Cover art for podcast Here Be Monsters

Here Be Monsters

184 EpisodesProduced by Here Be MonstersWebsite

An independent podcast about fear, beauty and the unknown. Since 2012. Hosted by Jeff Emtman and others.

184 Episodes | 2012 - 2024

Farewell

February 22nd, 2024

0:39

An important message from RadioPublic

HBM158: An Illusion

December 14th, 2022

40:09

n the midst of a stressful move, HBM producer Jeff Emtman finds comfort in the phasing techniques developed by minimalist composer, Steve Reich

HBM157: The Raw Whatever

November 28th, 2022

39:51

Allen H Greenfield is a UFOlogist and occult researcher.  He’s also a father of three.  

His first child, Alex was the subject of HBM155: Ghosts …

HBM156: Heavy Load-Bearing Body

November 9th, 2022

19:19

Berlin’s Schwerbelastungskörper is a massive concrete structure that, today, is hidden in plain sight between a railroad and an apartment building.  …

The HBM Art Exchange is Back!

October 24th, 2022

12:34

The Here Be Monsters Art Exchange is back!

It’s a really simple and wonderful thing where you, gentle listener, can mail a piece of art to a stranger …

HBM155: Ghosts Aliens Burritos

August 24th, 2022

32:16

Content Note: pervasive language, brief mentions of bigotry.

Alex Greenfield says that there was no such thing as a normal day when he was a kid.  His dad (Allen H Greenfield) self describes as a “researcher in the …

HBM154: Ancient Roman Recipes

June 22nd, 2022

24:26

Sally Grainger was originally a chef, but in her 20’s, she was gifted a copy of an ancient Roman cookbook called Apicius

Apicius is a bit of a …

The Straight and Narrow

June 2nd, 2022

12:24

In 2012, a street preacher walking three small dogs tried to convince Jeff Emtman of his way of thinking about gender and the afterlife. 

In this Here Be Monsters brief, Jeff shares the short essay he originally wrote …

HBM153: Klänge from Berlin

May 4th, 2022

50:15

The composer Pauline Oliveros thought there was a difference between hearing and listening.  She defined hearing as a passive act, something done …

HBM152: Dirt Becomes You

March 30th, 2022

35:07

What do you want to happen to your body when you die?  It’s a touchy topic where tradition, religion and death denial all come into play.  But across much of the world, there are just two options: burial and cremation, …

HBM151: Blowgun Time Warp

March 9th, 2022

27:13

Season 10 of Here Be Monsters starts and host Jeff Emtman hallucinates his adolescence while working long hours.  Scenes from middle school dances, …

Season 10 is Coming!

February 11th, 2022

4:41

Season 10 is nearly here!  The season starts on March 9th and episodes will be released on a rolling basis until all ten shows are published.

Want to …

Leaving Spotify

February 8th, 2022

12:55

I’ve decided to remove my work from Spotify.  It’s not just their recent controversies around Joe Rogan, it’s a much bigger problem with the way that …

HBM150: Cold Water

July 1st, 2021

40:23

The origins of Julia Susara’s chronic fatigue are hard to pin down.  She still doesn’t know exactly how it started but suspects that a deeply broken …

HBM149: The Daily Blast [Neutrinowatch]

June 16th, 2021

2:00

A short episode from the new show Neutrinowatch: A Daily Generative Podcast.  Each episode of Neutrinowatch changes a lil’ bit every day.  

This episode, The Daily Blast, features two computerized voices (Wendy and …

So What Exactly is Episode 149?

June 16th, 2021

25:56

Episode 149 is an odd duck for sure.  It changes every day due to some coding trickery that is happening behind the scenes. 

That episode is a part of a bigger project, a new podcast project that’s potentially the first …

HBM148: Early Attempts at Summoning Dream Beings

June 2nd, 2021

33:00

As a teenager, HBM host Jeff Emtman fell asleep most nights listening to Coast To Coast AM, a long running talk show about the world’s weirdnesses.   One of the guests stuck out though; one who spoke on his experiences …

HBM147: Chasing Tardigrades

May 19th, 2021

21:17

With much of the world shut down over the last year, HBM host Jeff Emtman started wondering if there were smaller venues where the world still felt open. 

