Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. Listener mail.
Speaker 2: My name is Robert.
Speaker 3: Lamb and I am Joe McCormick, and it is Monday,
Speaker 3: the day of each week that we read back messages
Speaker 3: from the Stuff to Blow Your Mind email address. If
Speaker 3: you have never gotten in touch before, why not write us.
Speaker 3: You can reach us at contact at stuff to Blow
Speaker 3: your Mind dot com. Whatever you want to send is fine,
Speaker 3: but we especially like when you have something interesting to
Speaker 3: add to a topic we've talked about on the show recently.
Speaker 3: Let's see, Rob, do you mind if I kick things
Speaker 3: off with this message from Joe about necromancy?
Speaker 2: Oh? Please do? This is a good one.
Speaker 3: This is from Joe spelled Jo. They're right, dear Joe
Speaker 3: and Robert. I loved the series on necromancy and communing
Speaker 3: with the dead. I'm Southeast Asian and supernatural slash spooky
Speaker 3: stories are the norm here. One of my favorite monsters
Speaker 3: is actually the Jongshi. They've been depicted as bloodthirsty, mayhem
Speaker 3: causing monsters over the years, but the legend behind them
Speaker 3: is quite sad. Imagine leaving your family to work in
Speaker 3: a far off province, only to perish in an unknown land.
Speaker 3: Your last wish is to be buried back home, but
Speaker 3: hiring people to carry your dead body back to your
Speaker 3: loved ones is expensive and difficult. Your only other option
Speaker 3: is to have a Taoist priest briefly resurrect you from
Speaker 3: the dead and guide you as you make your way
Speaker 3: home for the last time. Now an inauspicious creature, your
Speaker 3: limbs frozen in rigor mortis, you hop slowly through the
Speaker 3: wilderness in the dead of night. Your only company is
Speaker 3: the priest who walks before you, ringing his bell to
Speaker 3: warn the living that the dead are near. While your
Speaker 3: series was on how the Living Attempted to Contact the dead,
Speaker 3: Southeast Asia is rife with stories of the dead contacting
Speaker 3: the living. It's common for Chinese people to ask each
Speaker 3: other if they've dreamed of a deceased family member during
Speaker 3: or after the funeral proceedings. A friend once told me
Speaker 3: that the day after her grandfather passed, he appeared to
Speaker 3: her in a dream, and she asked him if he
Speaker 3: was all right. He replied, don't worry, I will soon
Speaker 3: have company. Your uncle is coming, and two days later,
Speaker 3: her uncle passed from a heart attack. A common story
Speaker 3: you'll hear from cab or rideshare drivers. Here is passengers
Speaker 3: asking to be dropped off at quote home, only to
Speaker 3: have the GPS lead them to a cemetery. All this
Speaker 3: makes me think of is that perhaps we're all lonely
Speaker 3: souls reaching through the divide in search of a connection
Speaker 3: we couldn't find in life or in death. On a
Speaker 3: lighter note, and this is connecting to our series on
Speaker 3: Monster Cats, Joe writes in the latest episode, Hello Kitty
Speaker 3: was listed as an example of a cat. You might
Speaker 3: not believe this, but Sonrio insists that Hello Kitty is
Speaker 3: not cat and is in fact a little girl cry
Speaker 3: laughing emoji. I guess Sonrio is the company that owns
Speaker 3: Hello Kitty.
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, Originally Hello Kitty was like a mascot and
Speaker 2: then of course takes on a life of its own.
Speaker 3: Joe says, yes, I couldn't believe it at first too.
Speaker 3: She is supposedly, or she is supposed to be a
Speaker 3: little girl called Kitty White who was born in London.
Speaker 3: I will leave you with this snippet from an interview quote.
Speaker 3: It is a one hundred percent personified character. A Sonrio
Speaker 3: spokesman told AFP in Tokyo, the design takes the motif
Speaker 3: of a cat, but there is no element of a
Speaker 3: cat in Hello Kitty setting. Joe adds in parentheses, I'm
Speaker 3: still mind blown. I love what you do. Looking forward
Speaker 3: to more episodes, Live Long and prosper Joe.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well this was a great one, I guess, starting
Speaker 2: with Hello Kitty. Goodness. I can't remember if I'd ever
Speaker 2: heard this before. If I had heard it before, I
Speaker 2: had forgotten it, And now I am shocked again or
Speaker 2: for the first time, to hear that Hello Kitty is
Speaker 2: not a cat, because clearly Hello Kitty is a cat, right.
