Black Hoodie Alchemy

This week is a Part 2 of sorts to last week! This is actually an episode that I recorded as a guest on Alex's show, Natural Born Alchemist, but I'm going ahead and releasing it here as well. Extending out of our last conversation about the Abrahamic religions, Gnosticism, and alchemy, we go deeper into alchemical symbolism and discuss the detailed ins and outs of what plants, gardening, and horticulture have to do with spirituality. We also get into how the use of drugs and getting high plays roles in spirituality, especially alchemy, and what the implications of all this might be. Talking about growing weed, detoxing from Big Pharma prescriptions, taking iboga and ayahuascha in indigenous ceremonies and much more! 

Don't forget to check out  

Alex's podcast here

my website here 

OUTRO SONG:  SQUARED CIRCLE - UMANG

This week's episode is released a bit late on account of me being bedridden with a stomach virus -- it was goddamn terrible. This chat was recorded before it hit me, but not before I had prepared it for release at all, so here it is a couple days late! 

It's a chat with my good friend Alex that started open-ended with some cannabis smoke and led us into a conversation analyzing Christianity, the Gnostic idea of the Abrahamic god as the Demi-Urge, alchemy in Hermeticism and the Abrahamic religions, and shamanic psychedelic rites relating to these religions. 

I'll leave it at that this time around and I hope you tune in next week when I'm back in full health! Cheers.

And don't forget to check out Alex's show, Natural Born Alchemist!

my website

Greetings everyone and thank you for joining me after a longer hiatus than I expected -- almost 2 months! It was a move to a new city, commuting a lot while the move finished up on top of a job-transfer and everything else. Nothing really eventful outside of the norm, but now here I am back in the weekly swing of things! This was a rare extended break for several reasons, and even when any more breaks come from me they won't be nearly this long. I appreciate anyone tuning back in after falling off for a little bit.

In this episode I am joined by my friend Justin Otto -- host of the Dharma Junkie podcast, meditation instructor, and studious Buddhist. It's rare to find a devout Buddhist that reminisces about the times he's drank with famously insensitive (and pretty hilarious) comedian Doug Stanhope, and the dark humor is definitely abundant in this episode. Whether or not you think it's funny, Justin and I are good at egging each other on without really trying and we had a great time. 

We discuss the new four-part documentary series about Teal Swan on Hulu (that's where I watched it at least), entitled 'The Deep End.' If you've never heard her name before, just imagine a woman in her thirties that started as a new age internet guru right as Youtube was really starting to take off as a platform. Eventually her Youtube blows up, leading to massive book sales and lecture tours about self-empowerment -- all of which is either pretty surface-level or highly debatable, until she amassed enough wealth and prestige to strong-arm all her assets into a cult blueprint. 

In the outer circle, she panders to people searching for answers at book signings, but in the inner circle she manipulates and even physically abuses her followers in certain cases, even using experimental hypnotherapy to alter their emotions and memories in disastrous ways that are a direct extension of Satanic Panic hysteria. 

Now, what sets this apart from all other cult research is that this was a documentary allowed by Teal Swan as a PR stunt: they thought that if they let a third party film crew come in and document them, then the world will know that Teal Swan is a chill superhuman and totally not running a cult. But as we will talk about in this episode, this PR stunt severely back-fired and has left Swan's public image in shreds. So aside from the audio tapes of Jonestown life and the video recorded goodbyes of Heaven's Gate followers, this documentary represents an authentic close-up look at the inner circle of an insidious cult. And its filmed in real-time about a group that is still very active and very mad about this exposure. They were just too delusional to see that they would be bringing about their own downfall. But cult leaders like this are often resilient, and we surely haven't heard the last from Teal Swan.

All this and more on this episode of Black Hoodie Alchemy!

Outro song: The Return - Babylon Warchild (feat. Daddy Rose)

support that underground black hoodie rap!

For this edition of Black Hoodie Alchemy, my good friend Martin joins me as my second official guest. We follow up my last conversation with Eric Millar about his book 'The Four Color Grimoire', the history of comic books, the mythologies and philosophies that inspired them, as well as unpacking some of the details of Eric's favorite authors and heroes.

This time, Martin takes what Eric helped us build on the show and adds to it, deconstructing the philosophies of Grant Morrison further and the writer's take on chaos magick and Hermeticism through writing titles like Batman, Justice League, Doom Patrol, Flex Mentallo, and The Invisibles. And we can't help but discuss Alan Moore a bit as well! Simulation theory, sigil magick, archetypes and analytic psychology, Moon Knight and schizophrenia, and a deep look at both DC and Marvel -- you won't wanna miss this if you're a comic head!

outro track: 

The Countown - BABYLON WARCHILD

support that black hoodie rap and your favorite independent artists!

