It’s just a matter of opinion
Miserable Metal Mind Podcast review
Rating – 
Isn’t it nice to have a review back on a Sunday this week? After scheduling/sickness and release day reviews, you would be forgiven for thinking that reviews would be one Monday forever now. Sunday will always be for reviews though. That and watching 9 hours of Columbo. But anyway…
Back into music this week with a rather new podcast that harks from the UK. Back when I first heard about this show, I couldn’t actually find any episodes at all. All the links went to a blogspot page, and it all seemed very mysterious. Probably more my fault than theirs. I did track it down on my podcatcher though, so here is my review of The Miserable Metal Mind Podcast.
So what’s it about?
Neil, Paul and Simon are three (well, two, I guess) passionate metal fans. That is, they are fans of heavy metal music as opposed to office ventilation. Each episode they discuss music new and old, classic albums, and all manner of metal based news and interviews. Being a British podcast, the majority of interviews are with UK based bands, and the gig reviews are also 99% UK based. Actually, because Paul is so busy photographing and reviewing shows, an awul lot of them seem to be Welsh, which is a nice change.
Half of the time they are eagerly frothing about some new band they’ve seen, or some overlooked track on a classic album. The other half of the time they are trying to convince Simon that their taste in music isn’t “absolute shit”. This appears to be quite the task, as Simon seems to make Karl Pilkington sound like a hyperactive puppy. I guess he isn’t called Mr. Miserable for nothing!
Is it any good?
In parts, it’s very good indeed. The guys are so at ease with each other that it’s like you’re just sitting outside a venue having a chat. Sometimes, they are sitting inside a venue having a chat. A lot of it is exactly how conversations between the bands that I play with just shoot the shit before and after a show.
Now for the negatives. I listen to podcasts on a podcatcher (Podcast Addict if you must know), and there are only a handful of episodes on there. You get the trailer, and then it jumps to episode 8. Actually, that’s not strictly true. I have found a different listing for the podcast which only has episodes 6 (part 2) and 7 on it. But the first episodes are still nowhere to be found.
On top of that, due to licensing restrictions, they are unable to play any of the music they recommend on any other platform than Spotify. To be honest, this is something they have overcome by not actually playing music anymore, but it was a bit of a pain to have a second or two of dead air after the introduction and then “well guys, what did you think of that?
Now here is where you may think I’m being a bit harsh. If you listen on the paid version of Spotify, you’ll have no problems. If you listen from their website, all the episodes are there. Various other platforms that host this podcast will have various degrees of “completeness”. So there absolutely are ways to completely avoid all these negatives, and I’m sure you will have a much better experience.
Final thoughts
From the beginning of this blog, I have always said that in the interest of fairness, I always review based on what’s available on my podcatcher. Something that affected my original Disgraceland review. Not everyone has a full Spotify account (which I don’t, out of principle as a musician), and not everyone wants to watch episodes on YouTube. It’s a real shame, but with so many plates spinning to publish a show, then I understand that some things get overlooked.
Despite my criticisms, I really like this show. I defy any group of metal fans to not identify with these guys. Every group of friends has these exact archetypes in it, which is why the discussions/arguments they have are so relatable. There are genuine laugh out loud moments, particularly from Simon, whose deadpan style I find incredibly amusing.
Also, I have had the pleasure of being photographed by Paul Hutchins on a few occasions (not in a weird way, he has photographed my band playing live), and he’s been kind enough to give us one or two good reviews too.
You can get The Miserable Metal Mind Podcast here:
For more great reviews, I recommend GreatPods