Speaker 3: Hello Kitty is obviously a cat. Hello Kitty has cat
Speaker 3: ears and also whiskers, I think, Am I wrong?
Speaker 2: Yeah? And then there are other animals. Is like a frog, right,
Speaker 2: I mean, as the frog a frog or not a frog.
Speaker 3: Maybe the frog's a frog, but the cat is not
Speaker 3: a cat?
Speaker 2: All right? Well, it's shocking. I can't lose too much
Speaker 2: sleep over this one, but it is shocking.
Speaker 3: This reminds me. I'm sorry to bring this up yet again,
Speaker 3: but of the AI generated story we had, which was
Speaker 3: one of those story generators we were playing with spit
Speaker 3: it out, and it was called Garfield Beyond Thunderdome. It
Speaker 3: had the fighters in the Thunderdome trading insults with each other,
Speaker 3: and whoever Garfield was about to square off against, said,
Speaker 3: so you're the famous cat and Garfield replied, I'm not
Speaker 3: the cat.
Speaker 2: Now. As for these other topics here, greatly appreciate these
Speaker 2: contemporary accounts of the ride share situation with people returning
Speaker 2: home the cemetery. That's that's wonderful. And then also, yeah,
Speaker 2: the jung shi are are such fascinating creatures slash motifs
Speaker 2: in in Chinese folklore and and and legend. We've we've
Speaker 2: talked about on a few times on the show. They
Speaker 2: came up in our Weird House Cinema episode on Mister Vampire,
Speaker 2: and I think there was a Monster Fact episode a
Speaker 2: while back about them. But yeah, they're they're they're horrifying
Speaker 2: and scary. But yeah, there is this sadness to them
Speaker 2: because they are deeply connected to concerns and cultural anxiety
Speaker 2: over improper burial, uh, you know, in improper caring for
Speaker 2: ones deceased loved ones.
Speaker 3: That really seems to be a theme this October that
Speaker 3: came up a lot in the In the Necromancy episode,
Speaker 3: uh anxieties over funeral rites not being properly observed and
Speaker 3: what would be downstream of that failure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, This next one comes to us from Scott.
Speaker 2: Scott writes and says, Hi, Robert and Joe just wanted
Speaker 2: to mention that your recent series on necromancy doubtless reminded
Speaker 2: many of us who grew up in the seventies of
Speaker 2: our introduction to this art, the classic but often campy,
Speaker 2: Saturday morning children's television series The Land of the Lost,
Speaker 2: in which Enoch often used the Library of Skulls to
Speaker 2: access the lost knowledge of his ancestors. My memories of
Speaker 2: this are probably not very reliable, so I leave it
Speaker 2: to you to say more about this pop culture invocation
Speaker 2: of necromancy, except to note that, despite the frequent goofiness,
Speaker 2: this show did deal with death and loss a little
Speaker 2: more than some others of his genre did, e g.
Speaker 2: Enoch's loss of his culture and friends after he found
Speaker 2: himself stuck in a later time when his people, the Altrusians,
Speaker 2: had degenerated into the barbaric slee Stack. Okay, I do
Speaker 2: know what the slee Stack are.
Speaker 3: Scott I wish I could comment on this because it
Speaker 3: sounds interesting, but I've never watched Land of the Loss,
Speaker 3: so I'm just baffled.
Speaker 2: I remember, I think I was watching cartoons during a
Speaker 2: time in which this show was still on. But it
Speaker 2: was on like in a weird time, like maybe it
Speaker 2: was on kind of late in the Saturday morning when
Speaker 2: you were there were increasing household forces to get you
Speaker 2: outside or to go and do other activities. I'm not sure,
Speaker 2: but I am vaguely aware of the Slee Stack.
Speaker 3: So the premise of the show is like a family
Speaker 3: is on vacation and in their VW bus they get
Speaker 3: transported back to the time of the dinosaurs. But it's
Speaker 3: not just dinosaurs. There are also lizard men.
Speaker 2: I think, so yes, okay, but again I've never watched it.
Speaker 2: I probably should.
