Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Doug Brod: Toronto Mike'd #1597

Episode Date: December 10, 2024

In this 1597th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with Toronto Star editor Doug Brod about his career in New York writing for Entertainment Weekly, Spin and elsewhere before moving to Toronto. His latest book is Born with a Tail: The Devilish Life and Wicked Times of Anton Szandor LaVey, Founder of the Church of Satan. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, The Yes We Are Open podcast from Moneris and RecycleMyElectronics.ca. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail]

Welcome to episode 1597 of Toronto Miked. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times, and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta! Enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. Season 7 of Yes We Are Open, an award-winning podcast from Minaris, hosted by FOTM Al Greggo. Recycle MyElectronics.ca, committing to our planet's future, means properly recycling our electronics of the past.

And Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. Joining me today, making his Toronto Mike debut. It's always exciting when someone makes their Toronto Mike debut. It's Doug Broad. Welcome Doug. Glad to be here, Mike. Glad to have you here. I mentioned to you when you arrived that this is the first time in the illustrious history

of this podcast, and that's almost, I don't know, 12 and a half years or something. This is the first time I recorded three, not one and not two, three episodes of Toronto Mic'd in the same day. That's a first. That's a lot of talking. So listen, I warned you. I said you're gonna have to carry the load here. I'm out of gas. You know, you're gonna have to do this one yourself, so go! I'm happy to. But I'm happy to meet you. When I announced that Doug Broad was making his Toronto Mic debut, a number of people put up their hand to say hello to you. The first one being Gilles LeBlanc.

Gilles LeBlanc, yes I work with him at the Toronto Star. Do you see that article hanging on the wall and making you turn all the way right? Do you see it? I saw when I walked in do you know who wrote that article Jill LeBlanc and guess who? Commissioned that article me is that true. It is true. Okay. I need some info On that note, I'm gonna crack open a Great Lakes beer because I'm you know overwhelmed by that fun fact. Hold on here. Yeah, Gilles actually suggested it and I said, yeah, let's do it. All right, we're going to get you right in front of that mic, my friend. So Gilles had the idea because he's a big listener and he's like, there's this guy in

the South Atopal Basement who just recorded episode 1000 and he's talking to great people, not just Ed Keenan, not just Ben Rayner, you know, not just David Ryder, but he's got all these interesting people on. And he came to you and said, hey, we should do this. And you said, like, did you have to think about it? Give me a little insight. Not really, no. I trust his judgment and I thought it was an interesting

story to pursue and to be honest with you, that was a couple of years ago. And I'm a recent arrival to Toronto, five years, from New York. So when I got the job at the Star, one of the things I wanted to do was to sort of familiarize myself with a lot of the culture that's going on here. When he pitched the story, I'm like, yeah, to sort of familiarize myself with a lot of the culture that's going on here. When he pitched the story, I'm like, yeah, this is an interesting story, let's do it. Thank you so much.

No, you've just, I might have to put you in the FOTM Hall of Fame after I'm learning this. So Jill comes up with the idea, pitches it to you, you say, go ahead. So you came from New York five years ago, and I'm assuming that was for a job at the Tronistar. No, you would be assuming incorrectly. You know, I'm gonna fire my crack research staff.

So can we do this? So you have a new book that I read. It is about the founder of the Church of Satan. And I'm here, I'm vamping because I'm scrolling down my notes. I'm gonna get this name. I'm gonna get this name I'm gonna get the proper name of this book. I know you know the name, but I want to know the name Yes, it is called born with a tale and it's about Anton Lavey and he's the founder of the Church of Satan and he wrote a biography about him and we're gonna get into that so

Everybody listening who's a member of the Church of Satan, all you Anton LeVay heads out there who wanna talk about this fascinating person, we're gonna get to that, but off the top, I need to know more about you, where you've been, where you've written. So I'm gonna burn through a couple more notes that came in and then we're gonna do like your biography, is that okay? Yeah, sure.

And by the way, thank you for not correcting me. It's born of a tale, but there's more to that title. Okay, you got more words in that title. The devilish life and wicked times of Anton Zander-Levay, founder of the Church of Satan. It's a mouthful. You know what, you gotta get the keywords in there now, right, it's not just, you gotta get those keywords

for search engine optimization, it's important. Absolutely. Okay, where do we begin begin my friend? You tell me what? Okay, so I've got my notes Oh, yeah, I'm gonna burn through these FOTM knows my apologies Okay, so Bob Wegener wrote in and said tell Doug I say hi. He's a great writer Bob Wegener Wow, yes, of course I funny story. So I met Bob backstage at a Darkness concert at the Phoenix Concert Hall. Excuse me. Yeah, so a couple of years ago, I went to the show and I had my first book with me. My first book is called They Just Seem a Little Weird, How Kiss, Cheap Trick, Aerosmith and

Stars Remade rock and roll. And I knew the darkness were in town and I knew the darkness. I knew Justin, I had written about him, I had written about the band many, many times. And I met him many years ago and I told him I was coming and I'd want to give him the book. He said, sure, come on.

And then after the gig, went into a room backstage and Bob was there because Bob knew Justin as well and I met Bob and we talked about our you know our our our fanaticisms and he told me about his major book he was right Max Webster Max Webster it's a very good book it's beautiful he showed me a copy of it it's tremendous listen I he just moved Montreal, so he was a Toronto guy. In fact, I met him in Blair Packham's living room. So I got Blair Packham from the Jitters invited me to a party all the way in East York. Okay. That's I know you're coming from afar here, but I went all the way to East York to go to a party at Blair Packham's house.

I met a bunch of interesting people there, including Bob Wegner. And then he, through a different channel, he ended up at one of my events, and we became, he's a great FOTM now, Fast Friends. But I've got to get him on the program so we can talk about Max Webster. But he's a good guitar guy. He's a guitar guy. Yeah, and he said that he had met Justin on a cruise,

on a music, on a rock cruise, and he was playing with a Queen cover band. I believe and they bonded Oh, that would make sense because uh, what was the queen? Uh, was it bohemian? What is this? There's rock. What's there's some Uh musical that came to town and queen was behind it and bob played guitar anyways He had to audition in front of like b May and these guys or whatever. Legendary story. Now this is the Bob Wagner podcast, but there's another note here and then we're gonna find out more about Doug. So Rob Pruse, do you know this name? I do only because we became Facebook friends and I think he had written on Instagram or Twitter recently that he was looking forward to my book.

And he can't wait for you to become an FOTM But I see now his questions really related to the book So I might hold on to the question and when we get to born with the tale the devilish life and wicked times of Anton Zander Levee founder of the Church of Satan. He's just saying that title. I'm exhausted, right? So when we get to that, I'm gonna get back to Rob Pruce's Question here, but yourself so okay. I've seen you know, you've been around since the 80s, but what made you want to, you know, write about entertainment, write about music? Like, what made you want to become a writer?

Well, I, I mean, I've been a journalist all my life. I was just to give sort of a, my quick resume. I was an editor at Entertainment Weekly Magazine for 11 years, and I was at Spin Magazine. I was editor-in-chief of Spin for six years. Then I went to TV Guide Magazine in New York, and I was editor-in-chief there for like two and a half years. So my entire career has been pretty much pop culture entertainment.

And now I'm at The star where I am editing a lot of the entertainment section, a lot of movies, books, some music content, some television content. So yeah, that's been my life's blood. And I did my first book around four or five years ago, I started it. And after that came in I was thinking of another book to write and Anton Leveille always kind of fascinated me. I'm into sort of the macabre and comic books and horror movies and he was a guy who I thought needed a real thorough biography written about him. And you did

just that and before we get into that I got questions about Entertainment Weekly okay. Sure. So when you're in Entertainment Weekly, we're in the 1990s here I guess, you kind of you joined shortly after the launch of Entertainment Weekly. Entertainment Weekly is a big deal like this is a big hit. Yes. I paused for the dramatic effect here. It was a huge magazine at the time and one of the great things about working there and I'm not giving away any secrets, but it was during the during very robust era in magazine making and magazine editing and working in an entertainment magazine, we were able to write off and get reimbursed for every CD, every concert ticket, every movie ticket, everything.

