Jeff Wagner and Hunter Ginn met in 2001 and quickly bonded over many shared music fascinations, from Mind Over Four, Nomeansno and Nuclear Death to King Crimson, Nudeswirl and Die Kreuzen, not to mention numerous other metal, prog, post-punk, indie rock, new wave, experimental, outsider and left-field sorts of sounds. Along with their uncanny intersections in music taste, their passion for Norwegian post-black metal weirdness (ie. Norweird) bonded them for life.
Radical Research is an outgrowth of an idea the duo had, to co-author a book on Norweird. Ditching that for various reasons, they developed a podcast instead, intended to focus on Norweird, but one that would also explore all manner of things the two feel worthy of revisitation and exultation. No barriers, no boundaries, no such thing as guilty pleasures.
Wagner comes to the podcast with a wealth of experience as a super-fan. He has worked for various record labels (Relapse, The End, Century Media, InsideOut), was an editor at Metal Maniacs from 1997 and 2001, contributed to numerous fanzines/magazines, is one half of the ridiculous BigDumbSkulls.com, and has authored four books (Mean Deviation – Four Decades of Progressive Heavy Metal, 2010; Soul on Fire – The Life and Music of Peter Steele, 2014; Destination Onward – The Story of Fates Warning, 2022; Always Moving – The Strange Multiverse of Voivod, 2025). He does all this with some reluctance, wishing, in some way, he could leave all the extracurriculars behind and just listen, focused and undisturbed, to more music. Maybe one day.
Ginn first came to the attention of music connoisseurs with his band, Canvas Solaris, who released 6 albums and an EP between 2003 and 2021. He has also recorded and released music with his other pursuits, Gorging Shade and Plague Psalm. In 2023, he joined Pacific Northwest legends Agalloch. He has also recorded with Dolven, Sculptured, and Fool’s Game. He publishes the dark musick journal, Deserts of Hex, with compatriot and friend of Radical Research, Thomas Nul. Ginn is rumored to be the world’s first successful hybrid of human and biscuit.