New Musician Interviews From The Borderline Radio, And More!!

Before we begin today's post, I wanted to offer our deepest condolences to the family, friends, and colleagues of veteran local radio personality, program director, and sports announcer John Bell, who recently passed away, as per an announcement on 1230 WSOO's Facebook page yesterday morning. Stay tuned to relevant Sault Michigan news outlets for information on services when it becomes available. A Minnesota native, John would become a fixture of local radio over the past 35 years across multiple stations and companies. SMS readers may best recognize John as the long-time news anchor for Rock 101 and their sister stations, but his on-air and behind-the-scenes roles on the Sault Ste. Marie airwaves go well beyond that, including lengthy runs as a DJ and/or morning host with WSOO, 99.5 Yes FM, and the former Know AM/Talk Radio 1400, as well as doing play-by-play for the Sault High Blue Devils hockey team and local junior hockey clubs like the Soo Eagles and the Soo Indians.

John had dealt with major health issues in the last couple of years that I won't get into here, but a fundraiser burger bash was held in his honour in October 2019 at The Elks Lodge, and that seemed to go over pretty well. I never met John, but his familiar voice and on-air talents were ever present when listening to local radio, and he will be missed by all that knew and respected him, if social media testimonials are any indication. R.I.P. John!

Now, today's post continues in the realm of radio, specifically Sault Ontario internet station The Borderline, which we covered shortly after it's launch last fall, and one missing aspect for me at the time was the ability to listen to episodes online after the fact if you weren't able to catch them live. Well, they have done just that on their redesigned website, and 10 of The Borderline's shows have streamable-on-demand episodes at this link! As such, let's at least start to spotlight the series that have episodes dealing with local metal, hard rock, or punk music, and we'll first look at Across The Tracks, where host & station founder Adrian Vilaca talks to local musicians about the story behind their original music. Most aren't hard rock artists, but back in August, Adrian did interview local/Thompson, Manitoba alt/hard rock musician Mike Haggith about the background of his newest CD "If Ever Comes The Day", so what should you know behind that episode?

An 84 minute listen, it features Mike discussing the lyrical inspirations and real life feelings that enveloped the album and it's individual songs, including how his day job in aviation puts things in another perspective, the reason behind the two blank tracks. Every full song from "If Ever Comes The Day" is included after the interview segments, though they aren't discussed in their running order on the actual album. This is an entertaining listen that will likely be the most context you'll ever hear from Mike re: the album's concept, and Adrian gives Mike lots of room to go into lots of details therein, so fans will want to hear the whole episode at this link! While we're on the subject, fellow Borderline staffer Mike "Sev Micron" Severin interviewed Mike Haggith himself on Friday for an episode of his own interview series Sev's Cellar, which has interviewed multiple hard rock performers so far.

Honestly, I'll hold a full write-up on Sev's interview with Mike Haggith for now, because only the second half of the interview is available to stream on demand. It's not labelled as such in the description, but Sev clearly notes that it's part 2 about three minutes into the 68 minute file, before jumping into the interview in progress. Hopefully the first half is posted at some point!

We'll close by looking at a full episode of Sev's Cellar from early last year, where he interviewed Jack Spades/Frightlight frontman and local concert promoter J.D. Pearce (a.k.a. Johnny Pints)! However, be advised that this was recorded before the pandemic, hence why J.D. promotes the local First Jason and Anti-Queens concerts and Jack Spades' annual July tour run, all obviously being cancelled. He also alludes to the lineup changes in Jack Spades, including an apparent new guitarist & drummer, but again, the pandemic may have delayed a further public reveal. The interview afterwards features J.D. discussing his inspiration as a songwriter, his favourite lyrics, songs he's listening to now, info about his personal life, why his concert output was decreasing, memorable local concerts of his, and advice for young musicians, among other topics. "Fright Night" and "C.H.U.D." by Frightlight are also played in full.

Mike revealed in the episode that J.D. would be hosting a punk/metal show on The Borderline, but as best as I can gather, that series never premiered. A lot of the context of the interview is very much dated now (this was only posted for on-demand listening last month), and the background music seems out of place despite reflecting the interview discussion, but this is a fun listen that has some interesting insights from a performing and promotional viewpoint! Give it and more a listen above, and stay tuned for more from Sev's Cellar and beyond in the coming days! Thanks everyone!