Doug Candano is the author of the new book of surreal short fiction "Infinite Lives, Infinite Deaths" (Penguin Random House SEA).

His literary writing has won several national level awards, including the Philippines Free Press Literary Award and the Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Award for Literature.

He has also written for film and theater and has a side career as one of the country’s top competitive eaters. He works as a freelance research consultant for dev't programs.

Follow Doug on his author page: https://www.penguin.sg/book_author/douglas-candano/

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*Contains samples from Surrogate Prey's "Cottonmouth." Used with permission.

Chris Linaban (director) and Ara Chawdhury (producer) are the creators of the 2016 Bisaya stoner movie SUPERPSYCHOCEBU.

With a cult following growing over the years (screenings during 4/20), in 2024 they now have screenings in the US and Philippines.

The filmmaking and real life partners look back on how they made the movie and what it means to them now.

superpsychocebumovie.com/

www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7N9aQEupCE

* Contains samples from Surrogate Prey, used with permission.

Extreme slow metal at its tastiest. Hailed as genre-defying and a tour-de-force, BASALT SHRINE's debut LP is burning up the Pinoy sludge swamp like someone freed a quartet of gleeful arsonists. 

The Filipino doom/post-metal super group is composed of Bobby Legaspi (Surrogate Prey, Malicious Birth), Rallye Ibanez (Ex-Religious Nightmare, Surrogate Prey) and Ronaldo and Ronnel Vivo (Dagtum, The Insektlife Cycle, Abanglupa, Imperial Airwaves, Ex-Hateure). 

On this interview we go through each of the tracks on their excellent album "FROM FIERY TONGUES", their thoughts on extreme music, and how they found a hack for performing their previously studio-only songs live.

Buy the physical releases on the ff platforms.

Electric Spark (Netherlands) / Vinyl

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Contains samples from Surrogate Prey, used with permission. This podcast is powered by Anchor. 

Australian phenom Rhiannan Iffland is one of the most dominant female Olympic divers in the world and the undisputed Queen of Cliff-Diving. 

A five-time consecutive Red Bull Cliff-Diving Series World Champion, she still credits one of her biggest wins to the time she came back from a devastating MCL injury in 2017, claiming the championship title despite a six-week rehab layoff. How did she bounce back so fast? Visualization and mental training were crucial to her recovery. 

This is a field recording from 2019, when Red Bull held an event off Palawan Island, in southwestern Philippines.        

Read my feature story on Rhiannan: https://aomnl.com/sports/Cliff-diving-red-bull-rhiannan-iffland 

Music provided by Surrogate Prey, used with permission. This podcast is powered by Anchor. 

RONALDO VIVO Jr. may be a well known musician and visual artist in Filipino metal and extreme music, being in bands like sludge supergroup Basalt Shrine and Abanglupa, but he is also an indie publisher, director, and popular writer of transgressive crime literature. On this episode, we talked about his recent release that's since become a cult hit "Ang Bangin sa Ilalim ng Ating mga Paa" (The Abyss Beneath Our Feet) and his first book "Ang Kapangyarihan Higit sa Ating Lahat" (The Power Above Us All), both available on independent presses.

CONTAINS sound samples from "Cottonmouth" by Surrogate Prey. Used with permission.

DDP is powered and distributed by Anchor.fm.

MANIC MUNDANE is the musical moniker of solo artist Kath Dizon. 

A young, bedroom producer based in Mindanao, she crafts a particularly robust strain of electronic music out of deceptively simple riffs, spiced up by sci-fi synths imbued with a triphop vibe, garnished with 80s post-punk. 

“Narrative Three,” is Manic Mundane’s debut EP under the Cebu-based record label Melt Records. It’s Dizon’s big coming out as a solo artist as well as a return to her roots, literally being back in her hometown of Koronadal City in South Cotabato. 

A college rocker who used to front a hardcore punk band in Iligan city, she has since made the jump to crafting moody hymns about the imagined ecstasies of psychic travel and exorcising religious demons.

On this episode of the Dead Drop Podcast, I talked to Dizon in late 2021 as she was putting the finishing touches to her album. Check out her music, now available on Bandcamp, and listen to it on any of the major streaming platforms. 

Excerpt from "Astral Bodies" used with permission, all rights to Melt Records.

CONTAINS sound samples from "Cottonmouth" by Surrogate Prey. Used with permission.

MIKHAIL RED is a Filipino director best known for Birdshot and Dead Kids -- the first Netflix original film from the Philippines. As the eldest son of acclaimed director Raymond Red, Mikhail has been immersed in cinema from an early age, studying under Marilou Diaz-Abaya when he was 15, and then making independent films in 20s. 

His career has since grown by leaps and bounds, and he's now managed by the influential talent management company Creative Artists Agency. While he is still finishing the third season of HBO's folklore series Halfworlds, I caught up with the young director earlier this year to take a look back on his work, talk about how he handled the challenge of shooting during COVID-19, and about his upcoming movie Arisaka. 

Arisaka stars Maja Salvador as a police officer who must retrace the path of the Bataan Death March to escape her pursuers. The title is a reference to the standard bolt-action rifle used by the Japanese invasion forces during WW 2. As this episode of the Dead Drop airs, Arisaka is set to make its world premiere at the Tokyo Intl Film Festival in November 2021. While we're waiting for its public release, listen to this.

CONTAINS sound samples from "Cottonmouth" by Surrogate Prey. Used with permission. DDP is powered and distributed by Anchor.fm.

JAY IGNACIO has worn many creative hats. He is the director of the 2012 FMA documentary "The Bladed Hand" as well as being a practitioner of kali. He is also a stand-up comedian and a guitarist for the novelty rock band Sa Pulis. 

Recently, he added graphic novel author to his accomplishments when he released ALANDAL, a swashbuckling tale of conquistadors and pirates set in 1700s Sulu, illustrated by the iconic DC and Marvel artist Alex Niño. 

On this episode of the Dead Drop, we talked about the challenges of writing a historical graphic novel, his fascination with the roots of Filipino Martial Arts, and how he collaborated with Alex Niño who is based in the US.

CONTAINS sound samples from "Cottonmouth" by Surrogate Prey. Used with permission. DDP is powered and distributed by Anchor.fm.