Somewhere in the Skies - Punk Rock and UFOs: True Believers

Episode Date: July 30, 2018

On episode 67 of SOMEWHERE IN THE SKIES, Ryan welcomes Mike Damante back to the show to discuss his newly released follow-up book, Punk Rock and UFOs: True Believers. Punk Rock and UFOs: True Believers is a call to arms to the common populace and UFO community to come together to better understand the unexplained. It tackles topics like the process of belief, religion, mythology, popular culture, disclosure, media, advances, science, the unexplained, the UFO phenomena becoming mainstream all in a thought-provoking package aimed at the common reader, as well as the UFO community. In a time where UFOs are slowly creeping more and more into the mainstream consciousness, it is important that we as a society WANT to know the truth, and are actively seeking it. The book is a wake-up call to the every-day person and looks to bridge the gap to the UFO research community. The book was written to simultaneously synergize both groups to a higher level of thinking. This, and so much more, is discussed this week. We also get Mike's thoughts on the developments happening with To the Stars Academy and we even dive into his own personal beliefs on if we are truly being visited by some sort of non-human intelligence(s). Guest Bio: Mike Damante worked for the Houston Chronicle as a copy editor, writer, reporter and web producer. He currently produces their "MIKED" music blog and has interviewed bands and musicians like Bad Religion, Blink-182, Taking Back Sunday, Tom DeLonge, Tegan and Sara, Aerosmith, B.o.B and countless others. He’s appeared on Fox 26 Houston, Spectrum News Austin, “Somewhere In The Skies” podcast, Rogue Planet TV, “UFO Classified” with Erica Lukes, Radio Wasteland, Newsweek, the Houston Chronicle and other media outlet, and has been considered one of the “best fresh faces in the field." His work can all be found at:www.punkrockandufos.com The closing of the show this week features an X-Files Theme Cover Song written by Septembryo. To hear more, visit: www.septembryo.bandcamp.com Patreon: www.patreon.com/somewhereskies Official Store: CLICK HERE Website: www.somewhereintheskies.com Order Ryan's Book by CLICKING HERE Twitter: @SomewhereSkies Instagram: @SomewhereSkiesPod Opening Theme Song, "Ephemeral Reign" by Per Kiilstofte Closing Song, "I Want to Believe" by Septembryo SOMEWHERE IN THE SKIES is produced by Third Kind Productions, in association with eOne Entertainment Catch the show on KGRA Radio Network every Wednesday at 1am EST at: www.kgraradio.com Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/somewhere-in-the-skies. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey y'all, Ryan Sprague here. As you all know, the Somewhere in the Sky's podcast is always free to consume. But it isn't free to create. That's why I've started the Somewhere in the Sky's Patreon campaign. On a monthly basis, you give what you think the show is worth. You'll be helping the show continue, grow, and to be something truly communal. And remember, there are rewards for each level of contribution, and the list is only growing. So please, help Somewhere in the Skies now by becoming a page.

patron. To contribute and to learn more, visit www. www. patreon.com backslash SomewhereSkies. Thank you for your support. And now on with the show. Welcome to Somewhere in the Skies. I'm your host, Ryan Sprague. And today, we've got Mike DeMonte on the show. What I'm trying to say is, you know, that's such a big debate in, you know, in UIFology. And is disclosure, disclosure, everything has to be disclosure. You know, if it's not the full truth, you know, we don't want it. And it's such a very impatient, community. And I'm a very impatient person. I get that. But at the same time, it's just like, I feel like the standards are always so high. If it's not disclosure, it's, you know, we don't care.

And the thing is, outside of this, think about it for a minute, how much of the mainstream public really care about this topic. Now, I know it's becoming more mainstream and more acceptable. And I know a lot of people do believe, but how many people believe enough to actually read more about it or research about it? So that's what I'm trying to do with the book. It's trying to get people to kind of say, hey, maybe I should care about it. This is somewhere in the skies with Brian Sprague. That was True Believers by one of my favorite punk bands, The Bouncing Souls. And it was clearly an inspiration for today's guest, who you've heard on the show several

times before. But today is a very exciting day, because his new book has just crash landed all over the place. Punk rock and UFOs, true believers. That's right. We're talking to Mike DeMonte, host of the punk rock and UFO's blog. And author of Punk Rock and UFOs, Cryptozoology meets Anarchy. His most recent book flips us on our heads and makes us look at belief systems like never before. We dive deep into some of the most controversial and thought-provoking questions he poses in the book.

Who are these regular people researching extraordinary things? And what are the commonalities with those who aren't initiating? in the beliefs of the unknown. In a time where UFOs are slowly creeping more and more into the mainstream consciousness, it's important that we as a society want to know the truth and are actively seeking it. True believers is that wake-up call

that looks to bridge the gap between the UFO research community and the mainstream. So, without further ado, let's hear from today's guest, Mike Demonte. Mike DeMonte, Thank you for returning today, my man, to Somewhere in the Skies. Thank you for having me. Like I said, I think this is one of the first podcasts I was ever on. And I think, you know, Somewhere in the Skies has done a lot for punk rock and UFOs and you've done a lot for me.