Martin's show 'The Alchemical Mind'

my book Hunt Manual

my book Dive Manual

Eric's book 'Four Color Grimoire'

'Deconstructing Grant Morrison' 

Stan Lee's Superhumans

This week of Black Hoodie Alchemy brings us our first guest: my friend and colleague, Eric Millar! While he's done the cover of my book Hunt Manual and we've talked back and forth for nearly a couple years, this actually marks our first real-time conversation, and we had a helluva time. Eric comes around to have a serious but informal discussion about old school comic books, their culture and content, and what that means to modern philosophy, magick, and mysticism. 

TRUE BELIEVERS, YOU WON'T FIND TALK ABOUT JOSS WHEDON, ZAK SNYDER, OR SEQUEL THEORY BULLSHIT HERE.

IF ANYTHING, ALLOW THIS CONVERSATION TO TRANSPORT YOU BACK TO THAT OLD, DINGY, BACK ROOM OF YOUR FAVORITE '90S COMIC SHOP. SMELL THE OLD PAPER, PULL OUT YOUR TRADING CARDS AND SLEEVED COMIC BOOKS AND DICE AND GET READY.

Eric takes an approach to the analysis of superhero comics and what it means from a Jungian standpoint to be a fanatic and to experience fanaticism. This unique mindstate is something that alchemists have been fascinated with for thousands of years -- and learning to utilize and experiment with this mindset is the greatest reason comic books have always attracted actual magicians and philosophers to their creation teams. We also discuss whether or not you can truly equate comic books to mythology in terms of archetypes -- and if you can, what are the easy pitfalls and important distinctions that we need to make when analyzing comic books in this way?

We talk about Jack Kirby, Alan Moore, Grant Morrison, Rick Veitch, Frank Miller, Steve Ditko, and we try to take Stan Lee down a peg! 

As for superheroes and their stories, we discuss my boy Spidey, Batman, Superman, Swamp Thing, Justice League, Marvel 2099, and a lot more!

Eric Millar's info:

Outlet Press books and posts

paperback of THE FOUR COLOR GRIMOIRE

Four Color Grimoire 00 post online

my info:

my book Dive Manual

my book Hunt Manual (the cover illustrated by Eric)

my website

outro song:

MAGNETO (feat. Pacewon) - Babylon Warchild

support Independent Music -- especially that black hoodie rap!

additional content from our comic book conversation:

Grant Morrison Disinfo Con

Alan Moore is a wizard

Jack Kirby's 'New Gods'

Rick Veitch's dream-imagery comics

Stan Lee Media scandal

Kirby vs. Lee

This episode of BHA is a 4/20 special! Roll up and put your thinking hats on, because we're gonna get high as fuck and philosophize a little bit. 

Starting with the primordial origins of humanity and moving forward, I discuss the evolutionary mechanisms of cannabis and how the chemical structure of the plant has been incorporated into our human biology for thousands and thousands of years now. I also take some time to talk about the ancient history of cannabis and its use in spiritual and religious customs throughout the ancient world, often used as a sacrament relating to the Tree of Life and revered by the alchemists of the east!

I even read excerpts from an essay that the Great Beast himself, Aleister Crowley once wrote, entitled "The Psychology of Hashish."

Additional topics will also include the modern science relating to cannabis, including neuroscience, psychology, botany, and horticulture. 

Then, at the end, we discuss some of the downsides to constant cannabis use! While cannabis is irrefutably considered a medicine again in our society, it can still be abused just like any other medicine and while you cannot overdose, there still can be some potential downsides. It's important to keep these things in mind!

SMOKE RESPONSIBLY, SMOKE TO GROUND YOURSELF AND SET INTENTIONS, AND SMOKE TO UNDERSTAND YOUR PROBLEMS -- NOT RUN AWAY FROM THEM. BUT MOST IMPORTANTLY, SMOKE WEED EVERYDAY! 

HAPPY 4/20 EVERYONE! 

my book Hunt Manual

my book Dive Manual

Cowboy Matt Hopewell - New Old School (end track)

The Psychology of Hashish

Chris Bennett and his work

a pretty damn old article I wrote about cannabis and metaphysics

modern anti-cannabis activism (mostly dumb with some kernels of interest)

a Manly Palmer Hall lecture on drugs and metaphysics (a little straight-laced but not judge-y and very interesting)

Welcome back to Black Hoodie Alchemy! In this episode we are setting the stage for our discussions of demonology. This is the first part, and this will be a subject we revisit consistently but not continuously, and we are starting out with poltergeists! We start with analyzing some of the actual sciences here, dealing with analytic psychology and the nervous system.

