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Professor Phil Ford and writer J. F. Martel host a series of conversations on art and philosophy, dwelling on ideas that are hard to think and art that opens up rifts in what we are pleased to call "reality."

SpectreVision Radio is a bespoke podcast network at the intersection between the arts and the uncanny, featuring a tapestry of shows exploring the anomalous, the luminous, and the numinous. We’re a community for creators and fans vibrating around common curiosities, shared interests and persistent passions.

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  1. Episode 221 – On 'The Exorcist'

    In this episode, long overdue, Phil and JF discuss one of the great American horror films: WIlliam Friedkin's 1973 adaptation of Willam Peter's Blatty's _The Exorcist_. Music:"Nascent Red," from PY Martel's Weird Studies Vol. 1. (https://pi

  2. Episode 220: The Dream of a Ridiculous Man: Live at the Dream Mapping Symposium

    On September 26, JF and Phil took part in the Dream Mapping Symposium, a three-day event organized by the Dream Mapping Project (https://thedreammappingproject.com/) and the Dream Library Foundation (https://thedreamlibrary.net/), and held

  3. Episode 219 – Composing the Cosmos, with Meredith Rigby

    In this episode, JF and Phil are joined by their beloved assistant and invaluable collaborator Meredith Rigby (formerly Meredith Michael) to discuss her recently completed doctoral dissertation, Composing the Cosmos: 20th Century Musical My

  4. Episode 218 — A Mighty Matter of Legend: On J.R.R. Tolkien's 'The Two Towers'

    Having taken up the first part of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings in episode 207, Phil and JF turn to part two, The Two Towers. Together, they peel back the husk of familiarity to reveal the strange object underneath: a story about s

  5. Mid-Hiatus Bonus: A Door in the Fourth Wall

    Episode 218 will drop at the end of our summer break on September 9, 2026. Today, enjoy this recent audio extra, originally released for members of the Weird Studies Patreon. In the intro, JF announces two important Weirdosphere events: a t

  6. Episode 217 – Books, Spirits, and Hysteria, with Asti Hustvedt

    Researcher Asti Hustvedt joins Phil and JF to discuss a talk she gave at the Lily Dale Symposium (https://www.shannontaggart.com/events/2026) this year entitled "Bibliophantoms." The question: What does it mean to "get lost" in a book? Asti

  7. Episode 216 – Artworks Are People Too

    "Now and then, a mysterious life and potency will flicker out of an artwork and confront you." So began "Artworks Are People Too," a talk Phil presented at the Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute earlier this summer. In this episode, JF

  8. Special Episode: Make Art!

    Owing to circumstances preventing us from releasing a new show this week, we are offering you one from the archives. This episode was originally released on our Patreon in March 2026. In it, we discuss the splendour and squalor of Victorian

  9. Episode 215 – Where No One Can Hear You Scream: On Ridley Scott's 'Alien'

    In this episode, JF and Phil discuss Ridley Scott's 1979 sci-fi/horror blockbuster Alien. Together, they wipe off the patina of familiarity that beclouds the film, restoring it to its original weirdness. What is the organism that terrorizes

  10. Episode 214 – Fortune's Fools: On Gordon White's Philosophy of Fortune-Telling

    It was with heavy hearts that Phil and JF learned of Gordon White's passing. Gordon was a force to be reckoned with: as an author and podcaster on all things occult, he offered unique perspectives and provocative interpretations at every tu

  11. Episode 213 – Comics, Surf Rock, and the Weirdness of Time: On Tom Manning's 'Eric'

    Tom Manning's 2018 graphic novel Eric is that rarest of gems: the self-published masterpiece. Available only on the author's website (https://www.tommanning.info/), it's the story of a washed-up surf rocker who stumbles into a cosmic conspi

  12. Episode 212 – Beyond Music and Back Again: On Glenn Gould

    The pianist, composer and sound artist Glenn Gould once wrote: "Art on its loftiest mission is scarcely human at all." What becomes of art and humanity when they are allowed to vary independently of one another? Which serves which, and to w

  13. Episode 211 – You've Always Been the Caretaker: On Kubrick's 'The Shining'

    In this episode, Phil and JF discuss Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of Stephen King's novel The Shining. That they are doing this eight years after starting the podcast is weird in itself, so fundamental is Kubrick's "chamber epic" to the mod

  14. Special Episode: M.C. Richards's "Wrestling with the Daimonic," read by Phil Ford

    We regret that we were unable to release a new episode this week. Episode 211 will drop on Wednesday, April 29, and will be devoted to Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining, a film we have long wanted to revisit in depth. In the meantime, we are pl