In this episode, Jeff interviews Chloé Savard of the Instagram …

Theodora is @hypo_inspo

May 5th, 2021

2:12

A brief follow-up to last episode: you can now follow our AI-powered friend Theodora on Twitter! She tweets several times a day, giving bad advice, …

HBM146: Theodora

April 28th, 2021

27:30

How does a computer learn to speak with emotion and conviction? 

Language is hard to express as a set of firm rules.  Every language rule seems to …

HBM145: The Juice Library

April 14th, 2021

25:16

Like so many others, Amanda Petrus got a bit lost after college. She had a chemistry degree and not a lot of direction.  But she was able to find …

HBM144: Keeping A Place

March 31st, 2021

29:33

HBM Host Jeff Emtman has always been afraid of losing his memories. Places he cares about keep getting torn down.

In this episode, Jeff bikes around Seattle recording the sounds of a popping balloon to capture the sound …

HBM143: Laughing Rats and Dawn Rituals

March 17th, 2021

25:59

Animals sometimes make noises that would be impossible to place without context.  In this episode: three types of animal vocalizations—described by …

HBM142: The Vastness of the Universe

March 3rd, 2021

27:42

1,420,405,751* hertz is a very important frequency.  It’s the frequency that hydrogen radiates at, creating radio waves that can be detected far away.  And astronomers can learn a lot about the history and shape of the …

HBM141: Filthy Riches

February 17th, 2021

40:17

When a group of broke college students start throwing lavish feasts, HBM host Jeff Emtman begins to wonder at the source of the food, initially …

Season 9 = February 17th

January 8th, 2021

6:24

Season 9 will be here soon!  We’ll bring you ten new episodes about fear, beauty and the unknown.  

We’ll see the fight for survival and beauty of the microscopic world.  We’ll learn how balloons can be used to capture …

HBM Continues as an Independent Podcast

August 13th, 2020

For the last five years, Here Be Monsters has been a part of KCRW.  And in those years, we’ve put out a 100+ episodes under KCRW’s imprint.  


However, moving forward, HBM will no longer be associated with the station, …

HBM140: The New Black Wall Street

June 24th, 2020

There used to be a neighborhood in Tulsa where Black people were wealthy. They owned businesses, built a giant church, a public library. Some Black …

HBM139: Acceptable Pains

June 10th, 2020

Hedonism seems pretty appealing right now—seeking pleasure and avoiding pain. On HBM137: Superhappiness, the hedonist philosopher, David Pearce imagined a future free of the systemic harms we currently experience: …

HBM138: Did Neanderthals Bury their Dead?

May 27th, 2020

There’s a large cave in the foothills of Iraqi Kurdistan. It looks out over green and yellow fields and a river far below. Starting in the 1950’s, …

HBM137: Superhappiness

May 13th, 2020

David Pearce thinks it's possible to end suffering. He’s a philosopher* who studies “hedonic zero”, the state of being which is completely neutral--neither good nor bad. He believes that, despite our momentary joys and …

HBM136: Jacob's Lost Biography

April 29th, 2020

In 2012, Jacob Lemanski started writing his autobiography a few words at a time when he signed his name on the digital card readers at the grocery store. He read somewhere that the credit card companies keep the …

HBM135: Dying Well

April 15th, 2020

We live in a culture of “death denial”. That’s what Amanda Provenzano thinks. She sees it when medical professionals use euphemisms like ‘passing …

HBM134: Questionable Hobbies of the Socially Isolated

April 1st, 2020

Searching for something to do during government-mandated social distancing, Here Be Monsters host Jeff Emtman recently digitized his cassette …

HBM133: Prey of Worms

March 18th, 2020

Bodies are odd.  Anyone who can see their own nose will tell you the same.  So will anyone whose diet changed their body odor.  And so will anyone who’s ever felt their phone vibrate in their pocket only to later …

HBM132: Moral Enhancement

March 4th, 2020

Natalia Montes was a teenager living in Florida when Travyon Martin was killed.  She says his picture reminded her of her classmates, “It could have …

HBM131: A Cure for Carsickness

February 19th, 2020

Bethany Denton has a long history of carsickness. Ever since she was a little girl, long car rides made her nauseous and gave her stomachaches. Once, …

HBM130: Mother Pigeon / Sister Marta

February 5th, 2020

Mother Pigeon says the wild animals of New York City are hungry.  So she feeds them.