So that was pretty awesome. That is awesome. And I'm wondering, is there any stories you could share of us perhaps where you had a clash with a publicist or a celebrity when you're writing at Entertainment Weekly? I was pretty good. I never really clashed with people. I try to be on the straight and narrow.

But no, I mean, I had a lot of interesting times there. I did a lot of... I look back now at some of the interviews I did. Like, I interviewed Quentin Tarantino right when Reservoir Dogs came out. That's pre-Pulp Fiction. That's huge. Pre-Pulp Fiction. Yeah, it was on the phone. I'll give you a funny story. Because you know, you're talking about maybe my favorite director of all time in Pulp Fiction yeah, I was on the phone I'll give you I'll give you a funny story Because you know you're talking about maybe my favorite director of all time in Pulp Fiction around the corner you get I got a poster Pulp Fiction hanging up in the other room in it there that might be my favorite movie of all time Well, just to go back a little bit. So before Entertainment Weekly, I was at a magazine called video review

We were the world authority on home video. This is like during the Betamax VHS days. Yes. And we reviewed video cameras and recorders and laser disc players and things like that. But we also reviewed video tapes. So there was a lot of software stuff and we did a lot of movie stuff. And I did a number of interviews there

that were pretty funny. One was with Paul Rubens who insisted on being interviewed in character as Pee-wee Herman which was kind of annoying on the phone as you can imagine. I know you are but what am I? Exactly and then I one of my favorite interviews was with Fred Williamson the famous football player turned actor and producer director. And he was promoting some, some black exploitation movie that was coming out on on on VHS. And I spoke with him on the phone. But when I called him,

he picked up and said, Hello, Doug, this is the hammer. I was just like, oh, man, you're great. You're great. And he was great. He was a great interview. And did you have to review any of those straight to video erotic baby blues?

That's that's I love that stuff. That was my my bread and butter at the magazine. I started a page in the back of the magazine in the review section that was dedicated to sort of the direct to video. We called them Skinimax movies, but also like the really kind of grotesque exploitation movies. I mean, I was all into all in on that stuff.

Okay, but you segue the the video review magazine experience into your Entertainment Weekly experience and you got to chat with a young Quentin Tarantino who worked at a video rental store. Famously enough. Okay, but I'm wondering, so like, if the only movie he's got under his belt is Reservoir Dogs, like you're in early, right? Because I didn't watch, I rented it,

my local video guy says you're gonna love this movie. I miss the local video guys. Like I remember that day, like he's like, I never heard of Reservoir Dogs. And he held it up and he says, you'd love this. And I rented it and I loved it. And we don't have that guy anymore, but you were in there before Pulp Fiction.

That's cool, man. Yeah, I mean, that was the beauty of that magazine. I mean, we called a lot of stuff really early. We had a really good team. You had a couple of critics I was going to ask you about. Owen and Lisa. Yes. So these are, you know, they had huge clout.

They did. And, you know, Owen still does. Owen's writing for Variety now. Lisa is, I think she's retired or semi-retired. I still keep in touch with with both mostly with Owen Owen Gleiberman and Yeah, he's um he's he's still Watching ten movies a week or whatever it is and writing writing about them

Amazing amazing here. So but you do make your way to spin So why do you what happens with this move from? It was just a step up. I went from being a senior editor at Entertainment Weekly to executive editor, the number two job at spin. And then eventually I took over spin after some, you know, nonsense that was going on. But yeah, so Spin, I was there during sort of the, I guess they called it like the rebirth of rock and roll with bands like The White Stripes. The Meet Me in the Bathroom stuff.

Yeah, White Stripes, Interpol, Strokes, all those bands in the early 2000s. Yeah, yeah, yeah, all this good stuff. Okay, my boy, he's 10. He asked me, my dad, just the other day, he goes, dad, it's weird how this stuff works. He goes, do you know the song Maps by Yeah, Yeah, Yeah? And I'm like, yeah, like I started singing it.

I'm like, I love that song so much. And he's, it's apparently, kid's his age. It's made some comeback in some format. Like, I don't know if it's in some kind of, some kind of meme tied to maps by Yeah, yeah, yes is making the round. I Totally get where you're coming from. I have a 17 year old daughter who will play stuff from her You know from Spotify on her iPhone in the car and I'll say how do you know this?

How do you know the cocktail twins, right? How do you know? God Diane toward I don't know if you know that that'seau twins? How do you know Diantward? I don't know if you know them, but that's weird stuff. Yeah, from Belgium or something. No, they're from South Africa. South Africa. Yeah. Okay.

She's playing all this and Bjork and Massive Attack and Portishead. I'm like, oh, you're a cool kid. Too bad you're like, you know, it's 30 years later. Well, they have every song at their fingertips, right? We had to like, some guy had to kind of teach you about that video star guy had to tell me about the reservoir dogs. It was like you needed sort of that gatekeeper to curate things and kind of show you away, which is what these magazines often did.

Right. Like spin tried to do. That's what you did. And so tell me about like, I don't know, like the White Stripes, I mean, you know, Jack is still touring, like Jack White Stripes, he says, she's what Dave Hodge called him the other day when he was in the basement. But you were the forefront covering White Stripes. Yeah, it's so funny when I think about it now, all of these bands like the White Stripes and the Strokes, I mean, they're, they're classic rock bands now. I mean, they really are. They are the classic rock bands, the Arcade Fire. I mean, Inter are they are the classic rock bands the arcade fire I mean Interpol is is is playing now and they and they're all playing like

Like I think Interpol was was playing the 30th anniversary of one of their albums It's like that's been 30 years already for 20 years 20. It just it boggles the mind boggles the mind Mark Weisblot correspondent for Toronto Mike was telling me that the previous spin editor got let go for putting Beyonce on the cover, the top 25 under 25. Apparently, that wasn't on brand for spin. So I don't know how much of that.

How do you know all this? Well, that's my correspondent. Yeah, that was an interesting time. I was hired by the editor in chief at the time, this woman named Sia Michael, who is now at the New York Times. She's a big cultural editor there. And the magazine went through a corporate transition when we had new owners come in,

and the new owners sort of swept out a bunch of people, including Sia, and I was left and they brought in a guy from Blender magazine and I guess it was either his mandate or his own doing that he decided to take the magazine in a more sort of populist direction and put Beyonce on one of the covers. Right. And the readers revolted. They just didn't believe that she belonged on the cover of Spin,

because Spin, I mean, Spin had an identity as an alternative music magazine. And Beyonce's a great artist, don't get me wrong, but was she the appropriate artist for the cover of Spin at that time? No, she was not. So, you know, he lasted a couple of months and then I was sort of brought up to write the ship a little bit. And that's a cool time. I mean, post 9-11 when you had we talked about that great book, Meet Me in the Bathroom. But yeah, the rebirth of rock and roll, I remember it well. Like are we gonna get another rebirth?

Is there one on the horizon? It feels like rock's pretty sleepy right now. It is very sleepy and that's too bad. No, it really is. I mean, it depresses me. I mean, I like what I like. I'm not a big fan of modern contemporary pop music. And I don't mind saying that, but. You're not a big Sabrina Car modern contemporary pop music and I you know I don't mind saying

that but you're not a big Sabrina Carpenter fan or no I can't I don't think I've heard one of her songs. You know what I've heard this name is I've been I listen to an IndieCast I listen to a bunch of I've heard that name referenced a million times and then I heard the fun fact Sabrina Carpenter's aunt is Nancy Cartwright the voice of Bart Simpson. Right. This is a fun fact. And now, now you have my attention because I love my, I still love my Simpsons. I'll tell you, I like the Olivia Rodrigo song that rips off the vampire.

