Friday, July 3, 2015

LOCAL CONCERT ALERT (Rotaryfest Second Stage) & New Sault Michigan Videos!!

Keeping our busy streak going at the SMS, here's a new news post half devoted to some short new videos from Sault Michigan, but leading off, here's a long anticipated LOCAL CONCERT ALERT concerning the return of a fan favourite summer concert event, so here's what you should know!

The full lineup for the return of Rotaryfest's Second Stage is now official, as per the official program, so what should you know for it's 10th installment? Returning after a year's hiatus due to financial issues, the all-original stage (now presented by Agero & Village Media, and labelled as "Stage 2: Redirected" on official materials) will be held at Clergue Park on an outdoor stage by the Art Gallery of Algoma, presumably due to the ongoing Downtown Association debate and the postponement or cancellation of outdoor Queen Street events until that's resolved, but whether this is a temporary move or not is to be determined. Also, with LopLops Lounge moving on to their own Emergency Festival last year, main stage assistant director Chelsie Parayko is the new director of the Second Stage, but how does this affect the lineup and schedule? For at least this year, the Second Stage will be held on Saturday, July 18th only (it had previously been held on the Friday too), and is is also a little shorter in length and earlier than before (1:00-8:00 PM rather than 2:00-11:00 PM)

Lineup-wise, there are no out of town bands this year, so this year's Stage 2 lineup is all-local for the first time in a noticeable while. In terms of genre, the bands are familiar in sound to past Second Stages, but with a youthful, punk/alternative base that will be up the alley of fans of Lopstock and Tidal Records events, and with one exception, all making their Stage 2 debuts! Headlining at 7:00 PM on July 18th are local post-punk quartet and VM Radio Battle winners Gnaeus, while their good friends in The Pixo Control will co-headline with their own alternative & grunge originals at 6:00 PM. and new local glam metal/power pop trio Caroline Divine will play at 5:00 PM.  Newer pop punk quartet Stereo North are scheduled at 4:00 PM, and young local indie rock quintet Aldous are on at 3:00 PM, while local rapper Conika & DJ Seith will play three 10 minute mini-sets together at 2:50, 3:50, and 4:50 PM. Some familiar Rotaryfest faces will open Stage 2 as well, so who are they?

Local progressive/indie rock quartet The Wild Iris (who previously played the First Stage twice as The Pesto Shirts) will head over to the Second Stage for a 2:00 PM set, while local alt-folk favourites The Boot Hill Crooners will make their first Stage 2 appearance since 2009 to open the day at 2:00 PM. Just for reference sake, this year's event breaks local indie/folk quintet The Porter Band's five year streak of Second Stage appearances since their 2009 debut, though I believe they fell inactive last year. Stage 2: Redirected is a FREE & ALL AGES event, and it's great to have it back in any form after losing last year's event! I'm encouraged by the more alternative and punk selection of bands, and it'll be interesting to see how this does, but of course, if you miss the old Second Stage format and band range, give The Emergency Festival a look next month! See the above links for more details, and we'll keep you posted if any extra info comes in!

We'll close today with some short videos that will be of note to Sault Michigan readers, including this commercial for TONIGHT'S  P.O.D./Hoobastank/Fuel concert at The Dreammaker's Theatre at the Sault Michigan Kewadin Casino! Uploaded by co-promoter John Yeubanks to the Yooper Bars & Bands Facebook group on Wednesday, this was obviously made before Lights Out Paris were added to the lineup, and Integrated System of Machines' name is said without the "S" at the end, but it's effective, gets the details across, and makes good use of music video clips of the headliners! Give it a look below, and remember, tickets are $42.50 at the door TONIGHT!



Finally for today, here's a brief new video from 415E guitarist Chris Hubbard's YouTube channel! The first new performance upload on his YouTube channel since 2011 (though note a few of his recent uploads have been deleted for unannounced reasons), this 15 second video is of Chris jamming on guitar with the help of his new EVH 5150 III Stealth guitar amp head. The camera is mounted on Chris' guitar (albeit with grainy quality), and everything sounds good, but it's too bad this isn't longer. Give Chris' new video a look below!



That's all for now, but stay tuned for this month's "Where Are The New Albums?" post TONIGHT! Thanks everyone!

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