon!

Next up, here's our preview of TOMORROW'S second Downtown Street Party in Sault Ontario for 2026! As these move west along Queen Street East, Street Party #2 takes place on a closed block of Queen from Brock Street to Elgin Street (the former RBC to the courthouse), but as this stretch is adjacent to to the Downtown Plaza, there will be more going on during the festivities. Local vendors will be on site, along with beverage gardens, food for sale, kids activities and games (in a proper Kids Zone, no less), and numerous Queen Street businesses will be open en route. The Downtown Plaza will play host to Nicole Does Trivia at 7:00 PM, followed by a free screening of Jaws 1 at 9:30 PM, and of course, this all happens concurrently with day #1 of Rotaryfest at nearby Clergue Park. Visit You Belong SSM's Facebook page for complete details on the non-musical portions of the second Downtown Street Party!

Like with last month's inaugural party since the City took over booking these from the former Downtown Association, there will be bands on two "stages", one at Brock Street, but the other will be at the turnoff for March Street (near The Queen's Tarts) rather than Elgin. Not as a far of a walk that way! The Brock Street Stage will play host to this event's likely only SMS-amenable act, namely acoustic punk cover duo Dos Amigos, who claimed on their own social media to be playing at 8:15 PM. The apparent headliners there are classic rock trio Flathead Ford (who said that they'd be on at 9:30 PM), and You Belong SSM have curiously not said who the third/opening act will be, referring instead to "more hometown heroes" and "so much more". We'll let you know if anyone is clarified! As for the March Street Stage, local country musician Brendan Hodgson is headlining there at 9:30 PM.

Classic country band The Stumpy Coldwater Trio gave their start time as 7:00 PM, leaving Rusty McCarthy (now alongside his regular partner Maja Bannerman) to likely be playing in the 8:00 PM hour. Remember, this is not an official Rotaryfest event, but as there's no Stage 2 bill tomorrow, the shoe kinda fits, even if this isn't on the same block of Queen as the Second Stage used to be held on! Downtown Street Party #2 is FREE & ALL AGES with a 6:30 PM start time, and 9&10 News is calling for mostly-partly cloudy skies tomorrow with no chance of rain, and temperatures ranging from 17-21°. Should be a fun time for all, with a dash of punk to boot, so visit the above links for more details, and here's Dos Amigos live!

Finally, I wanted to follow up on a brief note from last month where I mentioned that 104.3 The Fox and their sister Rogers Radio rock stations in Kingston and Northern Ontario have stopped airing the Winnipeg-based Sunday Night Vinyl Series, let alone on-air theme weeks. Based on what I have heard listening to 104.3 FM in recent months, as well as listings on the station websites and lack of promotion therein, it looks like Rogers have quietly dropped three more scheduled programs from the air no later than January. These include the Classic Rock Lunch with Lew McDonald (weekdays at noon), This Week In Rock with Adam Kane (Saturdays at 11:00 AM & 6:00 PM), and The Church Of Rock with Cosmo Grant (Sundays at 9:00 AM). All of the above hosts (including Howard Mandshein of the Sunday Night Vinyl Series) remain as on-air talent with Rogers rock stations, and Lew is still our afternoon DJ.

This leaves just the two zoo crew shows (Brock & Dalby and Biggs & Barr), individual DJ blocks, and Classic Rock Sundays as the only regularly scheduled programs on 104.3 The Fox, though if you miss Howard, Adam, and Cosmo, you can still hear them on Seekr via 92.1 CITI in Winnipeg or CHEZ 106.1 in Ottawa. Losing these shows is clearly a Rogers call and not the Soo's fault, and I haven't seen a public statement as to why these shows all ended at around the same time, but variety of the spice of life, and I do hope that Rogers try again with new scheduled programming in the future! That's all for now, but stay tuned for weekend concert previews next! Thanks everyone!

Details On The Fox 104.3's Saturday-Sunday On-Air Schedule!!