Speaker 3: Slee Stack sounds like the name of I don't know,
Speaker 3: like the the villain of the Lora Axe or something
Speaker 3: it does. Okay, moving on to some messages more focused
Speaker 3: on monster cats. This one comes from Anna. Anna says, Hi, Robert, Joe,
Speaker 3: and JJ I enjoyed your episodes on the Strange Cats
Speaker 3: of Japan. In part of it, you were talking about
Speaker 3: how there is the idea that cats have some secret,
Speaker 3: mysterious power. I thought you might enjoy the book The
Speaker 3: Silent Meow by Paul Gallico. This is written as an
Speaker 3: instruction manual for cats on how to control and dominate humans.
Speaker 3: It's very funny and really taps into stuff that every
Speaker 3: cat owner has noticed. I really like this idea for
Speaker 3: a book. So it's kind of like the screwtape letter
Speaker 3: is except from Instead of being from the point of
Speaker 3: view of demons, it's from the point of view of cats. Yeah,
Speaker 3: Anna says. I think part of the mysterious nature of
Speaker 3: cats is that they often seem to change their behavior
Speaker 3: when they realize they're being watched. My mom has a
Speaker 3: cat called Sammy Whiskers. She is now one year old.
Speaker 3: She is the size of an adult cat, but still
Speaker 3: has this frantic, clumsy running style. I like to call
Speaker 3: this galumphing. When mom and dad are away, I stay
Speaker 3: at their house and ta care of the cat. One
Speaker 3: of her funny habits is that she will run at
Speaker 3: me from behind and attack my legs or feet. The
Speaker 3: funny part is that her clumsy running style means you
Speaker 3: can very easily hear her coming. The other day I
Speaker 3: heard her running up behind me, so I turned around
Speaker 3: and she immediately stopped running. I just laughed out loud
Speaker 3: at this because it had this nothing to see here
Speaker 3: kind of quality to it. I think I know what
Speaker 3: you're talking about. Anna and Rob. You've sort of talked
Speaker 3: about this with your cat experiences, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, though, my cat Mochi well, is not shy about
Speaker 2: attacking my feed, so me looking at her doesn't prevent
Speaker 2: it from happening. And if anything, maybe eggs are on.
Speaker 3: That's that defiance. It's just like complete non compliance with
Speaker 3: social expectations. Okay, but and it goes on. I also
Speaker 3: enjoyed your weird house cinema. On Bride of Frankenstein. You
Speaker 3: were talking about a scene where Lord Byron says something
Speaker 3: kind of demeaning to Mary Shelley and she just snarks
Speaker 3: right back. This reminds me you have a scene in
Speaker 3: the book Jane Eyre. Mister Rochester, who eventually becomes Jane's
Speaker 3: love interest, is somewhat based on the characteristics of Byron. Yeah,
Speaker 3: Rochester is often held up as the so called quote
Speaker 3: byronic hero or byronic I don't know what the noun is.
Speaker 3: He's just byronic, you know. That's the adjective there is.
Speaker 3: Anna continues. There is a scene where they're sitting by
Speaker 3: a fire with the housekeeper in the corner. Mister Rochester
Speaker 3: says something like, oh, I think you must come from
Speaker 3: the fairy folk. As you've mentioned in past episodes, fairies
Speaker 3: were not the benevolent creatures we see them as today.
Speaker 3: This is a real vibe of the boss making a
Speaker 3: somewhat demeaning joke about an employee in front of other people,
Speaker 3: the sort of situation that you're supposed to just meekly
Speaker 3: go along with, go along with the joke. But Jane
Speaker 3: is taking none of it. She replies very casually with
Speaker 3: something like, oh no, those folks have not lived around
Speaker 3: here for one hundred years. The housekeeper is so shocked
Speaker 3: by Jane's boldness that she literally drops are knitting. Jane
Speaker 3: Air is one of those books that if you try
Speaker 3: to describe it to someone, it sounds pretty depressing, but
Speaker 3: is also a very witty book. Thanks for all the
Speaker 3: great work, Anna and I agree on that last point.
Speaker 3: It's been years since I read Jane Eyre, but yeah,
Speaker 3: my impression is despite its you know, dark and gothic overtones,
Speaker 3: I recall it also having very funny elements as well.
Speaker 2: All Right, this nice one comes to us from Chuck.