No, the one that rips off the Elvis Costello song, um, brutal. Okay. And I think I like it because it rips off. Right, right. But Sabrina Carpenter, uh, I can name her song, I never heard of it, but then my eight-year-old daughter watched a Sabrina Carpenter Christmas special on Netflix. And then they come, so this is on and I'm just in the room on my laptop, whatever I look over, oh, so that's what a Sabrina Carpenter looks like.

And actually it was kind of a self-deprecating tongue in cheek, kind of a funny little thing, actually. I didn't hate this thing. It was kind of a self-deprecating tongue and cheek, kind of a funny little thing, actually. I didn't hate this thing. It was kind of interesting. But it's like, oh, so that's like, there she is. This is a real person, not just this name and espresso that you kind of hear in the wild. Right, right.

But I never encountered any, because I don't tune in Kiss 92.5. So I don't encounter this music in the wild, but there was. I encounter it in the wild because I always shazam. Whenever I'm in a store or an unfamiliar place and I hear music, I'm just curious to see what it is. Because even DJs don't back announce what songs are anymore. That's been ticking me off for like 25 years now. They have one job, one job.

OK, so I produced Humble and Fred Show and just this morning they were talking about the night John Lennon was killed and what New York radio sounded like and they're talking about it. And then Howard's explaining like they didn't have two songs in a row, like they'd intro a song, they'd outro that song, then they'd intro the next song. Like nowadays they'll, what do they call it? There's a name for this, a sweep or something, they call it a sweep, where you'll, three songs in a row, and you're lucky if you hear a human being.

But I miss somebody telling me, what am I listening to? Maybe give me a fun fact or something, like this band's out of New York, and give me something. I remember being back in New York, driving around with my family, and hearing, like you said, like three or four songs in a row, and at the end of the fourth song the the DJ or whomever was on you know on the radio

said tweet to 892 to find out what we just played I'm like I'm in my car you want me to tweet right right well it's the times of, I'm almost mildly surprised we even have music radio anymore. It's like, why would, you said, how old are your kids? So 17. 17, like why would, cause I got a 20 year old and a 20, almost 23 year old, like why would a 17 year old want to like have this

unprogrammable iPhone or whatever, where they don't think these songs are gonna come on, they can't pause, they can't skip on they can't pause they can't skip They can't choose what it is. Like it doesn't I don't know why you'd ever want that like we had no choice Well, I think it's the function of having an a 20 year old car and that's all I can get in my car Unless my daughter hooks up her Spotify to the right you get a Bluetooth solution or something But that's it, right? It's the cars that haven't quite made it easy to Bluetooth and that's it. That's all that's left That's it

And you have to stop down for like I don't know three and a half minute ad breaks or five minute ad breaks It's like it's like oh my goodness. I can't imagine like what's the point anymore? What's radio doing then? Okay, so we got okay. Let's get you to TV Guide And we're still in New York. Is that right? Yes. In fact, I was I was born there and bred there. I went to NYU so I went to school there. So I actually never left the city until I moved to Toronto My wife is from here, which is so so wasn't the Toronto Star star it was your wife who brought you to know it Okay, it was a combination of things So I'll just TV guide was a was a fun gig didn't last very long last like two and a half years and then I went over to Conde Nast which is a

publisher of Vogue and the New Yorker and Glamour and all these magazines and I worked in their special interest publications department, which is the place where we put together these really expensive magazines, magazines that were like anthologies of the best recipes from Gourmet magazine, greatest crime stories from Vanity Fair magazine, things like that. And I also worked on tribute magazines like the 75th birthday of Paul McCartney, Martin Luther King memorial issue, Muhammad Ali memorial issue, things like that.

And that was fun. They did pretty well, right? They did. And you know, I was basically, I had to curate a bunch of stories from various magazines within the company and just sort of put them together. And that was fun until they decided they weren't selling enough and they closed a department. So

at that point that takes us almost to Toronto. So that was during, you know, the Trump era, the first Trump era. And my wife didn't really like her job that much. She would not let me rephrase that She was getting she was getting a little burnt out from her fix it in post Doug. Yeah she's getting a little burnt out from her job and and we were just getting tired of the city and tired of Trump and We had a house. We owned a house and we figured you know, let's do it. Let's just make the leap We have a bunch of family and friends here because my wife is from here. So we did it. We sold a house, moved up in July 2019. Now did, I'm just curious because we've, and I don't know how you lean politically. I have no idea. Okay. But if Hillary Clinton wins the

2016 election, you still come to Canada? Probably not. Probably not. That's what I thought maybe. I don't want to make assumptions over here. But yeah, so we're here and we love it. Alright, well New York's loss is our game. We got ourselves a Doug Broad and you came here. Okay, and I'm curious now, but so they shuttered this I guess, but this Condé Nast, these bookazines all of them okay like today those would just be Taylor Swift magazines right you'll go to any news stand now and they're almost I would say 80% bookazines so they're thriving they weren't thriving for Conde Nast though and I think it might have been just

because their their magazines are pretty high high brow and they weren't really trying to capture the new stand buyer with these really interesting provocative covers. They might have been a little too genteel. Right. I can just imagine that the marketplace for Taylor Swift history magazines or whatever would be enormous. It seems to be an insatiable appetite there. There is. You want to do one with me? We can make some money here. The Toronto Star just did one and it's coming out pretty soon. Yeah. Really? Yeah. Okay, whatever it takes, right? Whatever it takes to pay

David Ryder's salary we're gonna do. If that's Taylor Swift books, then yours too. Of course. Okay, so let's get you to Toronto Star so you come you decide you guys decide because your wife is burned out and she's from here so she's from Toronto Toronto right she's from Toronto Toronto that's not code for like she's from Aurora she's from she's from the beaches okay the opposite end of the city is here okay yeah and she she you guys move so are you are in the East are you are on the East end? We're on the East end. We're in Cabbage Town and um, yeah. So we decided to move here. We had nowhere to live. We were literally couch surfing and um,

house sitting for friends for a couple of months. We had all of our belongings in a storage facility. Like everything was just packed in a storage unit. Right. And, um, we looked for a house. We found a house we liked and we got it pretty quickly and that all, you know, the, the stars were all aligned for that, but then COVID hit. So we had like four or five months of like really great times in the city. And then we were

you know confined to our house for a couple of years. Oh I remember I was doing episodes I saw I remember the pivot because all my guests had to do what you did right now which is you had to come in the basement even if you're over in Cabbage Town you got to come visit and then I got my dime it was like I remember Peter Gross showed up on the Monday after so I guess the day we pulled our kids out of school is Friday the 13th of March 2020 and then I remember Peter Gross showed up on the Monday after the, so I guess the day we pulled our kids out of school was Friday the 13th of March, 2020. And then I remember Monday,

cause I had a recurring event where Peter Gross would visit me. You're from New York, but Pete, you have to take my word for it, Doug. Peter Gross is a legend. And I was like, I remember having a chat with Peter, I'm like, oh, Peter, you can't do this anymore. Like I'm gonna get in trouble with my wife.