Today on the SMS, we're outlining the weekend schedule on The Fox 104.3 FM, which is quite different than what listeners to CJQM will be accustomed to from Monday-Friday! Remember, there is no "Shows" tab on the station's website yet, but the schedule is more or less verbatim to what you'll hear on Q92 in Sudbury and their sister stations in North Bay, Timmins, and Kingston. After spending much of Saturday mornings on autoplay music rotation, the first scheduled program of the day is This Year In Rock, which airs from 11:00 AM-12:00 PM with a re-airing from 6:00-7:00 PM. Hosted by Adam Kane of 92.1 CITI in Winnipeg, he looks at ten notable rock songs from a given calendar year, while he also outlines historical events and milestones from the year in question, often with a Canadian slant. The local premiere episode from January 11th was on 1976, while this Saturday's episode focused on 1978.

This show is roughly comparable in purpose to the syndicated Time Warp with Bill St. James on Sault Michigan's Rock 101, though Time Warp is four hours long and has more of a sonic collage of audio clips beyond just songs (also, the two shows do not conflict, as Time Warp runs on Saturdays from 6:00-10:00 AM). I like hearing more modern tunes than what This Year In Rock has focused on so far, but classic rock fans should be into it, and Adam's trivia and facts add some spice! From 12:00-6:00 PM on Saturdays, you'll hear Dan Koo (the Country 104.3 holdover in the 2:00-6:00 PM weekday timeslot) back in the booth, and after the This Year In Rock replay at 6:00 PM, the last scheduled program on Saturdays from 7:00-9:00 PM is The Biggs & Barr Show with Pastey Jamie, the Ottawa-based zoo crew show heard on The Fox weeknights from 6:00-8:00. Less unique programming, but there's lots to enjoy for rock fans!

For the record, Biggs & Barr were followed on Saturday the 11th by the syndicated Greg Beharrell Show from 9:00 PM-2:00 AM, but Greg's show has not visibly resurfaced on the former Q104 since that night. If you liked what you heard on the first three nights after the format change, or are curious as to how Greg is on air, click here to find his current affiliates!

Lastly for the regular schedule on The Fox 104.3 is the biggest diversion of all, as Sundays there are Classic Rock Sundays! From 6:00 AM until midnight, CJQM and their sister rock stations devote 18 consecutive hours to music almost entirely from the 1960s-1980s, which will please classic rock fans and former The Bear listeners to no end! In terms of scheduled programming, Sunday's first show (from 9:00 AM-12:00 PM) is the Church Of Rock, which is hosted by Cosmo Grant out of CHEZ 106 in Ottawa. This program is loosely themed around being an actual Sunday church service, with Cosmo's "sermons" being trivia and context on certain songs. Informative program with a good range of classics, and I even heard a couple of 1950s songs on air during the Church of Rock! Note that the show's first hour does run opposite the last hour of The Chop Shop with Steve Black on Rock 101, in case you're planning what to hear.

From 12:00-8:00 PM on Classic Rock Sundays, DJs are in the booth, with the first being "Big" Kris Bawden (a.k.a. BK) until 4:00 PM. BK isn't otherwise an on-air personality on The Fox or Q92, but he is also out of CHEZ in Ottawa. The Fox's weekday afternoon DJ Lew MacDonald takes over from 4:00-8:00, and he is definitely well tuned to classic rock, as he also hosts the Classic Rock Lunch from 12:00-1:00 PM on weekdays. The last scheduled program of the weekend is the Sunday Night Vinyl Series, which airs at 8:00 PM and seems to have a somewhat variable end time. Each week, host Howard Manshein (also out of CITI in Winnipeg) plays a notable rock album in full, from front to back, while adding trivia and context before and afterwards, as well as at the midpoint when the vinyl would be flipped over from side A to side B (nice touch!) For the local premiere episode, the album played was Rush's "Moving Pictures".

Last night's album was Van Halen's 1978 self-titled debut, and if you noticed that both albums were by the band who was spotlighted with their very own "week" of coverage and extra songs played on air, you're not alone! I don't know whether the Sunday Night Vinyl Series selection is made prior to or as a result of what band gets the weekly focus, but keep that in mind going forward! It does go head to head with the second hour of the modern hard rock-focused hardDrive with Lou Brutus on Rock 101, so make note of that as well. Beyond the possibility of the Sunday Night Vinyl Series album being post-1989, I did catch at least one instance of a 1990s song being played during Classic Rock Sunday (Colin James' 1990 hit "Just Came Back" was definitely played one week ago), so the 1960s-1980s focus isn't 100% ironclad. Personally speaking, I honestly prefer The Fox's general rotation to Classic Rock Sundays, but there are still lots of good tunes then!

