Sharing Needles with Friends

In this episode, we really do our best to just manically jump from topic to topic, (*surprise, surprise!) ranging from things like Salt Lamps, Video Production, and a bit of Nostalgia; namely the newly released Playstation 4 remasters of Tony Hawk Pro Skater 1 and 2.

We go on to get a bit deeper talking about what causes stress, anxiety, and depression and tricks to help train your mind to push them away.

We then move on to self-help books and methodologies in general and touch on cults such as Heaven's Gate and NXIVM with its new documentary on HBO. This somehow ends up flowing ever so naturally into a story about a long lost band from Gene's youth and his search to find another copy only to find a very sad ending.

And as always we end up talking a lot about Religions and Beliefs, which brings us to a discussion on the fascinating origins of Scientology and it's origins with "Dianetics" as we know it, as well as the highly prolific and vast bibliography of L. Ron Hubbard who could quite literally write an entire sci-fi novel IN ONE DAY. WHO CAN DO THAT!?

In this LENGTHY episode, we are joined once again by our good friend Colin for a discussion on Video Games, Politics, Cancel Culture, and more.

We enter our discussion after a recording mishap where we lost the first 30 minutes of our conversation. It’s actually kinda funny, Derek’s dog somehow unplugged our mixer by getting tangled in the cord.

We jumped right back in and continued the conversation about video games after the power down, namely Mortal Kombat, and the moment in a parent’s life when their 12-year-old can beat them at a game you’ve been playing your entire life.

We talked about the recent situation with the Cincinnati Reds sportscaster Tom Breneman and him being caught on a “hot mic” using highly insensitive slurs and then making an on-air apology. During the apology, he almost sadly and comically breaks from his apology to continue commenting on the live game without skipping a beat and then back to the apology.

We discuss our current state on Cancel Culture and ask the question... should people be canceled immediately without fair analysis at any given time? There seems to be a broad range of OBVIOUS cases where it’s so apparent while at the same time, certain situations may be rushed without all facts involved.

We chat about celebrities that become famous basically for either unexplainable reasons unseen or by self-releasing what is said to the public is a “leaked” sex tape when in fact, there is an entire underground market for these things.

We talked a lot of politics ranging from the recent Qanon conspiracy theory, Donald Trump, and evening the much darker side of secret societies such as the infamous Bohemian Grove.

In between all other topics, we also discuss a lot of religious topics from the universal God, to shady preachers and mega-churches and even Kanye West's recent turn to gospel music and is it authentic, or is it for the money? It’s a long one... get ready and get heady!

In this episode, we are joined by our long-time friend and bandmate Henry for a discussion on everything from Aliens, Aliens BEING GOD, the universe as a whole, Religion and Spirituality, Coronavirus, and the current pandemic and quarantine times and how weird that is.

We somehow end up on the topics of Donald Trump, Joe Biden choosing Kamala Harris as his VP, the removal of confederate monuments, the current civil discourse, talking to family members with differing opinions on politics, and how to not kill one another, defunding the police, and a LOT of other political ramblings.

And no conversation between the three of us ever happens without discussing music. We spoke on spanning genres including artists such as Dishwalla, Tonic, Primitive Radio Gods, Oasis, Radiohead, Coldplay, Travis, and loads more.

This conversation actually took place BEFORE the beginning of our latest Episode 4 - Unbiased and Social Media, while we were getting set up, and letting it all set IN.

We chat a little bit about how different Indica and Sativa strains of marijuana cause such dramatically different highs, pro sports, and athletes that play professionally in more that one sport such as when Michael Jordan played "pro baseball" after his basketball career.

We also ask the "hard questions," such as, is golf a GAME or a SPORT... or BOTH, Derek's new psychedelic tattoo, white sand and where you can find it, the weird psychology behind podcasting in a traditional sense, behind a computer and desk with full-on headphones vs. sitting out on a back porch, no headphones, and trying to feel more conversational.

Blake has the most brilliant business idea gets hatched for "Same Vision," with the goal of giving you the same vision when you leave as when you come in. Yeah, again, this is kinda ridiculous talk, but maybe it's at least amusing... then our buddy Colin shows up.

In this episode, we had a few friends swing by the back porch to hang out and join in on the conversation. We talked a bunch about skateboarding, snowboarding, aging gracefully, the current state of mainstream music,"where, if anywhere can we find unbiased media, social media and it's complications within politics, psychadelics, smoking weed and the stories that come with it, and so much more!

In this post-show chat, we somehow found ourselves linking the covid-19 pandemic and the ways that viruses spread and evolve over time, what if we took a step back and looked through the microscope and we, as human beings, were in fact just a virus at a cellular level living off of another being. Yeah, it got deeper.

