Episode 668: Anton LaVey Part III - The Devil's Rain

There's no place to escape to, this is the last talk. On the left. That's one of the cannons where some started. In the front. Down, down. I think I get it. I see the aches. Oh, is that what's going on? I'm trying to figure out the Susie Atkins voice. It's been a while since I've been thought of. You're going to. There's a more Jan, it's like, for sure. You're more Jan. I think this is more Jan. Yeah. I mean, really, the Manson girls, they're far more tough than when you listen to them talk. Charlie Manson is the fucking genius man in this fucking world. Ain't nobody going to take Manson down. It's kind of crazy. You see tiny little ladies going like, I'll kill the fucking police officer for Charlie. He's my price. Yeah, he's my Satan in arms. They're all hot chicks that ate rocks. They weren't as hot as you. You know, when you look back on, they were. They were. They were younger man's energy. I bet you'll clean them. They're little Manson girls up. You take them anywhere you want. They're disgusting. What was the last talk? That's on the left, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Marcus Parks. I'm here with Henry Zabrowski. And I'm taking a swiffer to the Manson girl. That's my job is scrubbing them up, scrubbing them down, getting them ready for ends consumption. We've got the man who'll give any woman a chance. It's Ed Larson. All right. Here's comes the host. They're Twiggy. Who's the one of them? They're sleazy. Don't be. Yeah, there's a lot of them. You're taking a squeaky fro. I'm assuming you're taking out a squeaky. And here we are. Anton Levay, part three, part three of four. We're going to get into it. We are doing Satanism fully. Yeah. And Anton Levay fully because it's not just Anton Levay. That's the thing about Satanism. It's not just him. It's everybody around him. There's so many fascinating stories within the story of Anton Levay. Also, if you come to believe Anton Levay, which I do over time, he even pushes. He even positions himself as one of the least important people within the organization. When he starts it, the whole thing is like, "Oh, no. What have I done?" Second, he starts it. It's all like, "Oh, fuck. These losers are coming." Which is where we've hit right now. I really go back and forth on him the whole time. Like this guy's a fucking schmuck. And he's like, "I get it." Yeah, of course. And you know what? That's by design. Yeah. So when we last left Anton Levay, the year was 1967. And the Church of Satan had publicly established itself using Anton's infamous black house as the Church's headquarters, right in the heart of San Francisco. But while Anton Levay's theatrical style and freedom-forward ideas were attracting celebrities like Jane Mansfield, the Church of Satan, also began to cross paths with far more infamous characters entirely by coincidence. See, by 1968, Anton Levay expanded ceremonies beyond the black house to public occult ritual performances in other venues. And in February, he chose a lounge club called GGs in San Francisco as the site of a highly-produced ritual called The Witch's Seventh. And the key word is produced. Yes. Amongst other moving parts, one aspect of the performance called for a bare-breasted young woman to jump out of a coffin and walk around acting like a vampire on stage. Fuck yeah. Levay thought that he'd found the perfect girl for the role after seeing an 18-year-old dancing at a local topless bar, girl who called herself Sharon King. History, however, no Sharon King better by her real name. Sharon Stone. Man, oh, who is it? No. Susan Atkins. Yeah, it's Matt. Matt. Yeah. Oh, I just the idea. I know Anton Levay had a type, but just her going like, Eh, eh, eh, he buys Han, he buys Han. Sharon King was her group sex name. Yeah. Because she was the Sharon King. Oh. Well, the name Susan Atkins doesn't ring a bell. Susan Atkins, aka Sexy Sadie. I'm the Sexy One. Yeah, the Sexy One. I'm the one that bring out the public ensemble. Oh, God. Here's some history. Yeah. We get some spicy beer. It's supposed to spit it out. Yeah. Yeah, I'll say that. She was the only member of the Manson family present at all three murder scenes. It's Gary Hemman, The Tate Massacre, and The LaBianca Massacre. And it was Susan's bragging while in jail on car theft charges that eventually led authorities to link the Tate LaBianca murders to Charles Manson, central figure in the Manson story. But just a couple of years earlier, Susan Atkins was just another abandoned child of the 1960s who'd made her way to San Francisco as a teenager. But instead of joining the love and peace side of the flower generation, Atkins had become a stripper at 17 and lived an extremely reckless life of drugs and sex. Judgy. Judgy. Judgy. Right. It's reckless. Do you know how reckless you got to be to get a case of gonorrhea so bad that you got to be hospitalized? Yeah. The doctor didn't understand. When I sold him my gonorrhea, my gonorrhea said, "Hi." It was just supposed to be yellow. Not green. Yeah, I know. Congratulations to me, I know. After she was cured and released of this-- They needed to bring in a priest. They had to take a priest. And he came in. And he bled. And he didn't even jump out of me. And he didn't heal. After the gonorrhea was cleared up, Susan Atkins met Charles Manson in San Francisco shortly following Charlie's release from prison. Let me tell. Let me guess. You're just freshly clean, right? I can tell. I have a psychic ability to tell when gonorrhea has just left the body. Man, I can smell antibiotics on a woman. And now you're in here. And now you got-- you went to a doctor for that. And there was no way to-- you're the way to get. Well, this is back when Charles Manson was just an older guy in his early 30s with a guitar and a good line of bullshit. Incredibly, though, not long after Atkins met Manson, Anton LeVay noticed Susan Atkins dancing at her club. And LeVay figured that she'd be perfect for the role of the vampire girl in his new public ritual performance that she'd set to premiere in February of 1968. There is a distinct difference between the public performances and the stuff that Anton LeVay and his inner crew would do at this time period. And then it's here really the distinct difference is that he was obviously a PR machine. So a lot of this really was straight up performances. Yeah. This is all about advertising. It's attention. Would he charge a cover? Yeah. Oh, God yes. $2.50. So it's a show. Yeah. No, it's 100% a show. Yeah. I mean, it had reviews like the newspapers came out. You know what you call it? The term would be psychopump. Yeah. It was the idea of doing a public thing that was kind of an example of your magic. Yeah. So after being invited back to the black house to participate in dress rehearsals for the Witches Sabbath show at Gigi's, Susan Atkins reportedly got spooked by all the trappings of the satanic church. So funny. She was actually too scared to perform her part on stage until, of course, someone gave her a tab of acid. I need my acid. I only perform when I have my acid. I gotta have it. Oh, God. Just fucking her. Just so it's hard. I'm scared. Scared one of the fireplace. Scared of the what? Blue sunshine. I asked for orange sunshine. Get there. What I like. I'm allergic to the orange. She's an 18-year-old. She's an idiot. [LAUGHTER] Wobbly hallucinating. Susan Atkins got into a coffin wearing two-inch-long red fingernails in a jet-black wig. And when it came time for her to pop out in the middle of the psychopath, she did her best as the bear-breasted vampire. Yeah, yeah, blah. Blah, blah, blah. Blah, blah. I don't drink. [LAUGHTER] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Get out of my van. I can't move anybody. Yeah. I'm sorry. I'm not doing it. [LAUGHTER] But since both audience and newspaper reviews for the Witches Sabbath were lukewarm at best, that was the end of Anton's working relationship with Susan Atkins and the end of Susan's involvement with the Church of Satan. Soon after, though, the house where Susan Atkins and Charles Manson were living in San Francisco got raided by the police. So Manson asked Atkins if she wanted to join him for a summer road trip down to Los Angeles. They were going to drive down in a converted school bus with all the other Los souls Manson had gathered in San Francisco since he'd arrived. This, of course, was the first iteration of the Manson family. They would all soon settle at spawn ranch and by August of 1969, just 18 months after Atkins performed in La Valle show, Atkins was writing the word "pig" on Sharon Tate's front door with Sharon's own blood. So how about coming to play-- where the work is? Yeah. That's what Hollywood's always been about. It's where the work is, and that's where you go. So of course, you got picked up that quickly because you went where it was. If Sharon Tate was in San Francisco, she'd carve out the baby there. No, you got to come to Los Angeles. How many of you got murdered in Tate? There's five, five or six. you know it sucks for everyone else that wasn't a hot blonde like movie star they just they're just lumped in the tape murders. Oh Abigail yeah Abigail Fulger Steven parent um there was uh was a white check for a kowski. Well it's because the sheer job to fucking know their name. Yeah but no one was really sad. Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah the other ones were just you know obviously just acceptable losses. Yeah Steven parent was just there to buy a radio from a guy that lived in the back house like he was just a complete like completely wrong place the wrong time. Well I check for a kowski uh was kind of in love with Sharon Tate uh Abigail Fulger was just that she was a air she was the airist of the Fulger fortune. Fulger coffee. Yeah yeah and they were just all there hanging out because Roman Planski was out in uh I think London uh scouting for I think a dolphin movie. So I'm really stupid. I honestly I I will so I'm gonna take that back immediately because I said a blot you know the other ones were acceptable losses they weren't the only acceptable loss that's ever been was that godforsaken meddling waiter when he got between O.J. Nicole my favorite couple. Listen man I'm not gonna take this bad talk on waiters. Yeah all right yeah yeah I've been a waiter. Oh I know. I was a bad one but guess what you didn't do? Meddling the affairs of a end on the way. Certainly commented on his association with Susan Ackins as he did with any infamous character who crossed his path. Susan Ackins was not even close to the last one. Yeah he probably fucking loved it. Yeah well I mean he said that Susan's downfall came mostly because of drugs which was a fair point because events with the Manson family certainly would not have gotten as out of hand as they did without the excessive amount of acid that Manson was providing to family members. Of course whether or not Manson was being provided that acid by the CIA is another matter all together. We are doing it. Yeah Levay actually that's great. Yeah fuck yeah but I want to just fucking CIA acid. Dude we have some or some and we're in sunshine. Is that what it is? Yeah that's the CIA that's that CIA made baby. All right well you know the PO box there. We want to send a rainbow. Well Levay actually had no sympathy whatsoever for the kids who fell under Manson's spells nor did he care for the unwashed masses flocking on mass to San Francisco in the late 60s same time that he was trying to build the church of Satan. Anton called Susan Ackins an average hate street burnout flaky and made to order for someone like Charles Manson to control but really that is what sets Levay apart from people like Charles Manson and what makes Levay just kind of a bad person rather than a figure of evil. From what it seems like Levay never wanted to control anyone or at least he never wanted to control people collectively. Control comes with responsibility and as the story goes on we'll see that responsibility was the last thing Anton Levay ever wanted. Anton Levay viewed responsibility as coming hand in hand with hypocrisy because at some level as a boss you're going to have to do things that are against your own rules because you have to set up oh because they are for me enough or the it's just how it happens so he specifically never wanted that shit he never wanted it he thought this is what we'll get obviously as we go this was all supposed to stay local yeah it was supposed to stay local and I think it was just supposed to stay theatrical yes it was supposed to be like a theatrical thing but you know we're we're going to get into pretty soon about what happens when you let the nerds in the door always now as the church of Satan grew in popularity and membership so too did the rituals and the organization because Anton Levay quickly surmised that the rituals were what got him the most press and the most attention so on May 23rd 1967 Anton Levay held the first public satanic baptism using his three-year-old daughter Zena as the baptizand as it's called here according to Levay the ceremony was designed to delight the child by welcoming her into a world of indulgence with the sights and the smells that she liked instead of being dunked in water which is usually a terrifying experience I don't know either the two of you were you know almost drowned yeah I screamed yeah I was a baby I don't think I but I watched my my my nephew do it recently and he was screaming like a fucking lunatic and I literally looked at Julie and I was like I get it yeah I watch my dad do it in his 30s and I was like I'm not doing that ever because he got baptized late or he did yeah yeah late no he got baptized like yeah fuck that shit didn't yeah didn't take no yeah yeah no I they tried to do it again to me but it was hard to get passed by this yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah I rather just suck my dick priest instead of a dunk Zena sat basking in the attention of admirers and the press although having a naked woman present during the baptism was in my opinion gilding the lily just a bit there's of course nothing wrong with nudity I do think that Americans have been far too prudish about the human body for far too long but LaVay had to know that in 1968 having a naked woman present at a ritual involving a three-year-old it was going to make all the wrong waves in the press if press indeed was his main goal I think he's gonna make a chick there and you forget man you know what it is when we were just in Fairbanks right we were just there we went to that great place and they were all talking about how like you forget how hippies live yeah like these guys all like they were all talking about how they're like yeah that's night all the babies were upstairs we were partying down here man you know it's nice because all the babies are up there and you're like you don't forget that was like a thing yeah and my parents partied around me my my no Natalie was scarred by their parting around him and so I feel like it's it's was just different times yeah also you live in a counter-culture you know it's surprised you know when you're like the press is bad it's like well yeah of course the reaction is gonna be bad I was talking to Henry earlier we used to have this show with Creek in the cave murder for this called Brown Sabbath and I had Henry make a flyer and I was like hey can you make a church with a big pile of shit on top of it and I went around flyer and I'm now there in Long Island City but trying to put this and and bike stores and people like no I don't want that up my store and I'm like why not this is the world yeah you just don't understand yeah no it's like when I was in college I was in a band we called ourselves hugs a bunch pedophile and when we went out to put flyers around town that's when we realized not everyone finds that funny it's not that funny it's not that funny of course now it's super too much kids come up with but yeah no one wanted that in their in their window exactly and that's why we're we're we're rap man they should have listened to us dude Brown Sabbath is a funny name yeah I just played a bunch of like there was like a a black Sabbath mariachi band I played their music before the show's oh yeah nothing it's great band as the church of Satan grew in popularity and on laves black masses became more ornate although I made a discovery just this last weekend in Pittsburgh my favorite store in America eaties entertainment that put the creation of the black masses in a whole new light see I'm a collector and one of the things I collect are the more obscure men's magazines from the 50s 60s and 70s the ones outside of your standard playboys pinhouses and hustlers playboys to high class hustlers to low class yeah you don't like the piston on the ankels yeah yeah and pinhouse it's too middle of the road and while port the pornography contained their end is naturally a bonus I live in the year 2026 for Christ sake I don't need magazines to obtain pornography I also kind of feel weird you know what's funny is it I don't mind pre-fluffing to a woman that's definitely dead but there's something about masturbating to completion to a woman that is very much a skeleton and a grave I have no problem with that but that's neither here nor there I'm not joking off to these magazines are you no no no no sure it was funny I want it might lead to that but it's not it's a bonus it's it's it's a bonus it's a cherry on time I went to the store also with Marcus it was a lot of fun but we like separated you know because I like got a DVD from like Bondaroo 2008 yeah I'm walking around and then all of a sudden I there's like an area that you can't see then all of a sudden from inside go here oh yeah yeah which is normally the guy in that pornography I found a lot of great shit you have a full crate and you walked out of there with I absolutely did the main reason why I collect these magazines is because the articles work as a sort of secret history of the 20th century if you know what to look for and if you know the historical context in which these articles were written at Edie's in Pittsburgh for example I found an issue of magazine called rogue from 1962 which contained an article by one of Anton Levay's favorite authors William Lindsey Gresham author of Nightmare Ali who he stole his whole life story from the content of this article was the history of the so-called black mass published a full four years prior to the founding of the Church of Satan now the article is filled with exaggerations and half-truths as many of these articles are but I can almost guarantee that Anton Levay read this article not only was Anton also a fan of men's magazines hell we got an email from a fucking listener who said that he bought a whole stack of them from Anton Levay once he famously was a magazine collector yeah but Gresham was also one of Anton's favorite writers and this article was most likely the last thing Gresham wrote before he died that same year in 1962 but as they say the proof is in the pudding a lot of the things that go The question talked about in this article, it's a fucking fantastic article. Talks about fictional 19th century depictions of black masses, talked about historical rumor. They are all the same things that showed up in Antón the Vays black masses four years later, all the way down to using a naked woman as an alter. It's all there. - Yes, I think that he was definitely inspired and he knew what to do from it 'cause he was a collector of all these things, but then he did refine it. 