Speaker 2: Chuck writes in and says, Dear Robert, Joe and JJ,
Speaker 2: hello and happy early Halloween. Like many of your listeners,
Speaker 2: I truly appreciate your commitment to providing thoughtful intelligence and
Speaker 2: to be honest somewhat creepy discussion topics during October, I
Speaker 2: am writing to add a small but silly bit about
Speaker 2: the Baca Niko. The popular board game Betrayal at House
Speaker 2: on the Hill, made by Avalon Hill and now in
Speaker 2: its third edition, has the beck and Echo is one
Speaker 2: of the supernatural slash horror tropes the players must struggle
Speaker 2: against if you are unaware. Betrayal at House on the
Speaker 2: Hill generally shortened to Betrayal by board gamers, is a
Speaker 2: game that plays like a weird house cinema horrifflick. The
Speaker 2: game has players cooperatively searching a for boding mansion until
Speaker 2: a triggered event happens, where the monster goes to alien
Speaker 2: supernatural entity whatever is revealed and proceeds to attempt to
Speaker 2: destroy the players. The trigger is caused semi randomly, and
Speaker 2: there are fifty different in game events, so players are
Speaker 2: never quite sure what is going to happen. The usual
Speaker 2: horror movie batties are there, poltergeist, were wolves, acts, wielding killers,
Speaker 2: alien abductors, but the game does include more off the
Speaker 2: wall scenarios, like having a mad scientist who shrinks the
Speaker 2: players down and sends his pet cat against them. Ah
Speaker 2: doctor X. Yeah. The next part has mild spoilers for
Speaker 2: those who have not played this scenario. In one particular case,
Speaker 2: a back in eco and his army of undead cats
Speaker 2: are the big bat. The Okai's goal is either kill
Speaker 2: all the players or burn the house down. The players
Speaker 2: have to defeat the Bakuanenko before this happens, but every
Speaker 2: undead cat the bachan Eko summons strengthens it. In our
Speaker 2: gaming group, when we revealed the bacan Eko, after we
Speaker 2: collectively said what is the bacan Eko, we were quickly
Speaker 2: overwhelmed and died terribly in a burning house. That being said,
Speaker 2: it was great fun, especially with the player controlling the
Speaker 2: Bakaneko using an absurd amount of terrible cat puns. Of course,
Speaker 2: the title of the scenario is the Catastrophe. I'm including
Speaker 2: two photos of the rules for the scenario, which does
Speaker 2: have a drawing on one with the game's depiction of
Speaker 2: the Bakaneko in spoilers now with stuff to blow your mind,
Speaker 2: I've learned much more history and lore about the bacan Eko.
Speaker 2: Thanks again for all you do and keeping science and
Speaker 2: strangeness at the forefront. Sincerely and gratefully, Chuck from San Diego.
Speaker 3: I have never played this game. This looks like a
Speaker 3: lot of fun. So the scenario has sort of stats
Speaker 3: on the months, almost like like a D and D monster,
Speaker 3: except it looks not quite as complicated as that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Betrayal is a wonderful game. I've played it a
Speaker 2: few times. It's not one I own, so I wasn't
Speaker 2: even aware that this was one of the the baddies
Speaker 2: you could trigger, because it's just never come up in
Speaker 2: any play of the game that I've been involved in.
Speaker 2: But yeah, it's a super fun game. The exact form
Speaker 2: of the gameplay is very variable because basically everybody goes
Speaker 2: in as a particular you know, trope character in this
Speaker 2: haunted house, and then something triggers these cards going out
Speaker 2: to determine what the battye is, and one of the
Speaker 2: players will end up being instrumental to that battye. So
Speaker 2: I'm just making this up. Is this may or may
Speaker 2: not be what's in the game, but for instance, at
Speaker 2: this phase you might learn, oh, actually you're a familiar
Speaker 2: to a vampire and you're working on behalf of that vampire,
Speaker 2: that sort of thing, and so now it's you against
Speaker 2: the players, and so yeah, it's a load of fun.
Speaker 2: Hopefully it's gotten better. But as I remember from playing
Speaker 2: it several years back, one one thing I was warned
Speaker 2: about is that the instructions, at least at the time,
Speaker 2: were written in a kind of confusing manner, and so
Speaker 2: it was better if someone who had played the game
Speaker 2: before was present to sort of guide you through it,
Speaker 2: because some of the details might not be evident just
Speaker 2: by reading the instruction manuals that are included in the box.
