The Hotdog Laserhouse

Disturbed Area 51 Caller (Art Bell)
Coast to Coast AM

So I’ve mentioned that Art Bell used to host Coast to Coast AM - here’s one of his more classic clips, moving away from ghosts and more towards aliens and stuff. In this clip, Art is taking calls from supposed former Area 51 employees and gets one very shaken caller who begins to ramble about inter-dimensional extra-terrestrials and the government’s knowledge of them.

Right as he starts talking about how the government has safehouses to protect the population from these creatures and their impending invasion, the radio station begins to break up before cutting out entirely. What doesn’t come across in this MP3 is that Art’s station was off the air for more than an hour. The satellite broadcasting Art’s signal that night suffered a massive and mysterious hardware failure right in the middle of the call, raising more than a few eyebrows about whether or not somebody just got “silenced”. Art takes questions about the event and discusses it for the rest of the night.

What most people usually leave out of this story (and indeed, it is not part of tonight’s MP3, which, fun fact, is 6.66mb) is that the supposed distressed Area 51 Caller called back six months later and admitted to not only being the Area 51 man from that night, but to calling in to Art’s special hotline multiple times over the years to tell various strange stories in funny voices. To prove his case, he even does his best to replicate the stuttering, half-sobbing voice from that night. Rather than outright confirm or deny that is the same voice he heard, Art simply puts it to the audience to decide for themselves whether they think he is the real deal or just somebody impersonating the Area 51 caller from September 1997.

Check out previous “Modern Day Campfire Stories”

• Campus Shadows (MU)
• Road to Sydney (MU)
• Black-eyed Kids (MU)
• Black-eyed Kids #2 (MU)
• Insane Geologist (MU)
• Black-clad Creatures (MU)
• The Dog Face Man (C2CAM)

The Dog Face Man (Ian Punnit)
Coast to Coast AM

So for as long as I’ve been posting these so-called “Modern Day Campfire Stories”, they’ve all been clips from Mysterious Universe - largely because I think those guys are cool. They generally seem to have pretty good senses of humor and laugh at obvious crackpots and poke fun at just how dumb “paranormal” stuff can be. But there’s obviously more than just them, such as the granddaddy, Coast to Coast AM.

C2CAM was popularized as being hosted by Art Bell, and all through the late hours Art would take a variety of weird calls and interview strange people. I actually usually find it generally pretty boring because it’s always a lot of tinfoil hat conspiracy theory stuff, and not even on anything interesting. But around Halloween, they start talking about ghosts, and vampires, and all sorts of more atypical “spooky” content.

Art’s long since retired, only returning to do shows every now and again (usually on Halloween night for “Ghost to Ghost”), but here’s a clip I personally recorded from Coast to Coast AM, off of a real radio, probably close to 8 years ago. The host in this clip is Ian Punnit, and I’m not entirely sure if he still works at C2CAM anymore, but he discusses what he believes is the sound of a Werewolf - and has a man call in that may have seen it, or a creature related to it. Stick with it - Ian seems to trip over his words a little bit, especially at the start.

Check out previous “Modern Day Campfire Stories”

• Campus Shadows (MU)
• Road to Sydney (MU)
• Black-eyed Kids (MU)
• Black-eyed Kids #2 (MU)
• Insane Geologist (MU)
• Black-clad Creatures (MU)

Season 7, Episode 04: Black Clad Creatures
The 8th Kind

It’s Friday! That means another Mysterious Universe clip. I don’t even really know what to make of this one - the MU guys read some pretty out there emails, but this one sets some kind of record in absolute nonsense. Aliens, ghosts, premonitions and ethereal voices…

Check out previous “Modern Day Campfire Stories” (MU clips)

• Campus Shadows
• Road to Sydney
• Black-eyed Kids
• Black-eyed Kids #2
• Insane Geologist

Season 7, Episode 06: The Insane Geologist
The 8th Kind

Every Friday in October I’m going to post a Mysterious Universe clip. This is the first of such clips, where a geologist recalls a tale of a mysterious cave he explored - what he discovered has made him question his own sanity.