So I love being back on. Thank you. Of course, my man. It is a give and take and I love the work you do. And it's just furthering every day, you know, with punk rock and UFOs, the blog. And now you've got a new book that is coming out. well, we'll be out by the time this airs. So I'm super excited to talk to you today about that, man.

But before we even get to that, what's been going on over at punk rock and UFOs, the website? Anything exciting going on over there right now? The most recent thing I post, I post an interview with Professor Jeffrey Kriple, who's a professor of Religious Studies at Rice University, which is located here in Houston where I live. That was probably a big interview I've done recently. I also have a few book reviews coming up. I like to review books as well as, as well as, as well as. to interview people on the site. So I have a couple of those coming up. Yeah, just trying to find stories. The thing with the web is, what the website is, I don't want to just post things that

other people are always posting. I kind of want to do, I kind of want to get more original content. And sometimes, you know, it's hard to do that. So that's why I always try to post when I feel I deem it necessary or I think it's interesting or newsworthy or something different. So I'm always trying to look for something I can do that's not just reporting or not just aggregating something else. Exactly. I love that quote. If you don't have something to say, don't say it. So why, you know, why keep recycling things over and over again? So that's what I always love. When you do drop a new article, it's always something thought provoking, something that not everyone's talking about and gets the conversation going. New fresh material, new questions to ask. So again, I love what you do over there. And I think the last time I had you on was tail end of 2017, wasn't it? When we did that year-end, right? wrap up. Yeah, Jason McClellan, MJ Benyerson yourself came on. And this was right, right, when, you know, to the Stars Academy was starting up. The New York Times article was released. So I have to ask, man, where do you personally stand right now, almost a year, a little under a year has passed

since we last spoke about all this. Where do you stand on all this right now? I think it's interesting. I think it's encouraging. I don't think it's the, it's going to, I think people have to be patient because whether it's it ends up being something you know that's that changes everything or if it doesn't i think it's going to be something that's not going to happen overnight i think it's it's cool that you know you see louis elizando is kind of in the forefront now tom the launch is kind of taking a step backwards and is concentrating more on you know the the other side of it the arts part of the to the stars academy and um i think i think that's a good thing yeah and like i said earlier I think people just have to be patient.

You know, like I said, whether it fails or to see, just give it time. Because for all the things they want to roll out, it doesn't seem like it's going to happen within a year, you know? Yeah, absolutely. I'm with you, man. I think, you know, last year I was kind of in a place. I'm like, oh, come on. Just, like, get it out there.

And now I'm slowly learning that we can't have this stuff shove down our throats. You know, it does have to be a gradual, I hate this term. I know MJ Benayas does as well. This drip, drip, disclosure. But that's kind of what we have to accept at this point if we want to continue following the work of Elizondo and DeLong and everyone else over at to the stars is if you want this stuff, you're going to have to wait because we are getting the information as we're giving it to you guys. You know, it's not like they're sitting on some huge treasure trove of information. It's slowly

being disclosed to them as well, I would assume. I mean, I'm no insider when it comes to to the Stars Academy, but, but yeah, it's fascinating. The videos they've released since we last spoke have been extremely compelling, and now we know that Skin Walker had a lot to do with this as well, and Bob Bigelow. So it's only getting more interesting and more strange as we move forward with all this. So I'm along for the ride, man. I know you are too. So, yeah, yeah, fascinating, exciting.

And I love the times we're living in now with UFO disclosure. Yeah, it's, it's fascinating. because, I mean, we're getting these videos and it's getting people to talk. And if people are talking, that's a good thing. So, I mean, that's all I could ask for right now. Exactly. My family is asking me about UFOs. And that's never happened before all this went down.

So that's all we could really ask for. Well, Mike, the real reason we're here today is to talk about your follow-up book to punk rock and UFOs. And that is true believers. So I have to ask before we get into sort of the meat of what the book is about, what made you want to write a follow-up book? and why did you choose this overall theme of true believers? I'm fascinated by that. So I wanted to write a follow-up book because, you know,

I felt like my first book got a lot of people talking. And I saw that people were interested in what I had to say about the topic. I was like, well, they may be interested in what else I have to say about it. What comes next? And there are things I would have done differently about the first book. So all those things I had problems with or I wanted to tweak, I kind of took what I learned from that one and applied it to the same. second one. I wanted to write a book that was, it's different. It's, it's more researched. It tackles

some of the same topics, but from a different angle. I wanted to write a book that, that the UFO researcher could pick up and the everyday person could pick up and still be both groups of people. There'll be synergy in between them. You know, there's something that they can both pull from it. It's easy enough where the average person will understand it and it's thought provoking enough for someone involved in UFOology to make them, you know, think about some things. I kind of went in with that idea. I wanted to write a book that kind of pulled from those two groups of people. But also, I really wanted to kind of have a book to be a call to action, a persuasive text, kind of, if you will, about why this stuff's important, why people should care?