Speaker 2: But that was several years ago. They may have changed
Speaker 2: that with more recent editions.
Speaker 3: Man, I think you have more tabletop and board game
Speaker 3: experience than me, but that's almost always my experience is
Speaker 3: like trying to read the instructions is just overwhelming and confusing.
Speaker 3: The way to learn to play is to have somebody
Speaker 3: there who's already played and explains it as you go along.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's definitely preferable, and more and more I'm
Speaker 2: finding it's also great if there's at least a short
Speaker 2: video you can find me. There's so many videos that
Speaker 2: run you through gameplay on some of the more complex
Speaker 2: board games. I have found those very helpful from time
Speaker 2: to time. Like let's see, what is the Dune game.
Speaker 2: Dune Imperium, I believe is the one, which is a
Speaker 2: fabulous game, very playable, Like its complexity is not too
Speaker 2: high in my experience, Like you can definitely and I
Speaker 2: think the average board gamer can definitely grasp it and
Speaker 2: have a lot of fun with it. But at least
Speaker 2: for me, it's like I could read the rules and
Speaker 2: it got me so far, but then I really needed
Speaker 2: to see someone like point at some stuff and show
Speaker 2: me some stuff to really make all the lines connect. There.
Speaker 2: Short version of all that, it's a great time to
Speaker 2: be into board games because there's just so many of
Speaker 2: them and you have so many additional aids to understanding
Speaker 2: the rules.
Speaker 3: Uh huh, okay, you want to keep rolling the dice
Speaker 3: on cats?
Speaker 2: Sure?
Speaker 3: All right? This next message is from Joe, a different
Speaker 3: Joe Joe. This time he says greetings. Although the urge
Speaker 3: is strong, I will resist the impulse to just tell
Speaker 3: you about my cats. Instead, I will share someone else
Speaker 3: telling about their cat three hundred years ago. And so
Speaker 3: here Joe shares part of the poem jubilate agno, which
Speaker 3: means rejoice in the lamb, specifically a famous fragment of
Speaker 3: this poem known as for I will consider my Cat Jeffrey,
Speaker 3: written in the mid eighteenth century by the English poet
Speaker 3: Christopher Smart. I read this back in college, and this
Speaker 3: one really stuck in my mind as well. I'm not
Speaker 3: quite sure why, just I've never forgotten it. I think
Speaker 3: of it often. I think the story goes that it
Speaker 3: was written while Christopher Smart was housed in a mental asylum.
Speaker 3: He had been institutionalized for a time at a London
Speaker 3: facility that was then called Saint Luke's Hospital for Lunatics,
Speaker 3: and the cat Jeffrey was his only company there. Coming
Speaker 3: back to Joe's email, he says, it is a beautiful
Speaker 3: poem which also captures much of the ineffable spirit of
Speaker 3: catness to which cat lovers are drawn. I would leave
Speaker 3: it to you to pick an excerpt if you choose
Speaker 3: to read this on the show, But a few of
Speaker 3: my favorite lines, Joe, I will indeed read your excerpt first.
Speaker 3: So these are lines from Christopher Smarts. For I will
Speaker 3: consider my cat Jeffrey. For when his day's work is done,
Speaker 3: his business more properly begins. For he keeps the lord's
Speaker 3: watch in the night against the adversary. For he counteracts
Speaker 3: the powers of darkness by his electrical skin and glaring eyes.
Speaker 3: For he counteracts the devil who is death, by brisking
Speaker 3: about the life. For he is a mixture of gravity
Speaker 3: and waggery. For he knows that God is his savior.
Speaker 3: For there is nothing sweeter than his peace when at rest.
Speaker 3: For there is nothing brisker than his life when in motion.
Speaker 3: For he can sit up with gravity, which is patience
Speaker 3: upon approbation. For he can fetch and carry, which is
Speaker 3: patience and employment. For he can jump over a stick,
Speaker 3: which is patience upon proof positive. For he can spraggle
Speaker 3: upon waggle at the word of command. For he can
Speaker 3: jump from an imminence into his master's bosom. For he
Speaker 3: can catch the cork and toss it again. For he
Speaker 3: is hated by the hypocrite and the miser, for the
Speaker 3: former is afraid of detection, for the latter refuses the charge.