Like you can't come over anymore. Like we were all told, this was such a scary time but it wasn't long before I realized I could record in the backyard from like 20 feet away and that's what sort of saved me. It was like I can still do this in person. I just sat up outside. That's great. And that's what I did. You have a very quiet street here I noticed. Yeah it's pretty quiet but you know what I like that ambianto you know noise for a recording. But by the way we have an answer on the live stream,

live.torontomike.com. Earlier we were struggling, what the hell was the name of that musical that Bob Wagner is playing guitar for the members of Queen? It was We Will Rock You. It just came to me. I'm like, where was I? I think about half an hour ago here. Okay, so now we've got you at the Toronto Star, right? Or almost? Well, almost, yeah. So when I came here, I was in the middle of writing the first book, the Kiss Cheap Trick Aerosmith and Stars book. So I had gotten that deal while I worked at Conde Nast

and I'd started the book in New York and I finished it here during COVID. But while, in fact, I brought two books for you. Wow. Here's the first one. Okay, A Little Weird again. I got a silly question. I have not read this yet, okay?

And I am a titch younger than you, but here it is. So it's called They Seem A Little Weird. They Just Seem A Little Weird. Okay, They Just Seem A Little Weird. Right, I gotta put the glasses on. How Kiss, Cheap Trick, Aerosmith, so far. I'm very familiar. I've seen, I've seen Cheap. So I'm very familiar, I've seen, I've seen cheap,

so I'm very familiar with these three bands, but then, and Stars with a Zed, we're in Canada now, I say Zed, and Stars remade, rock and roll. I'm sitting here with you now, and I'm not sure I know a song by a band called Stars with a Zed. Yeah, that's a trick with this book.

So, if I can just go back a little bit. So the idea behind this book was to write a book about 70s hard rock zeroing in on three bands that I loved. And those are Kiss, Cheap Trick and Aerosmith and stars I really, really like. Now, the reason why I wrote about all four of them is because they're all connected and they were all interconnected throughout their careers. And in particular about all four of them is because they're all connected and they were all interconnected throughout their careers. And in particular, all four of these bands, on Gene Simmons' first solo album in 1978, when Kiss did those four solo albums, Gene Simmons had Joe Perry from Aerosmith play

on it as a guest, Rick Nielsen from Cheap Trick play on it, and Richie Rannell from Stars played on that record. on it as a guest, Rick Nielsen from Cheap Trick Play on it, and Richie Rano from Stars played on that record. So the idea behind the book was sort of looking at 70s rock through the POV of these four bands and how they intertwined. And there are a lot of connections between them. Does Stars have a hit I might hear on Q107 or something? They had they had a they they had an almost hit called Cherry Baby and it went to number 30 on Billboard's top 40 and didn't go any further and they never

had a hit again. And Boom's not playing that song by stars. Probably not. It's my own ignorance that because I didn't live it, like I kind of need a radio hit to draw me in, but not always. But now that I have this book, I will learn a great deal more about stars. So I like a stars, but it's our Canadian stars with an S. Yes. Not this stars with a Z. You might like that if you like the other three bands, you might like stars with his head.

Well, you know, I was a big Aerosmith fan from the get go because they had a bunch of songs I'd listened to in the late. They had like Do Looks Like a Lady and then Pump came out. I liked it very much. And then I would go back and I would hear the, you know, they had the run DMC single and then it would draw me back. And then, of course, the best song ever on a sports montage is Dream On. Like if you get a good sports montage And you set it to dream on its next level epic. Well, that song is great. There's no it's it's undeniable songs You want to sing it with me? No, okay You know I have a lot of I'll say like a lot of guys in their 60s come over to kick out the jams and they all rave

About kiss and I realized oh you had to be there like you had to be a teenager in their 60s come over to kick out the jams and they all rave about kiss and I realized, Oh, you had to be there. Like you had to be a teenager in the seventies. I think you did. Yeah. And then who else? Makeup with the makeup and cheap trick. Like I learned about cheap tricks. I learned about cheap trick from fast times at Ridgemont high because the guy was trying to sell those tickets and he was going down the dream police. He was singing all this stuff. And then I saw them cause I went to see Pearl Jam, one of my favorite bands of all time at Molson Park and Barry in 98 and Eddie loved Cheap Trick and he had them open up for him and but you'll laugh when I tell you basically the first Cheap Trick song I heard on the radio you might even be

able to guess. Was it The Flame? No it was the Don't Be Cruel cover of Elvis Presley's Don't Be Cruel on 680 CFTR. So I'm going to read this book. They just seem a little weird. And I bet you it's as good as Bob Wegener says it is. So we're going to do that. Bob's a big fan. Bob's a big fan. And we're almost at your new book, but I need to know what brought you, how'd you get the gig at the Toronto Star? Oh, so it was during the pandemic. I was God, I just started answering every ad that I saw that seemed appealing to me. And one that did was from the star.

They were looking for a team editor and I made it. I made it through. Well, they needed a guy like you. They needed a guy who can say I interviewed Quentin Tarantino before Pulp Fiction, right? That's the key caveat there. Yeah. OK. But yeah, so I was fortunate enough.

I think I was wrapping up this book, the first book, when I got that job. So I was very happy about that. OK, so I mean, I'm a big Toronto star guy because it was the paper on my kitchen table growing up. So that's why it was such an honor for you to approve the Gilles LeBlanc story, which you see hangs in the studio here.

That's how proud I am of that. That was pretty cool. Now, bunch of people I've talked to who sorta got like pushed aside, but I still see in print a couple of guys I'll shout out Peter Howell and Ben Rainer Okay, so these are two guys who do freelance work now, but are no longer full-time employees But you'll still see some Rainer and how will in the Toronto Star you definitely will in fact Peter writes pretty regularly for me, and'm in his editor. So yeah.

Okay. We call that pension friendly rates. I think is what we call that. But you know, the gentleman who I've had over recently and had a great chat with who doesn't seem to be involved anymore is Rob Salem. Rob Salem. Not familiar with Rob Salem. Yeah, you're too, too fresh. I'm too new. You're too new here. I'm here to lobby to get some more Rob Salem back in my, uh, in my Toronto star, but it's cool what you're doing there.

And, uh, things are, you know, rapidly evolving over there revolving door. And Jordan Bittove, uh, is, is kind of, I don't know, hoping for a bailout maybe or something, but, uh, long may you run. Like I love the fact that we still have the Toronto star. And again, I could have Ed Keenan on in three weeks time. He comes over every quarter. And I love seeing David Ryder at my events. And there's a whole bunch of other Toronto Star people that I just dig. And you're doing great work over there. Yeah, it's a great place. I'm really happy I'm there. And I just read today, your former stomping grounds. And I don't know, since you joined

during the pandemic Maybe you never got there. I have no idea but one Yonge Street is gonna be demolished soon. I Actually made it there once To the office, but yeah We're in beautiful digs now in the well and Spadina and Front Street and it's gorgeous a gorgeous building Keenan comes in fully need full reports of what's going on at the well there, but... Great food court.

Great, you know what, that's all you journalists need, I think, is a... but a lot of like, you have a different role there, because your role is editor? I'm a team editor. Team editor, okay. But when you're a guy like Ed Keenan, I'm sure you never go to the office, right? Like, I don't even know why you'd go to the office. We're all encouraged to go there at least twice a week, which which I do. And I think most people do.

Okay. Well, you have good food court, so it's not so bad. And we have just it's a very sort of Kush. It's a Kush place. I like it. Okay, so now we're going to dive into the world of Anton Lavey, and we're going to talk about the new book. But first, I I'm gonna give you a few gifts real quick because you gave me a gift and I got a little hint of another one coming, maybe I'll give you the gifts, then you give me that gift and then we dive in. Okay.

Okay, Doug, in that order, okay? We're editing on the fly here, you know what that's like. So these are gifts from me. Gifts for you, so the one in your hand, I feel like it's like a Christmas morning or something. That measuring tape in your hand is courtesy of Ridley Funeral Home and they're pillars of this community. And I feel like it's a good start.

