Stephen Malkmus

Ever since he heard the Trigger Cut 7" in high school, Emil has been a big fan of Stephen Malkmus' contributions to the American underground. Emil stopped by Stephen's house while visiting Portland a few years ago and had a rare conversation about his younger years and early experiences in Pavement. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ever since he heard the Trigger Cut 7" in high school, Emil has been a big fan of Stephen Malkmus' contributions to the American underground. Emil stopped by Stephen's house while visiting Portland a few years ago and had a rare conversation about his younger years and early experiences in Pavement. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

BONUS EPISODE - "STEPHEN MALKMUS"

 Ron &amp; Emil recently began a ritual of Sunday brunching at the same family restaurant they worked at back in 1992. After a pleasant brunch Ron is granted his customary 'hard cider' and the mics are fired up. Questions were posed by listeners on Patreon and, while Ron is initially shocked that he's gotten fan mail, his storied wisdom comes rolling out just the same. It begins with the unwrapping of some rare 8-track tapes Emil's just added to his collection, which to Ron's astonishment and inevitable arousal, contains the entire Bob Dylan discography. And then when the cider eventually starts hitting, Ron regales the true, unknown story behind his friendship with the, now un-locatable, "Ecstasy Damaged Chef". Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ron &amp; Emil recently began a ritual of Sunday brunching at the same family restaurant they worked at back in 1992. After a pleasant brunch Ron is granted his customary 'hard cider' and the mics are fired up. Questions were posed by listeners on Patreon and, while Ron is initially shocked that he's gotten fan mail, his storied wisdom comes rolling out just the same. It begins with the unwrapping of some rare 8-track tapes Emil's just added to his collection, which to Ron's astonishment and inevitable arousal, contains the entire Bob Dylan discography. And then when the cider eventually starts hitting, Ron regales the true, unknown story behind his friendship with the, now un-locatable, "Ecstasy Damaged Chef". Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

BONUS EPISODE - "RON GETS FAN MAIL!"

"LONER LEGENDS III" is the final episode of Season Five &amp; features::*an overview of Eden Ahbez &amp; the writing of Nature Boy**a difficult dive into the dastardly world of John Phillips**an overview of Alan Hull's work with Lindisfarne and his solo LPs**a section on Basil Kirchin and his pioneering of 'ambient music'*Thanks so much for listening Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

"LONER LEGENDS III" is the final episode of Season Five &amp; features::*an overview of Eden Ahbez &amp; the writing of Nature Boy**a difficult dive into the dastardly world of John Phillips**an overview of Alan Hull's work with Lindisfarne and his solo LPs**a section on Basil Kirchin and his pioneering of 'ambient music'*Thanks so much for listening Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

LONER LEGENDS III

Emil has a mid-life crisis... and records it. This episode is a sequel to "The Outsider", the other purely philosophical episode that anchored Drifter's Sympathy into a hardcore existentialist stance. This cast uses the holy trinity of American Country Music, Taoism and the Twilight Zone to illustrate our fruitless attempt to resolve the perpetually unfinished nature of consciousness itself. In the form of a classic Existentialist thesis, 'Four Walls' puts forward that escapism only erodes what integrity and strength we have... and that the only way forward is straight through the murk &amp; confusion directly. At the very least, you'll never hear the song "Hello Walls" the same again... and at the very best, this cast helps demonstrate why Kurtz's last words in 'Heart of Darkness' are "The horror, The horror."Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emil has a mid-life crisis... and records it. This episode is a sequel to "The Outsider", the other purely philosophical episode that anchored Drifter's Sympathy into a hardcore existentialist stance. This cast uses the holy trinity of American Country Music, Taoism and the Twilight Zone to illustrate our fruitless attempt to resolve the perpetually unfinished nature of consciousness itself. In the form of a classic Existentialist thesis, 'Four Walls' puts forward that escapism only erodes what integrity and strength we have... and that the only way forward is straight through the murk &amp; confusion directly. At the very least, you'll never hear the song "Hello Walls" the same again... and at the very best, this cast helps demonstrate why Kurtz's last words in 'Heart of Darkness' are "The horror, The horror."Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

FOUR WALLS

 The sequel of "THE DAWN OF SELFISH MUSIC" goes a little darker into the consequences of gaining total freedom. On the other side of this new frontier, Dylan finds people breaking into his house to find their leader, Miles Davis tries to shake off imitators chasing his every aesthetic move and a never-ending supply of drugs causes David Crosby's life to fully crash and burn. Gene Clark is the patron saint of this episode, while managing to commit various sins no saint has ever conceived of. If this particular cast ever seems overly negative, its really just an attempt to grapple with the true ugliness that went on behind the making of some of our favorite music. Because treating that music as a product alone doesn't really honor the spiritual confusion that came alongside the "me generation" and selfish music's announcement that anything was now fair game. When does being too selfish cause total destruction...? - All of the characters in this episode flirt with total freedom and some don't make it out.🔥Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The sequel of "THE DAWN OF SELFISH MUSIC" goes a little darker into the consequences of gaining total freedom. On the other side of this new frontier, Dylan finds people breaking into his house to find their leader, Miles Davis tries to shake off imitators chasing his every aesthetic move and a never-ending supply of drugs causes David Crosby's life to fully crash and burn. Gene Clark is the patron saint of this episode, while managing to commit various sins no saint has ever conceived of. If this particular cast ever seems overly negative, its really just an attempt to grapple with the true ugliness that went on behind the making of some of our favorite music. Because treating that music as a product alone doesn't really honor the spiritual confusion that came alongside the "me generation" and selfish music's announcement that anything was now fair game. When does being too selfish cause total destruction...? - All of the characters in this episode flirt with total freedom and some don't make it out.🔥Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

