Our Recap Of Episode #3 Of Metal Morpheus On The Borderline!!

With news relatively slow right now, let's take an overdue look at episode #3 of Metal Morpheus, the new metal music-focused series on local internet radio station The Borderline! As you may have seen via our recaps of the first two episodes, the series features host/local metal frontman Josh Amendola looking at the loose history of a metal subgenre every week (premiering Sundays at 9:00 PM), and the third episode from July 18th was about grindcore. Running for about 61 minutes, this one should pack in even more songs given the usually fast-paced and structured chaos of grindcore songs, but what does Josh spin in this episode? He kicks things off with two sub-80 second songs by Boston grindcore band Siege ("Drop Dead" & "Walls"), before moving to pioneering Japanese grindcore band S.O.B. around 3:55 in, specifically playing their song "Raging In Hell". At the 6 minute mark, Josh moves into grindcore legends Napalm Death, who get some good props!

Even comparing the legendary Buddy Rich to the rapid-fire blast beats typical of the genre, Josh plays the one-time Foggy Notions (well, Feedback) headliners' classic songs "Multinational Corporations" and "Instinct of Survival" from their highly influential LP "Scum", plus the title track of Napalm Death's "From Enslavement To Oblivion", though the middle song isn't credited by name. At about 12:40, we move on to Michigan grindcore notables Repulsion, complete with more of a biography, and he plays their song "Radiation Sickness", before moving on to British goregrind pioneers Carcass at about 16:25, from where Josh plays "Exhume To Consume", running for a very long (by genre standards) 3 minutes & 50 seconds. Next up at the 21 minute point is a section on American grindcore band Terrorizer, whose played song is their 1989 classic "After World Obliteration".

Afterwards, Josh throws back to two pioneering hardcore punk bands including Bad Brains via their song "Attitude" (24:55 in) and Black Flag with their Rollins-era classic "Rise Above" at about 27:00. Neither band are true "grindcore" acts to me, but both are highly influential towards newer bands in this and other subgenres! The first half concludes with "No One Can Be That Dumb" by the early Swedish grindcore band Larm, whose segment begins at around 29:25. Like S.O.B. earlier, Larm are not on Spotify, so keep that in mind if you use that service a lot. Josh kicks off the back half of the episode at about 30:45 with a look at local/St. Catharine's grindcore trio Shit Liver, from which Josh plays two songs off of their 2018 album "Hitting The Fan", including the title track & "It Won't Change". Not as in depth of a look as Repulsion got, but Shit Liver garnered the biggest chunk of the episode!

Next, about 38:55 in, Josh transitions to a segment on Brutal Truth, from which he plays their relatively long track "Denial Of Existence", before moving onto death metal/grimdcore quartet Misery Index (who are probably my favorite band of the episode) at about 43:30 with their song "Conquistadores", followed by Cephalic Carnage at about 47:35 with "Endless Cycle of Violence". Entering the home stretch, Josh plays "Shaping The End" by Swedish deathcore band Nasum at about 51:25, immediately followed by Pig Destroyer's "Terrifier" (at the 53:50 mark or so). The last song played on air is the Lord of the Rings-inspired "Black Breath" by Repulsion at 56:00 or so, before wrapping up with some brief thoughts. This was a fun and suitably intense episode, putting a good spotlight on such an underground subgenre, but I'd have spent more time explaining the appeal of grindcore and the bands in question.

Grindcore is an intense, brutal, and assaulting style of metal and hardcore punk, but it's also one that isn't overly accessible for a lot of casual fans, so this episode could have benefited in this way from more context and analysis. Still, a very solid listen for genre fans, and Josh is getting more comfortable as host here, so give it a listen! Stay tuned for episode #8 this coming Sunday at 9:00 PM, and hear episodes #1-7 at the above links, and look for our recap of episode #4 (on Canadian thrash metal) in the near future, plus weekend concert previews! Thanks everyone!