We're going to talk about it. You know, the founder of the Church of Satan here. And I feel like there's a Ridley Funeral Home and they're good people. They have a podcast called Life's Undertaking and I highly recommend it. Great. You see, I like well named, well titled things and that's a highly recommended. Great. You see, I like well-named, well-titled things and that's a great title. Ridley funeral home.

No, life's undertaking. I got to keep up here. You're, you're, you're playing 3d chess here. I'm playing checkers back here. Okay. So yeah, life's undertaking named by, by another Doug Brad Jones named that and it's great. So I want to give you a speaker it's in your hand right now. That's courtesy of Minaris. It's a wireless speaker. That's awesome. With that speaker though, before you go off and listen to some Harlem Nocturne or something, you have to promise me that you're going to check out Season 7 of Yes We Are Open, which

is an award-winning podcast hosted by Al Gregor from Minaris, where Al went to Winnipeg to collect some great stories from small business owners, inspiring stories. And we learned about their triumphs, their tribulations, and basically learned how these entrepreneurial people succeed in 2024. He also made a pit stop in Oakville because he talked to Ty the Christmas guy who is him and his wife run Retro Festive which is a store. It's like a pop culture, you'd love it, a pop culture, but it's like a 12

month a year Christmas store. It's made for people like Brian Dunn I think so shout out to Brian if he's listening at home. But he was the special guest and And that was the like the season finale of Yes, We Are Open. So that's what you're going to listen to if you're a wireless speaker there. Okay. And that very aforementioned, Ty the Christmas Guy gave everybody a gift at TMLX 17, which was, well, it was a week ago this past Saturday, So about eight days ago and that took place at Palma's kitchen in Mississauga And I have I hope you're sitting down Doug You are I have in my freezer upstairs a frozen lasagna for you from Palma pasta. Oh my god

That's why you're here right who tipped you off? She'll no one I No idea lasagna. So alright and last but not least I have fresh craft beer for you from Great Lakes Brewery. And they brew that right here in Southern Etobicoke. And that's delicious. They have a podcast called Between Two Fermenters. And I highly recommend that as well.

That's a great title. Another great title. It's all about the title here. I got to rework my Toronto mic. I'm a big punster. I'm, I'm big with my dad jokes. Okay. You know who you would, you would like, uh, Ron sex Smith. I follow him on, well now I follow him on blue sky and he's all about the, the dad joke puns. So that's me. Never ending. Oh, so I have a present for you.

Yeah, please. My present is, uh is a copy of Born with a Tale signed by me. Oh my goodness does that increase the value or decrease the value? It was I could have resold it like for just like 10% less than the sticker price but with that you writing all over it now I don't know what I'm gonna do I'm gonna see if I can wipe that out. Okay so I'm gonna read it again. Born with a tale, the devilish life and wicked times of Anton Zander Leveille and he's the founder of the Church of Satan. So why did you want to write this book, Doug? Well, I wanted to come up with another idea to write another book after I finished my first one and I had a few ideas that were not

not accepted by my editor at my publisher my publishing house and I suggested this one and he was like yeah let's do this one like I said earlier I I've always been fascinated by the macabre and and horror movies and sci-fi and fantasy and comic books. And he was always kind of in my peripheral vision. And in the in the 80s is kind of when I discovered him. He was kind of beloved by the, you know, the rock and roll underground. He kind of had a Renaissancenaissance after the Satanic panic Happened in the 80s. So that's when he kind of came on my radar and I was always fascinated by him and and there was

one Previous bio written there were two previous bios written about him one was in 74 by a member of the church and it was very biased and the guy who wrote it said that Lavey fed him lies. So, you know, it's a very rare book. It's out of print. And then in the late 80s, early 90s, Lavey's then longtime companion wrote a biography of him with, you know, obviously a lot of his help since she was living with him at the time. And the book is really good. It's called The Secret Life of a Satanist by Blanche Barton.

And, you know, it's, but it's one-sided. It's his side. And there'd never been a real deep dive sort of journalistic look at his life. And it was something that I feel like if I'm gonna spend two years researching and writing, I have to be really interested in a subject. And he interested me. Yeah.

What I was gonna ask is you have a full-time job, Doug. I do. And that was the thing. So for the first book, I didn't have a full-time job, Doug? I do. And that was the thing. So for the first book, I didn't have a full-time job for much of it. So it was actually kind of easy to, you know, easy and leisurely to actually write that book. Because that becomes your job.

Right. And this and I, I, I joke all the time that when I was writing this book, I literally had two full-time jobs for two years. Yeah. And it's like, you have to reintroduce yourself to your teenage daughter. I know know and I had no social life. I didn't go to movies. I didn't go to, I didn't go to many concerts. I just was in my, you know, my basement man cave writing this stuff. And you said it took a couple of years to research and write this book? A little bit under, yeah, a little bit under. Okay, wow. Okay, so I have a few questions about this, but you alluded to the fact that your editor Rejected the first ideas would you share her in any chance? I could get one of those topics that year that was rejected

You know what? I don't want to share them only only because you have in the back pocket They're in the back pocketing come out and they might come out again. You're right. You're right. I'm sorry about that No, you know what? I actually don't blame you at all because you don't want to burn that idea I'll give you one that that that I That I really like but I have a feeling the audience is really small So in in the vein of my first book looking at for artists that were connected I was thinking of writing a book about I don't I don't know if it's translates at all in into Canadian, but Dick Clark from

American Bandstand and Casey Kasem from America's Top 40. Well, I wanted to do a dual biography of them because they were connected in many fundamental ways as well. And I thought that it would be an interesting look at sort of how rock and roll and how pop music became sort of the monoculture for awhile. And you think that it's too small an audience? Cause that feels like two very famous people. It is. I think it might be too old an audience. I'm not sure if anyone under the age of 45 really cares?

I feel like I read lately that there's like a, there might be a mild Casey case and revival going on. Like, like some, some streaming service or something has like, is now airing. I forget the details now, cause you know, so much going on, but somehow there's like suddenly there people are listening to older episodes of America top 40. Anyways, I'm throwing this out there that I like this idea. I do too. I have a feeling maybe I'm too late now someone's gonna

pitch it to somebody else. Do I have to fix this in post? Is this where people are gonna listen to this and they're gonna get beeps, beeps and then they'll be writing me notes like what got beeped there and I'm like I'm not telling go ask. So yeah I mean this is my my obsessions are kind of like off the beaten path, you know, they're not they're not the The the the stories that are gonna sell millions of copies of books I can relate to that like some of the areas I go deepest into is like sometimes I wonder like maybe I am the only Human who cares about this but it's my I don't have an editor I got to impress like I'm going to just go dive into this this area that I'm interested in and I don't care if anyone else follows me. Yeah and when you're writing a book that's all you care about it's like because you you want to be entertained and you want to be

enlightened as you're researching it so you, when you're doing the investigative kind of reporting, it's like you get these eureka moments, you end up, you know, talking to someone who you never thought you'd get, you end up finding someone through somebody else. And this person gives you like amazing quotes. So it's like there's something about the process that's really invigorating. Amazing. Would you, and again, I urge people to read the book and learn more about Lavey, but can you give us like a, like what led him down this path? Like what is the catalyst that causes him to, you know, in, you know,

invent the church of Satan? Well, to go back, he was born in 1930 in Chicago and he was Jewish and he moved to San Francisco, the San Francisco North Northern California area with his parents as a boy and grew up there. And he too was like me. He was a big horror nerd and he was into film noir and he was into the supernatural into film noir and he was into the supernatural and the occult. And as he got older, he sort of built this world around him. I mean, he looked the part. He, at one point he shaved his head and he had a goatee

and he lived with a pet lion in his house. And he lived in this big black lived in this big black Victorian mansion. And you know he basically lived the aesthetic of the occult and he decided at one point he wanted to start a church but it wasn't really, it wasn't a devil start a church. But it wasn't really a devil-worshipping church. It was actually a totally atheistic church.