Each morning, a flock of about 150 pigeons waits for her at her local park in Bushwick.  She feeds them twice a day if she can afford …

HBM129: The Underearthlings

January 22nd, 2020

Lars Christian Kofoed Rømer claims his red hat is mere coincidence. He wears it because his mother-in-law knit it for him 15 years ago and he quite …

HBM128: Seeing Auras

January 8th, 2020

Colby Richardson’s mom got leukemia when he was young. He has trouble remembering her. Soon after her death, Colby and his siblings wound up at a …

HBM127: QALYs

December 25th, 2019

Most of us want to help.  But it can be hard to know how to do it, and not all altruistic deeds are equal, and sometimes they can be harmful.  …

HBM126: Sounding the Deep

December 11th, 2019

How familiar are you with the shape of the continents?  What about the shape of the seafloor? 


If you’re unfamiliar with the contours of our planet’s underwater mountain ranges and plateaus and valleys, then you’re not …

HBM125: Deepfaking Nixon

November 27th, 2019

There’s a beautifully written speech that was never delivered. Written for President Richard Nixon by Bill Safire, the speech elegizes astronauts …

HBM124: Banana Softies

November 13th, 2019

“Gene” says it started because he wanted to be a veterinarian. So he took a job as a research associate at a vivarium that studied cancer drugs. He was often alone in the lab at night with hundreds or thousands of …

HBM123: Water Witches

October 30th, 2019

Some time in the 90’s, Kathy Emtman received a gift from her husband, Rick. It was a pair of bent metal rods, each shaped into long ‘L’. Nothing special, not imparted with any kind of magic, just metal rods. …

HBM122: Should Cows Have Names?

October 16th, 2019

Mike Paros lives in two worlds. In one world, he’s an animal welfare specialist and mixed animal vet, meaning he works with both “companion” animals like cats and dogs, and large animals like horses, cows, goats, and …

HBM121: True North

October 2nd, 2019

Angels saved Here Be Monsters’ host Jeff Emtman once.  They picked him up and took care of him after a bad bike crash.  It was just one of many times that Jeff felt watched over by God.


Jeff used to think he might be a …

HBM120: Own Worst Interest

June 5th, 2019

In the fall of 1989, in Vancouver, Washington, a short, 29 year-old man named Westley Allan Dodd raped and murdered three young boys. The boys were …

HBM119: An Episode of Pebbles and Twigs

May 22nd, 2019

The end of our seventh season draws near! Just one more episode until we hang up our podcasting hats for a few months. We don’t want you to miss us too much though, so on this episode, we’re tying up some loose ends, …

HBM118: Mountain Seabed

May 8th, 2019

Life on earth began in the oceans.  And it used to be simpler. For the first few billion years, life consisted of microbes that didn’t really swim or hunt; they mostly floated and, if they were lucky, bumped into …

HBM117: Grave Oversight

April 24th, 2019

Sudan has been involved in ongoing civil wars since 1983. The wars were about religion, culture and resources. By 2005, approximately two million …

HBM116: Finest and Most Rotten (Going Forward)

April 10th, 2019

Mar 21, 1919 - NEW YORK CITY

An anonymous writer for the New York Tribune stands at 154 Nassau.  The writer asks passers-by a simple question: “Do you think this is a good world?”  It’s just four months after Armistice …

HBM115: Bound in Walton et al.