Because the first book, you know, kind of asked, you know, why do we rebel against our certain belief systems, our process of belief? And this is kind of arguing why we should care about it. So, hence the title of True Believers, which is also a song of a, a song title from the band The Bouncing Souls, which is a punk rock band. So it kind of goes to the brand, too. It kind of worked. And I thought it was very catchy and clever. So I thought it just kind of fit together, the name, the working title, and then thematically everything in the book. And it just kind of came together really well.

Yeah, man. And ever since you released the cover of the book to the public, and I saw it. And I remembered that song by The Bouncing Souls. I've been blasting it nonstop in my apartment. My neighbors must hate me at this point. But, dude, it's so, it's invigorating. And when you mix UFOs with punk rock, it's just there's nothing like it. And there's no one like you doing that out there.

So when it comes to belief. Now, these are some chapters that really stuck out to me. This book is a very quick read for anyone out there. It's easily accessible, digestible. and what I really enjoy about what you do is you bring theories to the table. You're not just throwing info into the book from Wikipedia and publishing it. You're actually putting the things out there and asking questions of it. And that came first for me in Chapter 2, and that's the God Complex.

You know, being part of the title, belief plays a huge part in the entire UFO question. And you cover religion in Chapter 2, which is, you know, super risky, I would say, to sort of start the book off with, but I loved it. I loved that you just kind of went there. So could you tell us a bit more about why you wanted to tackle UFOs and religion to begin with so early on in the book? Well, I think because it goes against so many people's preconceived beliefs, you know, what they were taught up, you know, people who are religious, you know, they're taught a certain thing and they go together, you know, it's not, it's not like pick or choose, choose your size. It's not, you know, religion or this. I really think that there's some parallels that can be

drawn there. I'm not a religious person. I find these stories in religion fascinating, but I'm not, I don't go to church or anything. I'm agnostic. But I think there's possibly some truths in some of these religious stories. And I wanted to start with that chapter just because once again, it's people's process of belief. I want to jump right in there and hit them right from the start. People who may not be a non-believer, you know, and stuff we believe in, you know, UFOs and ufology.

And I just kind of wanted to get, you know, to question their own beliefs and say, well, we believe in this, why can't we believe in this? So that's kind of why, yeah, it's kind of why I kind of jumped right into that from the start. Right. And you really jumped into it when you pointed out the Betty Andreessen abduction, which we covered extensively on a early episode of Somewhere in the skies. Now, you have to tell me, you and I have talked extensively about this case as well, the religious undertones or overtones to this entire case. It's just, it's right out there. So I would love, maybe if you could give us sort of a brief overview of the Andreessen affair and why you

chose to include it into this chapter. It's really interesting. Well, I chose to include it because I read the book and I was blown away. I love books. I love the UFO books about abductions and about hypnosis and regressions. I love hearing those stories. And that was out for me. What stood out for me is, you know, the revisitations, they were very specific and there were specific religious imagery that was coming through to her, you know, in these, in her abductions and in her regressions. And I always wondered if, you know, is that part of whatever she was experiencing because what she experienced was real to her? Now, was that something she was really seeing or was that her pre-established beliefs mixing in with it? And that mystery was really fascinating. So that's why I wanted to include

that, because you have this religious memory like the Phoenix, which appears. in Christianity, appears in Egyptian mythology. You know, so that was something I really wanted to include just because she was somebody who was previously a very religious person. And she had her belief system kind of flipped on its, on his tail, you know, when this happened to her. So, you know, this happens to everyone. And I thought it was a, it was key to include it in that chapter just because of all

the religious overtones that happened to her. Exactly. And I've spoken to many witnesses who claim some sort of. spiritual connection or, you know, almost like miraculous experience during an interproduction experience or a UFO sighting. You know, one woman in particular and another gentleman I spoke to, they prayed that the event would stop and it stopped. So you really do have to wonder your perception, your beliefs, your structure of belief throughout your life. Does that influence what you're experiencing or vice versa? So yeah, I found that really fascinating.

And then another person that you spoke to that we mentioned earlier that you interviewed for your blog and in the book was Jeffrey Krippel. What did he have to say about religion and how it sort of influences the perception of a UFO event? What was really telling when I talked to him is what he said that the Bible is filled with what we would call paranormal stories. And I'm going to read his quote directly. The quote's in the book. It's also on the interview I did with him on punk rock and UFOs.com. It says we have people telling a story with abilities and it's miraculous or an actual. act of God. If these paranormal abilities belong to another community, a competing or warning

community, then they are magic or witchcraft. So it's interesting how, like, you know, what he's saying is basically people can code these different abilities that, you know, are they angelic? Are they evil? Right. It just depends on what tribe they belong to. So that was really interesting that his response to the Bible is filled what we would call paranormal stories. And you think about it, the Bible is full of paranormal and outlandish and mythical. amazing, like, you know, stories that sound impossible. Absolutely, man. I mean, levitating on water, turning water into wine.

It's all there. It is. It's like the biggest paranormal book out there if you really think about it. Well, let's move on to chapter four. This one really, really caught my attention as well. This was titled Destination Unknown. And this immediately brought to mind Josh Gates and Aaron Ryder and all these really cool people. that I know you and I both follow in these worlds.

