Some Other Sphere

Episode 53 - Laura Tempest Zakroff - Magic, Witchcraft, Sigils and Symbols

My guest for this episode is artist, author, dancer and Witch Laura Tempest Zakroff. Laura’s artwork which includes drawings, paintings, jewellery and talismans embodies myth and the esoteric and has received honors and awards worldwide.
She is also the author of the best-selling books Sigil Witchery: A Witches guide to crafting magic symbols and Weave the Liminal: Living Modern Traditional Witchcraft as well as the creator of The Liminal Spirits Oracle.
In the interview we talk about how Laura became interested in Witchcraft and the magical practices she followed and developed alongside and as part of her artistic work, which led to her starting her own tradition with a group of like minded individuals.
We also discuss some of the more fundamental concepts of what magic is and how it works, the role of symbols and sigils in that, and how paranormal phenomena can be viewed through a magical lens.
To find out more about Laura and her work please visit her website https://lauratempestzakroff.com/.
You can now also support Some Other Sphere via Ko-fi. To buy the podcast a coffee go to https://ko-fi.com/someotherspherepodcast. Thank you!
 
The Some Other Sphere theme music is from Purple Planet Music - 'Hubbub' by Geoff Harvey/Chris Martyn.
 

Episode 52 - Tanner F. Boyle - The Fortean Influence on Science Fiction

My guest for this episode is author Tanner F. Boyle, who joined me to talk about his book The Fortean Influence on Science Fiction.
Charles Fort is an enigmatic character – part researcher, part writer, part philosopher. In the early twentieth century he extensively catalogued any reference he could find made to anomalous phenomena, which he would later go on to write about in a series of books, the most famous of which is The Book of the Damned. His writing includes ideas that would go on to be extensively explored in both science fiction and paranormal research – things such as Cryptids, UFOs, poltergeists, strange disappearances, ancient mysteries and unusual natural occurrences.
Tanner’s book examines the work and ideas of Charles Fort, their influence on science fiction, and the writers and editors who included and popularised them in their work, as well as the challenges faced by doing that.   
Charles Fort is a hero of mine here at Sphere HQ – without him, the podcast might not exist, so it was great to be able to record an episode about him.
Tanner can be found on Twitter (@TannerFBoyle1) and you can get a hold of his book from McFarland Books.
You can now also support Some Other Sphere via Ko-fi. To buy the podcast a coffee, please go to https://ko-fi.com/someotherspherepodcast. Thank you!
 
The Some Other Sphere theme is from Purple Planet Music - 'Hubbub', by Chris Martyn/Geoff Harvey.
 

Episode 51 - Ruth Roper Wylde - British Ghosts and Hauntings

My guest for this episode is paranormal investigator and author Ruth Roper Wylde. Ruth has written extensively on supernatural happenings in Britain, beginning with her book The Ghosts of Marston Vale and continuing with titles such as The Almanac of British Ghosts and The Roadmap of British Ghosts. Her latest offering is the second volume of These Haunted Times, which covers a wide range of first hand accounts of encounters with ghostly entities.
In the interview we talk about her life-long interest in the supernatural, her approach to investigating reports of hauntings and some of the theories as to what might be behind this sort of paranormal activity.
 
Ruth can be found on Twitter (@Ruth Roper Wylde), Facebook and Pinterest and her books are available from all good book retailers.
If you would like to support Some Other Sphere you can do so via Ko-Fi. To buy the podcast a coffee, please go to https://ko-fi.com/someotherspherepodcast. Thank you!
The Some Other Sphere is from Purple Planet Music - 'Hubbub' by Geoff Harvey/Chris Martyn.
 

