Occulture Shock Podcast

Good evening Seekers,

I thought I'd try out a new series theme for the rest of November (and maybe a little into Dec. if it feels right) and that is: Nightcap Noire - A series that explores famous cocktails based on gruesome true crimes and the histories behind them.

Los Angeles, 1947.

A body in a vacant lot. A dark legend in the making. Elizabeth Short, soon to be known as The Black Dahlia, wanted to be seen...

And Hollywood promised her that would happen.

This episode of the Occulture Shock Podcast follows the investigation from the Biltmore Hotel's involvement and homage cocktail: The Black Dahlia, to the surgeon's table, police files, cover-ups, and the city that, even after all of these years, can't leave it alone.

Thanks for getting weird with us!

-J

Seekers!

Here's a true crime story that I've been sitting on for a while: The Mysterious death of Josslyn Hay, the 22nd Earl of Erroll and the scandalous lifestyles of the "Happy Valley Set," a group of British elites in Kenya during the early 20th century.

In 1941, a car was found idiling on a desolate road just outside of Nairobi.

Inside? A British aristocrat with a bullet in his brain.

This week's episode dives into one of the most notorious true stories to come out of the 1940s: the murder of Lord Erroll (Josslyn Hay), his not-so-secret love affair with Diana Delves Broughton (the wife of "Jock" Broughton), Jock's sham of a court case and the inevitable unraveling of the so-called Happy Valley Set - a group of white British colonials whose idea of paradoise was cocaine, cocktails and each other's spouses.

We trace how this band of British (and some American) aristocratic misfits fled post-war England for the Kenyan highlands, turned stolen land into personal playgrounds and built an illusion of civility that rotted from the inside out.

By the end, we're left with a question that still lingers over the entire enterprise: When there are no consequences no matter what you do, is it any surprise that all you have left to destroy is yourself?

Hello Seekers!

Well, I'm still rockin' that Shirley Jackson podcast angle this week!

After last week's podcast, I ended up falling into quite a deep Shirley Jackson internet history hole and discovered that Mrs. Jackson is connected (however tenuously) to an infamous and unsolved murder case of one of the most important American heiresses within the U.S.'s Gilded Age "royalty."

Jane Stanford was the wife of prominent robber baron/ railroad tycoon and founder of Stanford University, Leland Stanford. She was also the victim of a notorious case of murder by poison!

This week's podcast is a twisted game of "six degrees of Kevin Bacon," but with Shirley Jackson swapping places with the ol' Footlooser, her famous great-great-grandfather inspiring The Haunting of Hill House and Mrs. Jane Stanford of San Francisco's horrific and untimely demise.

Thanks for getting weird with me!

Hello Seekers!

This week, we take a look at the author who inspired modern day horror writers such as Stephen King and Guillermo Del Toro by turning her ordinary suburban American life into quiet horror.

Shirley Jackson lived in a house full of noise - four children, a controlling and flandering husband and a typerwrite on a kitchen table within the middle of it all.

From that chaos she wrote fantastic short stories and novels revolving around the seemingly calm surface of the suburbs and the evil truth bubbling just underneath, such as is, The Lottery, The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in the Castle.

This episode unpacks her marriage, her fascination with magic and the occult and how the control she tried to manifest within her writing became her personal spell for survival.

I hope you enjoy today's episode and I also hope you go and read some of her works - they're EXCELLENT psychological horror and thanks for getting weird with us!

Hello Seekers!

Last week we went into the connections between the top 3 Romantic writers of their era: Mary (Godwin) Shelley, Percy Shelley and Lord Byron.

But that just SCRATCHES at the surface of these lunatics (and their friends).

This week's episode goes more "behind-the-scenes" of what famously went down at that villa in Switzerland (hint: It wasn't all writing. There was also a fair bit of sex, drugs and rock n' roll), as well as, everyone's messy personal lives and Percy's creepy and slightly paranormal death at a very young age.

