Welcome to The Saw’s Butcher Shop! The Saw is often asked about the origins of her Show – how it developed, how and why I named the segments, what exactly am I butchering in The House of Horrors(!), and etc. 2022 marks five years of The Saw’s Butcher Shop! It began in 2017 as “DJ Saw” doing a one-hour show, at midnight on Friday nights, on college radio – WKNC 88.1 – at NC State University in Raleigh, NC.

Central Prison (Death Row), Raleigh, NC

Even at that time, DJ Saw was playing HEAVIER METAL than anything else on the station! Soon, my GM moved my on-air time slot, and expanded my haunting time to two hours (10-12pm on Friday nights). About that time, The Saw began hearing from listeners, writing letters to me, from Central Prison in Raleigh (about a mile away from the campus). My first letters were from inmates, on death row, where the community radio was tuned to 88.1.

My first pen-pal was “Chino Loco” [not his real name], a death row inmate, who was incredibly knowledgeable about old school Thrash/Heavy/Death Metal. We would write back and forth and he (and other inmates on his block) would request songs for me to play on-air during my set. One day his letters quit making song requests. So, I wrote and asked him if he (they) had any. And he responded with two answers that changed the trajectory of my radio DJing experience.

An Unintentional Influence

First, “Chino” said that I was doing a great job on-air, and that he (and the others) loved the music I was playing; that I mixed old and new school Metal so well that requests were unnecessary. It meant a lot to me to get this compliment from him (them)! Others told me the show was good, but to hear it from “Chino,” it turns out, was very important to me.

The second thing he said was in the form of a question: He asked, “How long have you been working in the butcher shop?” Now, his question was an old school euphemism; a way of asking the length of time I had been DJing. In the 70s, radio DJing was known as being a butcher, in “the butcher shop,” spinning “stacks of wax,” “DJ jaw-jacking,” and so on. However, his question – more specifically, his use of “the butcher shop” – struck me like a ton of bricks! Right there! The moment I read that phrase in his letter, I knew the direction I was going to take my on-air time!

The House of Horrors

The Saw’s Butcher Shop was born right then and there. My focus: to feature a wide spectrum of METAL, from all generations of it’s existence, in all it’s iterations; to provide THE HEAVIEST METAL ON THE PLANET! Because (as you know) The Saw is a categorical thinker, I immediately thought of dividing my show into “segments” based on genres. I imagined The Butcher Shop as a horror show – a House of Horrors (you know The Saw loves horror movies!), and that I would insinuate that it was NOT animals being slaughtered at THIS butcher shop! My on-air time at WKNC would soon be expanded, again, to a three-hour show, from 5-8pm on Friday nights (Primetime), so I had plenty of room for the SLAUGHTER!

Death Row Cell Block – “For the Homies in the Big House”

One of the first segments, in honor of “Chino” and the other homies on death row in Central Prison in Raleigh (though they probably had no idea of their influence on me), became Death Row Cell Block, “for the homies in the Big House.” I told “Chino,” in my next letter, what I was doing, and he loved it; thanking me for the honor of a place in The Saw’s Butcher Shop – perpetually, forever. The segment features old school Thrash, Death, and Black Metal. The music they love! And so do I!

The Beatings Will Continue

I registered the name of my award-winning radio show, The Saw’s Butcher Shop®, as a trademark in 2019. In 2021 The Saw and her Butcher Shop graduated from NC State and left Raleigh, continuing to tighten screws and add new and wonderful torture devices to The Butcher Shop in preparation for what would come next. And the next move also occurred in 2021, Overkill Radio would become the new home of The Saw’s Butcher Shop®, where I provide the beatings with THE HEAVIEST METAL on the planet!

Hold still, Butcher Crew! This is going to be a painful ride! The beatings will continue…

Next up, an answer to the question: “Why do you sometimes say, ‘The Saw’s Butcher Shop’, but often you call it, ‘The House of Horrors’? I’m confused by all the names and titles.”

Stay Metal,

THE SAW