Speaker 3: And then, to share my own favorite lines from this fragment,
Speaker 3: here Smart writes, for he is of the Lord's poor,
Speaker 3: and so indeed he is called by benevolence perpetually, Poor Jeffrey,
Speaker 3: Poor Jeffrey. The rat has bit thy throat, for I
Speaker 3: bless the name of the Lord Jesus, that Jeffrey is better,
Speaker 3: for the divine spirit comes about his body to sustain it.
Speaker 3: In Complete cat, Complete cat.
Speaker 2: Oh, this is great. Some of the various catneme makers
Speaker 2: should look this poem up and run wild with it.
Speaker 2: I mean, can't you imagine like reading it and then
Speaker 2: setting it to various clips of cats doing their thing?
Speaker 3: Yes, complete cat, absolute cat.
Speaker 2: And now I don't know that my cat knows that
Speaker 2: God is her savior, though I'm not sure what her
Speaker 2: theological bent happens to be.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there is a lot of theology ascribed to the
Speaker 3: mind of the cat in this poem. I don't know.
Speaker 3: I don't know about that. But then again, she does
Speaker 3: spraggle upon waggle, though, for he can jump from an
Speaker 3: eminence into his master's bosom. What is the eminence? I
Speaker 3: don't know. I guess that just means like a high
Speaker 3: place in the room like we were talking about.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, it could be, could be watch out bosom though. Yeah,
Speaker 2: they will definitely jump into the bosom.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that is complete cat into the bosom. All right, Rob,
Speaker 3: you want to pick one of these Weird House cinema
Speaker 3: messages to respond to?
Speaker 2: Oh man, we got some good ones here Ooh hm hmmm,
Speaker 2: select as you will, all right. Oh well, that one's
Speaker 2: good too. I guess I'll start with this one comes
Speaker 2: to us from Andrew. Hi, guys, I just had to
Speaker 2: send a quick email to say that in your recent
Speaker 2: episode of Weird House covering Terror Vision, you briefly mentioned
Speaker 2: a film that would make for another great Weird House
Speaker 2: episode One day. In the connection section, you noted that
Speaker 2: one of the characters had previously appeared in Rock and
Speaker 2: Roll High School, the nineteen seventy nine musical comedy featuring
Speaker 2: the Ramones. Surely at least Joe has seen this wonderful
Speaker 2: piece of weird terrible gold. I don't know a ton
Speaker 2: about how er why this movie came about, but there
Speaker 2: are some good stories out there, like about d d
Speaker 2: Ramones acting being so bad that they had to cut
Speaker 2: his lines down from five to three, two of which
Speaker 2: are along the lines of, hey, pizza, it's great. I
Speaker 2: think you guys could have a great time with it,
Speaker 2: and I know for a fact that I'd have a
Speaker 2: great time with it. So tass it on the list. PS.
Speaker 2: Still waiting for that Langaliers send up, Love you guys, Andrew.
Speaker 3: I feel like we've talked enough about Langaliers in unrelated
Speaker 3: episod so so that can we even do do an
Speaker 3: episode on it now?
Speaker 2: Probably? Probably it's I think, as I mentioned before, I
Speaker 2: weirdly weirdly enough. I don't think I've seen it. I've
Speaker 2: only read it, but I have seen clips from it
Speaker 2: and they look stupendous.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's just peak made for TV Stephen King.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, with some strong Twilight Zone elements to it.
Speaker 3: Uh and some I think this has come up before,
Speaker 3: but yeah, the the like CGI thing is flying around
Speaker 3: eating time. They just look like meatballs in the sky.
Speaker 3: But to address the main subject here, Andrew, you know,
Speaker 3: I rock and roll high school. I don't know whether
Speaker 3: I've seen that or not. If I have, I remember
Speaker 3: nothing about it.
Speaker 2: It certainly exists, and yeah, perhaps it's got some great
Speaker 2: people in it. Oh, Clint Howard is in it as well,
Speaker 2: is Dick Miller.
Speaker 3: Clint Howard and Dick Miller. That's uh, that seals the deal.
Speaker 3: Which one of them is playing a janitor and which
Speaker 3: one is playing a grumpy store clerk.