March 27th, 2019

A highway robber with many aliases lay on his deathbed after contracting a bad flu.  He dictated his life story to his captors before succumbing to …

HBM114: Envisioning AIDS

March 13th, 2019

In a warm and dark room in the winter of 1987, people lay on the ground with their eyes closed.  A facilitator from the Shanti Project guides those assembled on an intimate visualization through the process of dying …

HBM113: The Last Ones

February 27th, 2019

Bethany Denton’s been thinking about grief a lot lately. In 2017, two of her friends, a mother and a daughter, died unexpectedly just two months apart. Since then, Bethany’s started seeing grief in just about …

HBM112: Negative Space

February 13th, 2019

Back when HBM host Jeff Emtman was a photographer, he used to solve his problems with walks in the woods.  There, he’d see the ways that branches …

HBM111: Waiting for Earth

January 29th, 2019

Motherhood always seemed non-negotiable for Bethany Denton. Her upbringing in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints certainly instilled this. Mormons believe in what’s called a “premortal existence,” a place …

HBM110: Big Numbers

January 16th, 2019

For two thirds of his life, HBM host Jeff Emtman has been thinking about the distance to The Moon in terms of corn snacks.  Bugles specifically.  It was a factoid written on the packaging that purported to convey …

HBM109: Untitled Noises of New York (Sound Matters)

January 2nd, 2019

HBM host Jeff Emtman travels to New York City in an effort to fulfill open-ended recording assignments issued from afar by Tim Hinman for an episode …

HBM108: Witch of Saratoga

December 19th, 2018

Angeline Tubbs may have been as old as 104 when she died alone in the woods, in a hut she made with her own hands.  She came to America with a …

HBM107: Carlo Surrenders

December 5th, 2018

Carlo Nakar spent more than twenty years in the United States before he was called by God to return to the the Philippines. It happened during one of …

HBM106: Beautiful Stories about Dead Animals (part 2)

November 21st, 2018

This is a special two-part episode, in which Kryssanne Adams describes the many times where she’s seen death or inflicted it upon animals.

Content Note: Animal slaughter and other descriptions of death

Kryssanne is a …

HBM105: Beautiful Stories about Dead Animals (part 1)

November 7th, 2018

Before Kryssanne Adams was old enough to understand death, she found a dead mouse and carried it around with her in a plastic Easter egg shell.  She …

HBM104: Scrapheap Reactor

October 24th, 2018

Max Turnquist advises against wearing shorts while dumpster diving for used lab equipment. Almost every day, Max visits a university parking garage, where there are several small mountains of discarded equipment, some …

HBM103: Fate's Notebook

October 10th, 2018

Somewhere in Maritza Gulin’s basement, there’s a typewritten notebook that belonged to her father, Reynaldo. The notebook contains essential advice …

HBM102: Breath Holder

September 26th, 2018

Archer Mayo has always loved finding lost things. He grew up on several navy bases and spent much of his childhood swimming and looking for human detritus–sunglasses, teacups, glass bottles. That’s why he takes such …

HBM101: Much Corruption

September 12th, 2018

Growing up, Jeff Emtman had a hard time balancing his piety for the One God with his piety for the Gnomish lord Berwyn.  Generally, he deferred to the latter, though he lost favor eventually with both.

Jeff’s …

HBM100: Faraway Minds

June 6th, 2018

Anna Klein thinks that tea tastes better on the Faroe Islands.  She thinks the water’s more pure there, and the Northern Lights let the sky be …

HBM099: Spell for the Repulsion of Astral Vampires

May 23rd, 2018

There’s currently an invisible, supernatural pandemic affecting the world, or so claims HBM host Jeff Emtman.  What else could explain the …

HBM098: Feed the Queen

May 9th, 2018

The Victoria Bug Zoo is home to dozens of species of insects and arachnids, and two leaf cutter ant colonies.

There's the new colony, with a three …

HBM097: Fox Teeth

April 25th, 2018

In the Westfjords of Iceland, people wait for birds to come ashore so that they can gather the feathers they leave behind.  These birds, called Eider …

HBM096: Are We Still Afraid?