Episode 50 - Timothy Boucher and Jeremy Puma - The Quatria Theory

In this episode i’m joined by Timothy Boucher and Jeremy Puma to discuss their work exploring the history and culture of the ancient, enigmatic Quatrian civilisation.
This is no mean feat, as you will find very few direct references to Quatria on maps, in historical texts, or recorded in archaeological investigations. Imagination, legend and myth are the means by which it has survived the many millennia since it fell.
This has informed the way that Tim and Jeremy have uncovered the story of this culture – most notably a book called The Lost Direction, written by Timothy, and The Oracle of the Hypogeum, a card deck created by Jeremy and Garrett of the Liminal Earth project.
To say much more than this would spoil the interview a little I think. Enjoy!
If you'd like to read more about ancient Quatria please visit https://medium.com/quatrian-folkways
You can get a hold of The Lost Direction at Lost Books and The Oracle of the Hypogeum at https://liminal.earth/the-oracle-of-the-hypogeum/.
You can now also support the podcast via Ko-fi. To buy Some Other Sphere a coffee, please go to https://ko-fi.com/someotherspherepodcast. Thank you!
 
The song playing out this episode is 'White Christmas' by The Inkspots (Decca Records 1947).
The Some Other Sphere theme is from Purple Planet Music - 'Hubbub' by Chris Martyn and Geoff Harvey.
 

Episode 49 - Dr Eric Wargo - Precognition, Retrocausation and the Unconscious

My guest for this episode is Dr Eric Wargo, who joined me to talk about his research into the nature of precognition, specifically its connection to dreaming, the unconscious and the scientific principle of retrocausation, which posits that events in the future can produce effects in the present, and present happenings can have a similar influence in the past.  
He covers this all extensively in his 2018 book Time Loops and next year sees the release of Precognative Dreamwork and the Long Self, which explores in more details methods that can be used to interpret these glimpses of the future. His work encompasses physics, psychoanalysis, anthropology and esoteric thought and challenges a lot of long held assumptions about the nature of our reality and how it works.
Fascinating stuff indeed. Enjoy!
You can find out more about Eric's research and books at http://thenightshirt.com/
You can now also donate to Some Other Sphere via Ko-fi. To buy the podcast a coffee please visit https://ko-fi.com/someotherspherepodcast. Thank you!
 
The Some Other Sphere theme music is from Purple Planet Music - 'Hubbub' by Geoff Harvey/Chris Martyn.
 

Episode 48 - Peter Bebergal - Technology and the Supernatural

In this episode my guest is author Peter Bebergal, who joined me to discuss his 2018 book Strange Frequencies: The Extraordinary Story of the Technological Quest for the Supernatural. In that work he explores the various ways people have tried to use technology to better understand and communicate with the supernatural along with the engineers, inventors and seers who were fascinated by those mysteries.
Peter has written extensively on a range of fringe and Fortean subjects, with essays and reviews featuring in The New Yorker, The Times Literary Supplement, The Believer and The Quietus. He is also the author of Season of the Witch: How the Occult Saved Rock and Roll and has recently edited Appendix N: The Eldritch Roots of Dungeons and Dragons, due out early next year.
This is a wide ranging chat, covering magic, technology, myth and science. Something for everyone, I hope!
Peter can be found on Twitter as @peterbebergal and his books are available from all good book retailers.
You can now donate to Some Other Sphere via Kofi. To buy the podcast a coffee, please go to https://ko-fi.com/someotherspherepodcast. Thank you!
The Some Other Sphere intro music is from Purple Planet Music - 'Hubbub' by Geoff Harvey and Chris Martyn.
 

Episode 47 - Timothy Renner & Joshua Cutchin - High Strangeness and the Bigfoot Phenomenon

My guests for this episode are folklorists, paranormal researchers and authors Timothy Renner and Joshua Cutchin, who joined me to talk about their new co-written work Where the Footprints End: High Strangeness and the Bigfoot Phenomenon Volume One: Folklore.
The book details Tim and Josh’s extensive research exploring the multitude of similarities between Bigfoot encounters and the folklore of other Fortean entities such as Fairies, Aliens, Witches and Ghosts. The connections they have found are numerous, and offer a compelling counterargument to the hypothesis that Bigfoot is simply a flesh and blood creature – an as yet undiscovered great ape, or relic hominid.
It’s an exploration into the myriad oddities of the phenomena – the high strangeness mentioned in the title – and has been compared to the work Jacques Vallee has done writing about the true nature of UFOs.
Both Tim and Josh have written extensively on a wide range of paranormal topics and are some of the most interesting voices in Fortean research right now, so it was a real treat to get them on the podcast to talk about their latest work.
Enjoy! 
 
