Dangerous Minds

As part of the backer rewards on the Magick Show Kickstarter page, we’re offering a special limited edition of this poster designed by our very talented artist and musician friend, Dima Drjuchin. Dima’s instantly recognizable style will be, er, recognized instantly by those familiar with his classic cover for Father John Misty’s Fear Fun album—I’m proud to say that I am the one who introduced Josh Tillman to Dima’s work—and his work for Tool.Dima is a Russian-American whose street art and stickers remind me of Keith Haring if he’d spent a lot of his younger life in Moscow.He’s also responsible (along with comedian Greg Barris) for the “Fuck you, I’m Batman” and “Tom Selleck saved my baby” stickers that were seen festooned all over the area surrounding the Occupy Wall Street event and the incredible portraits of Robert Anton Wilson that a lot of people use as their avatars on social media.When he sent me this poster design, my reaction was one of “OH HELL YES,” but wait until you see what this looks like animated for the opening title sequence!Support Magick Show on Kickstarter! ...

Newly added to the backer rewards on the Magic Show Kickstarter is a place in Arden Leigh’s Re-Patterning Project class. Arden is a practicing chaos magican and musician living in Los Angeles who Grant Morrison has described as his “magical heir.”I asked Arden a few questions over email.What is the Re-Patterning Project course and what should someone expect to get out of it?The Re-Patterning Project is an 8-week course container that provides a comprehensive view of the way our human operating system forms the beliefs, mindsets, and patterns that inform our responses, habits, choices, worldviews, and ideas of what is possible. It is a multi-disciplinary approach to unearthing our core bugs and re-installing our behavioral patterns and frameworks, culled together with information and practices from cutting-edge trauma and addiction research, neuroscience, attachment theory, neuro-linguistic programming, Timeline Therapy… and a little bit of magick. It’s being handed the keys to deep self-awareness and integration of our past timeline so that we can fully meet our present and evolve to generate our ideal future. Graduates of the program report an overwhelming, often eyeball-melting slide into the life of their dreams about six to twelve months after...

I’ve always been ever so slightly jealous of people who get invited to do AMAs on Reddit. It’s not exactly like being parodied on SNL, still it’s a signifier that whatever you are up to seems to be perceived as relevant. And who doesn’t want to be relevant, especially halfway through a Kickstarter for a documentary project? Count me in! I will go anyplace or do anything to push the Magick Show Kickstarter campaign over the finish line, even if that means going into the den of lions that is a Reddit AMA.Just kidding, I’m grateful that the r/Occult moderators invited me to discuss Magick Show and I’m sure it will be a mostly welcoming crowd. I’m equally sure that at least a few fuckwits will show up, but, for me at least, that’s part of the fun. It wouldn’t be a Reddit AMA without the requisite assholes, now would it? I want the full experience, especially if this is my only shot at it.So join me on the r/Occult subreddit on Monday, July 29th at 6pm EST and ASK ME ANYTHING. In this...

I hesitate to say that Pleasant Gehman is one of those people who is famous in Los Angeles, because I think that many people know who she is all over the world and I don’t want anyone to think she’s an Angeleyne-type, either. Long before I moved from New York to Los Angeles in 1991, I already knew who Pleasant was because of her connection to the first wave of LA punk rock, and especially because I was then, and still am, a massive Gun Club fan and she had a long friendship with Jeffrey Lee Pierce. But suppose you live in LA, and are even the slightest bit hip or occultish. In that case, you are probably very aware of Pleasant Gehman’s long history in the city and her Belle, Book and Candle witch-themed burlesque shows, which have become a monthly meeting place for LA’s most magical people.Aside from being an author, actress, screenwriter, singer, internally-renowned dancer and certified punk rock living legend, Pleasant is also a lifelong witch, clairvoyant and tarot card reader. In fact, before she even saw it in herself, her grade school classmates were calling her “Witchiepoo” after the memorable...

Amanda Yates Garcia is a professional witch based in LA. She—very cleverly, in my opinion—markets herself as the “Oracle of Los Angeles” taking a cue from Pythia, the Delphic oracle who was said to deliver prophecies from Apollo. She’s also the author of really great book, Initiated: Memoir of a Witch. I don’t think Initiated has gotten the attention it deserves in the occult community. It’s very deftly structured to explain to the reader how life events—both good and bad—can be seen in retrospect as necessary occurrences for an occult practitioner to gain a deeper understanding of what they’re pursuing. Of course it’s true to say that everyone is forged by their life experiences, but it’s vastly different process when one is as self-aware of such emotional and intellectual growth as a witch would be. It’s a great book—her prose is superb—and the reader comes away with a nuanced understanding of what a magical initiation is. I can’t recommend it highly enough. It’s an important book.When I was putting together the list of who I wanted to interview on camera for Magick Show,...