April 11th, 2018

Here Be Monsters is almost 100 episodes old. It’s grown a lot since Jeff was a scared 22 year old learning audio editing in his basement. So as we …

HBM095: The Bats that Stay

March 28th, 2018

Not all migratory bats migrate.  We don’t know why some choose to stay behind at their summer roosts.  But according to the University of …

HBM094: The Fatigue of Violence

March 14th, 2018

In the nearly 20 years that Susan Randall’s been working as a private investigator, she’s seen Vermont’s most disadvantaged people struggling to have life’s most basic amenities.  Sometimes her job is to interview …

HBM093: The Brain Scoop

March 1st, 2018

In school, Divya Anantharaman used to get teased for having long skinny fingers like ET.  But now she sees them as valuable asset for the intricate …

HBM092: Carry the Scent

February 14th, 2018

Robert Larson does not have an easy job. He searches for missing people with his dog Captain Dexter as a K9 search and rescue volunteer. Robert often …

HBM091: Hypnosis of Hunger

January 31st, 2018

Producer Bethany Denton found a box in her basement storage room with two old cassette tapes inside. It took her a moment to realize what they were.

HBM090: Two Small Creatures with Human Eyes

January 17th, 2018

Natural history museums are art galleries.  Scientifically focussed art galleries, but art galleries nonetheless.  

Ian Tattersall, of the American …

HBM088: Riptides and a Sinking Ship

December 20th, 2017

A riptide recently pulled Ariana into open water off the shore of Santa Monica.  She thinks it’s her closest brush with death thus far.  A lifeguard …

HBM087: Trifle Not with Sacred Things

December 7th, 2017

It hasn’t been easy for Ashley Fryer to let go of her faith. For thirty years, she dedicated her life to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day …

HBM086: Eve is Hungry

November 29th, 2017

In HBM085: Ascended Fiction, we explored a rumor about Scientology and whether there exists a belief that founder L. Ron Hubbard will return to Earth.

HBM085: Ascended Fiction

November 22nd, 2017

There’s an office in every church of Scientology dedicated to the founder.  It’s a full reconstruction: desks, chairs, books and memorabilia.  The …

HBM084: Are You Sure You're Awake?

November 8th, 2017

Chrissy was having trouble remembering who she was when she woke up.  First she thought it was early-onset dementia, then she thought it was schizophrenia.  She had recurring hallucinations about being stalked by a …

HBM083: Sweet Like Snap Peas

October 25th, 2017

Ryan Graves thinks that store-bought asparagus is as flavorless as potatoes.  But that's just because he's spoiled on the really good stuff. 

His preferred crop grows wild among the tombstones at Clinton Cemetery, hidden …

HBM082: MI5 MI6 KGB CIA

October 11th, 2017

John Barner spent his entire childhood fiddling with his dad’s shortwave radio, picking up transmissions from all over the world. He like the way the sounds crackled, and the voices speaking foreign languages, and the …

HBM081: Kinnikinnick Nick VS The Bear

September 27th, 2017

Boy Scout Leadership Camp was a bad fit for Jeff Emtman.  He was a meek 13 year old who didn’t eat meat and talked to animals with his mind. …

Psychic Blob and The Radio Race

August 9th, 2017

On a hot summer day in 2014, HBM host Jeff Emtman received a bit of amateur, backyard surgery from a fish biologist.  

It was for the KCRW 24 Hour …

HBM080: The Ocean of Halves

June 7th, 2017

Remi Dun enjoys her job. She's good at it, she makes good money, and she generally enjoys her clients’ company. And although her job rarely gives her sexual pleasure, one client with a curious tongue gave her two …

HBM079: The Tingles

May 24th, 2017

Devaan describes it as a pulsing, tingling feeling on the back of his neck.   His preferred stimuli are whispers, shuffling cards, scissors, tapping …

HBM078: Sagittarius Has $45

May 10th, 2017

Sagittarius has been good for the last year.  That’s what he told us.  He told us that the cage that Luna designed for him is working.  She controls …

HBM077: Snow on Date Trees, then on Pines

April 26th, 2017

Muhammad Tariq still doesn’t know who the men with guns were.  They wore masks on their faces when they came into the teachers’ lounge.  His small, …

HBM076: Griff's Speech

April 12th, 2017

As a baby, Griff Eldridge was quieter than most.  But he slept well.  He fed.  He played with his big brother Ira. And he smiled easily.  For a long time, his parents Luke and Davinia didn’t worry, because he was so …

HBM075: The Weight of Science

March 29th, 2017

Anita Woodley went to the Rhine Research Center for scientific confirmation.  Since childhood, she’d dreamt the future, able to predict imminent murders in her neighborhood.  She prayed away her abilities for a period …