'Cause he talked about-- - He did refine it. - Absolutely. - But the framework is in this fucking article is the framework. - Yes, he saw it. 'Cause the black mass is really fun. - Yeah. - Technically, in many ways, it could be quite funny. - Yeah. - It's a surprise, nothing ever happened. I mean, like as a magazine collector and the guy who loves candles that much is really gonna lit a fire. - You really think you gotta be careful? - Yeah, yeah. - He's super good with fire. - He's, you know, the Pope of the Church of Satan. - Okay. - You think he'd have, at least that unlocked down here. It's more water. - Yeah. - I think he had a problem with water. - Now, Anton may have taken the framework from the black masses from Gresham's article. He certainly added his own flair. As we can see from this description of a black mass in 1968, when the Church of Satan was firing on all cylinders. Le Vet, read a recitation of the Lord's Prayer Backwards. Then he inserted a triangular holy wafer into the vagina of a naked woman acting as the altar. - Hooray. (laughing) - You always made that sound. - Henry, could you explain for the listeners like when I say used a naked woman as an altar? Could you explain to them what that means? - Legitimately, she's lying on a, she's lying on a table. She is the thing that you put stuff on. Oh, see, I thought it was gonna be your back and she was on all fours. I'm actually glad you said so. - No, normally she's lying. - No, she's not like playing tables. - She's not the table. She's normally on a table and people put things on her. There's also been those where they just stand 'cause they'll stand next to the two things I've seen that. But largely it's that and they literally go, all right, damn, for here comes the airplane and then they bring in, they bring in, they're the hosts, and then let's open up the hanger. (laughing) And then they spread her up and then they just put crackers in her. - Yeah, like a peasant dispenser upside down. - Yes. (laughing) - Well, after removing the moist cracker from the vagina, Levet broke it up into six pieces and placed those pieces on the tongues of six congregants. - That's not. - I want to have that first. - All right, give me, give me, I want to have that first. I want a devil. - That's great. No, I want a devil. (laughing) - But at the same time, 'cause there's a lot going on in a black mass, there's a lot going on in every corner of the room. At the same time that this is happening, a red-headed congregant laid naked across the lap of another naked acolyte who whipped the red head with the cat and nine tails. - Not a table, working up to the table. - Working up to the tail, yeah, that's the end term. - Yeah, he still giggles too much. (laughing) - They're here, honestly, they're here, they're semester from UCLA. We love them here, it's just so nice to have you here, Gregory. - Meanwhile, another participant dressed like the Pope was thrown to the floor by black-robed men who all pulled down their pants and pretended to take a shit on the Pope stand-in. - That's fine, that's fine, that's fine. - Yeah, a bunch of guys burned it. (groaning) - I pooped, I pooped on the Pope. - I pooped on the Pope, I pooped on the Pope. - I mean, obviously I'm into it from what I stated earlier just moments ago about the brown Sabbath shit. - Obviously, and even though it's pretend there was still a lot of stage craft here. They managed to splatter brown mud all over the Pope's faith, the fake Pope's vestments. I don't know, they had like a, you know, like one of those like little squirt things in the sleeve or if their butts were filled with mud, I don't know. - It might have been all been very symbolic. - It might, no, no, this was literal mud splashed over it. - But I mean, even the pressing it upon him was probably like a, they lift they all brought the mud in and they brought it up and he'd go, "No, the duke has arrived." And then they have to like smear him with the duke, "My hand," and then he's just like, "I'm duke." - Well, after the man was adequately covered, the robed men dragged him out of the room while a Wagner record played and the whole congregation began the standard chowts of Hale Satan. - Hale Satan! - Hale Satan. - Hale Satan. - Hale Satan. - Yeah. - And the music. - I said Hale Satan. - Music is by far the single most important thing in every single one of these presentations. And some of they specifically say that because again of the presentation of it, everything has to do with classical music. And he said, well, again, one of the natural Satanist was Wagner and another one was guy before Wagner, named like Schnoosh. Some guy that also did that kind of music. - Carl Orf. - Well, he also loved Archibald Joyce. - Oh yeah. - Like he was big in a prokofy of Williams as Jack Parsons. - And rock mod and off, yeah. - Yeah, man. - So after covering the Pope in mud, Levet brought out a guy playing Jesus, wrapped in a white sheet and carrying a cross on his back. Levet would curse Jesus himself, calling him, quote, - That belled my trust indeed that hangs limply upon the cross still. - And Levet then crushed a plastic Christian figurine and threw it into a chamber pot, proclaiming, - Yeah, don't switch around him. I'm proved that he had never walked on water. He never shall again. - Levet then ambled over to the pot, unzipped his fly and tried in vain to piss on the remains of the figurine. Even the way it seemed occasionally got staged, right. - Yeah. - Ah, fuck. You know how you hear your dad in the morning? Like I gotta be hard to hear that, ah, ah, ah, come on. Come on, evil piss, come on. - Come on, little devil, let's do it. - Why did I, why did I piss before this? I knew I had a piss. - But while Anton did get a little pea shy during this particular black mass, he still took it and stride and asked the organist to, quote, play him some water music. - Ah, ah. - The organist droly responded with an Irving Berlin song called How Dry I Am, which caused the congregation to break character with various knowing jackals. - This fucking good comedic piano man. - Yeah. - For perhaps the Levet he was needed. For Anton's stream did flow from that foot forward. - Fuck. (laughing) - Oh, fuck. - Oh, oh, oh. - Darn it. (laughing) - And after he finished, the nude female accolades in the room all took turns as well, including one who pissed in the bucket for what was said to be an uncomfortably long period of time. - Jesus Christ, Sandra. (laughing) - Three and a half minutes ago. (laughing) Some people have to catch a bus. - Hey, Sandra, you have a problem. - Is that, is, are you just bleeding? - What is happening to you? I don't even understand how you can have that much water inside if you only 70%. - Your mother a camel. (laughing) - All this piss, I'm sure, was much to the pleasure of Anton Levet who had figured out how to make his personal sexual fetish, Europhelia, a central penit of the Church of Satan black mass. - I mean, he's in charge. - But after the urine part of the ceremony was over, a woman dressed as a nun came out and a distriptease to a particular walled by Archibald Joyce, which very much reminds me of the type of music Jack Parsons listened to when he did magic. Let's listen to some of that striptease. - Vision of Salome. - Oh. - It was used in a movie, I came rid of which one. - Can we take this back? We need to do this for strip clubs. We need to go back to this. - There's no lumpies. - When if we go back to like, Matahari and like the dance of the seven vales? - Hey, it's still, there's someone in Los Angeles tonight stripping somewhere to a song like this. You can find it. It's out there. Just go to the magic castle and start asking people. That's where that line starts, unfortunately. - I don't know if those magicians know a lot of ladies. (laughs) - Man, those guys love ladies. Matahari, they get in the magic. Otherwise, they'd never talk to a woman. - Yeah, it's true. - Now, in the conclusion of the black mass, Anton Leve would open his cape in front of the naked altar and hold his hands in a sign of the horns. Now, if you didn't know, the devil horn sign actually has meaning. 'Cause today, the horns of Satan have pretty much evolved into a more intense thumbs up. When you like something, you do the devil horns. - But it used to be, it's against the world's things. It used to freak people out. - Yeah, yeah. The two points of your index and pinky fingers represent goat horns thrust upwards into fiance of heaven. - Well, the three fingers turn down or supposed to be in denial of the Holy Trinity. You know, but not everyone does. - And then you put the thumb out that's I love you. - Yeah, that's I love you. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Whoa, everybody. - Anybody can do ASL. - Only for deaf people, you know what, Marcus? That's for you. - Oh, thank you. - You did nothing. You're nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing. - Back to you. - Thank you, that's okay. - I mean, today, it's amazing that this thing that used to be, it's a well-established fixture in American culture. Like you see this anywhere and everywhere. - Yeah, we don't use this. - You see it in little flea games, you know? - Yeah, Joe Biden did it once. - Yeah. - But concerning a stroke. - Yeah, being out there and the problem. (all laughing) But concerning the end of this black mass, after three shouts of Hale Satan, Levet put out a candle, covered the naked woman who acted as the altar in a leopard-skin blanket and carried her out of the room. After the ritual was complete, the members of the Church of Satan, including Ant on Levet, retreated to his kitchen where they shmoosed over, not alcohol, drugs, nor a virgin's blood, but coffee, tea, and cake. And not come cake, either. Regular cake. - Just normal ass cake. - Yeah, no cakes of light, just tea and cake. - This is really what Ant on Levet was trying to strip away from all of the stuff. As an after-a-red-old, the Alistair Crowley stuff, he's trying to remind people that the whole magic thing is actually here. It's here amongst us. It's here in this room. Like yeah, sure. It's, we're praying to Satan, but what we're actually doing, It's building the community. Yeah, and nothing builds community like late night coffee. It really does it in a piece of cake. That is just one of my favorite ways to live life. It is one of the things that they did that every other fucking religion did. Is it funny? No, they were racist, I mean, I'll do that. He was always coughing. Yeah. Now, Anton Leve was certainly enjoying all this attention. Because by the end of 1968, he was advertising black masses in San Francisco newspapers. And these gatherings became so popular that he would do the same performance two nights a week. By 1969, Anton Leve claimed that the Church of Satan's membership had reached 10,000 worldwide, although the real number was almost certainly far lower. But even so, there were enough people paying attention for Anton to release his first book. This, of course, was the foundational text of the Church of Satan, the infamous Satanic Bible. Now, I didn't read the Satanic Bible until around 2012. But what surprised me most is that while it is incredibly judgmental and more than a little fascist, it basically reads like a guidebook for how to balance being a good person with standing up for yourself in the modern world. It's actually a great place to start when you're trying to figure out your own personal guidelines for living outside of a Christian framework. Because it really is far more of a philosophy book than a religious tone. It also isn't meant to be taken that seriously, nor is it meant to be the end all be all. You don't end with the Satanic Bible. You begin with it. The key is to read it because then you can really see what the actual tone is, which is mostly funny. Largely, it is a lot of wink. It's a lot of tongue and cheek mix with passionate belief systems that largely have to be included in context to the Christian Church. That's what kind of the main issue about Satanism in general is that even on its own as a religion, it doesn't kind of like stand up because it's not supposed to. If you read all just the stuff inside the Satanic Bible without realizing why it's there or what the point of it is, it doesn't serve as a bunch of lessons. Well, it really is defined by its opposition. And when something is defined by opposition, then it really can't stand on its own. And you really need something that stands on its own. Which is why it's a good place to start. Yes, and that's why it's on the way, which we'll get to, was trying to fight it, becoming a huge S religion. Yeah, and if you don't have time to read it, you can always read the jump off a cliff notes. Yeah, you fucking got it. Fucking. The Satanic Bible, however, is also largely plagiarized from many dubious sources. It better, mate. Did someone like, like, did like penguin put it out? Like, did someone like, by the. Yeah, it was a publisher. I think Avon was a publisher. It's been, you know, put out through various publishing houses throughout the year. It takes a lot of fucking balls. It does. Yeah. See, according to Anton Levay's daughter, Zena, who later did an expose on Levay's past after she broke with the church, the Satanic Bible was more of a cash grab meant to capitalize on the recent success of the Rum Polansky Classic Rose Mary's baby, which had greatly increased the public's appetite for Satanist, and it caught content. In other words, it's merch. Yeah. But when Anton Levay and his partner, Diane Hagarity, gathered everything Anton had written about the Church of Satan for a book. It was far too short, and it was an absolute fucking mess. It's actually said that it's editor, a woman named Carol Smith, who mostly did cookbooks. She was the one who made the Satanic Bible readable. Oh, I bet that a hoonroid Paul Sand. You know what I'm saying? Cookbooks, great way to start for the. It's actually really good for ritual writing. Yeah, you're gonna need, like, two outs of blood. One new guy. Yeah, it's instructions. But to meet the length requirements laid out by the publisher, Levay and Hagarity heavily borrowed from authors like the infamous Ragnar Redbeard, author of the antisemitic white supremacist, social Darwinist garbage book might is right. In this book from 1896, Ragnar argued that weakness should be met with hatred, and that social Darwinism should be the law of the land. Now Levay stripped out the antisemitism, the misogyny, and the racism, but large parts of one section of the Satanic Bible, the book of Satan, were lifted from Ragnar Redbeard's writings. In fact, while it has been removed from recent pennings, early editions of the Satanic Bible list Ragnar Redbeard as an influence. Might is right, by the way, has since had a resurgence among the more foul, far-right, manned-sphere influencers who have all spent the last few years absolutely ruining the internet for reasonable people like ourselves. I will say, as we're. Now that this is. I'd like that we're getting into this. Of course. This is one of the big, major problems of Satanism has is this problem, which is this idea of people don't understand fundamentally what all of this means, and what Anton Levay meant by it. So go through this, you can kind of see, and you can see why he chose this topic, and then stripped it of all the quote-unquote hate. I can see why he chose it, but let's get into it now. Do you keep all that shit in there because he needs women to love it? Oh no, it's not about that, because again, it was all it's not. How do you say this is the problem when something isn't that deep? That's the problem almost, is that when something becomes an Anton Levay, this is a problem. He set up an issue for himself in the future by not really thinking about it hard enough, about what it was he was adding without the later on in the Devil's Notebook and Speak of the Devil, Anton Levay will couch this, package this more, explain more what he kind of did, like he kind of does that over time, but in the beginning, you know. Yes, Satanic Bible is kind of rushed, so it's just sort of it's put out, because like, hey, we can make a lot of money, because people are really into this Rosemary's baby shit, like let's get this thing out there. So it's, you know, so yeah, there's a lot of shit in there that probably shouldn't be in there. Yes. Even more than Ragnar Redbeard, Anton Levay also stole from the much-maligned objectivist writer Eyn Rand for his nine Satanic statements, and those who were meant to replace Christianity's ten commandments. Then he wanted statements instead of commandments. In fact, Levay himself said that Levay and Satanism was, quote, "just Eyn Rand's philosophy with ceremony and ritual added." Which it doesn't, even if you listen to Anton Levay, I'm sorry, he doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about, because he doesn't because Eyn Rand specifically doesn't believe, that's what objectivism can't have rituals in it. So it doesn't make any sense for them to have any rituals in it, so yeah. Well, ironically, though, considering how much Republicans love Eyn Rand because she helped bring their fuck you, I got mine philosophy to the modern world, I'd say that today's Christians actually follow Church of Satan philosophies far more than the teachings of Jesus Christ. For example, this blessing written by Anton Levay as a parody of Jesus' blessed or the meek speech, this might as well be the guiding light for the modern Republican Party. Henry, please. Other week, for they shall inherit the yoke. Bless it for the Iron Handed, for the unfit shall flee before them, curse it, or the fallen spirit. For they shall be spat upon. Yeah, but the key is, okay. The Church of Satan more than anything is a direct offense against the happy movement and the Christian Church. So in this world, the idea is, God, you're supposed to be afraid of God, and you're supposed to inherently obey God. You're supposed to obey your parents. You're supposed to obey the priests. You're supposed to do all these things, and you're supposed to turn the other cheek when they punish you. So when they punish you, when something bad happens to you, you're just supposed to walk away. You're supposed to just lay down your