Sunday, September 22, 2013

YouTube Channel Profile Series: biro753's Channel

It's now time for our latest YouTube Channel Profile at the SMS! This is, of course, our monthly look at 1-3 YouTube channels featuring at least a 50% concentration of local metal-relevant videos, and like past installments, the following channel was randomly chosen. This month, we're looking at a regional high school's Dunnplugged-esque concert series mainly via a channel that filmed a lot of videos there, so read on below for videos, info, and more on this month's profiled YouTube channel!
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biro753's channel (http://www.youtube.com/biro753)

Owner: Former Diego Experience/Vendetta guitarist & CASS Cafe regular performer A.J. Biron

Channel Timeline: Launched on June 19th, 2007; Videos posted from February 2008 through December 2010

Channel Summary: One of the largest sources for YouTube videos from the CASS Cafe live music series at Central Algoma Secondary School in nearby Desbarats, Ontario, 2/3rds of A.J.'s 21 videos came from CASS Cafe sets by various performers (himself included) between the spring of 2008 and the spring of 2010. Most are of unnamed bands playing covers (generally metal songs), but 5 come from A.J.'s then-hard rock band The Diego Experience, one video is of an early Crimson Crusade lineup, and another is a drum solo by then-student Mike Christie. A.J.'s other videos (including his last 4) are mostly of outdoor activities like fishing, but two of his early uploads were solo guitar performances.

Why Should You Watch: Fans of the CASS Cafe series would be well served to check out A.J.'s channel, as there's some quality performances and solid early glimpses at future prominent metal musicians there, including later members of For All That Is Lost and Late & Loud! A.J. also shown talent in his solo videos, but keep in mind that the quality varies across the music clips on this channel (these were still high school students, after all.) Note as well that A.J. hasn't used this channel in over a year, or posted any videos in almost three years, in case that changes your mind on subscribing.

Our Recommended Videos To Check Out:

Seek and destroy by our band lol at CASS CAFE: A.J.'s last concert video on his channel, this April 2010 cover of Metallica's "Seek & Destroy" at CASS features current Crimson Crusade bandmates Devon Lucier (on vocals & guitar) and Robert Crossley (on drums) alongside A.J. on guitar and ex-Column Ruins bassist Travis Garside. Well filmed by a concert attendee, this is a solid cover that shows their musical growth well, with a nice guitar solo from A.J. and fitting vocals by a then-long haired Devon (I wonder why he doesn't sing straight thrash anymore?) As a precursor to later music work, this is a good video to check out, and hopefully we hear more from these guys in music soon! (For more from Devon & Robert, click here for their early Crimson Crusade cover of Judas Priest's "Living After Midnight".)



Alex, Andy, Benn, Mike and Tom all playin Bed Of RaZoRs CASS: The most viewed of A.J.'s music uploads is this instrumental cover of Children of Bodom's "Bed of Razors" from a CASS Cafe practice session in May 2008. Featuring guitarists Alex Pierce & Andy Turbin, bassist Tom Leindecker, drummer Mike Christie, and keyboardist Benn Garside (now The Hydra's Teeth's bassist), this cover (his first from a CASS performance) is well performed and suitably brutal, especially from Alex, but comments indicate that the full version from the actual event was better. Uniquely, this was also shot on multiple camera angles, but the cuts can be jarring (especially concerning the audio), and Benn is barely visible. Still, this is a quality cover that brings the metal even without vocals!



crazy train and other metal riffs: Among A.J.'s early uploads to his channel in 2008 were two solo cover videos, one being an audio-only take of Ozzy Osbourne's "Diary of a Madman". The other (embedded below) features him playing various metal riffs (mainly Ozzy Osbourne's "Crazy Train") in what appears to be his room. Though he admits playing them too fast, they sound pretty good, but it'd be nice to hear more solos and get more distinction between the covers (plus, the "One" cover broke the flow somewhat.) Solid riffing and guitar work even still, and it's be nice to see A.J. playing live music again (also, nice lights in the guitar!)


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I hope you guys liked this month's YouTube Channel Profile! So, what channel's next in this series for October? For the first time in 8 months, we'll be looking at 3 different YouTube channels, as the first one we randomly selected only had 3 very similar videos, and the second only had one entirely. With that said, our next profiles will look at the channels of Toast/Galactic Alignment guitarist Mike Libertoski (his most recent one, with three solo guitar covers), YouTube user canadianchic29 (featuring a live Caveman Morrison video), and former T.E.N. mainman Tyler Gibson (featuring three of their original demos), so watch out for all of that on or around October 22nd! That's all for today, but stay tuned for more news this week! Thanks everyone!

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