I hope you enjoy today's more personal episode regarding the illustrious 3 and thanks for getting weird with us!

**Thumbnail image: "The Funeral of Shelley (1889) by Louis Édouard Fournier**

In 1816, under a sunless sky, 18 year old Mary Godwin dreamnt of a man who could re-animate the dead. But the story of Frankenstein: Or the Modern Prometheus wasn't born out of superstition, it was born out of the Ennlightenment itself.

This episode unravels how a secret Bavarian order, a volcanic winter and one radical family's obsession with reason combined to create the world's first modern monster.

From the real Illuminati in Ingolstadt to the electric horros of Galvanisim, discover how humanity's pursuit of perfection became its own cautionary tale.

Thank you for getting weird with us,

-The Occulture Shock Podcast

Hello Seekers!

Welcome to an episode that I've done inn combination with: A). Just getting back from a weeks long vacation in Japan and B). Popular demand for this particular subject matter.

What is that subject matter, you ask?

It's actually about one of my favorite things in Japan - their toilets! Specifically, their high-tech Toto ones.

Because the Japanese didn't just re-invent the toilet into something spectcacular, they actually turned it into a cultural icon!

Today on the Occulture Shock podcast, we're talking about "night soil" and its ties to farming, French courtesans with their first bidets and how Japan took that tech and turned it into a point of pride.

Thanks for getting weird with us!

-Jessica

PS: For those interested inn early and ad-free episodes, you can join the Occculture Shock Patreon at Patreon.com/OccultureShockPodcast. Their bare Tier groups for every type of listener.

Enjoy the show!

Hello Seekers!

Jess here - I'm back from Japan (expect that love-letter podcast to Toto toilets coming your way very soon :)

In the meanie, Here is my latest deep dive into videogames and their real-life counterparts. This week, we're loking at: Assassin's Creed Hexe (as currently titled) and the real German witch trials it world-builds around.

Plus, it's the first day of October, so it's a rather apropo subject matter.

When people think of witch trials, they almost always think of Salem but that's just one chapter in a buck longer, much darker book. Long before New England's panic, the German lands and people of the Holy Roman Empire were already in flames. Not from superstition alone but from politics, corruption and fear turned into law.

Continuing with my Occult In Videogames series, I'm delving into Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed IP and their latest annoucement of HEXE (working title).

HEXE's in-game locations have real world counterparts. A place and time where a single bishop coould (and did) sentence hundreads to a horrific fate. Where owning the wrong book of symbols could mean death. And where demons like Mephisto weren't just legends, they were written into confessions under brutal torture.

Did you like this episode and are craving more?

Remember: You can always get early and ad-free episodes when you sign up for a tier over on the Occulture Shock Patreon.

Seekers!

This week we're heading deep into the Pine Barrens of New Jersey. A million acres of twisted pitch pines, bogs and legends that refuse to die.

For over 250 years, locals have whispered about a winged, hoofed creature living within the wilderness: The Jersey Devil.

But here's the plot twist: one of the most famous supposed eyewitnesses wasn't a farmer or a trapper. It was Joseph Bonaparte, Napolean Bonaparte's older brother and a king in exile in his own right and living on a palatial estate in Jersey after fleeing Europe.

In this episode I trace how a colonial family feud, Benjamin Franklin's b*tchiness, a cursed thirteenth child and a monarch in exxile all collided to give America one of its most enduring monster legends of all time.

Get ad-free and early episiodes by becoming a member of our Patreon at Patreon.com/OccultureShockPodcast - Enjoy the show!

Thank you for getting weird with us :)

-Jessica

Hello Seekers!

Step into the world of the unseen as we explore the strange history of dowsing rods in this episode of: Do You KNow Where Your Ghost Hunting Techniques Come From?

From their origins in Germanic medieval mines to their controversial use in modern warfare, this episode uncovers the folklore and the alleged science behind this mysterious practice.

Join me as I ask the question: Is dowsing a functional skill or a testament to the power of human belief?

Thanks for getting weird with us!