A couple of weeks ago the moderators of Reddit’s r/Occult forum invited me to do an AMA (“ask me anything”) session to help get the word out about my new project Magick Show, which I was only too happy to accept.Not gonna lie, it was a lot of fun. I anticipated that there would be at least a few characters asking questions like “DO YOU LIKE FOOD?” “IS MILK A TOY?” and things of that nature. We’ve all seen an AMA that’s gone south quickly, but unless the mods were lightning-fast at deleting those sorts of questions, everyone on r/Occult was as nice as nice can be. (I’ve always found the occult community, as a whole to be very friendly. Friendlier than most in-groups tend to be because everyone has something somewhat rarer in common in occult circles than they would anywhere else. That’s my theory.)So without further ado, I direct you to my Reddit AMA on r/Occult.PLEASE SUPPORT MAGICK SHOW ON KICKSTARTER!TIME IS RUNNING OUT!

The other day I taped an interview for the Dark Art Society podcast hosted by painter Chet Zar. Mr. Zar is a charming and well-informed host and asked the right questions to get some good responses out of me. Big fun.This week I interview publisher, author and underground culture and occult legend Richard Metzger. We discuss his Kickstarter project Magick Show as well as magick and some impossible synchronicities we’ve both had. It’s a shorter episode but a really good one!Watch other episodes of the Dark Art Society podcast on Chet Zar’s YouTube channel. Mitch Horowitz has been a frequent guest.Support Magick Show on Kickstarter! Time is running out!

From left to right, Richard Metzger; ‘Magick Show’ executive producer Douglas Rushkoff; Obeah woman and co-host of ‘The Afroanimist Podcast,’ Jay Percy; Bri Luna the Hoodwitch; Maja D’Aoust, the Witch of the Dawn; psychic revolutionary Grant Morrison and occult historian/TV host Mitch Horowitz.Behold the original Magick Show artwork created by the great Sean Pryor!Not gonna lie, I absolutely love this! The “Super Friends” vibe nicely matches my own aspirations for Magick Show. To my mind this project is a sort of “Bat Signal” beaming out into the world hoping to reach the next generation of magician warriors and pass the torch to them. This tracks with that, obviously! The eagle-eyed among you might recognize the hand pads as an homage to Paul Laffoley’s famous “Thanaton III” painting. The woman inside the torch refers to Marjorie Cameron’s 1966 painting, “Holy Guardian Angel according to Aleister Crowley.” Both of these details are interesting as 1.) I don’t think Sean knows that I am the owner of the “Thanton III” painting and have been since 1998 and 2) if you have been listening to any of the podcasts I’ve been doing in support of the Magick Show Kickstarter you’...

For the next few days I will be flinging more podcasts at the reader than anyone could possibly be expected to listen to, but if you are listening then this is a particularly good one. I recently was on This Podcast is a Ritual hosted by real-life wizard Devin Person and not only was it a lot of fun to speak with him, he drew some good stuff—some deep cuts if you will—outta me.Sez Devin:The other day, I decided to do some self-hypnosis, which despite working full-time as a hypnotist, I still find a bit challenging (it really is a different animal). As I explored the inner landscape of my psyche, I encountered a powerful force within that wanted to deliver a crystal clear message: “Focus on the podcast.” It had no tone of blame or shame or critique of the current state, but was just encouraging me to recognize that applying more magical energy to the show right now would be very rewarding in ways it could not reveal.The next day, I got an email out of the blue from Richard Metzger, founder of Disinfo, and the editor of the Book of Lies...

If you’ve been considering backing the Magick Show project on Kickstarter, you’ve got just 24 hours to go (depending on the time you are reading this of course.)It’s been a fun and super-rewarding process. Old friends—many who I haven’t spoken to in years in some cases—have stepped up to support me, and this has been very sweet and gratifying. And I’ve had the occasion to make many wonderful new friends as well.On the other hand, holy fucking shit has this process been exhausting, both mentally and physically. This has been one hell of a sprint from the end of May—when Thomas Negovan first asked me “Why don’t you try to raise finishing funds on Kickstarter?” which had never even occurred to me—to today. I have been in full-on octopus mode for nearly four months, juggling phone calls, podcasts, email interviews, writing blog posts, social media, and just generally trying to get this thing over the finish line through sheer bloody-mindedness. I can’t recall the last time when I was just… so absolutely bone tired, but it’s probably been decades. I have every intention of staring blankly...