Myself, I do want to hear modern stuff along with older songs, but 18 hours of classic rock will have a lot of appeal for many listeners, especially with the Canadian content factor. If you want songs from the 1990s or this millennium though, you'll have to tune in before 6:00 AM Sundays, or wait until Monday. Barring future programming changes or hosts/DJs coming & going, this concludes our look at The Fox 104.3's on-air schedule, so hopefully this helps give a better look at what you're hearing on Sault Ontario's new rock station, and whether you're all-in on The Fox or if you like bopping between it and Rock 101 or any other stations as songs/shows dictate, enjoy this new variety on the local dial! Thanks everyone!

The Fox 104.3 FM: First Details On Sault Ontario's New Rock Radio Station!!

Alright, it's time to finally dive into the local radio bombshell from Thursday afternoon on the SMS, now that I have spent a few days listening in, so let's begin: Sault Ontario has its own rock radio station on the FM dial! At 2:00 PM on Thursday, Rogers Radio suddenly switched the format of Country 104.3 (née Q104) to mainstream rock, giving the Sault Ste. Marie market two fully local rock stations for the first time since Classic Rock: The Bear left 97.9 FM fifteen years ago, and suddenly giving the Sault Michigan-based Rock 101 some direct competition. CJQM is now airing as The Fox 104.3 FM, with the name coming from their sister station The Fox 101.9 in North Bay (whose call sign is CKFX, hence "The Fox"). Of course, Rogers likes having their stations sharing similar branding and playlists, so The Fox looks and sounds very similar to not just the North Bay station, but also Q92 in Sudbury and Timmins, with only minor variations in the playlist and on-air talent, but with local commercials, bumpers, and inserts.

This is also how Kiss 100.5 operates, and how Country 104.3 did until Thursday. One imagines that the local staff at CJQM opted to take on The Fox name rather than go the Q92 route because everyone in the Soo associates Q104 with country music. If you hadn't listened to much of Rogers Radio's local stations before now, 104.3 FM and Kiss 100.5 are both locally based out of 642 Great Northern Road, and The Fox has inherited one of the best FM radio signals in the market, with both FCCData and Radio-Locator showing a wider coverage range than Rock 101 (which already has a good reach). The on-air presentation may share a lot with Q92 and North Bay, but many bumpers directly reference Sault Ontario, and in many respects, Canada in general, with "great Canadian moments" heard often between songs and commercials. Note that the station frequency is usually said on air without saying "point" (as in "one oh four three"), unlike how Country 104.3 did it.

It's also worth noting that they're openly calling The Fox "the Sault's rock station" in bumpers, even though Rock 101 has been doing that for years, and it's in their logo! As far as I know, The Fox hasn't directly referenced Sault Michigan/the EUP at all from what I've heard on air, but this does open up the door for Yooper listeners to be exposed to more Canadian music, and that's a key setlist difference for the new station! Per the CRTC, CJQM must play 30% domestic content. Last night, I recorded both Rock 101 and The Fox from 12:33 AM (when The Hair Scare ended on 101) to 6:00 AM (when Classic Rock Sunday began on 104) to get a playlist sampling of the two stations, and while I won't give away that big of a chunk of what The Fox is airing, I can tell you that in that span of time, they played 79 songs, 25 of which were by Canadian artists. There was a stretch where eight songs weren't by Canadian acts, but four of the next six were.

Meanwhile, Rock 101 played 76 songs in that span, of which only seven were by Canadian artists (remember, there's no Cancon laws in Michigan), but there was a spell where five out of thirteen songs were Canadian. In that near 5½ hour span, just four songs (AC/DC's "Highway To Hell", Everclear's "Santa Monica", Three Days Grace's "Mayday", and The Tragically Hip's "Courage") were played on both 101 and 104. Seventeen acts cropped up on both stations while playing different songs. Of course, personal tastes are extremely subjective, so what you prefer to listen to will vary, but there's suddenly a much wider rock radio variety, which is definitely welcomed! In terms of time period for songs in general rotation, at least overnight, Rock 101 actually led The Fox in terms of new songs (fourteen from the 2020s compared to six on The Fox), while the former Q104 was more inclined to play 1990s and 2000s songs by a count of 39-26.