But before we get to that, you allude to research into cryptids, you know, not just UFOs, being hindered by the limitations of travel, you know, logistics, all this sort of stuff. You know, you talked about how there are these really isolated areas 2,000 miles away from civilization. So how do we investigate those areas? How do we know what's going on there? That really, really stuck with me. I've never really thought of it that way. So could you sort of maybe comment on some of these examples you came up with in terms of like locations and geography having a lot to do with UFO investigations? Well, one of the things I go back to with this is you need people who care enough to research it, right?

You need resources. You need to go on expeditions. And this is something that if you believe it's out there and you're going to research, this needs to be done constantly. When I interviewed Aaron Ryder from Destination Truth, what she was telling me was a lot of these. production limitations they have. You know, they're in these parts of the world, which are sometimes dangerous, not just geographically, but also sociopolitically, are dangerous places to be. And they're out there for about two or three days, you know, in not safe conditions.

And what is the chance, the percentage that you're going to happen to see Bigfoot in that three-day window that you're there? Right. So that's why so many of these shows are so inconclusive, which is kind of a tease to the viewer. but, I mean, as long, you know, you're not going to, you know, it's almost a one million chance to find something because anytime someone ever cites something, it's always by accident. You know, it's very rare that somebody goes out to find, you know, a loctus monster or a chupacra or any cryptid and they actually see something. So, yeah, I think it kind of goes with having the want to research these things and the abilities to do so.

Absolutely. You know, and another person who really wanted to do that that you found was a hero of mine. I was huge into WWE, the Hardy Boys, all those guys, Christian Edge. They were my heroes, man, growing up, Royal Rumbles. And Lita, Lita, you know, this kick-ass girl in the WVE, you got to interview her about her roadshow that she's doing, about UFOs. So I have to ask, how the hell did this girl get interested in UFOs? And how'd you get hooked up with her? And what's going on with that?

Honestly, I met her years ago at a Comic-Con thing, and she doesn't remember. But somehow, she may have posted something about, no, Renee Young, who works with WWE. She posted a photo of her in Lita. They were at Roswell or something like that. And I may have commented on it. I don't know how it started, but she started following me back on Twitter. And we just started having discussions about UFOs And I knew she was out these places

Exploring these things recreationally This is before she decided to kind of film it And she just decided to do it DIY You know, she was in talk to some companies that fell through And I mean, I think she has the resources to do so So she got interested in this stuff She was telling me she just went on a UFO tour In Arizona and she was blown away by it

And that's all it took. It took that tour And her show is more based on the human aspect of it Which I think whenever she comes on your show was going to be great because your book is very based on a similar, the human interaction. Her show is kind of more about the, it's a little bit more kitsch, you know, the kitsch elements of it, but it's still kind of the human factor of people who are interested in this stuff too. So yeah, I've been a big wrestling fan for years, so it was kind of cool to, you know, I was the one to break the story that she was having a show and she wanted me to do so. So that was very flattering because, like I said, I grew up.

I mean, I still watched wrestling in this day. So that was really cool. Absolutely, man. And I mean, she's in a punk band, so there's full circle right there. And again, just the idea that, like, these people who are not necessarily in the UFO field are getting interested and bringing it to a new audience, more people who can now look at this topic and be like, there's something to this. There you go right there. It's just like it's spreading. It's becoming more mainstream.

And we'll get into that a little bit later. But I love it. I love that chapter. The next chapter that really stuck out. to me was chapter 10 of the book, Revolution Science. I love the titles of your chapters, by the way, man. You can tell you're a journalist. You hook them right from the title. So in this chapter, you propose technologies, you know, scientific advancements, and how they may sort of play into a furthering the research of UFOs, everything from like hotspots of UFO

activity, dark energy, natural resources, DMT, like it was all over the place. I loved it. And you spoke to many different types of scientists, even. Would you care to sort of elaborate on, you know, maybe some of the thoughts and theories of the individuals you interviewed for this chapter? In this chapter, some of the people I spoke to was more just kind of the way the stuff is viewed by the scientific community. How it's kind of like a pseudoscience. That's what I wanted to get people's insights who are in academia or involved in any type of science. I want to kind of get their insights to it.

But what I also want to include is some of the advanced. that mainstream sciences are doing. The fact that, you know, a University of Texas approved, I believe it was a $40 million upgrade to its telescope to study dark energy. Like, that says something. You know, that mainstream sciences are starting to break from the tradition in the mold and start to kind of go other places in terms of what they research. Like I said, some of the people I spoke to in this chapter was Greg Grafton, who is the frontman

of the band Bad Religion. He's also a PhD professor at Cornell, UCLA. He teaches evolutionary biology. And then another thing I kind of cover was how John Hopkins University is seeking out people who have seen beings or entities for a study while in the drug of DMT, which I talked about in my first book as well. So that kind of comes together too and how people are kind of saying DMT represents a spirit molecule. And this goes back to kind of the theory I proposed in the first book that, you know, what if our soul, quote unquote soul is our consciousness and it lives on and it goes to the goes to the, it goes to the, these places of the universe that we cannot currently get to you in our current physical state. And, you know, these are some ideas that are actually starting to be looked into by mainstream science.