arms and just take it. And it's the whole thing. And with Christianity, that tenant makes you easy to control because eventually it's like, you're just going to do what I say because I'm telling you to say it. And this, you're literally, you, you like groveling and obeying me is a virtue. The idea of you, that being a virtue. So this is an over correction. The whole point of this is to give to dewebes and nerds the ability to be like, no, like, you know, when your mom, my mom said, would your mom have the same philosophy? I don't want to see you start in a fight, but you can finish your fight, right? So it is that idea of being like, no, fuck God. So like, oh, so God places little games with me. And I'm supposed to be fucking angry about it for his lessons. So everything bad he does to me is just a challenge that I'm just supposed to suck up and take fuck you. And it's a good general like all of these people. Just because you're wearing a suit, I'm supposed to think you're better than me just because you're, you act like you have some moral agency, you act like you are the guy, the arbiter of morality. And I just have to believe you because you're on fucking television, fuck you. Sure. I mean, to bring the Satanic Bible down to its absolute basics, it really comes down to living a life that makes you happy and successful while doing everything in your power to ensure that your happiness does not come at the expense or the pain of others. And that's despite all of the book's negative influences. In my opinion, Anton Leve took a lot of really ugly shit and made a religion that when you strip away a lot of the edginess, it's actually quite nice. And it's far more realistic than Christianity as Christianity is actually practice. Your opinion on that, of course, depends a lot on your opinion about the true nature of mankind. If we're inherently good, inherently bad, or as Leve sees it, and honestly, how I see it for somewhere in between. Because Christians believe we're bad. Do you know that, right? Original, no, original sin. That's the whole fucking thing. We're born sinful. The devil exists to scare them out of doing bad things. Which guess what they do? They do bad things, especially the ones that have the mandates, because they've been given God's mandate. They've been told that they're chosen by God, and so they can do whatever the fuck they want. - Yeah, like Pence was too scared to be alone with another woman. - Yeah, that's how fucking it was, you know. (audience laughing) - So yes, yes, I do understand this, and then this will be the thing that will cause problems in the future for him. This will cause problems, but it's because of the, it's not understanding it, almost on purpose, and also where he got it from. - Sure. - I met a bunch of Satanists when I lived in Tallahassee, and I was pretty close-minded about Satanism at that point in my life, 'cause I was like, you know, 23 years old, I just think of like Satanism as evil. - Sure. - And then I mean, you're a good Catholic boy. - I wasn't, at this point I was an atheist, but I met a couple of Satanists, and they were so kind. - Yeah, they were like, literally like, help me, my car was stuck on the side of the road, and they came and helped me. And then like, they helped, a couple of them helped me move. I barely knew them. And then I started working with some of them in hooters, and they were just like, the guys you shot up the work on time. (laughing) - I was like, I don't know what to say. - The guy you're describing at ease, the guy that just now arriving in the story was Michael Aquino. So Michael Aquino is an example of this, is that in Satanism, the most effective members have an extremely high moral viewpoint of the world. Like that is the, that's the only way it works. - You're knowingly so. - Yes, it is the only way it even works, is that the whole point is that you are annoyingly moral. - I would say, almost aggravatingly normal. - Yeah, moral. - Yes, that is the idea. You are, 'cause you have believed, you come to believe, which is what I come to believe, that the Christian world is a place of sickness. Like it's like a place of rot and poison, and then until it's fixed from the bottom up, it's not, it's not helping anybody. I've seen way more evil in the Christian church than I have in the Satan church. Oh, yes. - We all have. - No, anyone who says any different isn't paying attention. - No. - Now in March of 1969, Anton LeVay's inner circle grew to include a member who would be far more of a pain in the ass to Anton LeVay than he probably suspected. That man was the future founder of the Temple of Set, Michael Aquino. - Hell, fight! (laughing) He's my best friend. Anton, just, you don't get it. You're a man, but by the rules, you, oh, I understand. - He was a big old boy, though. You portray him like such a dwee. He looks scary. - No, he's chunker, he's chunker. - Yeah, he's a, he's a chubby man. - Yeah. - He's got some army training. He doesn't get into it, all right. - And reportedly, Michael Aquino met Anton LeVay at a showing of Rosemary's Baby when Aquino was just 22 years old. - Do you know that story? - No. - It's so funny, 'cause Anton LeVay would just show up thing. So again, an example of why he was just a local character. Anything that was remotely evil, Anton LeVay and his crew were just show up. - So, literally, so funny. - Michael Aquino said he got out of the car and it was the premiere of Rosemary's Baby in San Francisco. And he said he watched the doors fling open. And Anton LeVay in his full hood was out with all of his coterie. And he watched them all walk into a hearse and he'd gotten a hearse and drove off. And it was just Michael Aquino being like, I wanna be just like that. (all laughing) - Well, Michael and his wife quickly applied for membership in the church. And before long, they were participating in their first Satanic rituals. Aquino, however, does not in any way fit the profile of an average satanist or at least how people think an average satanist would be. When Aquino met Anton LeVay, Michael was an officer in the army who'd grown up as a conventionally respectable boy. Aquino was an eagle scout who joined the ROTC at UC Santa Barbara, graduating in 1968 as a distinguished military graduate. Do you know how much of a fucking nerd you have to be to join the ROTC in Santa Barbara in the 1960s? - It's so much just goes surfing. - Yeah. - That was the, it's too fast for surfing. - He definitely was a Santa Barbara Goth. And for those of you that know other Santa Barbara Goths or beachside Goths, you know for a fact, it's just him just going, "All these people that tied little tummies on these newborns, they don't know a span that the universe is complicated." I mean, I know many things. - Meanwhile, everybody's fucking and dancing and having a great time. And he's just sitting there just and like, "They don't fucking read like I understand all my references." (laughing) My necklaces are caught my fish necklaces. (laughing) - He was in Santa Barbara from 1964 to 1968. And he chose the ROTC. - Yeah, what a nerd. - Well, after that, he joined the army. - After that, Akino joined the army and soon found himself as a Syop Special Forces officer at Fort Bragg during the Vietnam War. Reportedly, Akino's Syop ideas included experiments to disorient North Vietnamese and Viet Cong soldiers using amplified sounds. Sometimes using so-called demonic screams blared from helicopters overhead. - I love him, I did myself, who's kind of fun. He's going, sit down, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, I speak it up. - When Akino traveled to Vietnam for an active duty tour in June of 1969, he brought a copy of John Milton's paradise lost with him. If you'll remember, Antón the V based his ideas about the character of Satan on Milton's interpretation. Like Levet, Akino saw Satan as the hero of paradise lost. And since Akino was going through a heavy existential and philosophical crisis at the time, he latched on to the idea that Satan might have better ideas than God. It must be said, however, that his crises had nothing to do with his career and the armed forces, nor did it have anything to do about his feelings concerning Vietnam. Because Michael Akino stayed in the military as a powerful and influential figure throughout his entire life, up until the 2000s. And that was even with his incredibly goofy eyebrows, which were styled into points to mimic devil horns. - That is a diabolical. - But that really shows you how good Michael Akino was at his job. He was so fucking good that the army put up with that. - Yeah, but the army also likes scary shit. - Yeah, they like weirdos. And they like people patriotic weirdos. - Michael Akino is a patriot and through. He is a very similar to Mormons. That's why they use Mormons and the intelligence services and they use Mormons for those types of things. Because they are Mormons have an ability to believe in something entirely not real. And they, and just be able to dispel reality so hard that it makes them really good at being a part of the CIA. - Who do you think Michael Akino's more, who likes more? The United States for America or Satan? - I would say America. - Well, I'd say he loves that he lives in America, but he wishes that you can understand of the power of set himself would release you to an ocean of endless knowledge. - Boring. (laughing) - Exactly. - And Anton Lave met Michael Akino at the Rosemary's Baby screening. Lave