No radio station has a perfect rotation for everyone, but I do like a lot of what I've heard from The Fox in the last few days, particularly the general rotation on weekdays and Saturdays (Sunday is largely classic rock-focused but we'll touch on the individual programs in an upcoming post). The Cancon selection alone will appeal to a lot of people, and for a market that has always been kinda funny for awareness of domestic rock bands who do better in markets not on the US border, having this exposure and airtime will only help get ears on them and build fans! For better or worse, you likely aren't hearing The Headstones, Big Sugar, Arkells, or Sloan on Rock 101. I also found that Rogers isn't as liable to edit down songs, so we got the full "Killing In The Name" and "Epic" here, where 101 often airs shortened versions. Regardless, I'll like the ability to hop from signal to signal when a song I dislike comes on, so I'll like having both 101 and 104 as presets!

Rest assured, while I am glad that Sault Ontario has a domestic rock station of its own, and we don't necessarily have to gamble on fringe Northern Michigan stations to pick up here as an alternative, I do feel for fans of Country 104.3 who miss that station, a staple of the local FM dial for decades. I never wanted to get a Sault Ontario rock station at the expense of another one. A reason wasn't publically given for the format change, for the record, though Rogers must have seen something concerning with listenership or ad revenue. While we still have Country 105 (WMKD 105.5 in nearby Pickford, Michigan), that station's coverage area is smaller and isn't beholden to Cancon rules, so this may hurt local exposure to domestic country music. After the format switch, Rogers/The Fox did recommend that listeners tune in online to Country 600 in North Bay, which is very similar to what we got in the Soo by default (albeit still on AM there).

If you want the same playlist and miss Robin & PJ and them, tune in to Country 600 on their website or on applications like Seekr (Rogers' new radio application) and TuneIn. If you're curious, the closest Ontario-based country station to the Soo now is Country 103 in Little Current, 3+ hours east of here (Sudbury has Pure Country 91.7, which is owned by Bell). We'll have more on The Fox in an upcoming post, particularly the schedule of on-air programs, but enjoy our new rock station and the variety that it affords! Tune into 104.3 FM to see what's up at the former Q104 as it begins this new era, and we'll have more on the site soon! Thanks everyone!

YouTube Channel Profile Series: Garrett Rogers

It's now time for this month's YouTube Channel Profile, and in our last installment of this series of 2021, we're again looking at a randomly selected YouTube channel whose content is at least half devoted to local metal, hard rock, or punk musicians/concerts. Our random selection gave us quite a fitting channel to look at this month, given the extremely sad events of over a decade ago this month, so here's what you should know!

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Garrett Rogers (http://youtube.com/deformedpie) 

Owner: YouTube user Garrett Rogers, who I don't believe is from Sault Ste. Marie

Channel Timeline: Launched on May 24th, 2010; Videos uploaded from October 2015-July 2016

Channel Summary: A metal fan with a clear appreciation for defunct local blackened doom metal band Woods of Ypres, all but five of Garrett's uploads comprise of Woods of Ypres' entire studio catalog of original songs (as of 2021), all represented with the song alongside its album cover. The only songs not here from released albums are the cello cover of "Allure of the Earth" from that single, the Necramyth bonus disc from "Woods IV", and the producer's mix of "Finality" from "Woods V" on vinyl. Garrett's only non-Woods videos are still related, namely New Brunswick black metal band Thrawsunblat's 2016 EP "Metachthonia" (remember, Thrawsunblat feature the surviving members of Woods of Ypres' final lineup, including Joel Violette from "Woods V").
 
Why You Should Watch: If you love Woods of Ypres and have been mourning the 10 year anniversary of frontman David Gold's death this month (hard to believe it's been a decade already), then this channel will quench your thirst! Granted, this is a fan channel and not official through any band or label-linked account (I don't believe), so keep that in mind, but if you just want a convenient spot to hear the vast majority of Woods of Ypres' recorded output, keep DeformedPie in mind!