THE DAWN OF SELFISH MUSIC II

Duncan Trussell returns to Drifter's Sympathy for the continuation of "The Lecturer". Emil and Duncan get into the archaeology of their friendship, their early development and how they were molded by completely different forms of trauma to come to a similar internal place. The second half dives into their artistic process and how Taoist methods have helped lead them towards creating their body of work over the years.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Duncan Trussell returns to Drifter's Sympathy for the continuation of "The Lecturer". Emil and Duncan get into the archaeology of their friendship, their early development and how they were molded by completely different forms of trauma to come to a similar internal place. The second half dives into their artistic process and how Taoist methods have helped lead them towards creating their body of work over the years.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

THE LECTURER II

Tracing back to the beginnings of when music on the radio began to slowly fracture and morph in the late 50's, Emil returns to a small fleet of songwriters in the Teen Heartthrob era that began to dream of a coming world of freedom and evolution in the art of songform. Driven by the seizing of a personal power outside of the need to please the crowd, these writers leaked actual emotions into their recordings which set the stage for bands like the Beatles to flex an intellectualism that couldn't have been hypothesized a few years before.This setting is established by the epic meeting of Bobby Vee and Bob Dylan in a record store in Fargo, North Dakota in 1959. Dylan lasts two weeks in Vee's band after greatly misrepresenting his skill set and then Bobby Vee goes on to become an international superstar without him, showing Dylan that the dream is really possible. Then when Dylan makes his return to the market with a fully developed image, he ends up eviscerating Bobby Vee's entire genre and the world would never be the same. This is part one of "the Dawn of Selfishness". Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tracing back to the beginnings of when music on the radio began to slowly fracture and morph in the late 50's, Emil returns to a small fleet of songwriters in the Teen Heartthrob era that began to dream of a coming world of freedom and evolution in the art of songform. Driven by the seizing of a personal power outside of the need to please the crowd, these writers leaked actual emotions into their recordings which set the stage for bands like the Beatles to flex an intellectualism that couldn't have been hypothesized a few years before. This setting is established by the epic meeting of Bobby Vee and Bob Dylan in a record store in Fargo, North Dakota in 1959. Dylan lasts two weeks in Vee's band after greatly misrepresenting his skill set and then Bobby Vee goes on to become an international superstar without him, showing Dylan that the dream is really possible. Then when Dylan makes his return to the market with a fully developed image, he ends up eviscerating Bobby Vee's entire genre and the world would never be the same. This is part one of "the Dawn of Selfishness". Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

THE DAWN OF SELFISH MUSIC

 The new season of Drifter's Sympathy picks back up at the end of the last episode.'I Want to Live a Peaceful Life' was about the sudden malaise that can descend on you at the end of college. Emil moved in with Duncan Trussell in LA and only lasted a summer before he realized that it wasn't the right place to start a music career based on hyper-honesty. This episode approaches the emotional field of getting to Portland in 1999 and experiencing cultural confusion after having spent four years recording up in the mountains of North Carolina. The cast wades in what it feels like to be 22 years old... simultaneously out of your depth, while also having something to offer that no one wants any part of.  There will be a part two of 'Moving to Portland' next season that gets into the beginnings of starting to play music in front of people, but this episode is centered around the sensation of arriving in a foreign land. Its a meditation on the true deflation one feels when they grasp how ridiculous scaling the vertical wall that trying to make art in public can be... and the harsh reality of trying to achieve what you think your heroes did. There are important references in here to the earlier episodes : 'Moving to LA',, 'The Satan Seller' and 'I Want to Live A Peaceful Life'...  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The new season of Drifter's Sympathy picks back up at the end of the last episode.'I Want to Live a Peaceful Life' was about the sudden malaise that can descend on you at the end of college. Emil moved in with Duncan Trussell in LA and only lasted a summer before he realized that it wasn't the right place to start a music career based on hyper-honesty. This episode approaches the emotional field of getting to Portland in 1999 and experiencing cultural confusion after having spent four years recording up in the mountains of North Carolina. The cast wades in what it feels like to be 22 years old... simultaneously out of your depth, while also having something to offer that no one wants any part of.  There will be a part two of 'Moving to Portland' next season that gets into the beginnings of starting to play music in front of people, but this episode is centered around the sensation of arriving in a foreign land. Its a meditation on the true deflation one feels when they grasp how ridiculous scaling the vertical wall that trying to make art in public can be... and the harsh reality of trying to achieve what you think your heroes did. There are important references in here to the earlier episodes : 'Moving to LA',, 'The Satan Seller' and 'I Want to Live A Peaceful Life'...  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