simply gave him his card. It wasn't until Akino was on leave in San Francisco in March of 1969 that he would see an ad in an underground newspaper advertising the performance of a so-called satanic circle at Anton's black house. - They're gonna love me there. (laughing) - There's gonna be so happy on him. So excited for my presence. - The circle that Akino attended featured all of Anton's greatest hits, including a robed henchman stationed at the door who was actually just a history professor and a grand entrance from Lave himself emerging from an Egyptian sarcophagus. Now Akino was impressed by Lave's charisma, confidence, and philosophy. So he went all in on the Church of Satan. He later wrote in the nerdiest way possible, quote, "I reached out and I took the apple." (laughing) - Thank you. (laughing) - Fucking God, dammit. How do you take it and make it just so not cool? (laughing) - That's the thing, Anton Lave, he was just so like. (sighs) - But he knew he needed these guys. That's the problem he needed, guys. - But did he though? - I mean, not with what they would do, but he originally is like, "Okay, I need guys "that aren't just drug addicts and losers and strippers." I need like someone's gonna work the books. - Yes. - Well, not just intellectuals. Like that's where it is, 'cause that's really the people that he's surrounding himself at this point is like, it's intellectuals, it's, you know, people who say they're magicians, but they're really dentists. But there are people who have other shit going on. He needed some, he thought at least that he needed someone who could take care of the abman. - It was highly curated as well. - That's what also people don't particularly understand is how curated this environment was in the beginning. It really was friendly thinkers that were all willing to talk about this in a fun way and then just leave. - Yeah. - You know what I mean? It was like very hip people. - Yeah, it's like guys who get into like, magic to gathering, but they're cool, and then they just gotta go deal with these fucking nerds all the time. - That's how it is, that's what Anton Lave, he, yes. He was, it was his punishment. - Now, within just a few years, Michael Aquino was a major insider at the Church of Satan, although he took on all the nerd roles that Anton Lave couldn't be bothered with. Like, for example, editing the church's internal publication, The Clothing Hook. - Excellent, because I love templates. - Yeah, and I have clues for hand. Just get the fuck out of here. I just feel like there were so many good conversations like, okay, Michael, now get the fuck out of here. - I'm done, I'm done. - I'm done with you, foot today. - I don't wanna hear that, - I don't want to hear a single moment. more thing about the email list, play you one more fucking thing about an email list. I'm going to fucking sacrifice you to myself. How many empty doorways that Michael Aqino talk through? He was just walking away slowly. Now that's it, the other part that I want to do, that's fine, I'll save it. I'll save it for when we're on a plane together. Most importantly though, Michael Aqino was a member of the Church of Satan's governing body, the Council of Nine. This presumably is how Aqino came to be so heavily involved in a short-lived organizational structure called the Grotto system. Now, incredibly, the Grotto system was modeled after the Boy Scout troops that both Aqino and Lave loved. The idea was that the Grotto system would give each member a chance to be more than a so-called "male order" Satanist. Using the Grotto system, members could share in ritual practice and discussion with their own local Satanist outside of San Francisco, wherever in the country they may be. By July of 1970, 25 Satanic Grottoes had been established around America, with names like the Plutonian Grotto, the Esmodius Grotto, the Babylon Grotto, the Karnat Grotto, and the U-Goth Grotto. Each Grotto, which was required to have at least five members, could I ask which Grotto had the Colbrook? That's my main thing. Karnat Grotto. I'll be there. I'm sure everyone was in Connecticut. Well, each Grotto, which was required to have at least five members, was led by someone who was at least a second degree witch or warlock. Each Grotto also had to be approved by Michael Aqino in the rest of the Council of Nine, who were all fourth degree witches or warlocks. Oh, I just graduated. I'm fifth degree now. That is you make the rules. Yeah. I know. Yeah. That kind of is the problem. That's actually the main problem. When you just make up a bunch of stuff and you'd say, okay, all of you individuals, former group. So, other than San Francisco, where was the next biggest community do you know? I actually don't know, but they were all over the country. Like I said, they're 25 of them. I would guess probably New York was New York and the UK. Yeah. Well, Grotto's also had to make monthly reports about its members. Whatever one's up to, how are the rituals going? And some even had their own local newsletters like Satan Spawn, Devil's Advocate, children of the night. And my favorite, the Typhon Tusk. Woo. Now, as far as Michael Aqino's role in the Grotto system went, he handled some of the administration and of course, wrote the articles of protocol for the whole system, which outlined the purpose of the Grotto. Oh, yeah. Anytime there's something with articles, articles or protocol in it, Aqino is all over. Yeah, Mike. I want you to take care of that. I was actually going to volunteer. That's my father's the hottest thing in the world. Well, I was thinking of a 12 point for a point system. Michael, that's great. That's great. That's okay. Great, Michael. I do. I need to hear every fucking minute of it. Do I get you every fucking second of it? Basically, Aqino believed because he was both an army man and an eagle scout. The people who work in formal organizations can realize their desires for power more easily. Grotto's allowed Satanist to help each other rather than go it alone. And black magic ceremonies were of course far easier to pull off if you had friends helping. But what does that do, Marcus? It creates a series of hierarchies and guess what Satanists don't like? Series of fucking hierarchies. We don't like them. No, but they hate them. But they also hate being alone. All humans do. Yeah, but that's the thing. Because I'm hanging out with a bunch of people. Do I have to put a bunch of rules around it? Why we got to fucking all have titles? Yeah. Can we just hang out? Yeah. But even though things were going swimmingly for the Church of Satan on paper, it seems like Michael Aqino's influence in the organization took a lot of the fun out of the enterprise for Anton the Vay. And the Vay began getting disillusioned with the whole affair within just a few years. In 1972, Anton the Vay ended his public ceremonies at the black house. In his mind, he'd wanted the Church of Satan to evolve into a quote, "cubblistic underground instead of the long-running pageant." It had become. And that is, of course, his words, "long-running pageant." And furthermore, the grotto system under Michael Aqino had, again, in Lave's words, turned the Church into a Satan-Penpal club. It's kind of funny. Yeah, it went from like ceremonies to meetings. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. But concerning the pageantry, Lave began feeling embarrassed to be seen with members who wanted to show the whole world that they were Satanists all the time wherever they went. Lave said that he'd step off a plane and there his dark children would be, huddled together in black velvet robes and capes with huge baffamette necklaces at the fucking airport. Because, yeah, there's a time and place for this shit and it ain't the fucking airport. I've learned. Yeah. He's got to target on his back. He doesn't need the moment he lands for there to be a crowd waiting for him. Yeah. He's the Church of Satan, guys. Everybody kill him. Yeah. So, from how Lave saw it, the grassroots people around the country didn't know much about subtlety or decorum. In other words, Lave was disappointed that his Satanists, they didn't know how to just be cool, just fucking hang out. It doesn't have to be like this all the fucking time. He said, and this is my favorite ant on Lave quote. I was trying to present a cultured man of image and their idea of protest to shock was to wear their lodge regalia into the nearest denys. This is the thing that I think about all the time because this is kind of what I've even modeled myself after in a way because ant on the day, he straight up gets what he kept saying. He's like, the Church of Satan part of me is only like a 20% part of me. Yeah. Like, I actually have all these other things. I actually have all these other abilities and all these other interests. And I started this thing and it was actually never supposed to be a merch carrying club. Like, this was supposed to go underground for me. This was supposed to be for me and for the people like minded to me because Satanists, if you believe how the Satanists believe themselves, we're the fucking elite. That's the idea, right? We're supposed to be the fucking top of the top that don't get fucking pulled in the nets of these religions and shit and makes you naturally very divisive human being. But the dude fucking just was like, can't you just do it with style? Yeah. Yeah. Just hang out. He was right about the denys thing. I feel like that's wherever