HBM074: Benedict Arnold Makes People Nervous (Rumble Strip)

March 1st, 2017

There is an unusual piece of carved grey stone in the hills of upstate New York.  It depicts the boot of a notorious American villain who was shot in …

HBM073: A Trial Ghost Hunt

February 15th, 2017

Ken Arnold and his wife Donna have opposite work schedules, but they are lucky to share a hobby. For the last nine years they have operated an …

HBM072: Ant God

February 1st, 2017

As far as gods go, Jacob Lemanski is more tepid than most.  Despite his omniscience, he feels unequipped to deal with the ethical decisions required of him.

Content Note: this episode contains a description of a …

HBM071: The Evangelists of Nudism

January 18th, 2017

Growing up Mormon in Montana, Bethany Denton had a phrase drilled into her mind from an early age: “modest is hottest.”  To her, it became a mantra even while many of her friends, especially other girls, struggled with

wet-slop-plop.wav (Among Other Sounds)

January 4th, 2017

There are about 10,000 files in the Here Be Monsters sound library.   HBM producer Jeff Emtman has been recording, synthesizing and downloading them since way back before this show started.  And of these thousands of …

HBM070: The Way The Blood Flows

December 21st, 2016

“I used to think you were brilliant” Evan Williamson’s dad wrote to him in a letter.  Evan was in treatment for chemical dependency at the time.  His …

HBM069: Redwoods of the In-World

December 7th, 2016

Ariadne, Jacqueline, North, and others unnamed are all part of the same system.  They share a single body.  They take turns “fronting” the body, …

HBM068: The Wake Up Stick

November 23rd, 2016

When Dylan Wright placed his first Craigslist ad back in 2006, he called himself a “nice and genuine person with waking up problems.”  He was looking for someone to help him in the mornings.  First it was phone calls, …

HBM067: Dispatches From PestWorld 2016

November 9th, 2016

Feeling anxiety about the American presidential election, HBM host Jeff Emtman took a trip to a place he hoped to be insulated from politics:

HBM066: What Jacob Heard

October 26th, 2016

Jacob Sutton loved going to church when he was a little boy. He sang in the choir, and when he got older he led Bible studies and helped teach Sunday …

HBM065: We Pay Them In Meat

October 12th, 2016

Walk through any natural history museum and you’ll see rows of effortlessly clean animal skeletons.  Chances are you're looking at a strange form of human/insect symbiosis happening in the museum’s back rooms. 


Preparing …

HBM064: A Shrinking Shadow

September 28th, 2016

Erin was fat as a kid. Since middle school, she tried all different methods to lose weight. From a young age she developed the idea that the most …

HBM063: The Art of the Scam, by Malibu Ron

September 14th, 2016

Presumably, any given mystic falls into one of two categories: true believer or scam artist. It's foolish to think that this is a categorization that …

HBM062: The Near Death of Sir Deja Doog

August 31st, 2016

Before Doog could walk, his family gave him a guitar to hold and encouraged him to play music. By the time he was twelve, he'd started writing songs …

HBM059: When Cthulhu Calls

March 23rd, 2016

The most notable monster created by Howard Phillips Lovecraft was completely omnipotent, yet completely uncaring.  A massive, tentacled being that …

HBM058: Kelly Is Cold

March 2nd, 2016

It was early in the morning of New Years Day and Kelly had just bought a purse-load of psychedelic mushrooms from Laramie Wyoming's local "druggist."  Kelly handed them out to the assembled company and took some …

HBM057: Impostor in a Pink Pinstripe Suit

February 17th, 2016

Growing up in small-town Montana, Bethany Denton's parents and teachers told her what she knew already: she was brilliant.  Bethany couldn't help but …

HBM056: It Works Better in Movies

February 3rd, 2016

When Lina Misitzis was a teenager, she told people she was dying.  She wasn't.  But, an entire genre of "dying girl gets the guy" movies taught her …

HBM055: Ghost Tape Number Ten

January 21st, 2016

All is fair in love and war... even mind games. The United States military employs psychological warfare in nearly every war it's part of. From …