Didn't believe in anything. Only believed in man as God, man as his own God. And it was all about self-empowerment. It was all about manipulating others to get what you want. And it was a very much a selfish, and he admits it, a selfish kind of greedy philosophy. And people were into it. People went to his house, and this is the bizarre thing.

So this is 1966 and 67. People are going to his house for rituals. So like he's getting strangers paying $2 or whatever it is, or whatever the membership was to come to his house and do these rituals with naked women on the fireplace mantle with chalices and swords and all this stuff. And it's just this remarkable story about this guy

who just created his own sort of, his own environment, his own aesthetic. Well, I have a note here I took when I was going through the book satanic but the satanic Bible work or shoot Okay So one of the things that strikes me is like I can't tell where is he's like the world's greatest showman or whatever like there's some grift at play here and how much of this is like sincere like Yeah, I mean that that's a good question And I hope I answered it somewhat in the book, but it's kind of hard to really nail down. I mean, throughout his life, he he made up

a lot of stories. You know, he claimed to have been a carny like a lion tamer lion tamer. He played the Calliope at carnivals. He knew all the sideshow attractions. He claimed to have had an affair with Marilyn Monroe when he was 18 years old. And he was accompanying her in a burlesque house. He was playing the organ. And, you know, he just, he said a lot of things that are disprovable.

He also claimed that he was on the San Francisco police force as a police photographer and he shot, you know, accidents in the aftermaths of murders and all this other stuff. But that would be something easy to prove. Yeah, and apparently there's no records at the San Francisco Police Department that he actually did this. He also claimed to have been a ghost buster. So when the San Francisco Police Department would get all these calls about like strange noises in someone's addict, he would have to go out and investigate. And he knew that it was all baloney. And he said that this stuff is all baloney.

But then it kind of sort of took over his life, obviously. He wrote a bunch of books. He wrote the Satanic Bible, which was his first one. And it was mostly a collection of essays and rules, just the nine satanic statements. And it was a best seller. It has sold over a million copies since it went into print and hasn't been out of print. Then his second book was a book called the complete

The complete witch and that was more of like a guide for women to sort of Trap the man they want to get the man they want And then his third book was called the satanic rituals Which was kind of a companion to the first book all about the Satanic Rituals, which is kind of a companion to the first book all about the rituals that you can perform to, you know, manipulate people to your benefit and to, you know, gain more gain more wealth, gain more sexual attraction,

those kinds of things. And I mean, and he, you know, he walked the walk. I mean, there's a satanic marriage. There's a satanic baptism I'm reading about like this guy is He's yeah, you know, but but but at that point that was very early early on after he created the Religion he did this first satanic marriage and that was a sham and that's kind of the opening of the book And he admitted it that it was just these these are things that he did for publicity marriage and that was a sham and that's kind of the opening of the book.

And he admitted it that it was just these, these are things that he did for publicity. They were kind of like, he's like Bohemian happenings in a way. Right. And for guys my age who we will talk about the satanic panic, where it's kind of where we get introduced to this whole universe. But, uh, I mean, we're talking about a famous man because in a monolithic culture, getting on The Tonight Show is massive. Yeah, he was on The Tonight Show

and he was on the cover of Look Magazine, which was Life Magazine's competitor. So he was pretty well known. He was on a bunch of talk shows. Steve Allen Show? Steve Allen Show a couple of times. He was on one episode with Jack Palance and Charles Nelson Riley Which I you know none of these things exist anymore. They've all been taped over

But man some of those things I'd love to see yeah, that's a shame We did that like I know you know you can't get there from here or whatever But the fact that so much even the tonight show apparently a whole whack of the tonight Show got taped over. Yeah that that one that his episode is not available on anywhere Not even retro. Ontario's got these episodes archived. So that's how you know, these things are tough to get okay I'm gonna bring in the pot the Rob Proust question that I put off because if I forget it He'll be very mad at me and you don't want Rob Bruce to be mad at you. Okay. Okay.

You know, he co-wrote Romantic Traffic for the Spoons and I realized as a New Yorker who just arrived, whatever, five years ago, Yeah. you're going to be like, what's a spoon and what's romantic traffic? And you'd be well within your right to do so. No, I've heard of the spoons.

Okay, Nova Heart, but you didn't, yeah. So Nova Heart is Gord's song and then the co-writing is on romantic traffic, but I digress Rob Bruce writes I've been interested this year in a writer named Carl Abrahamson Abrahamson a lot of syllables there Okay, he wrote about Anton Lavey in a chapter of his book Oh culture and I found it very intriguing I've been interested and learning in learning studying spiritual and occult stuff for 30 years And that's a whole other conversation. Okay, I'm Rob. I'm gonna have that conversation with you on toast in January Okay, so get ready

So he says I can't wait for Doug as an FOTM But what can you share with me about like Carl Abraham's son and what he's written about Anton Leve. Well, Carl has done a lot to sort of bring Leve back into the sort of into the culture from that from that book. He also published a book of photographs of Anton Leve and Jane Mansfield, the actress, when they had this connection in 1967 for a few months before she died. And there was this whole story about how he put a curse on her boyfriend at the time, Sam Brody, which led to the car accident that took both their lives

uh... but this guy this photographer named walter fisher uh... took all these great publicity shots of them and carl collected a lot of them in a book a cold california infernal and he also put together a book

called debauched and it was a collection of all of these satanic men's magazines from the 60s and like there's a lot of pubic hair a lot of topless women they're just like these cheesy magazines that were like the third-rate playboys that focused on the occult because the occult was big back then. So anyway, so Carl is an expert no doubt and I reached out to him actually interviewed him for the book and he was very frank with me and he was very candid and you know he actually was his first marriage he was married in the church by in the house, by Lave, who had given up marrying

people at the time, but made an exception for Carl. Is there anyone you really wanted to talk about when you're doing your research for this book who refused to talk to you? Well, yeah, Lave's two daughters didn't want to talk to me, Carla and Zina. Zina actually was on a recent episode of Jordan Peterson's podcast. And it's fascinating. Fascinating interview was like, I think, like two months ago. She the one who was baptized. Yes, she was the one who was baptized in the satanic baptism.

He was the one who was baptized in the Satanic baptism. But one of the more interesting, I'll say, people I didn't get, I tried to get his grandson, Stanton, who's Zena's son. Now, Stanton is, he would be in his early 40s now, I believe. But I actually had scheduled an interview with him. I guess it was a two two December's ago, and we're gonna do a zoom interview. And he never showed up to the zoom interview. So I, I emailed him and I said, you know, let me know if there's a bit of time

for you and I'd be happy to, you know, call you back or reschedule whatever never heard back from him. And then like two days later, I heard from, I heard from a mutual acquaintance. Uh, I got an email and it was like, did you know that Stanton died? Wow. I'm like, no, early forties. Yeah. And I'm like, no, I didn't know that.