Quantum physics, my man. I love it. Speaking of physics the other day, so I was out of town. I was in Chicago. I was with my girlfriend and her friends and her friend's brother was there and my first time meeting him and he's going to get his master's, he's going to try to be a physicist. So the topic came up about, you know, what I'm into. We talked about, you know, UFOs. And he's, he says mathematically, absolutely, there's other dimensions and there's other universes out there. He's like, and he said mathematically, there's no denying it. Although that was very interesting, somebody who's going into this mainstream field who says, you know, mathematically,

you cannot disqualify these possibilities. Absolutely. And so many other physicists have agreed with that. It's just, it's, it's ridiculous to think otherwise, I think, at this point, at least mathematically. And if you're looking at it mathematically, this is the most structured thing we have on this planet in possibly the only way we could communicate with some other intelligence out. So if you have someone like that coming forward and saying, there is something out there, there are other dimensions or worlds or ways to jump through and get there. Like, that's, that's exciting to me. And that shows that even the younger minds now getting into the physics realm are willing to look at these topics and be like, yeah, yeah, definitely. We're

open to it, and we hope there is other life out there, at least the people I've spoken to. In this chapter as well, man, you brought up a case that I, as a UFO researcher, should know about, but have absolutely never heard of. That was the Lake Bacal case in Siberia. What the hell is this, man? Could you give me a little bit of information on this? So brief summary of it. So it's really fascinating because I kind of lead in about how I talk about U.S.os a little bit, you know, which are basically underwater UFOs and how so many sightings appear, you know, by, by Navy bases or by waters or people, a lot of sightings happen by waters, especially military base. So I kind of went this to that idea that maybe we should start looking underwater instead of in the skies for these answers. And that brought me to this case, which is where there was Russian divers.

They were in this lake, Lake Lake McHale, and they saw what it looked basically were three aliens. I think it was three. I forgot the number. but there was basically aliens underwater, and all they had on was just a very primitive-looking mask, like a breathing apparatus. And they were just swimming in the water. And apparently one of the Russian divers got too close to them. And next thing you know, they were rocketed from the water onto shore where they died, where the person died. Oh, my God.

So it's mind-blowing. Like, you know, I mean, so many of these stories are here, even if a, a, of a, uh, a, uh, uh, a, uh, a person died. 25% of them are true. You know, it's still amazing. Absolutely. You know, my colleague and someone a lot of people may know in the show, Nick Pope, I love his response to most UFO accounts, and it's extraordinary, if true. And that's kind of what we have to rely on at this point.

You know, I'm all about the human aspect, witness testimony, and that's where I stand, man. You know, anytime I hear a story, it's interesting, if true. and sometimes that's all we can rely on is witness testimony when it comes to these things and for me I love that I'll let other people deal with the you know the trace evidence and the documents and all that all that good stuff stick me with a human being in a room let me see how they're reacting and that's all I need to know that something either did happen to this person or it did not so it's where I land on that one but the Lake Pical case I'm going to have to look into this one so we're moving on to chapter 11 strange

than fiction. This was an interesting one too, man. You, you trace fiction throughout history and how it may actually be based around nonfiction or vice versa, you know, when dealing with others coming from the sky and things like this. So would you care to touch a little bit about on the theories that you brought about in this chapter? So this chapter was probably my favorite chapter to write just because it pulls in so many things that I'm interested in, not just you have followed in cryptosology, but, pop culture, mythology, the unknown. And one of the things going into it was, you know, I did a story on the website that I interviewed you for, I believe, as well. I was talking about how a lot of people who are interested in this topic tend to eventually write fiction down the line. I mean, you look at Billy Schreiber, who is a fiction author first before his, you know,

before his, his not-fiction career. You know, he was talking about what happened to him. So that, for me, it was always like, well, are the lines being blurred? So I kind of, you know, I was always kind of against this idea of people who, not necessarily people who write fiction and writing nonfiction, but I always, it kind of, you know, the idea of, you know, we have this idea of a slow disclosure through pop culture. And I was always kind of like, oh, that's not necessary.

You know, there's the idea that Hollywood's been making these films and, you know, these, these, these, these fiction franchises, you know, just as a way to kind of soften the blow to some of these things. And I was always kind of like, oh, that's not needed. And I still, to the state, think that. But, you know, the lines are blurred in a good way as well. I think it all kind of goes together. I think you see mythology, which is, I think, influenced by real life, religion, which is influenced by real life.