MOVING TO PORTLAND

Season Five of Drifter's Sympathy will be dropping on March 8th! - This is a special mini-episode meant to announce the new Season, but it includes a section of last season's special Q&amp;A episode where Patreon listeners were essentially able to guide their own episode. Emil dives back into the 90's and navigates the difficulties artists face from an extremely personal perspective. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Season Five of Drifter's Sympathy will be dropping on March 8th! - This is a special mini-episode meant to announce the new Season, but it includes a section of last season's special Q&amp;A episode where Patreon listeners were essentially able to guide their own episode. Emil dives back into the 90's and navigates the difficulties artists face from an extremely personal perspective. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

 *Q&A and 5th Season Announcement*

We've reached the Final Hour of this season... for now... Emil went out to his mother's farm and recorded the finale of these 6 episodes in the middle of the night while drinking a significant amount of moonshine. He enters a strange and dazed state of mind, temporarily entering a flashback of the 'religious episode' he experienced in 1998. After several years of being held captive inside an extreme and crippling depression, he had a dream where God came to him and said that it was finally time to experience what actual happiness is. This cast is about the epic struggle to appreciate life itself, and how, if we are lucky enough to achieve any kind of peak experience of what enlightenment is, we have no idea how long that insight will stay before releasing us back into the world as it is generally seen. The cast ends in 1999 with Emil moving up to Portland where his artistic life began all over again. Because of the eerie quiet and meditative quality of this cast, its best listened to while alone, late at night. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We've reached the Final Hour of this season... for now... Emil went out to his mother's farm and recorded the finale of these 6 episodes in the middle of the night while drinking a significant amount of moonshine. He enters a strange and dazed state of mind, temporarily entering a flashback of the 'religious episode' he experienced in 1998. After several years of being held captive inside an extreme and crippling depression, he had a dream where God came to him and said that it was finally time to experience what actual happiness is. This cast is about the epic struggle to appreciate life itself, and how, if we are lucky enough to achieve any kind of peak experience of what enlightenment is, we have no idea how long that insight will stay before releasing us back into the world as it is generally seen. The cast ends in 1999 with Emil moving up to Portland where his artistic life began all over again. Because of the eerie quiet and meditative quality of this cast, its best listened to while alone, late at night. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

I WANT TO LIVE A PEACEFUL LIFE

Emil Amos charts the birth and development of the classic archetype 'The Outsider', telling disturbing and often humiliating stories about growing up in a small town in the 90’s. Every other episode digs into the archaeology of lesser-known music to illuminate the same themes from a more objective, historical perspective.

{ -/e ^ ~ }

As everything Emil does, super f-ing tasteful!

Emil Amos' Drifter's Sympathy

In 1994 Emil was kidnapped briefly while on LSD, taken to a shack out in the woods and greeted by a teen dressed as Michael Jackson who attempted to coerce him into a three-way along with another boy who appeared to be in witness protection. As this podcast unfurls the anthropological setting for such a tale, it's an interesting side note that the film 'Blue Velvet' was set only two hours away from the small town in North Carolina where this occurred. The implicit metaphor is that places like One Eyed Jacks (Twin Peaks) or any various shack out in the woods double as off-track meeting zones for those interested in transformation or a quick Faustian trade. This episode also explores the nature of one's early gurus and the late-night ritualism that comes along with being inducted into the cult of LSD. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 1994 Emil was kidnapped briefly while on LSD, taken to a shack out in the woods and greeted by a teen dressed as Michael Jackson who attempted to coerce him into a three-way along with another boy who appeared to be in witness protection. As this podcast unfurls the anthropological setting for such a tale, it's an interesting side note that the film 'Blue Velvet' was set only two hours away from the small town in North Carolina where this occurred. The implicit metaphor is that places like One Eyed Jacks (Twin Peaks) or any various shack out in the woods double as off-track meeting zones for those interested in transformation or a quick Faustian trade. This episode also explores the nature of one's early gurus and the late-night ritualism that comes along with being inducted into the cult of LSD. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

THE SPOILS OF VANITY

...One of the most important chapters of our tale!📕 The towering myth of Ron's benevolence is put into perspective as his trust with Emil becomes fractured. Emil begins to see Ron as fallible and human just like the rest of us while his second guru begins to grow darker and darker. A new theory is posited... that the pull of the guru is fueled by a tension that comes from risk. And that putting one's trust in them can inevitably go very, very wrong... but the dare to follow them away from safety simultaneously functions as a life-affirming leap of faith. The end of this cast wrestles with the mentality of the second guru and admits that we can't understand someone who does not want to be known in this world where everything is about exhibition. Comparing him to Kafka won't do because Kafka is LEGENDARY. What great artist has successfully avoided being received entirely? Kafka wanted all of his work burned on his death... and he was defied by his best friend Max Brod, who decided to preserve his writings for future generations. This is such a complex 'betrayal'... but being able to look inside the mind of someone who existed without the most basic sustenance has created a small fire that the most alienated of us continually get warm by. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