Then the main subjects will be Peter Page and the Church Street Poltergeist of St. Catherine's Canada in 1970; and Ernie Rivers and the Project Poltergeist in Newark, New Jersey during the early 1960s. The first has a great deal of police paperwork behind it, involving 6 esteemed and longtime police officers begrudgingly investigating this paranormal activity, only to begin writing detailed official reports about how poltergeists are the only explanation left for what they've been seeing happen to the Page family. Today the police report can be viewed online, and so can interviews with some of the police officers. 

The second is the first purported case of a poltergeist in inner city project housing, and how Ernie Rivers became such a radical case that he not only had the Newark Housing Authority hiring a priest to help cleanse the project building, but he also had scientists from Duke's now-defunct Parapsychology Department come to pay him many visits. 

We also talk a little bit about the exorcism of Anneliese Michel (inspiration for the movie The Exorcism of Emily Rose), the Amityville Horror, and we talk about the suspiciousness of Ed and Lorraine Warren (inspiration for The Conjuring movies.)

Lastly, I sign off with a musical track from my friend, Keats Ross, under the name DAKOTA SLIM. 

You can listen to his song Wasted Bones here!

Ernie Rivers Poltergeist

Church St. Poltergeist

Exorcism of Anneliese Michel

Ed & Lorraine Warren

my book HUNT MANUAL

my book DIVE MANUAL

my website

In this episode we talk about a few different things, the largest portion of focus being on Todd Murphy and Michael Persinger's peer reviewed scientific study of reincarnation. Published in the Journal of Near Death Studies over 20 years ago, titled "The Structure and Function of Near-Death Experiences: An Algorithmic Reincarnation Hypothesis", this is a truly empirical look into forming a cogent hypothesis to actually explain the physics and psychology of the hypothetical reincarnation process. This study looks into Near Death Experiences and Out of Body Experiences from a comparative religious point of view, as well as the evolutionary brain sciences of memetics and the developments of the temporal lobe and the dreaming process. It as well discusses some of the actual physics required for a reincarnation process, and much more. 

But before that, we also talk a little bit about a UFO documentary I'm going to be in this year -- a documentary titled "The Experiences: From UAP to DMT". The people making the documentary and involved in it, including myself, are not "Ufologists" and are tired of the toxicity and cult mentalities found in Ufology. This documentary is set to simply be an exploration of experience from a mystical and even psychedelic point of view. One of the guests in this doc is even going to be Dr. Rick Strassman himself, the first doctor to perform clinical trials with DMT!

We discuss some alchemical principles from a practical, psychological perspective.

And lastly, we talk some about Dr. Seuss' Midnight Paintings! Dark, surrealist, and even unnerving, these paintings were Seuss' equivalent to Carl Jung's "Black Books", pieces of work that helped him purge aspects of his psyche's dark recesses. It's genuinely a beautiful story, and the paintings are all absolutely incredible!

And this episode also features a song written and performed by my friend and fellow fortean researcher, AP Strange! Under the name Cowboy Matt Hopewell, I play his song "Phantasmagoria Blues" at the end of the show, and it's a 10 minute epic of existential rambles on top of bluesy gallops and soloing. I absolutely love it and I hope you do too.

Full Gallery of Dr. Seuss Midnight Paintings

The Structure and Function of Near Death Experiences Study

The Experiences: From UAP to DMT trailer

Hunt Manual: 21st Century Demonology & Forteana

Dive Manual: Empirical Investigations of Mysticism

My Website

Have you ever wondered: what would happen if a child in a California Bay Area community was groomed to be a softcore Mormon prophet for God? A New Age Joseph Smith 2.0? If you've ever thought about that, maybe you've also wondered how long it might take before he reaches his eventual mental breakdown, or how much methamphetamine he might smoke, how many harems of women he might fail to create for himself, or how many people he might kill in a spree. But even if you've wondered a little bit of all of that, I bet the idea of kidnapping Brazilian orphans to turn into assassins to help take over the leadership of the Mormon LDS Church AND turn Utah into a nationstate hasn't crossed your mind. And I bet you also haven't considered the all-encompassing, Matrix-hacking '12 Principles of Magick' that is sure to turn your life around and get you to see the bigger picture: that Methamphetamine, magick, and murder evidently get you closer to God in this episode of Black Hoodie Alchemy! Get ready for an absolutely insane and at times hilarious story of a man's raised to be the magickal equivalent of a trust-fund-brat, eventually leading him to piss it all away in a fashion that few people will ever do. Rest in peace to the victims.

my website

My book Hunt Manual: 21st Century Demonology & Forteana 

My book Dive Manual: Empirical Investigations of Mysticism

my homie Duncan created BHA's theme song, and his music project is New Vew Dew. Check out his track "Typhoon" here 

Helzer's 12 Principles of 'Magick'

Murderpedia profile 

a book on the Helzers and their wannabe cult