Folklore, all these things are influenced by something. You know, one of the things I kind of went to was not just mythology, but, you know, the idea of, you know, gods among men. And that's kind of a big thing in the movie Batman or Superman, which I know, was kind of pan by critics, but I'm a big fan of it because I like how Zach Snyder took this idea of what would it be like if we had in a real world situation, God's living among men, alien beings coming down. How would people react to Superman in a real world? And there's a line in that movie from Lex Luthor when he talks about the meta-human thesis, the idea of behind our myths,

gods among men. That was really fascinating to me because it's like all these stories, you know, all these superheroes, it all comes from something else. And one of the books I'm reading right now, it's from Jeffrey Kriple. It's called Mutant Mewin. mystics. It kind of goes in a further detail about that. So it was always fascinating to me that there's a lot of parallels to be drawn between what science research is and what science fiction is. You look at what you have in comic books. You have this idea of alternate universes and different worlds. And one of the guys I talked to for the book was David Marquez, who is an artist and he's part of the creative team at Marvel Comics. And I want to get his take about what is this

idea about how, you know, we kind of, you know, fiction always plays with the idea of multiple universes and alternate versions of you and, you know, how our universe works and how fiction plays a part of that or how they're influenced by that, by what science studies and so forth. I think it's kind of vice versa as well. So that was really fascinating to me. And, you know, you have these reports that there is Nordic looking aliens that look just like us. And they almost look like Nordic gods like Odin or Thor.

And you go back to mythology and you go, hmm, what if there was true to that? What if that mythology was true? What if these alien visitors were just like us? So all these fictional stories, who knows, you know, if they're fiction anymore? What they are is their stories. And that's why it's kind of entitled Stranger Than Fiction, because, you know, we don't know, but there's so many parallels. Yes, there are. And the one thing I always come back to is, you know, people like Arthur C. Clark or Gene Roddenberry, these bohemists of science fiction, how unbelievably intelligent they are.

to sort of use science fiction as a catapult of either influencing our future or what our future could become. And that's always really stuck with me is a lot of these things we look at in fiction, you know, 30, 40, 50, 100 years ago are now coming true. And again, it's that that tandem of did it influence us? Did our literature and stories throughout time influence us moving forward? or is it just they were able to see so far ahead of where we were heading? It's fascinating. And I'm really happy you included this chapter because I could see an entire book written just about this topic and having to do with UFOs as well.

So, yeah, yeah, this is definitely one of my favorites as well, then. The next chapter that I really like the title of, this is Party on Apocalypse. This is an NFG song, right? Yep. Yeah, I knew it. I knew it. one of my all-time favorite bands growing up. I actually went to see Blink and Newfound Glory one summer in my hometown of Syracuse, New York.

NFG was opening for Blink, and I left after NFG finished. That's how much I loved then. That was a great show. It was Blink, Newfound Glory, and Midtown. Yes, yep, that was the tour. Exactly. Yeah, that was, I missed those days, man. That may have been one of my first concerts I ever went to, I think, as a kid.

Really? Oh, wow. nostalgia at its best. Newfound Glory just played here in L.A. a couple weeks ago. I wasn't able to make it. But, oh, well, such his wife. But, again, party on apocalypse. I love this title.

We are talking a lot about end of days and doom and gloom being sort of told to us from these symbols and these beings that people supposedly come into contact with. And the cover of your book is Pyramid. And I want to sort of dive to that with you here because you talk a lot about symbology and messages throughout different

types of mysteries, you know, the pyramids, the Freemasons, and whatnot. And again, acclaimed abductees say that they've been given these messages by other intelligences as well. You know, stop destroying the planet. Don't do this. Do this. So would you care to elaborate what you were really trying to go for when it came to this chapter? I kind of wanted to relay the idea that these people are having these same experiences or similar experiences. And these have been happening since the beginning of time. And this is before the internet. So before people had the means to, if they wanted to create a fictional story or a hoax, these were happening to people. And the fact that, you know, there are structures on the planet

that are the same. Before there was those means of communication, the fact that you have pyramids or pyramid-like structures all over the world, whether you believe in Pangea or, you know, the ancient astronaut theory, I think there's something there. So, yeah, the reason why I chose the pyramid on the cover of the book, I came up with this idea of a very simple design of a triangle because the shape of a triangle shows up a lot too in Ufology and Freemasonry. It shows up in a lot of things. So the idea of the shape of a triangle, and then I put seven signs going out of it. The number seven is symbolic as well, but I wanted to have this very simplistic design. And when the artist came back with it, it almost looked like a cave drawing.

and it looked really cool, and they decided to put it in front of an actual pyramid. I just wanted to have the shape. But I think it really does a good job of kind of bringing in, you know, this idea of true believers and throughout time this belief system. Yeah, absolutely. I love the cover, and I do love that they added the pyramid because it does. It evokes this idea of these things have been happening far longer than any of us can even imagine. And, you know, I spoke to an Egyptologist a few weeks ago at AlienCon here in L.A., put on by ancient aliens.