I really love this kind of stuff. That doesn’t mean I necessarily believe in it, but it’s something I’ve come to call a “modern day campfire story”. Sure, people still go camping, and they still tell weird/spooky stories around them, but I think there’s something to be said for just listening to them as a podcast like Mysterious Universe. Check out their podcast here.

I have a few others I’ve uploaded here and there, prior to Halloween. You can find them under the Modern Day Campfire Stories tag. I kind of wish I had saved “The Road to Sydney” for Halloween, because I still think it is the best thing to come out of MU.

Check out previous “Modern Day Campfire Stories” (MU clips)

• Campus Shadows
• Road to Sydney
• Black-eyed Kids
• Black-eyed Kids #2

(Source: mysterousuniverse.org)

Season 7, Episode ??: Letting Black-Eyed Kids In
The 8th Kind

“Oh,” I said. “Somebody ♥’d one of my old Mysterious Universe posts. I should do another one.”

And so here we are. In the last one of these I posted, it was about a segment on the weird “Black-Eyed Kids” stuff, which is becoming some kind of weird modern-day myth, sort of like the Slenderman stuff. It usually involves people (usually kids) with solid black eyes somehow radiate this sensation of fear - usually only intensified when the kids approach a victim and ask if they can be let inside, usually because they have an odd request like “We want to borrow a glass of water”.

The clip was sort of strange but not really all that spooky, but I feel like it is necessary to set up the concept of the story. In the previous clip, they wonder aloud what happens to those who fight back their instinctual fear of these “black-eyed kids” and actually do let them in to their homes. Well, that’s exactly what this next clip is about.

(Source: mysteriousuniverse.org)

Season 2, Episode 12: Black-eyed Kids Encounters
The 8th Kind

Here’s something that’s a little weird for your Friday the 13th. I figure I posted the other clips of Mysterious Universe on Fridays, so I might as well continue the trend and post another in honor of one of the most iconic Fridays.

This is a nearly 15 minute excerpt from a Mysterious Universe podcast where they first cover a phenomenon known only as “Black-Eyed Kids”. They read a number of stories about these entities, each slightly weirder than the last. They also spitball some ideas about what exactly these things might be. This one isn’t so much spooky as it is just kind of strange.

Mysterious Universe infrequently returns to the topic of black-eyed kids, and I definitely have at least one more of these “clips” stored away on the subject that maybe I’ll post at some point.

Season 3, Episode 21: The Road to Sydney
8th Kind

Since it’s Friday and I seemed to get a couple of likes on my last post, I decided to indulge in a second. When I really want to convey to somebody just how good Mysterious Universe is and why I listen to it, I give them this clip. I don’t specifically remember what season or what episode this one is from (It might’ve been from Season 5) (Update: I tracked down the episode number), all I know is that this story is completely amazing. Whether or not what happened was some kind of dream or simply a work of fiction does nothing to lessen this tale’s haunting atmosphere, and Ben and Aaron’s narration and subsequent discussion only makes it all the better.

Season 7, Episode 04: Campus Shadows
8th Kind

Whether or not you believe in this kind of stuff is irrelevant; I just like listening to these kinds of things. It reminds me of old campfire tales, in a way. This comes from Mysterious Universe, a podcast I’ve really come to enjoy in the last year or so. It’s kind of like Coast to Coast AM, but C2CAM is only really interesting to listen to around Halloween, otherwise it’s all stupid tinfoil hat junk like chemtrails and economic conspiracies. Mysterious Universe is like if C2CAM was condensed from 4 hours of boring nightly content down to 1 hour of the best stuff once a week, hosted by two charming Australians who like to laugh at obvious crackpots just the same as anyone else. They also tell a pretty mean story. This clip comes from a recent episode I just listened to, where somebody describes their time spent on a haunted college campus and the very negative impact it had on their life.

If I don’t get made fun of for posting this and there’s enough out there who like it, I might post more clips.