...One of the most important chapters of our tale!📕 The towering myth of Ron's benevolence is put into perspective as his trust with Emil becomes fractured. Emil begins to see Ron as fallible and human just like the rest of us while his second guru begins to grow darker and darker. A new theory is posited... that the pull of the guru is fueled by a tension that comes from risk. And that putting one's trust in them can inevitably go very, very wrong... but the dare to follow them away from safety simultaneously functions as a life-affirming leap of faith. The end of this cast wrestles with the mentality of the second guru and admits that we can't understand someone who does not want to be known in this world where everything is about exhibition. Comparing him to Kafka won't do because Kafka is LEGENDARY. What great artist has successfully avoided being received entirely? Kafka wanted all of his work burned on his death... and he was defied by his best friend Max Brod, who decided to preserve his writings for future generations. This is such a complex 'betrayal'... but being able to look inside the mind of someone who existed without the most basic sustenance has created a small fire that the most alienated of us continually get warm by. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

WHAT HAPPENS TO A GURU

To bring Season 2 to its thematic close, Duncan guest-hosts with Emil and they try to sum up their thoughts on the light and dark sides of the nature of the Guru.The episode is named after a Universal voice that Duncan dubbed 'The Lecturer'... an entity that might visit you when you've ingested too much and the rudder of your mind leaves you floating directionless. In that moment of vulnerability, the universe may deliver this intrinsic voice to you... and when that fragile moment comes, pray that you'll be visited by a benevolent Lecturer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

To bring Season 2 to its thematic close, Duncan guest-hosts with Emil and they try to sum up their thoughts on the light and dark sides of the nature of the Guru.The episode is named after a Universal voice that Duncan dubbed 'The Lecturer'... an entity that might visit you when you've ingested too much and the rudder of your mind leaves you floating directionless. In that moment of vulnerability, the universe may deliver this intrinsic voice to you... and when that fragile moment comes, pray that you'll be visited by a benevolent Lecturer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

THE LECTURER

Pink Floyd comes to North Carolina in 1994 and Emil accidentally takes 9 hits of acid in the back of a station wagon alongside Ron, the gay deadhead who'd previously inducted him into the cult of LSD. Sadly, this is the final episode of 'the Ron Trilogy' as Emil eventually begins to drift towards a new Guru who shows up in town. In order to rigorously encapsulate the Era of Ron, a few more stories from the summer of 1994 are covered here like walking across the graduation stage in high school on BLUE SUNSHINE, the inevitable self-hate that comes from clearing a 6-foot bong and ruining a stranger's wedding in the middle of a deadly car chase. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Pink Floyd comes to North Carolina in 1994 and Emil accidentally takes 9 hits of acid in the back of a station wagon alongside Ron, the gay deadhead who'd previously inducted him into the cult of LSD. Sadly, this is the final episode of 'the Ron Trilogy' as Emil eventually begins to drift towards a new Guru who shows up in town. In order to rigorously encapsulate the Era of Ron, a few more stories from the summer of 1994 are covered here like walking across the graduation stage in high school on BLUE SUNSHINE, the inevitable self-hate that comes from clearing a 6-foot bong and ruining a stranger's wedding in the middle of a deadly car chase. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

LOW BROW SHAMANISMS IN '94

Episode 13 kicks off the second season of Drifter's Sympathy.💐 Like an archaeologist going over the same prehistoric site twice, we go back to High School in an attempt to return to more optimistic times. That strategy backfires completely as we dive fully into the experience of finding a dead body, the extremely faint footprint we leave on earth and the confusion of watching a peer get destroyed by authoritarian figures right in front of your eyes. This season is dedicated to Don Clarke-Pearson, a lovely kid I went to High School with that the local media and law enforcement put on a plank to walk in front of us. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Episode 13 kicks off the second season of Drifter's Sympathy.💐 Like an archaeologist going over the same prehistoric site twice, we go back to High School in an attempt to return to more optimistic times. That strategy backfires completely as we dive fully into the experience of finding a dead body, the extremely faint footprint we leave on earth and the confusion of watching a peer get destroyed by authoritarian figures right in front of your eyes. This season is dedicated to Don Clarke-Pearson, a lovely kid I went to High School with that the local media and law enforcement put on a plank to walk in front of us. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

HIGH SCHOOL

The tide turns as a new Guru comes to town. This episode sits at the crux of 'Drifter's Sympathy' as it visits the ultimate transformative moment when a young kid is inducted into underground culture and falls in love with the pursuit of making art in the mold of their heroes. "My Best Friend" functions as a deep love letter to growing up in a small town; in this case Chapel Hill, where Emil's life begins to take a spiritual left-turn after seeing Sebadoh open for Fugazi in 1991. Its a time-capsule of the groundfloor era when the 90's began and the underground was still a completely open-ended, boiling pot of potential.In the same spirit of the great mythological figures that left home for adventure on a spiritual mission, we're pulled towards the Faustian trade before our minds can really understand the same pitfalls our heroes fell into. So we naively push forward into those dangers and pull back from them or walk straight into an unknowable transformation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The tide turns as a new Guru comes to town. This episode sits at the crux of 'Drifter's Sympathy' as it visits the ultimate transformative moment when a young kid is inducted into underground culture and falls in love with the pursuit of making art in the mold of their heroes. "My Best Friend" functions as a deep love letter to growing up in a small town; in this case Chapel Hill, where Emil's life begins to take a spiritual left-turn after seeing Sebadoh open for Fugazi in 1991. Its a time-capsule of the groundfloor era when the 90's began and the underground was still a completely open-ended, boiling pot of potential.In the same spirit of the great mythological figures that left home for adventure on a spiritual mission, we're pulled towards the Faustian trade before our minds can really understand the same pitfalls our heroes fell into. So we naively push forward into those dangers and pull back from them or walk straight into an unknowable transformation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