  15. Episode 210 – Angels & Daimons, with Cristina Campo and M.C. Richards

    In this episode, JF and Phil bring together two visionary essays on the daimonic and the imaginal: Cristina Campo’s “On Fairy Tales” and M.C. Richards’s “Wrestling with the Daimonic.” What emerges is a conversation about imagination, person

  16. Episode 209 – At Home in the Labyrinth, with Murakami and Borges

    In this episode, Phil and JF discuss Haruki Murakami’s “Cream,” from First Person Singular, alongside Jorge Luis Borges’s classic tale, “The Garden of Forking Paths.” Together, these two stories occasion a meditation on time, perplexity, an

  17. Episode 208 – Unbridled Creation: On Kenneth Batcheldor's Theory of the Paranormal

    Kenneth Batcheldor was a British clinical psychologist who, during the final two decades of his life, investigated the paranormal through direct experiments in table-turning. The final fruit of that work was an essay, compiled from Batcheld

  18. Episode 207 – Magic Mirror: On J.R.R. Tolkien's 'The Fellowship of the Ring'

    This is the first of three episodes on J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings to be released in the course of the next several months. Focusing here on The Fellowship of the Ring, our hosts discuss the first leg of Frodo's journey into dark

  19. Episode 206 – On Ken Russell's 'Altered States': Live at Indiana University Bloomington

    This episode was recorded before a live audience at Indiana University Cinema as part of Weird Academia, a series of events that brought much high strangeness to Bloomington, Indiana, in January 2026. The discussion followed a screening of

  20. Episode 205 – Discipline and Delight: On the Hierophant Card in the Tarot

    In this episode of Weird Studies, we turn to the fifth Major Arcanum, the Hierophant, symbolizing tradition, instruction, and the exoteric aspect of spiritual practice. Drawing on Meditations on the Tarot and other sources, we question the

  21. Episode 204 – The Perilous Realm: J.R.R. Tolkien's 'On Fairy Stories'

    For Tolkien, fairy stories are not stories about fairies, but stories that take place in Faerie. And in doing so, they make Faerie present. They are not escapist fantasies but disclosures of a real mode of being and invitations to live in t

  22. Holiday Bonus: Scavengers in the Ruins of Heaven

    To tide us over as we prepare for a new season of Weird Studies, here is an "audio extra," originally recorded for our Patreon supporters, wherein we discuss imposter syndrome, the eternal inadequacy of the intellect, the perils of playing

  23. Episode 203 – Distant Early Warnings: A Return to Marshall McLuhan's 'Book of Probes'

    Back in episode 112, Phil and JF devised a gimmick for a show: randomly select one of the many aphorisms in The Book of Probes, a compendium of Marshall McLuhan’s prophetic quips designed by David Carson, and see what happens. It proved liv

  24. Episode 202 – The Human is Two: On 'The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde'

    In this episode, JF and Phil discuss Robert Louis Stevenson’s Gothic classic, the tale that conjured the fog-shrouded London hellscape that has haunted the modern imagination ever since. Though written as a quick “Christmas crawler” to earn

  25. Episode 201 – On James Whale's 'Frankenstein' and 'Bride of Frankenstein,' with Peter Bebergal

    In this episode, Phil and JF are joined by independent scholar Peter Bebergal, author of Strange Frequencies, Season of the Witch, and other books on the intersections of culture, religion, and the occult. The topic is Frankenstein—not Guil

  26. Halloween Special: A Reading of Arthur Machen's "The White People"

    Originally released in 2018 but remixed for your listening pleasure, here's Phil reading Arthur Machen's classic weird tale, "The White People." Happy Halloween! Machen's "The White People" was discussed all the way back in ⁠Weird Studies e

  27. Episode 200 – On 'The Call of Cthulhu'

    For their 200th episode, JF and Phil turn their attention to H. P. Lovecraft’s “The Call of Cthulhu,” a story foundational not only to modern horror fiction but to the very idea of the Weird. In revisiting this tale of forbidden knowledge a

  28. Episode 199 – On Michael Jackson, with Shannon Taggart

    Photographer and paranormal researcher Shannon Taggart joins JF and Phil to explore the phenomenon that was Michael Jackson. One of the most brilliant and successful musicians of the modern era, Jackson was also a liminal figure sans pareil

  29. Episode 198 – Breaking the Frame: On the High Priestess in the Tarot

    Since 2020, Phil and JF have been creating an on-again, off-again series on the major trumps, or "arcana," of the tarot. In this episode, they continue the series with a discussion of the second arcanum: the High Priestess, also known as la

  30. Episode 197 - Sounding the Otherworld: On Bryn Chainey's 'Rabbit Trap'

    In a rare surfacing in the contemporary world, JF and Phil discuss a film that has just been released. Bryn Chainey’s Rabbit Trap is psychological horror in the tradition of Repulsion, Jacob’s Ladder, and Angel Heart. But it is more: a meta

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