HBM054: Flaming Sword of Truth

January 6th, 2016

Patti Negri is a witch who lives in a house buried deep in the Hollywood Hills.  Here Be Monsters producer Jeff Emtman and performance artist Lenae …

HBM053: Eleven Trips to Dreamworld

December 23rd, 2015

In 2014, Jeff Emtman mailed tape recorders to people around the world.  He asked them to keep the recorders by their beds and flip them on early in the morning as their dreams were still fresh in their minds.  Once the …

HBM052: Call 601-2-SATAN-2

December 9th, 2015

Christian prayer hotlines are common in the United States. Less common are prayer hotlines for the other guy.  Since 2012, the Satanic Missionary Society in Olympia, Washington has managed a Satanic prayer line on their …

HBM051: Sister Bethany, Proxy for the Dead

November 25th, 2015

Bethany Denton was about five years old when she learned that she was a Mormon. When she was eight, she learned that she was an eternal spirit …

HBM050: The Scientist is not the Angel of Death

November 11th, 2015

What's a life worth? About $25, before shipping.  At least, that's the case if you want a high-quality inbred lab mouse, like the C57BL/6J (in the biz, they just call them "black mice"). 

In this episode of Here Be …

HBM049: Sam's Japan Tapes

October 28th, 2015

When Sam Parker went to Japan to celebrate his mother's 60th birthday, he brought along a handheld audio recorder.  For the next few weeks, he …

HBM048: Barrie's Mental Tempest

October 14th, 2015

Barrie Wylie has heard voices for as long as he can remember. Growing up on a small island in Scotland, the voices in his head were like secret best …

HBM047: Peacocks Without Tails

September 30th, 2015

When Hippocrates noticed that the hair on the top of his head was falling out, he fought it by applying various ointments of opium to his scalp.  But none of them worked.  So he called it a disease and named it …

HBM045: Deep Stealth Mode (How To Be A Girl)

September 2nd, 2015

Marlo Mack gave birth to a son.  At least, she thought she did.  As a toddler, her son crawled towards dresses, wanted to be a princess, asked to grow long blonde hair.  And at age 3, Marlo's son requested to return to …

HBM044: Distant Warfare

August 19th, 2015

Bridget Burnquist was backpacking around Southeast Asia. After weeks of drinking cheap liquor on beautiful beaches, she was beginning to feel as …

Lying in a Stranger's Grave

August 5th, 2015

Carlos Gemora loved the feeling of the dirt at the cemetary where he used to dig graves.  One day he climbed down into the loamy, silty soil and looked up at the sky.  It felt like a womb... a death womb. 

This piece was …

HBM043: Last Chance To Evacuate Earth

July 22nd, 2015

Marshall Applewhite met Bonnie Nettles in 1972, and together they built a religion. It was called Heaven's Gate, and it drew heavily from the bible, …

HBM042: Deers

July 8th, 2015

Andy Wilson and Ryan Graves are best friends, despite having very different opinions on the hierarchy of human and animal life. The two come face-to-face with those differences after a fatal encounter on a frigid winter …

HBM041: Crossing the River, Feeling Watched

June 25th, 2015

In his junior year of high school, HBM host Jeff Emtman left his home and everything he knew to live and study in a tiny village nestled in the …

Fear of Silence

May 20th, 2015

HBM producers Jeff and Bethany are having more and more trouble bearing silence.

On this episode, Jeff calls back crow researcher Kaeli Swift and asks her what it was like to sit in silence with a stranger. And Bethany …

Forty Monster Bites

December 31st, 2014

Here's a little gift for you.  It's clips of every episode of Here Be Monsters.  You can use this page as a hub to your discovery of HBM.  As each clip plays, a comment will pop up in the bottom of the player.  Click …

HBM040: The Reformation Bible Puritan Baptist Church

October 29th, 2014

Eric Jon Phelps knows a lot of things.  He knows that the Pope controls the world.  He knows that it was the Jesuits who poisoned him in Tampa.  And …

HBM038: Do Crows Mourn Their Dead?