MY BEST FRIEND

In 1998 Duncan Trussell (comedian), David MacLean (writer) and Emil (musician) went to India and Sri Lanka together for 3 months. They lived in Dharamshala for a month with Tibetan Refugees and Buddhist monks and then traveled to Agra, New Delhi and Varanasi together. In Varanasi they took a semi-disastrous trip down the Ganges where Emil ingested too many religious drugs and his body evaporated after being locked inside a very small, hot room after the power had gone out across the city. This OD came on the heels of having experienced an entire year of constant &amp; supreme happiness... an unexpected explosion of serotonin that occurred after a dream where God had come to him and said "Are you ready?". After the overdose shattered that state, Duncan and Emil came back to the US in various states of distress and David decided to go on to Southern India. Four years later, David returned to India as a Fulbright scholar and ended up having a catastrophic reaction to Larium (an anti-Malarial drug), consequently losing the entire memory of his identity. This cast is an explanation of both of these unfortunate events, a conversation between David and Emil about how they met at Warren Wilson College and more. Check out David's book "The Answer to the Riddle is Me" or read more about it in the NY Times here. :: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/18/health/the-answer-to-the-riddle-is-me-a-debut-takes-on-memory-loss.html Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 1998 Duncan Trussell (comedian), David MacLean (writer) and Emil (musician) went to India and Sri Lanka together for 3 months. They lived in Dharamshala for a month with Tibetan Refugees and Buddhist monks and then traveled to Agra, New Delhi and Varanasi together. In Varanasi they took a semi-disastrous trip down the Ganges where Emil ingested too many religious drugs and his body evaporated after being locked inside a very small, hot room after the power had gone out across the city. This OD came on the heels of having experienced an entire year of constant &amp; supreme happiness... an unexpected explosion of serotonin that occurred after a dream where God had come to him and said "Are you ready?". After the overdose shattered that state, Duncan and Emil came back to the US in various states of distress and David decided to go on to Southern India. Four years later, David returned to India as a Fulbright scholar and ended up having a catastrophic reaction to Larium (an anti-Malarial drug), consequently losing the entire memory of his identity. This cast is an explanation of both of these unfortunate events, a conversation between David and Emil about how they met at Warren Wilson College and more. Check out David's book "The Answer to the Riddle is Me" or read more about it in the NY Times here. :: <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/18/health/the-answer-to-the-riddle-is-me-a-debut-takes-on-memory-loss.html" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/18/health/the-answer-to-the-riddle-is-me-a-debut-takes-on-memory-loss.html</a> Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

JOURNEY TO THE EAST

This is the 'season finale' of the first 6 month run of Drifter's Sympathy.We've already covered that there's inevitably a moment in the 'hero's journey' where one doesn't know what they're doing anymore and has lost all sense of safety and direction. This cast is about the stage beyond that where the joke goes too far and one isn't taking death or life seriously. Its a void that a lot of people don't return from. Something needs to eventually peel away the callousness, alleviate the pain and/or cease the addictions that fuel our urge to swim down to the bottom of a very viscous and dangerous swamp where we test fate by living without any of the elements that actually sustain life. A new sensitivity and reason for being need to finally emerge.Until that alleviation, this realm offers a dare symbolized in some mythologies as a kind of Satanic contract... ...to live on the other side of sanity and health for as long as you can while laughing at the imminent destruction that's coming straight at you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the 'season finale' of the first 6 month run of Drifter's Sympathy.We've already covered that there's inevitably a moment in the 'hero's journey' where one doesn't know what they're doing anymore and has lost all sense of safety and direction. This cast is about the stage beyond that where the joke goes too far and one isn't taking death or life seriously. Its a void that a lot of people don't return from. Something needs to eventually peel away the callousness, alleviate the pain and/or cease the addictions that fuel our urge to swim down to the bottom of a very viscous and dangerous swamp where we test fate by living without any of the elements that actually sustain life. A new sensitivity and reason for being need to finally emerge.Until that alleviation, this realm offers a dare symbolized in some mythologies as a kind of Satanic contract... ...to live on the other side of sanity and health for as long as you can while laughing at the imminent destruction that's coming straight at you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

CENTER OF THE CYCLONE

Fantasies eventually have to turn to sour to reveal the true way forward. Transgression, Adventurism and pushing the boundaries of one's own psychology are a central piece of the hero's journey. So this episode dives deep into the gutter where one becomes unsure if they belong there or will make it back to tell a decent story. In the beginning, we experiment on the way towards knowledge and then the lust for adventure can consume us.The cast is named after the great Fugs song "I Want to Know" and preaches the exploratory gospel of those like Baudelaire, Burroughs and Buddha who wanted to use themselves like a Petri dish to achieve the higher benefits of alchemy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Fantasies eventually have to turn to sour to reveal the true way forward. Transgression, Adventurism and pushing the boundaries of one's own psychology are a central piece of the hero's journey. So this episode dives deep into the gutter where one becomes unsure if they belong there or will make it back to tell a decent story. In the beginning, we experiment on the way towards knowledge and then the lust for adventure can consume us.The cast is named after the great Fugs song "I Want to Know" and preaches the exploratory gospel of those like Baudelaire, Burroughs and Buddha who wanted to use themselves like a Petri dish to achieve the higher benefits of alchemy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