Speaker 2: Well, it looks like Dick Miller plays the police chief,
Speaker 2: so he's out of the running for that. Clint Howard
Speaker 2: plays a character named Eagle Bauer, so I'm not sure
Speaker 2: where that ends up.
Speaker 3: Okay, since we're on the subject of Terror Vision, let's
Speaker 3: see we were going to do a ps from a
Speaker 3: message from Brian Love to come back and do the
Speaker 3: rest of Brian's message another time, but because it's about
Speaker 3: Terror Vision, Brian says in PostScript to another email, I'm
Speaker 3: listening to your episode on Terror Vision and yes, WASP
Speaker 3: was a parenthesis. Is most definitely a very real band.
Speaker 3: This came up because Uncle Rico in Terror Vision is
Speaker 3: wearing a T shirt that has a band on it
Speaker 3: called WASP as an acronym WASP, and we did not
Speaker 3: know if that was real or not, or if he
Speaker 3: was made up for the movie.
Speaker 2: His character is od, you know, a good Irish boy.
Speaker 3: Who is the character to discover that the hunger Beast
Speaker 3: from outer Space is into metal. Yeah, anyway, Brian has
Speaker 3: the info for us. Brian says, uh, Wasp, they are
Speaker 3: the progenitors of what my friends and I call quote
Speaker 3: crude dude rock heavy metal. Buy dirt bags for dirt
Speaker 3: bags and those who love them. Wasp's main claim to
Speaker 3: fame was that Columbia dropped the presumed lead single from
Speaker 3: their debut album before it even hit stores in nineteen
Speaker 3: eighty four. The studio recording of the egregiously titled Animal
Speaker 3: Parentheses f Like a Beast wasn't officially available in the
Speaker 3: United States until over a decade later, which gave them
Speaker 3: the air of danger that all crude dudes desire. I'm
Speaker 3: a big fan of their absurdity and think they might
Speaker 3: have made a bigger splash if they hadn't been quite
Speaker 3: so unattractive. They really leaned into it in the eighties.
Speaker 3: That was a non starter for hair metal, so they
Speaker 3: never really broke big. Still. A vinyl box set of
Speaker 3: their first five albums was just announced and I'm anxiously
Speaker 3: awaiting my copy. Wow, thanks for the pleasant memories.
Speaker 2: I'm looking at this vinyl box set right now, and yeah,
Speaker 2: that's a lot of WASP. That is a definite proof
Speaker 2: of their existence right there.
Speaker 3: Well, I admit this gap in my knowledge. I am
Speaker 3: a metal boy that knows absolutely nothing of WASP.
Speaker 2: Oh and then here's a picture of them. Yep, yep.
Speaker 2: They've got that hair metal crew dude vibe going.
Speaker 3: On here, and they're all holding knives.
Speaker 2: Yeah, knives, Michelle. Oh, one has a hand grenade teeth
Speaker 2: on the pin. There you go. All right, Well, thanks
Speaker 2: Brian for that, and we'll come back and discuss your
Speaker 2: your main thoughts in a future listener mail episode. All right,
Speaker 2: we're gonna go ahead and close the mail bag on this one.
Speaker 2: We'll be back later. We have our listener Mail episodes
Speaker 2: that occur on Mondays and the Stuff to Blow Your
Speaker 2: Mind podcast feed with core episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays,
Speaker 2: Monster Factor Artifact on Wednesdays, and on Fridays. We set
Speaker 2: aside most serious concerns to just talk about a weird
Speaker 2: film on Weird House Cinema. Just a minder. Hey, if
Speaker 2: you happen to use any of the social media platforms
Speaker 2: out there, you can look us up there, you can
Speaker 2: follow us. If you use Instagram, go do SDBYM podcast
Speaker 2: and follow us there. You know, if you're already using it,
Speaker 2: it's a one way you can keep up with the
Speaker 2: types of topics that we're covering. You know, be some
Speaker 2: some fun photos on there to promote some of the
Speaker 2: episodes and so forth.
Speaker 3: Huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer JJ Posway.
Speaker 3: If you would like to get in touch with us
Speaker 3: with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest
Speaker 3: a topic for the future, or just to say hello,
Speaker 3: you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow
Speaker 3: your Mind dot com.
Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For
Speaker 1: more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.