The SIMULATION will not be televised.

In this episode, we start with a chat about one of our collective favorite television series, “Hannibal” with Mads Mikkelson and how he played the undisputed (to us) Hannibal Lecter, Which somehow lead to us touching on the disappearance and murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

We then take a deeper dive into the large scale thoughts of excessive use in the world of not only CCTV but also new government facial recognition that can scan photos and use algorithms to pinpoint and find people in a crowded photo and match each and every person throughout all social media and the internet.

This leads to a much larger and more mind-bending discussion on how Hollywood and the “industry” may be using television shows and films to normalize certain things in our daily lives by psychic leading and planting ideas early to condition us.

As both of us have struggled with depression and anxiety in our lives, and both suffered from massive anxiety/panic attacks, we begin linking the feeling of being “in the moment” and being “fully present” during the feeling of panic or attack to the feelings of things like deep meditation, hyping jerks when almost asleep while mid awake / dream, paranoia during a marijuana high or psilocybin, DMT, or LSD psychedelic trip, and pulling together the similarities between the two as that could have pretty massive benefits if you could learn to harness it and live in the moment at all times.

We get even deeper on the “Simulation Hypothesis” which is the idea that our physical reality is far from being a solid physical universe and is part of an increasingly sophisticated video game-like simulation where we all have multiple lives consisting of pixels with its own internal clock run by some giant Artificial Intelligence.

Simulation Theory explains some of the biggest mysteries of quantum and relativistic physics, such as quantum indeterminacy, parallel universes, and the integral nature of the speed of light.

This leads to more on the ideas of the multiverse theory, parallel lives we are living and when they glitch or converge as well as a little touch on quantum physics.

In episode number two of Further Down the Rabbit Hole, we come right out of the gates with a light-hearted discussion on Nihilism and the fantastic philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. We discuss nihilistic skepticism, morality, philosophy, and spirituality in regards to our never-ending search for finding better and more whole versions of ourselves.

We talk a bit about both being raised as Christians and the impact growing up within the church had on our spiritual developments we have both made through years while searching and studying various religions from Islam, Buddhism, Satanism, and any organized religion that exists in the world.

We discuss the current administration in regards to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, namely Donald Trump and his recent WH comments on how people should believe him over Dr. Fauci and science.

We touch heavily on wearing a mask in public as a simple sign of respect as well as its ability to help stop the spread, even if only a little, as it has unfortunately become a very divisive political statement to wear or not to wear. Our takeaway is... WEAR A MASK. We also get into the President’s push to get kids back in school with all of the social distancing guidelines in place and how abstract and dangerous that thought actually is.

We venture down the thoughts of exorcisms in the Catholic Church, are they a real thing as we see them in films, or are they something entirely different?

We take a memory stroll down the red light district in Amsterdam and discuss our thoughts on their cultural differences from the legalization of marijuana, psychedelics, and yes, obviously, prostitution.

This brings us full circle back to a conversation on America and its views on drugs within our culture and we ask the big question of WHY marijuana, or “The Devil’s Lettuce,” if you will, is not legalized nationwide when it could give not only a massive boost to the economy via the tax money collected alone, but more so how it could literally help millions of people across the country with pain management, anxiety, depression, and many other disorders it’s been scientifically proven to help.

Why is our country so divided and split down the middle solely off of the political party you choose to affiliate with instead of coming together using common sense and compassion.

Let’s go further down the rabbit hole...

In this episode, we just kinda take a deep-dive right into the entire reason we started this new podcast "Further Down The Rabbit Hole" after putting our last show "Sharing Needles with Friends" on hiatus the past few years. We decided that it was therapeutic for us to record these candid conversations, and we felt compelled to start something new with a larger spectrum of topics and areas of discussion.

In this episode we talk a whole lot about "metal" band Threatin and how he scammed his way onto a fake European tour "Break The World," after building a fake fanbase of likes and comments on Facebook, to bolster his non-existent reputation. We talked in depth about how all of this played out and how his band discovered mid-tour it was a scam and they were played, his music videos and fake concert footage, and go in depth on his website of hilarity.  We also briefly discussed the new show on Shudder we are super excited about called DeadWax, as well as the current SyFy series called Channel Zero bassed off of internet creepypastas. We also took listener questions about our favorite hip-hop albums of the year including Vince Staples, Action Bronson, Denzel Curry, and more, best biopics such as Joy Division / Ian Curtis' Control, Johnny Cah's Walk The Line, Morrissey's England Is Mine, the early 2000's metalcore resurgence, and more!