I WANT TO KNOW

Episode 4 dives into the history of lesser known American record production and songwriting, uncovers various Neil Young imitators and features a mini-section on the significance and extreme depression of Del Shannon. Under the same spell of classic American records, Holy Sons has just announced a new collaborative record with legendary producer John Agnello (Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr. Kurt Vile). "In the Garden" sets Emil's songwriting into the atmosphere of the kind of early 70's records you'd pull out while slamming whiskeys by the fireplace late into the night (out Oct. 21st on Partisan Records). So, while getting wasted and going deep in the search for a classicism that truly satisfies, Drifter's Sympathy dusts off lost curiosities left by some of the original 'American Trailblazers'. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Episode 4 dives into the history of lesser known American record production and songwriting, uncovers various Neil Young imitators and features a mini-section on the significance and extreme depression of Del Shannon. Under the same spell of classic American records, Holy Sons has just announced a new collaborative record with legendary producer John Agnello (Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr. Kurt Vile). "In the Garden" sets Emil's songwriting into the atmosphere of the kind of early 70's records you'd pull out while slamming whiskeys by the fireplace late into the night (out Oct. 21st on Partisan Records). So, while getting wasted and going deep in the search for a classicism that truly satisfies, Drifter's Sympathy dusts off lost curiosities left by some of the original 'American Trailblazers'. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

*AMERICAN TRAILBLAZERS*

This cast is about the absolute peak of recklessness... when you spin the wheel just to see where everything lands. It picks up the thread left off in "Center of the Cyclone", the darkest chapter of Drifter's Sympathy, where Emil had a classical guitar broken over his head and 17 staples put in to rectify the situation. In this episode he accidentally gets into college and then travels up to Boston to live with his guru one last time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This cast is about the absolute peak of recklessness... when you spin the wheel just to see where everything lands. It picks up the thread left off in "Center of the Cyclone", the darkest chapter of Drifter's Sympathy, where Emil had a classical guitar broken over his head and 17 staples put in to rectify the situation. In this episode he accidentally gets into college and then travels up to Boston to live with his guru one last time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

BACK TO BOSTON

Duncan Trussell &amp; Emil Amos have been sitting on an archive of prank calls they did in college &amp; talking about releasing them for 2 DECADES now. Some of Emil's favorites have been cleaned up for this exclusive episode of Drifter's Sympathy.✨🌺✨ It serves as a frozen photograph of a strange moment up in the mountains of North Carolina in the 90's, the bizarre personalities of that region and Duncan's spur-of-the-moment Genius that leads people's minds into places they didn't originally want to go. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Duncan Trussell &amp; Emil Amos have been sitting on an archive of prank calls they did in college &amp; talking about releasing them for 2 DECADES now. Some of Emil's favorites have been cleaned up for this exclusive episode of Drifter's Sympathy.✨🌺✨ It serves as a frozen photograph of a strange moment up in the mountains of North Carolina in the 90's, the bizarre personalities of that region and Duncan's spur-of-the-moment Genius that leads people's minds into places they didn't originally want to go. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

INSIDIOUS MIND CONTROL

Episode 29 tells the genesis tale behind the song 'Saccharine Trust' that was named after the classic SST band of the '80s. The first half of the cast meditates on the unstable period of life the song is about and then segues into a lesson on meeting your heroes when Emil ends up face to face with his early underground idol, J Mascis from Dinosaur Jr. The second half of the cast drifts into the minefield of trying to discern why the modern era seems less distinct and vital and mourns the loss of a central underground community. While the end devolves into solipsistic philosophical attempts to find a positive thread somewhere within our cultural wreckage while wrestling with an increasingly plastic world. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Episode 29 tells the genesis tale behind the song 'Saccharine Trust' that was named after the classic SST band of the '80s. The first half of the cast meditates on the unstable period of life the song is about and then segues into a lesson on meeting your heroes when Emil ends up face to face with his early underground idol, J Mascis from Dinosaur Jr. The second half of the cast drifts into the minefield of trying to discern why the modern era seems less distinct and vital and mourns the loss of a central underground community. While the end devolves into solipsistic philosophical attempts to find a positive thread somewhere within our cultural wreckage while wrestling with an increasingly plastic world. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

SACCHARINE TRUST

This cast is about the slow attempt we make to repair ourselves while staring into the heart of absurdity. Its about the family of people who've inadvertently helped each other through death and re-birth... the writers, thinkers and artists who have recorded their attempt to appreciate life throughout history. Taking its name from Colin Wilson's book 'The Outsider', the cast eventually devolves into metaphor and a drunken tribute to Emil and Duncan's Taoist teacher who died a few weeks ago. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This cast is about the slow attempt we make to repair ourselves while staring into the heart of absurdity. Its about the family of people who've inadvertently helped each other through death and re-birth... the writers, thinkers and artists who have recorded their attempt to appreciate life throughout history. Taking its name from Colin Wilson's book 'The Outsider', the cast eventually devolves into metaphor and a drunken tribute to Emil and Duncan's Taoist teacher who died a few weeks ago. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