And someone asked him, all right, man, you know, with ancient aliens, do they really think that aliens came here and built the pyramids? And he was the first to say, no, no, that's not what we're saying. We're saying that throughout time, Egyptians in specific, were given messages from the gods. We're given messages about how to prosper, how to thrive, how to thrive, how to. to create a civilization, a society. And we hear this throughout time, that people are given messages on how to do things, how to further humanity. And his big thing is, we're not saying aliens built the pyramids. We're saying possibly the Egyptians were given messages on how to do it. And that's what led them forward and made them do these incredible things that people don't

think human beings could do. But we are far more capable than most people give us credit for. and that's what I found really interesting. And right there, you've got the pyramids, and that's on the cover of your book. So this is a really interesting one. It really made me think, and I'm glad you covered that one. The last chapter I really wanted to touch on with you

is the big D word that a lot of people don't like, but a lot of people do like, and that is disclosure. Chapter 19, disclosure closure. I love this quote that you had in this chapter, and it's quote, the thing is, disclosure doesn't mean a damn thing if we as a public don't care enough.

So right there, man, that says so much. So what were you trying to say with this quote before I try to decipher it? What I'm trying to say is, you know, that's such a big debate in, you know, in UIFology and is disclosure, disclosure, everything has to be disclosure. You know, if it's not the full truth, you know, we don't want it. And it's such a very impatient community.

And I'm a very impatient person. I get that. But at the same time, it's just like, I feel like the standards are always so high. If it's not disclosure, it's, you know, we don't care. And the thing is, outside of this, think about it for a minute, how much of the mainstream public really care about this topic? Now, I know it's becoming more mainstream and more acceptable. And I know a lot of people do believe, but how many people believe enough to actually

read more about it or research about it? So that's what I'm trying to do with the book. It's trying to get people to kind of say, hey, maybe I should care about it. And one of the things is it's hard because there's so many challenges. I mean, we live in a world where things are progressively getting worse as a human race. We have things to worry about. We have families. We have finances.

We have, you know, we have interest. We have all these things on our plate. We have work, you know, that it's hard to find the time. I love all the podcasts. I love you and all the other podcasts as well. I wish I had time to listen to every single one. Every month or a while I'm able to get one in here and there. But, you know, it's hard.

So think about it, you know, to get the average, the public to kind of invest their free time. And one of the things I mentioned on the side, I did a story on the website about what we do for day jobs. And, you know, a lot of us don't do this for a living. You know, we do this for no money. I mean, you know, this is as well as I do in terms of being an author. You know, we don't see any, you know, we don't see much money from writing books. You know, we're not Stephen King. We don't have a million dollar signing contract.

You know, we do this because we're passionate about it. We enjoy it. We're interested about it. And we're trying to get the word out there. And so I think that's another thing. It's another barrier we have is that people have to be interested and they have to have the time to do so. So if the mainstream public doesn't care, disclosure doesn't mean the thing. I mean, Project Blue Book, whether it's, you know, 100% accurate or not, that should have been a huge story.

It wasn't. Did people outside of our community care? No, not one bit. Not one bit. And something like that, you would kind of say, oh, wow, that's eye opening. You know, you would think. but nobody's there. Yeah, I mean, I've had so many people come up to me since, you know, the trailer for this new

Hynek television series dropped called Project Blue Book coming up to me and be like, dude, Ryan, is this real? Like, did they actually have an Air Force project that investigated UFOs? Yeah, like fucking 40 years ago. Come on, guys. You know, and then the whole A-TIP thing going on now, that was huge news, you know, for us, at least, in the UFO community. and we thought for the mainstream, but then within weeks, it was kind of 10th page news in the newspaper at that point.

I do give credit to some people out there, even Tucker Carlson on Fox News of all things, that continues to cover this topic and bring Luis on, bring Nick Pope on, and ask really good questions about UFOs. So there are some people out there who care, but like you said, maybe not enough to really get the interest there. when at the end of the day, the way I kind of look at it, man, is we can either waste our energy in trying to legitimize the topic and get more people interested, or we can keep researching and try to tap into these mysteries and get answers for ourselves. This is a very personal topic, I think, for every person heavily involved in it. Yeah, we want the truth out for the public, but at the end of the day, we want the truth for ourselves. We want to know our purpose,

why these things are happening, why it may have touched our lives or not touched our lives. And that's what's always fascinated me. This is a very selfish and personal topic. It means something different to each and every person. And I think you really tapped into this with true believers, at least in my opinion. So I guess I kind of want to wrap it things up here is ask, in saying true believers, what do you make of this entire topic in general? Do you believe, that we are being visited. Do you believe this is a topic that could ultimately change humanity if we are being visited? What do you think is Mike DeMonte?

I'm going to put you on the spot here, man. Well, first I want to go back to what you said, how there's, you know, we have these groups of people who want, who are doing their research, and we have these groups, people who are interested in it. And that's a synergy that I kind of want the book to create. You know, we have these, you know, these millionaires and billionaires like Elon Musk and Bigelow who are actually putting their money into research and stuff. But we also, like I said, we also need a public to care about it as well.

So I think they kind of go hand in hand. I don't think it's an either-or thing. I think you kind of need to have both going forward. Because you're right, it is a selfish thing. You know, we kind of want answers for ourselves as well. But, you know, we want a populace to be able to share these answers with and to them to actually care. And it's hard because, you know, the new cycle is dominated with so many other things going on right now. It's hard to get this stuff, you know, in the media.