September 10th, 2014

Crows have really strange habits around death. When a bird dies, crows gather, squawking loudly and gathering as many other birds as they can find to come and look at the dead body.

Much of what we know about crow …

HBM037: Uncertain Death

July 30th, 2014

Recent episodes of Here Be Monsters have been largely about death.  So, on this episode David Alvarado and Jason Sussberg teach us about the exact opposite—immortality, living forever.  Their documentary film, The …

HBM036: Throw It In The Ocean

July 10th, 2014

Eric Chase's memory of April 19th, 1989 is largely a blur. On that day, he was aboard the USS Iowa, a World War 2 era battleship, equipped with some of the world's biggest cannons, capable of leveling a city block with …

HBM035: Spirits of the Past

June 26th, 2014

It was a group of businessmen in the late 19th century who originally invented the Ouija Board. They sold them in toy shops and promising questions …

HBM034: The Grandmother and The Vine Of The Dead

June 4th, 2014

Ayahuasca is one of the most powerful and most illegal hallucinogens in the world. It contains DMT. But, for as long as anyone can remember, it's …

HBM032: Fugitives of the Blue Laguna

May 7th, 2014

Back when David was a nerdy Oklahoman teenager, he fell in love with Stephanie. They both had angst towards their overbearing, conservative parents and they both wanted out.

So, when the opportunity presented itself, …

HBM031: The Roman Slug Death Orgy

April 23rd, 2014

In a strange, small, moss-covered forest in Bellingham, Washington, Jeff stumbled on to the most gruesome scene of hedonism he's ever seen.

While it's not common for humans to witness slug death orgies, every once in a …

HBM030: Crickets, Cadavars, and Conventional Wisdom

November 27th, 2013

This episode is a Grab-bag, it contains three segments that serve as follow-ups to the three most recent episodes of Here Be Monsters.

Part 1: …

HBM029: Do Crickets Sing Hymns?

November 17th, 2013

A bit of stunningly beautiful audio has surfaced online recently and it's riling up two different kinds of people--churchgoers and audio engineers. …

HBM028: Jonathan's Cadaver Paintings

October 31st, 2013

Jonathan Happ’s white lab coat and latex gloves make him look like a doctor when he stands in a room full of people. But he’s not a doctor…he’s an …

HBM027: Balancing Act

October 17th, 2013

For thousands of years, Western Medicine thought it had itself figured out. Everything came in fours. There were four sensations, four fluids in the body, four kinds of people, and four elements making up the world. …

HBM026: John Comes Down The Birth Canal

October 3rd, 2013

It was 40-odd years before John Hanneman figured out what the night terrors of his youth represented. In this episode, John describes the first trauma he experienced in life—something we all share. And he explains how …

HBM025: The Sasquatch of Pumpkintown VS Motley Crue Jon Bon Jovi

September 18th, 2013

Homemade Bigfoot costumes can get you in a lot of trouble. And in gun-toting community of Pumpkintown, SC, a fake Bigfoot costume might get you killed too. But when the recession caused a local outfitter’s store sales …

HBM024: The Friendliest Town In Texas

September 5th, 2013

Shoppingspree Clark showed up on the side of the road outside the “Friendliest Town in Texas” with nothing more than a sketchpad and the burnt-out …

HBM023: The Near Destruction of Rey Jaguar [Extended Cut]

August 21st, 2013

For lucha libre wrestlers, masks are everything. They wear them in the ring, they wear them to the grocery store, they wear them any time they appear in public. No one knows what face lies under that mask, so it makes …

HBM022: The Holy Ghost Fixes David's Brain

August 7th, 2013

David Blackshire Key has been called a douchebag more times than he can count. It's probably because he used to wear big sunglasses--day and night, indoors and out. He wasn't a movie star, he just had brain cancer.

HBM021: Potential Energy

July 24th, 2013

Season 2 of Here Be Monsters begins.

The reasons why I bike at night are diverse. It’s partly because I don’t feel graceful anywhere else, it’s partly …

HBM000: Hello There

January 1st, 2012

2:15

Here Be Monsters is a podcast about strange and unusual and beautiful and sometimes dark things.

Jeff Emtman started Here Be Monsters in 2012.

Here are …

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