And he said, yeah, he, he died on, I think it was December 14th. And that was the day of our interview. Wow. So he died the same day we were supposed to talk which was kind of chilling to me That's chilling to hear about even now especially because this wasn't you know, a 96 year old man You were gonna talk to you know And actually I actually spoke with his wife for the book and she's quoted a few times but no he had he had a It He had a back problem and he had surgery on his back and I think it was a pain killer

issue. Oh no. Well, yeah. Wow. Okay. So that was an interview that never happened, obviously. But okay, by the way, you mentioned Jane Mansfield. So now I feel obligated as host of, I've decided host of Canada's

favorite podcast. Can I run of that? You're the editor. Prove me wrong, okay? So Jane Mansfield, if you remember, there's that scene at the 50s diner in Pulp Fiction. And I remember, I can't remember, I think Mia Wallace thinks it's Marilyn Monroe. And then she's, no, corrected. No, there's Marilyn Monroe. That's Jane Mansfield. Do you remember this scene? Or was it Mamie Van Doren? Oh, am I complaining on my blonde bombshells? I recently rewatched the first half of that movie. Okay, why did I think, but does the Jane Mansfield lookalike, serving at that Yeah. Yeah. You ever think back? Okay. So we were all freaking out in 94 over the $5 shakes. And here we are in 2024. Where it's like, that sounds like a pretty, you

can't even get a McDonald's or whatever they call it. They can't even call it milkshakes, whatever they call their flurry, whenever they call it, you can't get that for five bucks anymore. No, times have changed. Yeah, that's crazy. Okay. we'll have more pulp fiction references as we go here. By the way, Robert Lawson, who wrote a great book on the Guess Who. So Bob Wegener's got the book on- Oh, and Robert Lawson also wrote a great cheap trick book. Okay, so that's okay.

So Robert Lawson wrote me when he heard you were coming on to say he read your book. He loved it. His mind was blowing that Leve was Jewish, a Jewish man. You're saying you had an interaction with the great Robert Lawson or just that you he Yeah, no, he came to I did a book signing and an event on the east side, the east end, I should say. At Queen Books and he came and I signed a book for him. He bought a book and we had been in contact because I used his first his Cheap Trick book as a

source for my book. Right, for your my little weird. Okay, look at you know what? It's a small world, right? It is, it really is. I had on I had Randy Backman on the program and Randy tells a good story, good storyteller. I'm sure he does. But he embellishes things, okay? And then Robert Lawson, who did write a book on the Guess Who and is friendly with Birding Cummings, he came over here to fact check Randy Backman. Like the episode is basically Robert Lawson fact checks

Randy Backman. Quite an episode and then henceforth we've anointed, or I mean we've appointed Robert Lawson as the official fact checker of the Toronto Mike podcast. So we always joke that if somebody's telling a mistruth or spinning something a little too aggressively, he literally comes out of the bushes like in Field of Dreams. Although really it's like the Simpsons where he comes out in fact check. So it's interesting to hear him and you he comes out in fact checks. So it's interesting to hear him and you have some convergence there and yeah he loves your book. Yeah, no he's been a supporter. He wrote a really nice review of it on I believe it was on Goodreads.

Sure. Yeah. His most recent book is about little Stevie from the the Eastbury band. It is yeah. He also wrote a book about Nazareth who I just recently sort of got into. And this flight tonight which is the big radio hits you hear from Nazareth right that's a cover of a Joni Mitchell song. I know. I know you know. Yes I guess I'm talking to someone out there. Yeah yeah and then but Love Hurts was the big song in the same. But that's a cover too right? It is. Yeah, geez

Yeah, I love hurts is a big jam too and co-opted by some advertising campaign because it's so it was selling something in the last 15 years But maybe all the great songs at some point will be co-opted except for the Neil Young songs They won't know this notes for you. He won't allow it, right? You won't allow it you won't allow it not as long as he's with us. Okay Oh, and he's he's married to Darryl Hannah now and Darryl Hannah's in Kill Bill. Should we shut this down? Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Should we shut this down right now? There's a book here. There's a book here somewhere. You know if you hang out with me long enough Doug you can shadow

me. Like this is my third episode so I'm a little you know I'm enjoying my great legs and I'm a little bit punchy here. Episode three of the day day But literally all the pieces matter they all fit to know and that's all this social is no wonder Jill brought this great idea To you. Okay. Congratulations on approving it Okay So Milan heard you were coming over and he wrote me this great note and this is gonna bring us into the satanic panic I want to talk about Milan writes how much of the attention they got, and I'm going to read a verbatim here, how much of the attention they got was due to the rise and fall of the satanic panic and metal music popularity during the 1980s. The mainstream opinion often ties Anton to those two events,

and it doesn't seem that his church ever got so much attention again. So can we, maybe this is our gateway to discuss I remember, I came of age in the eighties, the satanic panic of the 1980s. Okay. Well to start, you have to go back a little bit because there was a schism in the church in 1975 and sort of, Lavey's right-hand man, this guy Michael Aquino, went off and sort of formed his own church called the Temple of Set. And it was a genuine satanic devil worshiping sect. Lavey had no time for those kinds of people. He called them occultnics. He called them occultnics. So, yeah, so the church never really recovered after the split.

And when the Satanic Panic hit in 1980 with the publication of Michelle Remembers, which was this purported remembrances of a young girl who claimed that her mother was in a satanic cult and abused her. And there was actually a great documentary that recently came out about this. And when that book came out, it kind of caught on like wildfire, and it led to this whole repressed memory sort of phenomenon where these psychiatrists were drawing out all of these you know purported repressed memories of kids being involved in satanic rituals so it was this whole phenomenon called the satanic ritual abuse. And all of these daycare centers, starting with the McMartin Daycare Center in Los Angeles, they had kids

who claimed to have been involved in satanic rituals with animals and blood and sexual abuse and just all this kind of craziness, which was obviously disprovable, but it sort of caught on throughout the country, and a lot of lives were shattered because of this. LeVe was kind of underground at that point. He was kind of keeping a low profile and he had asked Zena and Carla to go out and sort of speak on his behalf to defend the Church of Satan. Because the Church of Satan had nothing

at all to do with this. People claim to have been Satanist who did this kind of stuff, but they weren't Levesse Satanists. In fact, in the book Michelle Remembers that came out in 1980, she claimed that there was an organization called the Church of Satan that was part of her abuse. you know, was part of her abuse. And he said, you know, at that time, his organization had not even come into existence. So there's a lot of that kind of nonsense

being attributed to the Leve, which he had nothing to do with. Yeah, so that takes us to the satanic panic when, you know, heavy metal was being accused of, you know, warping kids' minds and even like games like Dungeons and Dragons. And yeah, so, you know, he basically sort of wrote it out and didn't go public at all trying to defend the Church. Eventually, in fact, when I interviewed Blanche, his longtime companion for the book, she told me that after the Satanic Panic died down down they got a lot more requests for

memberships for the Church of Satan because it basically popularized it and then she said younger people saw all of this coming up about the Church of Satan and they were like oh this sounds like a pretty cool organization. It's like an awareness campaign. Yeah and it aligns with my beliefs, you know, basically, you know, you know, I worship myself and, you know, it's all about, you know, putting yourself first and self-empowerment. Right. So, yeah, so in a way, the Satanic panic, when it eventually kind of went away, it kind of left the door open for him to sort of have a Renaissance. And in the late 80s early 90s the underground culture, at least in

America, especially within, you know, with rock and roll bands, rock stars, rock stars people like, I guess, King Diamond and, you know, a lot of people in the underground kind of took to Leveille and his philosophy and sort of, you know a lot of people in the underground kind of took to lave and his philosophy and sort of You know brought it back up in fanzines. Yeah, like these punk scenes Yeah, yeah, I was reading about that like so yeah resurgence here Yeah, so he had a resurgence and that's kind of when I kind of discovered him and you know he was a hyper intelligent guy

And you know, he was a hyper intelligent guy Who was really funny and that was that's one of the attractions to me is that he's a really funny writer and Yes, so that was that appealed to a lot of people and he you know made a lot of fans after the Satanic panic kind of funny but from your I gather, kind of nasty too, right? Like he's got this like nasty funny blend. Definitely had a nasty streak. And he was accused by his second longtime companion, before the woman before Blanche,

woman named Diane Hagerty. She accused him of physical abuse and they divorced. They didn't divorce, they split in a sort of a palimony suit and basically he was left with not a lot of money after that happened. Right, okay. Here, I thought you were giving an amazing, I know I said I'd take an hour, I'm taking a little more. So what are you going to do?