 Our Recommended Videos To Check Out:

 

Woods Of Ypres - Deepest Roots And Darkest Blues: If you count the songs on the five canonical Woods albums + the "Home" single, you'll come up with one more song than Garrett uploaded. The discrepancy comes from his combining "Deepest Roots: Belief That All Is Lost" and "Darkest Blues: Relief That Nothing Can Be Done" from 2007's "Woods III" into one seven minute continuous track for his song uploads. There's no major break in between, so they blend together as one suite, as they were intended to on the album. These provide melodic black metal from the tail end of Woods of Ypres' Southern Ontario era that fans will still easily be able to, and the evocative lyrics certainly don't hurt this song's cause!

 

 

Woods Of Ypres - Wet Leather: Surprisingly, Garrett's most watched video is a song from the Thrawsunblat EP he uploaded, with "Fires That Light The Earth" garnering over 18,000 views! While a great band that carries the Woods torch very well, they're not local, so the most viewed Woods of Ypres video here is "Wet Leather" from 2009's "Woods IV: The Green Album", their only song here to crack 3,000 views (and by a healthy margin, at that). A nicely paced doom metal song best known from the "Life is just pain and piss..." lyrics, this is a fan favourite from their local era, and I'm not surprised it got a lot of hits on this channel!

 

Woods Of Ypres - Death Is Not An Exit: Given how the lyrical themes from 2012's "Woods V: Grey Skies & Electric Light" have been connected by fans to David's passing in December 2011, especially with that album's posthumous success and accolades, it made perfect sense to feature a song from the album here. Death, loss, and mourning are heavy themes on the record, but I went with "Death Is Not An Exit" here because it's less sorrowful and morose, and more optimistic about what David felt that death meant. I've had to reconcile that a lot myself, having lost my mother to cancer last fall. It's a shame that Woods of Ypres didn't get their true breakthrough until David was gone, but thankfully, his music never will be!

 

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I hope you guys liked this month's YouTube Channel Profile! To kick off 2022 in this series, we're taking a look at another randomly selected single YouTube channel, that being from YouTube user Jon Tiberious (a.k.a. Late & Loud guitarist Jonathan Tiberi), whose channel features an array of musical content despite it's seeming brevity! Look for that on or around January 26th, and for more news and content on the site this week! Thanks everyone!

LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS (Fifth Way & Peril), A Band Breakup, And More News From Sault Michigan!!

Hey guys, here's a special auto-post while I'm rocking out at the Ypres Metal Fest, and it's 100% devoted to the Sault Michigan metal scene! Tomorrow, I'll work hard to get videos of all 12 bands from tonight's show online with a review going up likely early Monday, but for now, you Yoopers should enjoy the news we've got tonight, including LOCAL CONCERT ALERTS for Kewadin Casino over the next few months, a local band's breakup, a bassist departure, and Half A Man's latest updates, so here's what you need to know!

According to Kewadin Casino's Facebook page, Detroit hard rock standouts Fifth Way will return to Sault Michigan on April 27th! Though we had heard about their planned concert weekend with Brimley metallers Half A Man that same weekend (more on them in a bit), this show doesn't appear to be directly linked to those plans, as Fifth Way will open for platinum selling Arizona pop rock band The Gin Blossoms that night at The Dreammaker's Theater! Best known for hits like "Hey Jealousy" & "Follow You Down", they're not really a hard rock band, but they have lots of well known songs, and they're worth a listen! As you may remember, Fifth Way feature Rudyard native & LSSU grad Zak Stelmaszek on guitar, and this show will be their first local concert appearance since the Kewadin Casino 25th Anniversary Festival in July 2010, so this is a long time coming! Also, it'll mark their current lineup's first local gig, as Mike McMann & Chris Castro replaced Nicholas Cole-Klaes & Dave Reingardt on bass & drums respectively last year. Fifth Way will be sure to deliver a great set of original material, including songs from their upcoming new album "Sacrifice", so keep their local return in mind later this month!

Tickets are $32.50 for this concert, and you can buy them at 1-800-KEWADIN, this location, or the Kewadin box office. The show starts at 7:00 PM, it's all ages presumably, and there are still tickets in the second row and back available, so act now if you wanna go! I'm aware that this show is probably better suited to Gin Blossoms fans, and Fifth Way may be too heavy as openers, but they'll leave their mark for sure at this show, as they did in 2010 opening for Tesla and Three Doors Down at Kewadin! Stay tuned for more on Fifth Way's next local shows as they come in!

