Our Recap Of Episode #11 Of Metal Morpheus On The Borderline!!

We're almost caught up on recapping episodes of Metal Morpheus on local internet radio station The Borderline, so let's look at what host Josh Amendola played on air earlier this month! Today, we'll just focus on episode #11 from Sunday, September 12th, and in a possible sign that Josh is running out of metal subgenres that he personally likes, that episode focused on punk rock, and given the typically short song lengths that the genre calls for, this one crams in a lot more songs than normal, so hopefully my time codes are reasonably accurate!  After the intro and Josh's explanation of how punk began and how it connects thematically to metal, he opens with pioneering proto-punk/garage legends The Stooges with their song "T.V. Eye" (0:45), before moving on to The Dead Kennedys with "We've Got A Bigger Problem Now" (7:15). Both bands get lots of welcomed biographical details, but Josh is pretty hard to hear over the latter song's introduction.

We move into faster territory next via British punk icons Discharge's "Protest & Survive" (12:50), via which Josh offers some brief commentary about vaccine passport protests (I'm not getting into that here), before playing the Bad Brains' song "Pay to Cum!" (16:15), which is sub-2 minutes, so don't bogart the fast forward control. After a bit more of a mainstream turn with The Clash's iconic hit "London Calling" (18:50), we get to this episode's local talent way earlier than usual, but rather than go with the plentiful amounts of established local punk bands from the 1990s onward, Josh instead went with The Roll-Ons via a live recording from a show they played at the former New Ontario Hotel (later Studio 10) in 1978. The Roll-Ons are way before my time, but they are a logical pick given the age of most of the bands played in this episode, not to mention that their drummer is Mike "Sev Micron" Severin!

Of course, Mike hosts Sev's Cellar on The Borderline where he interviews local musicians, but he also works in technical support & audio engineering with the station. Josh noted that Sev was joined here by singer Paul Cooper, guitarist George Pavelich (did he mean Ravlich?) and bassist Steve Stinson, while Josh even credits some of the names who helped make this concert and recording happen, I don't believe these songs circulated online freely, but two Roll-Ons songs are played here, including a cover of Vince Taylor & The Playboys' "Brand New Cadillac" (23:05) & the original "1984" (26:40), and while I lean more to skate & hardcore punk, these songs are lively, melodic, and well performed, with perfectly respectable audio quality for a 40+ year old live recording! It'd be interesting to see and hear more from The Roll-Ons at some point. The second half of the episode begins with The Sex Pistols' "Pretty Vacant" (29:30), complete with more backstory info on their career and this song's surprise inspiration.

The episode next moves into early 1980s punk legends Minor Threat's very short self-titled song (33:25), followed by Montreal punk band S.C.U.M.'s song "Double Cross" (36:00), which is not on Spotify. Staying in Canada, we next get a trifecta of domestic punk bands who have all headlined in Sault Ste. Marie in the past decade, including the also-Spotify-devoid Bunchofuckingoofs' "In Dog We Trust" (40:20), The Dayglo Abortions' "Wake Up America" (43:40), and Random Killing's "Terrorist Attack" (46:50). Surprisingly, Josh doesn't mention that their frontman Andrew Kiteley is a Saultite, let alone their Rockstar Bar gigs in the 2010s! Next up is Death (not the Chuck Schuldiner-fronted death metal band, the 1960s proto-punk group), whose song here is "Politicians In My Eyes" (48:15). The home stretch features Crass' "Do They Owe Us A Living" (54:30) & GG Allin's "Louden Boomer" (58:00).

Of course, Josh dropped some back story details on GG Allin, who lived quite a life (that's an understatement), and credit to Josh for describing his high points without sensationalizing the obvious! Between the extra bands, added biography info for most of them, and a nice look into The Roll-Ons, there was more to cover here than recently usual, but Josh gave some good appreciation to classic punk in this episode, so genre fans new and old will want to hear it at this link or above! We'll have another recap post soon as Josh moves to non-genre topics for episodes #12 & #13, but listen to episode #14 live on Sunday at 9:00 PM, and stay tuned for a new news post tomorrow on the site! Thanks everyone!