For more information about Tim's work please visit: https://www.strangefamiliars.com/
To find out more about Josh's work please visit https://www.joshuacutchin.com/
You can now donate to Some Other Sphere via Ko-fi. To buy the podcast a coffee, please visit https://ko-fi.com/someotherspherepodcast. Thank you!
 
The Some Other Sphere theme is from Purple Planet Music - 'Hubbub' by Chris Martyn and Geoff Harvey.
 

Episode 46 - Keith Linder - The Bothell Hell House

My guest for this Halloween episode is author Keith Linder, who joined me to talk about the unsettling events he experienced for four years whilst living in a house in Bothell, a suburb of Seattle WA. These happenings started as soon as he and his partner moved in in 2012, and include almost everything you can imagine happening in a haunting, or poltergeist case.
Unusually though, their house was not on old structure, or a building marked by a gruesome history. Still, what has happened within its walls has been terrifying enough for it to become known as the Bothell Hell House, and be visited by numerous paranormal investigators.
It is a truly fascinating case of what it is like to experience malevolent paranormal activity first hand.
Enjoy..
 
For more information on Keith's experiences at the house and his books, please visit https://demonsinseattle.com/.
You can now also donate to Some Other Sphere via Ko-fi. To buy the podcast a coffee, please visit https://ko-fi.com/someotherspherepodcast. Thank you!
 
The Some Other Sphere theme music is from Purple Planet Music - 'Hubbub', by Geoff Harvey/Chris Martyn.
The track playing out this episode is 'Bogey Wail' by Jack Hylton and his Orchestra.
 

Episode 45 - Sorita d'Este - Isles of the Many Gods

My guest for this episode is author, publisher, researcher and priestess Sorita d’Este.
Sorita has been teaching and writing on a wide range of esoteric subjects for over twenty years, with her work being published in both mainstream and community magazines, websites and an impressive amount of books. This episode was inspired by one of these works, Isles of the Many Gods, which is a comprehensive A-Z of the many Pagan Gods and Goddesses worshipped in Britain from the Iron Age to the late Middle Ages.
We talked about some of those deities, their origins and nature, along with Sorita's life long interest in exploring the many pathways of experiencing magic, mysticism, folklore and religion. 
Lovely stuff indeed. Enjoy!
 
To find out more about Sorita and her books please visit http://sorita.co.uk/.
You can now also support Some Other Sphere via Ko-fi - to buy the podcast a coffee go to https://ko-fi.com/someotherspherepodcast. Thank you!
The Some Other Sphere theme music is from Purple Planet Music - 'Hubbub', by Geoff Harvey/Chris Martyn.
 

Episode 44 - Munya Andrews - Journey into Dreamtime

My guest for this episode is author Munya Andrews, who joined me to talk about her book Journey into Dreamtime, which is a guide to the ancient wisdom and beliefs that form the spiritual philosophy held by the aboriginal peoples of Australia.
As well as being a writer, Munya is a lawyer, educator and an accomplished, influential voice in her community, well versed in traditional laws, customs and practises. She is also a much sought after public speaker, so it was an absolute privilege to talk with her about the Dreamtime and the magical world of her people, one which I knew very little of before reading her book I have to admit.
To find out more about Munya and her work, please visit https://www.evolves.com.au/
You can now also support Some Other Sphere via Ko-fi - to buy the podcast a coffee, just go to https://ko-fi.com/someotherspherepodcast. Thank you!
 
The Some Other Sphere theme is from Purple Planet Music - 'Hubbub' by Geoff Harvey/Chris Martyn.