The other new shows come courtesy of new additions to the schedule at The Rapids Lounge at Kewadin Casino, as per Kewadin's entertainment page! One was for a planned Swayze Train concert weekend in July, but that's likely off now (more on that in a second), and they also confirmed that Trail's End will ONLY be playing there on Friday, April 20th due to a planned screening of UFC 145 in The Rapids Lounge on the 21st. Disappointing, but they'll be back for much more, and the Jones/Evans fight should be good! However, one new metal concert weekend was added to the Rapids Lounge schedule, as Charlevoix metal trio Peril will return to Sault Michigan on July 20th and 21st! Almost four months after their latest local stops last weekend, they'll be sure to deliver a solid weekend of metal and hard rock covers and originals this summer, so keep these shows in mind this July! They're both likely 21+ events, there's no announced cover charge, and 10:00 PM start times are likely. Check the above links for more details! Peril are always a fun time with some great covers in store, so don't miss them this summer! Stay tuned for much more in new Sault Michigan concerts as they roll in!

Thirdly for today, here's some surprising news, as Sault Michigan hard rock quintet Swayze Train have disbanded. The news was broken Thursday evening on the band's official Facebook page, where they said that they were "at an end" and thanked everyone for the support during their run. A reason for the band's demise has not been publically made, but the tone of what I've read doesn't indicate an acrimonious split. As a result, the band's scheduled Rapids Lounge concerts through July are likely cancelled, barring a new band with common members picking them up in the interim. Swayze Train had been active since succeeding members Melissa Strand & Tony Rogers' earlier acoustic band Electric Motor Fish at the first annual LemmaFest last June, and have since rocked the Sault Michigan and St. Ignace areas over the past 9 months to solid reviews, despite never posting video footage that I've seen. I'm honestly really surprised to see Swayze Train break up, as they had a very talented lineup and I'd heard almost universally positive things from their live shows, but this is likely the best internal option for right now for them. Best of luck to Melissa, Mike, Scott, Tony, and Tyler in the future, and hopefully they stay active in local music in the near future (or at least post some old Swayze Train videos finally!)

While we're on the subject of ends for bands featuring bassist Tony Rogers, I'll note that when he confirmed Swayze Train's end on his personal Facebook page Thursday afternoon, he also announced that he'd left Clownsack, the popular local funk/hard rock band where he'd performed as Slappy since their inception. In referring to leaving both bands, he said he was just "clearing the slate", and later added that Clownsack were still around, "just not funny anymore", so read into that however you want. Clownsack have not officially confirmed Tony/Slappy's departure, but note that they haven't updated their online pages since August, so imminent confirmation of the news isn't a guarantee. It's really disappointing to see Tony leave the Clownsack ranks, as his considerable bass skills helped define Clownsack's sound, especially on "Rotten Candy", but hopefully he gets into a new band at some point in the near future. He'd definitely be an asset, that's for sure! As for Clownsack themselves, there's big clown shoes to fill, but hopefully they return to activity soon in general! It's been too long since their last concert and the "Funny Farm" release, so fingers crossed that we see them back at it in 2012! Stay tuned for more as I hear of it!

And finally for this all Sault Michigan post, here's the latest news from Brimley metal quartet Half A Man! No, we haven't heard concrete details about their planned concert weekend with Fifth Way on April 27th & 28th yet, but the Gin Blossoms gig for Fifth Way doesn't necessarily mean that they're off. If I hear anything definitive, I'll let you guys know! The rest of the band's recent updates have related to Half A Man's long delayed debut demo release, which they revealed some big news on last month on their Facebook page. It has a planned May release, it will feature their songs "Drunk", "Die In Disgrace", "Cripple", "Bad Way", and a newer track named "Release Me", and it will not feature new singer Dillion Semasky, instead having guitarist Erik Rintamaki handling lead vocals as he originally did with Half A Man. A reason for that wasn't publically disclosed to my knowledge, though they hinted at a new recording location, so that could be linked. I'm still curious to hear Dillion sing on Half A Man's originals, but Erik singing will at least be familiar to their earlier incarnations! Stay tuned for more from Half A Man at the above links, and even if the April shows don't go down, they'll be at LemmaFest this summer, so Half A Man will be back in full force before you know it!

That's all for today, but keep an eye out tomorrow for photos & videos from the Ypres Metal Fest, with my review to follow it! Thanks everyone!