THE OUTSIDER

'Dawn of Individuation' launches Season 3 of Drifter's Sympathy by grappling with the etymology of nostalgia as an 'acute form of homesickness'. Its a mellow opening that digs into the initial chance you get to invent yourself at age 13, the mating rituals of junior high school and the vanity that drives one to flip a penny into a water fountain and pray to god earnestly for popularity and affirmation. Turning more serious at the end, we address the moment you become truly molded as a teenager and the initial set of decisions one makes that will damn them towards their future self forever. Hearing Dinosaur Jr.'s first record begins to change Emil’s mind completely by confronting him with the idea that art 'might actually be about what your really going through, rather than what you want people to think'. This is the moment we perceive the power of art as it radicalizes the child mind that was previously being trained to manipulate their appearance for other's affirmation. By the end, Dawn of Individuation becomes a love letter to the power and beauty of what skateboarding and underground music can present to a kid by positing the idea of total independence to their mind. Like the previous seasons of Drifter's Sympathy, the first episodes roll back the clock to early life and then crawl up closer to current times, winding thru the stories of Emil's 3 guru's and the various upsets that were alchemically turned into pieces of the puzzle of his huge body of artwork over the last few decades. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

'Dawn of Individuation' launches Season 3 of Drifter's Sympathy by grappling with the etymology of nostalgia as an 'acute form of homesickness'. Its a mellow opening that digs into the initial chance you get to invent yourself at age 13, the mating rituals of junior high school and the vanity that drives one to flip a penny into a water fountain and pray to god earnestly for popularity and affirmation. Turning more serious at the end, we address the moment you become truly molded as a teenager and the initial set of decisions one makes that will damn them towards their future self forever. Hearing Dinosaur Jr.'s first record begins to change Emil’s mind completely by confronting him with the idea that art 'might actually be about what your really going through, rather than what you want people to think'. This is the moment we perceive the power of art as it radicalizes the child mind that was previously being trained to manipulate their appearance for other's affirmation. By the end, Dawn of Individuation becomes a love letter to the power and beauty of what skateboarding and underground music can present to a kid by positing the idea of total independence to their mind. Like the previous seasons of Drifter's Sympathy, the first episodes roll back the clock to early life and then crawl up closer to current times, winding thru the stories of Emil's 3 guru's and the various upsets that were alchemically turned into pieces of the puzzle of his huge body of artwork over the last few decades. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

DAWN OF INDIVIDUATION

✨🐍✨Episode 35... this is the finale of Season 3✨🐍✨In 1998, Emil has been living deep in an alternate universe with the other campus leper 'Crazy Jeff' up in the mountains of North Carolina. Jeff is almost a decade older than all the other students at school and he's been ordered to go to prison on the weekends after getting one too many DUI's. Eventually spring break arrives and Duncan has become fixated on going up to Boston to see the Guru. Duncan and Emil hitch a ride to find the Guru knowing that they might be asking for trouble. When they finally meet, Duncan randomly hands the Guru a book on the Satanic Underworld which skews the entire light of their visit. While the boys are running around Boston during the day, the Guru reads the book at work trying to discern the true intention of their visit. At the end of the trip Emil and the Guru venture out into the woods on acid and the devil comes home to roost.🔥 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

✨🐍✨Episode 35... this is the finale of Season 3✨🐍✨In 1998, Emil has been living deep in an alternate universe with the other campus leper 'Crazy Jeff' up in the mountains of North Carolina. Jeff is almost a decade older than all the other students at school and he's been ordered to go to prison on the weekends after getting one too many DUI's. Eventually spring break arrives and Duncan has become fixated on going up to Boston to see the Guru. Duncan and Emil hitch a ride to find the Guru knowing that they might be asking for trouble. When they finally meet, Duncan randomly hands the Guru a book on the Satanic Underworld which skews the entire light of their visit. While the boys are running around Boston during the day, the Guru reads the book at work trying to discern the true intention of their visit. At the end of the trip Emil and the Guru venture out into the woods on acid and the devil comes home to roost.🔥 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

THE SATAN SELLER

LONER LEGENDS brings the second season of Drifter's Sympathy to a close with special spotlights on Pete Hamm, Roger Rodier, Moondog and the great Skip Spence, who might've unknowingly kicked off this entire genre. Spence's story is used as a jumping off point as he embodied the classic tragedy of someone who was impossibly talented, taken off the path towards happiness by schizophrenia and addiction. A pure source of loner wisdom &amp; confusion, Spence embodied the true spirit of 'private music' on his record "Oar", transmitting his idiosyncratic frequency from his own planet alone. Drifter's Sympathy will be forced to take a 2 month break to prepare for Season 3 and allow Emil the time to mix records again!... &gt;&gt; we'll be posting some updates on the Drifter's Sympathy Facebook page soon.✨🔦✨ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

LONER LEGENDS brings the second season of Drifter's Sympathy to a close with special spotlights on Pete Hamm, Roger Rodier, Moondog and the great Skip Spence, who might've unknowingly kicked off this entire genre. Spence's story is used as a jumping off point as he embodied the classic tragedy of someone who was impossibly talented, taken off the path towards happiness by schizophrenia and addiction. A pure source of loner wisdom &amp; confusion, Spence embodied the true spirit of 'private music' on his record "Oar", transmitting his idiosyncratic frequency from his own planet alone. Drifter's Sympathy will be forced to take a 2 month break to prepare for Season 3 and allow Emil the time to mix records again!... &gt;&gt; we'll be posting some updates on the Drifter's Sympathy Facebook page soon.✨🔦✨ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

