Philly Morris
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Philly Morris (born 13 July 1972 in Heswall, Merseyside) is one of the UK's leading campaigners for more testicular cancer awareness for young men.
[edit] Early years
Philly left Pensby High School in 1988 to become a studio hand in the "attic" recording studio in Liverpool. After two years of training with such bands as The La's and The Real People, he decided to follow a boyhood dream and join the armed forces. Phil joined the RCT regiment in 1990, based in Bunde in northern Germany.
He saw campaign service in Northern Ireland, after a stint in Bosnia. Philly went on to be come the first Army boxer to wear the newly formed RLC colours in 1993, along with being placed fourth in the BAOR downhill skiing championships in 1994.
After the death of his close army friend just days after he had signed up to stay in the army for another 5 years he decided he would leave the army as soon as he could in 1996.
Phil soon went back to his childhood love of drums, joining Duncan Ross to form DeltaRest and also playing drums for The Other. Phil also roadied for Clipper Cartel.
[edit] Testicular cancer awareness
After having two types of testicular cancer he set up the UK's most famous testicular cancer website checkemlads.com with the help of well known musicians Steve White and Paul Weller in April 2003. In this time Philly also managed to force more awareness of testosterone replacement, with long-time campaigner and cancer survivor Nick O'Hara Smith, in men who had lost a testicle or testicles to injury or cancer which was widely ignored until recent pressure on health authorities from Nick. Philly works alongside his close friend Mick Riley who also survived cancer of the testicles in 1998. Even though they are from the same area in Merseyside, shared a room in the army and were in the same boxing team in Germany, both had the same cancer within 5 years of each other; the chances of this are around 560,000:1, which still baffles leading cancer experts today.[citation needed]