But you had to go back to your question. Yes, I do believe you're being visited. I do think it's one of the greatest questions of our time. And I think the answers are there. I think they're in our mythology. You can pick from some religion too. You could, you know, they're in sciences. They're all there.

But the thing is you kind of have to suspend some of your disbeliefs or what your belief systems are to kind of accept some of these ideas and these theories that may sound so far out. You know, people are so dismissive of stuff. If it's not, you know, if it's not what they previously believed that science can do or what they previously taught before, you know, they're so opposed to it. And I have friends who are really educated, really smart people who are just like, no, we'd never been visited. And they're just like so adamant about it. And it's like, why can't you open up your mind to that possibility? Because a lot of these people don't read the stuff that we do.

They don't look into some of the avenues that we do that are against mainstream ways of thinking. And I think that's where you have to start. You have to basically say, well, what if? My first book, you know, I talked about as a journalist, you'll learn to question everything, which you should do. You know, you should be skeptical. You should question everything. But also, you should always pose the question, what if, because, you know, history is changing,

and I believe so is science. I don't think they're definite. This episode is brought to you by Netflix. Most valuable promotions in Netflix are hosting a blockbuster triple headliner Saturday, May 16th. Rhonda Rousey returns to face fellow woman's MMA pioneer, Gina Carrano, and the main event. Plus co-main's Nate Diaz versus Mike Perry.

And the best have you wait in the world, Frances Ngano, versus Feliz. Lince. Watch Ronda Rousey versus Gina Carrano, live only on Netflix. Saturday, May 16th at 9 p.m. Eastern Center time, 6 p.m. Pacific time. Absolutely. I, you know, I always come back to that quote. People forget that there's going to be a 22nd century, a 23rd century.

Science changes. We have to go along for that ride and know that things we once thought are going to be shattered into a million little pieces that we're going to have to pick up in a whole new light. So I guess, you know, closing things up here, true believers, it's out tomorrow from when this is going to release. So where can we find the book and more about what you're up to? Punkrock and UFOs.com will be, you'll be able to, there'll be links on there. You could also go to Amazon and Barnes & Noble.com as well. Also, if you live in Houston, Texas, they'll be at the River Oaks bookstore.

You'll be able to buy physical copies there as well. Like I said, it's going to be available in physical and digital formats, your Kindle, your iTunes, what have you. And yeah, but punk rocking UFOs is a good way to, good site to go to see what I'm up to you in terms of after the book and stories and reviews and research and other things I'm going to be doing after the book. So, yeah, punk rockinginfos.com or follow me on Twitter as well at Mike Demonte, my name. That's how to find me. Perfect, man. And I'm going to say this right now. The more I do this show and the more I research this topic, the more skeptical I become.

And I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing. But after reading True Believers, I'm going to tell you right now, I am leaning more towards the Believers side every chapter I dive into with this book, man. So congratulations. I think this is a great book for anyone out there who's new to the topic or a veteran. It's going to open your eyes, for sure. And I can't wait to see what comes next for punk rock and UFOs, Volume 3. Thank you so much, Ryan. Like I said, I appreciate it. I'm a big supporter of your show and your friendship. I really appreciate it, all that stuff. And yes, there will be a volume three, hopefully one day, hopefully, to complete the trilogy. Yes, we all know trilogies are the best, and we eagerly await that with open eyes and open minds, my man.

So thank you again for coming on Summer in the Skies. Thank you. That's it for this week's episode. My thanks again to Mike for coming on the show. Be sure to grab punk rock and UFO's true believers at your local bookstore or order it online at Amazon or at Mike's website. where he's constantly posting some of the best articles on UFOs out there today. That's punk rock and UFOs.com. Somewhere in the Skies was recently a featured banner on iTunes, Canada.

And it's because of you, the listeners. Thank you to all my Canadian listeners out there, and now we have to give it a try here in the United States and beyond. If you have a few moments, please subscribe, rate, and review somewhere in the skies on iTunes and Apple. podcasts. It helps us become visible to new listeners, and then we can ask new questions of the UFO phenomenon together. We're on Twitter at SomewhereSkies and Instagram at SomewhereSkies pod. We also have a very active Facebook group. Just search for Somewhere in the Skies podcast and ask for an invite, and I'll let you in. Just behave yourselves. For past episodes, articles, and contact

information, visit the official website, Somewhere in the skies.com. Thank you to the E1 Podcast Network, KGRA Radio, and to you for listening. To continue our journey with the True Believers, I leave you with this awesome X-Files theme cover by musician Septembroio. Check them out on all music outlets and at septembroio.com.com. I will see you here next week, True Believers. And remember, keep your feet on the ground, but never stop searching somewhere in the skies. Heart's ways to find the future In the Skies is produced by Third Kind Productions

in association with the Entertainment One Podcast Network. To learn more, visit Entertainment One Podcast.com. I'm Rosie. And I'm Derek. Welcome to Rabbit Hole Motel. You can check out anytime you like, but I can never leave. And I can just sort of come and go, whatever. Each week, we open a new room to discover strange true tales and mysteries

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