What are you going to do about a dog? Okay, you're trapped in the basement now here. Okay, so we talked about like Jane Mansfield, like these stars or whatever, but I was reading in your book, Sammy Davis Jr. too. Like, so what, Sammy Davis Jr. was his friend or follower? Like, how does he come into this Church of Satan? Yeah, so that's an interesting kind of wrinkle in the book.

So Sammy claimed that he interesting kind of wrinkle in the book. So, Sammy claimed that he was kind of always into, not always, but in the late 60s he was into Satanism and he was going to Satanic orgies, which he actually details in his own books. In 1973, he made a made-for-TV movie in America called Poor Devil. It was a comedy with Jack Klugman and Christopher Lee. He plays this emissary from hell who was sent by Satan to sign up some souls. Jack Klugman is one of the souls he sign up some souls and Jack Klugman is one of the souls he wants to sign up. And it was supposed to be a pilot, like a feature-length pilot to a TV series. Didn't go to series, but when it did play on

television, the church found out about it and the church were actually they were actually pleased with what they saw because this the movie actually mentions the Church of Satan in downtown San Francisco so they were happy for the promotion. That's earned media. That is definitely earned media. Like my cover on the Together section of the Toronto Star. It might even be unintentional product placement. So yeah so, yeah. So, so, so, so Sammy, um, did this movie and Lave had his guy, Michael Aquino, reach out to Sammy and see if he would accept, uh,

honorary warlock certificate in the church of Satan. And he said, yeah. And then they became aligned for awhile. Um, they became friendly. There are photos you can find on the internet of Sammy with Lavey. And Sammy basically said after a while he was part of a coven that didn't turn out too well or something, and he kind of lost his taste for Satanism. But funnily enough, I was watching the Jerry Seinfeld show, comedians in cars getting coffee and he had Eddie Murphy on it. Eddie Murphy sort of went on this whole thing about Sammy Davis Jr. being a Satanist, just kind of randomly.

And Eddie Murphy told Seinfeld that, yeah, you know, Sammy, he was really, he was a dark guy, and he really believed in the devil. He believed there was a lot of evil in the world. So yeah, so there's a lot of signs lot of signs pointing to the fact that yes, Sammy was really into this. The Candyman said that? That's Herschel Christofsky, the rabbi and father of Krusty the Clown. The Candyman said that? Simpsons trivia is not my forte. So like I said, this is a podcast with a target audience of one. I'm not even recording this Doug. I literally just wanted to chat with you about this guy. This guy who I knew like when I saw the picture of the cover of the book and I saw him, you

mentioned the shaved head and the goatee there. I recognize this guy. I remember the satanic panic of the 80s. It seemed like, I don't know, Sally, Jesse, Raphael and all, you know, this whole, I don't know, Phil Donahue Call are you there caller and her Aldo Rivera? Oh, that's the big one, right? So did her all her Aldo that was like I mean, I know he broke into the vault of Capone He couldn't find Jack. So we they all went home. Shout out to Maestro Fresh West and Joel Goldberg, but this has been amazing

So I really do find this guy fascinating. Like I knew nothing about him. Like I'm almost surprised. Like he's a real guy. Like it just seems kind of surreal when you're coming up in the 80s and this thing's here. And then it sort of disappears forever. And to your book is well researched. It's fascinating. It's not a dry read. It's got some humor. It's all it's a great read. And I wonder if I can nail the title before I ask you my final question here. Born with a Tale. T-A-I-L. This is clever too, much like life's undertaking in between two fermenters. Born with a Tale. The devilish life and wicked times of Anton Zander. And that's how you pronounce that middle name,

right? Zander? Correct. Okay, because there's an S that, okay. Lavey, founder of the Church of Satan, and I highly recommend everybody reads it, but in this book you find out like Lavey, just a regular guy, he liked going to Olive Gardens, and I was thinking, okay, so you're an American who's only a recent New Canadian, if you're a new member of our community here, we don't have any olive gardens in this GTA. We used to have them though. So before you got here, there was one your Sherway Gardens I would go to. I really liked the olive garden. And then all of a sudden our olive gardens were gone. But I

consume, like many Canadians, I consume a lot of American media. And they're still going to olive gardens. They are. What's going on? Do the next book on this. Where's our Olive Gardens? I don't know. The Olive Gardens still, you know, all of these chains still have a little bit of life left into them. Not in this country.

Where am I? Where is our Olive Gardens? So Lave liked the Olive Garden and I thought it was just like a, you know, an easy family restaurant. You get a bowl. I mean, it's no Palma pasta don't get me wrong but it was a nice easy place to be the kids you get a nice bowl of pasta whatever no more Olive Garden limited breadsticks from what I understand right and then I feel like East Side Mario's kind of stole that thunder a bit when all of

gardens disappear if I can I just want to give a shout out for the books title yeah it's not original I actually took it from a song born with a tale by the super suckers Do you know the super suckers? No, I mean, I don't think I do. Oh, you must play them after I leave. Okay What era like give me a little like genre? Who are we talking about mid 90s? They're on sub pop. Oh, yeah, so sub pop I mean, that's where Nirvana was before they went to correct label That was be bleach would be a sub pop release, right? It would be yes. Okay. See you're a cooler guy, Doug That's why you're an editor. That's why you're the cool guy from spin spin magazine, right? So, you know

You're much cooler guy than I am. But how was this for you? So I didn't realize till you sat down here over an hour ago and I mentioned that Gilles LeBlanc says hi and I found that you actually played a role in that me being on the cover. And I mean, the photographer who's excellent. Do you remember the name of the photographer? Famous, his dad used to write, I think for the star. I know I'm putting on the spot here. Great photographer came over took some wonderful pictures There's four color photos in this two-page spread, you know, that's kind of a you know pumping my own tires here But you made that happen. I Helped make it happen. Well, I feel like without you Gilles LeBlanc could not get that printed

We needed an editor and that's you and now you're an FOTM and I love this. I love this same here I had a blast. We gonna do another episode? I mean, every time you write a book, you come over here and talk about it with me. Five years from now. You gonna do a book on the Olive Garden disappearing from Canada?

No, I'll let you write that one. Maybe it's more of a blog entry. It's more of a sentence. All right, much love. Everybody subscribe to the Toronto Star. We need a good strong media and we need more subscribers there. And Doug, again, thanks for the two books. Enjoy your lasagna, enjoy your beer, and thanks for making the trek all the way west. Thanks for having me. And that brings us to the end of our 1,597th show.

Go to torontomic.com for all your, I said this the other day, go to torontomic.com for all your Toronto mic needs. And I can't remember, but a guest called me out like, what would be your Toronto mic needs? And I'm like, I didn't know. I don't know what that means. But if you wanted to hear... Free lasagna.

Yeah. If you want to know how to find Palma Pasta, maybe, I don't know. But there are 1500 plus episodes in the archive. Go back and listen to, I don't know, go listen to Ben Rayner on Toronto Mike. I love that guy. Ben's the best. Can we shout out Ben Rayner? He's the best.

Shout out to Ben. He's the best. Okay. Shout out Ben Rayner? He's the best. Shout out to Ben. He's the best. Okay, shout out to Ben Rayner. We're gonna get him back in the basement. Much love to all who made this possible. That is Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, a lot of P's in that, Palma Pasta, RecycleMyElectronics.ca,

Minaris, and Ridley Funeral Home. I'm going into my calendar everybody. The most exciting part of the extra. Who is my next guest on Toronto Miked? Okay it's a he made the NHL and he's got the most fascinating story. Gare Joyce turned me on to this guy. He wrote a story about him for the hockey news. His name is Luke Sellers, and Luke Sellers will be in the basement, 12 noon on Thursday.

See you all then. you