*LONER LEGENDS*

Emil heads back down to the initial crossroads where we naively wander across the dividing lines of various sub-cultures and get sucked under their psychological tide. He sees a somewhat unfortunate Grateful Dead show with Ron at around age 15 which bores and frightens him in turn... and that experience begins a strange fascination with the dark side of the hippie movement. 'Plastic Flower People' has become a depository for speculation on the 60's and the rise of modern bohemia. This episode features a fascinating moment where Roger McGuinn talks with Hugh Hefner about the fact that long hair and hippie attitudes are ALREADY played out in 1968. Revealing a puritanical distrust that started to mount as the underground first began to be bought up and sold back to itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Emil heads back down to the initial crossroads where we naively wander across the dividing lines of various sub-cultures and get sucked under their psychological tide. He sees a somewhat unfortunate Grateful Dead show with Ron at around age 15 which bores and frightens him in turn... and that experience begins a strange fascination with the dark side of the hippie movement. 'Plastic Flower People' has become a depository for speculation on the 60's and the rise of modern bohemia. This episode features a fascinating moment where Roger McGuinn talks with Hugh Hefner about the fact that long hair and hippie attitudes are ALREADY played out in 1968. Revealing a puritanical distrust that started to mount as the underground first began to be bought up and sold back to itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

*PLASTIC FLOWER PEOPLE II*

This is the story of how the first song on the first Holy Sons record was channeled during a precarious bender and super-faded viewing of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom in 1997. This bender eventually leads to a semi-disastrous conclusion at a party that Emil has some trouble owning up to. The second half of the cast gets into the initial elation we feel when canonizing our early heroes... and then the complex horizon that opens up when we meet the spectre of depression for the first time. Emil meets Gator Rogowski right before he shocks the skateboarding world by committing the most notorious crime in its history (documented in the excellent film "Stoked"). And then Emil experiences the death of his love for the act of skating as depression takes over and music offers the only way out. This cast is soundtracked by the great Chapel Hill band POLVO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the story of how the first song on the first Holy Sons record was channeled during a precarious bender and super-faded viewing of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom in 1997. This bender eventually leads to a semi-disastrous conclusion at a party that Emil has some trouble owning up to. The second half of the cast gets into the initial elation we feel when canonizing our early heroes... and then the complex horizon that opens up when we meet the spectre of depression for the first time. Emil meets Gator Rogowski right before he shocks the skateboarding world by committing the most notorious crime in its history (documented in the excellent film "Stoked"). And then Emil experiences the death of his love for the act of skating as depression takes over and music offers the only way out. This cast is soundtracked by the great Chapel Hill band POLVO. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

TO ABRAXAS WITH HEADACHES

 EPISODE 30 ✨🔦✨ In this episode Emil travels back down to Chapel Hill to try and re-assess the landscape that gave birth to his musical outlook in the early nineties. He uses the flashpoint of Chapel Hill's underground music explosion to argue that its the people living in a town that truly define the psychological geography of a place before they disappear and that place's identity transforms. This will probably be the only Drifter's Sympathy cast that focuses on the atmosphere surrounding a 'modern band'. Polvo's era opens up a perfect gateway into the study of a fleeting uniqueness that explodes in unwatched environments before the sudden death of a culture's heyday and the rebuilding period that inevitably follows. In Episode 27 ('To Abraxas with Headaches') Emil dubbed Polvo as the band that quintessentially personifies the charm and underdog position of a local band for him. So we dive into the influence these older kids wielded and study a boiling kettle in its most unique moment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

EPISODE 30 ✨🔦✨ In this episode Emil travels back down to Chapel Hill to try and re-assess the landscape that gave birth to his musical outlook in the early nineties. He uses the flashpoint of Chapel Hill's underground music explosion to argue that its the people living in a town that truly define the psychological geography of a place before they disappear and that place's identity transforms. This will probably be the only Drifter's Sympathy cast that focuses on the atmosphere surrounding a 'modern band'. Polvo's era opens up a perfect gateway into the study of a fleeting uniqueness that explodes in unwatched environments before the sudden death of a culture's heyday and the rebuilding period that inevitably follows. In Episode 27 ('To Abraxas with Headaches') Emil dubbed Polvo as the band that quintessentially personifies the charm and underdog position of a local band for him. So we dive into the influence these older kids wielded and study a boiling kettle in its most unique moment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://megaphone.fm/adchoices" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">megaphone.fm/adchoices</a>

*THE CASE FOR POLVO*

The Best Multi-Part Documentaries, with documentaries on Obama, Federer vs Nadal, the making of Star Wars, Netflix vs Blockbuster and more. Add episodes you're interested into your queue below!

Best Multi-Part Documentaries

The best episodes for anyone looking to learn more about topics such as happiness, fulfillment, depression and psychology/mental health in general. With interviews with industry experts, personal stories of individuals, this topic has lessons applicable to everyone. Add episodes you're interested into your queue below!