I see a Satanist is in like a denys or a shitty diner. Well, I mean, I don't know what it is, but just I mean, it's a well known fact that goth kids are drawn to denys. It is a safe place. Yeah. Perkins as well. They're like Perkins. Yeah. Every time they're just hung out and it is because you could sit hang out in a denys unlimited coffee and you could smoke and they won't kick you out and it's open 24 hours. As long as you don't fight nobody, you're good. Yeah. Now, yeah. Now, the inevitable backlash against the church of Satan started getting dangerous by 1974. While the black house was among the world's first Satanic tourist destinations, the crowds of lucky lose and admirers also included people who genuinely wanted to hurt or kill Anton and his family. We're talking about in the first episode, that's an inherent problem about being a Satanist is that you're asking people to punch you in the face. Yes. And the star does look like a target. It does. Very much so. Levain is family therefore moved to a house in Sonoma, north of San Francisco, after enduring a barrage of bricks, eggs, spray paints, bullets, and even a bomb. Levain became reclusive, fortifying the black house with surveillance cameras and a 10 foot tall electrified fence, even though he wasn't even living there anymore. He was more of the black house basically became like the church of Satan's office. Yeah. Then around the Halloween of 1974, Levain went public with his dissatisfaction. He said in an interview that he wanted to be nowhere near San Francisco, daring Halloween. He didn't want to be the center of attention for a bunch of Satanists. He didn't like a respect further explaining that for him, which I totally fucking get, Halloween was like New Year's Eve to a bartender. It's just the truth. Hey, and I will be there for a Tuesday night, man, that's when you want to meet the fucking Pope with the church of Satan. I want to meet the Pope with the church of Satan on April 14th. Yes. Little of the day. Actually, now April 14th back is he's going to be, he's in preparations for Valpurgis knocked. Yes. Yeah. I want to meet him sometime in like June. Yeah. What after? Yeah. The normal anti-Christian celebration. Levain also announced that in an attempt to steer the church back to a dignified place, he was done doing performative Satanic rituals. He said that the new type of Satanist is not ostentatious nor garish, but a substantial responsible citizen who prefers to keep his Satanism on the inside rather than on his sleeve. Levain also dismantled Michael Aquino's beloved grotto system, because the majority of the grottoes couldn't get their shit together due to rivalries, scandals, and the general types of antics that one would expect more in a high school glee club than in a Satanic mini-cult. Can I speak as the charismatic leader of a small group of people that do form side groups and explain that every single time you do that, when you form a Facebook group or you form a Reddit group, it begins to suck and does begin to eat itself because the internet's, because groups of people in those areas for some reason just slowly become like evil, a dark rats to each other. Whenever you're like group chat on their text chat, like changes names for the fifth time, it's time to go. Yeah. Yeah, it's time to get out of there. Yeah. It's really, it's not just Satanist. It's any group of people. Like, you get too many people in one place and just if for too long, everything has an end. And you kind of just need to say, like, okay, that's enough. But and on the way saying, like, we're not doing the grotto system anymore. That was also, I, it seems like the beginning of the split between him and Michael Aquino very much so because they were also what he's not telling the world is that he himself was taking magic more seriously on his own personally. Yeah. And that was like the thing he sort of understand I wanted to do it for me. And the Michael Aquino in the order of the trapezoid shit, all of that was supposed to be for his own private practice. And for him to sort of teach himself because according to Michael Aquino, that's the ideas that they started doing fake rituals. And then one day they met something real. Yes, right from North way. Now LaVay did continue as a leader of the church, but he narrowed his focus on the more intellectual and, of course, the wealthier followers. Mainstream fame as it turned out resulted in mainstream people all up in your shit. And from what it seems like, LaVay didn't want to be a mainstream figure. Instead, it seems like after the Church of Satan began to be far more troubled than it was worth. Anton LeVay became far more concerned with how he could worm his way into Hollywood because Anton LeVay was first and foremost an entertainer. Oh, yeah, baby. Now, LeVay had claimed that he'd worked as a satanic consultant on Rosemary's baby. And it was rumored that it was LaVay himself who played Satan during the movie's impregnation scene. Now, there are those things, of course, are true, but it is interesting. Yeah, he did. No, no, that's not true. He just, you know, he just, he's an evil man. Yeah, but it is interesting that Anton's detachment from the church does coincide with his increasing involvement in Hollywood productions, even if all of his contributions were in the decidedly B movie category. He just wanted to make movies at this point. He knew he knew he just wanted to make movies. He never wanted to make a religion really. No, entertainment. Yeah, exactly. He wanted to make entertainment movies TV, whatever music. Yeah. But this is the big lesson here. The big lesson is that way all of this magic shit works is that what Anton LeVay understood did not fully understand, even in his creation of it, is that you can't control it. Yeah. And you really do become what you pretend to be. It is real. That is fucking real. It's why the senators change is why these people change is because as soon as you get to that place, it changes you. Yeah, it does. Well, in 1973, Anton LeVay advised on a script for a TV movie starring William Shatner called The Horror at 37,000 Feet. Whoa. Shatner, I suppose, was trying to recapture the magic of his classic Twilight Zone episode Nightmare at 20,000 Feet. Oh, I know. It's incredibly stupid. Yeah. And that's also it's interesting that remember William Shatner's other Twilight Zone episode was the one, the little devil creature, you know, that we're at the diner. You know, it's just one more, just one more. Yes, which is honestly incredible allegory for chat boxes and chat GPT. It is. It really is. Yeah. What do I do? Tell me what to do next. Yes. But instead of a Grimlin tearing the plane apart, that was Nightmare at 20,000 Feet, horror at 37,000 Feet. Completely different. I don't want to hear this. It's entirely different. 15,000 yards. I like that. I like that. I like it. It makes me think of football. Football goes on a plane. Terror at 30,000 inches. That's what I like. That's a real low one. I like that. Well, horror at 37,000 Feet was a high concept mess about a bunch of demonic druid ghosts causing havoc from an airplane's baggage compartment by torturing the passengers with demonic visions. Yes. It is considered to be William Shatner's worst film, which is saying a lot. Yeah. Just had to open like, okay, right. Now, you had to go. Yeah. Absolutely. All right. When he goes to the plane, where we had a grandma in this fine, when he goes on the plane, it's fine. Drew, it's perfect. Yeah. Exactly. I were stunned. British people. So scary. Absolutely. Where did you go? Where did British ghost go? Baggage in the baggages in the bags. No, yeah. Because that's where crazy shit. No one knows it's in the bags. Nobody knows it's on the plane. Yeah. That's the scariest part of the plane. Aren't we all mentally carrying a lot of that? You know, people say you can't do art with TV. It's just wrong. We're doing it. We're doing it. But even though horror was a fucking flop, Lave also consulted on a movie called The Mathisto Waltz about a dying Satanist piano player who transfers his soul into the body of a younger man that younger man was played by Alan Alda, you know, for a match. Wow. Wow. I haven't seen the poster from The Fisto Waltz is fucking awesome. It's very cool. It's got a girl on the floor and she's drawn a pentagram. It's very cool. But I hear like the set is really cool. But overall, like they say Alan Alda's the worst part of the movie. Yeah. They say he flubs it. I can't. No, not Alda. He's young. Well, I will say if we're saying that the set is good, it's not a good move. You know, I'm proud of them for getting it all together. Yeah. Wow. They really put a lot of work in that. Well, I'm a massive B movie guy. So whenever someone says like the set is incredible, I'm like, watch that. In this one, got better reviews. But the praise was mostly focused on the occult imagery, the set, you know, all of the various things in the background. That of course was all LaVay's doing critics. However, we're less kind about the car, which involved the possessed Lincoln Continental that runs people over for no good reason and was parodied many years later in an episode of Futurama called the Honking. I think it was somewhere around the same time as Christine. But while LaVay bragged that the car was filled with occult symbolism the film's writers denied all that saying that they had simply written a quick ripoff of jaws using a car instead of a shark and a few vague occult elements. That's tool. Yeah. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, it's called the car. You know, that actually kind of mansions. That's two cars. This is not what about several cars. It's about one car and it's a Lincoln, which is nice, and it goes on a song. And we all know what Lincoln did. But out of all the movies and on the way it was involved with in ways big and small, none were more insane, more satanic, more entertaining, nor more incoherent than the devil's reign. Oh, it's awesome. Yeah, starring again, William Shatner, as well as Tom Scarrett as the hero and Ernest Borgnein in one of his best roles as a manic satanic priest. Dude, it was awesome. Marcus made me watch it last night and I can't tell if I know more or less about satanism now. You know less. You know, Ernest Borgnein's amazing in this movie. Yeah, I really enjoyed it. And he disavowed it afterwards. Yeah, although it was, you know, he said later this, oh, I hid my trailer the whole time. He didn't. He had a fucking great time. Everyone on the, everyone on the set had a great time except William Shatner. And the only reason why William Shatner had a bad time was because it was filmed in Mexico and nobody in Mexico knew who the fuck William Shatner was, no one seen Star Trek. And so he was jealous. The set was nice. The set was amazing. Yeah. Oh, and bonus horror movie fact, a plastic mold was made of William Shatner's face for the big climax in the devil's rain. And that mold was turned to a mass produced Halloween mask. And that same model of mask was later painted white and turned into the face of Michael Myers for the Halloween movies. Hell yeah. Fascinating. So it did lead to something good. Yeah. It did. Oh, it actually we're going to get to it here in a second. It led to a lot of shit. Yeah. Now concerning the devil's rain, the plot barely makes sense. And I've seen it like a few times. Yeah. They melt. Cause of the rain. That's cause it. That's cause the doings of the rain. Well, best as I can tell it, Ernest Borgnein plays a satanic priest who's been trying for hundreds of years to obtain a book from a family of former followers. The book is filled with the names of followers. Borgnein has obtained for Satan. You know, the, remember all the Salem witch trials stuff, you know, put the name and the devil's book. But those souls cannot be claimed by Satan until Borgnein gets the book back and therein lies the plot. Oh, it's kind of like when you left all your Marlboro miles, like if you had left them behind, you can't get them. So that's what he needs. Oh, that's what it is. Yeah. It's don't count. No, I don't count. No, no Marlboro miles in heaven. No. Oh hell. You can smoke as much as you want. But if you don't turn them in, you ain't getting the windbreaker. Now the devil's rain was a full on production. An ant on the va was present for the entire five-week shoot down in Mexico. He did set design, costume design, and his name is prominently displayed in the opening credits as technical advisor and high priest of Satan, which, and it's more of a publicity stunt than anything. I'm happy for him. This was his dream. It was. But ant on the va did put quite a bit of Satanism into the movie and he did work both as an advisor and as crew when needed. During the filming of one scene, for example, LaVay led the local Mexican extras playing Satanic cult members in a recitation of actual magical rituals from the lesser key of Solomon, which were also printed in the Satanic Bible. But since the extras didn't speak English, Lavey wrote out syllable by syllable cue cards for the scene and he stood next to the cards during the filming pointing to each syllable for the extras benefit. This actually happened. There are pictures of him doing it. All right, so everybody, I just want to say just first of all, this is all happy you all here. My contento is the upper hando is the less the endo and just want to say okay, we're going to do some here's Reggie. Reggie. Reggie. Very good. Satanus. Say, say, say, say, say, say, I know what you're saying that, but today, Satan is his bueno. He did actually have to search like far and wide for locals who were willing to be in the movie because most of them were scared shitless. Yeah. All the whole thing, the whole production being around him. I had to tell you know, we have our handyman or Turo. We talk with him quite a bit about the devil imagery. Now he understands quite a bit about it. That's good. That's really good. I did once have a cleaning lady leave my leave my home halfway and through the job after she cleaned my office. She just walked into the office and then just left without saying word. The lady that came and cleaned our house, we have a wonderful way lady owner named her by name because she's wonderful. She works for her the network too, but I'll always say that after that murder for show, we did from the 20th anniversary and I didn't know it left the dildo inside of my pants for this scene. It's like a whole thing was like a dildo just there amongst my pants and she took it out on the scene. So I didn't even think about it. Was the nacho cheese still on it? Yeah. And she cleaned it all off and left it on top of the sink. That's one of the nicest things because I know it wasn't on the sink before and then I came back and it was definitely just on the sink. That's fucking raise mood. I gave her a little bonus for that. No, I can't just be like a shushu. We don't always fuck my ass. You don't have to clean the dildos, but if you do, could you use the scented oil? Not satisfied to stand behind the camera. Levet even talked his way into cameos in a few scenes. But interestingly, when you watch those scenes, Anton Levet looks uncomfortable, almost nervous, which is why I think Anton Levet never quite made it in Hollywood. See, Levet could hang with intellectuals, magicians, and even movie stars, one-on-one. But in the end, I think that Hollywood as a whole, it may have been just a little too intimidating of an experience for the dirty pope to handle. Everybody thinks they can do it. They really do. And then you step on stage sometimes and you realize, "Oh, what have I done?" And I think that he's used to being the coolest guy in the room. Yeah. And that when you're there and you're at the very-- With Ernest Borgnein, you ain't going to be the coolest guy in the room. Oh, no, sir. Not on the movie, sir. Especially not Ernest Borgnein when he puts on that fucking amazing devil makeup. Oh, my God, it's incredible. Dude, it's so cool. The makeup of that movie is really good. It's insane. It's so incredibly good. That's a movie star. That's not just-- that's Ernest-- we forget the time. That's-- that wild bunch. That's fucking a movie star winner, Marty. Yeah. You know, like-- So he's-- I can feel him being like, "Oh, I'm second fiddle here." Yeah. And he's-- yeah, he does the Beijing Mr. Herman. Like he does that. But before he's like looking down the pipe, you know, like-- No, it's-- there's-- the first scene that he's in, he's kind of in the background. And his-- you can see his eyes darting around. He's like looking at the members of the production. He even has a giant gold helmet on him. Yeah, I feel like fucking can't do it. Yeah. But the most interesting bit of trivia about the Devil's Rain concerns the actor who played the head henchman in the satanic cult. He only had one line. But the Devil's Rain was indeed the first movie to ever feature John Travolta. They gave him billing, too, even though he had one line. Well, they gave him billing because of the job that he booked after filming was done. Oh. So we've mentioned this many times before. But it was on the set of the Devil's Rain that someone gave the stressed out young actor a book that they said would help manage his life. That book was, of course, "Dionetics." And it was that book that set Travolta down the path towards Scientology. I just got to see. Thank you so much for giving me this book. It's one of the nicest things I've ever read. But you think that maybe you could give me one of them. Get your hand job. [laughter] Come on. Come on. Come on. It is because Devil's Rain is, like, ant on the face, battlefield earth. Yeah, a little bit. Sure, yeah. Wow. Interestingly, though, even though Travolta's role was a smaller one, and even though John Travolta was at this point, it was his first movie. He was not a star in any way whatsoever. It was said that he and ant on the vape became fast friends. And a picture does indeed exist of the two of them standing together in a candid moment. And it really shows you ant on the vape. It's like, he's sitting there wearing a fucking t-shirt. Ant on the vape, everybody says, was the most charming man in the room when you met him. Is that when you met him? He's the exact, he's everything you wouldn't think he's be. He's like warm and ingratiating. And sweet and, like, like, memorize his name. He's a carnie. Yeah. He's really good at it. See, Travolta was fascinated by old Hollywood, particularly Marilyn Monroe. And the vape claimed to have known Monroe, biblically. But Travolta's obsession with Marilyn was not about her looks or her gnashing and farting during orgasm as LaVay had put it. Instead, LaVay said that John Travolta wanted to know how Marilyn moved and acted because Travolta could do the most convincing and realistic Marilyn Monroe in personation that ant on the vape had ever seen. Straight as an arrow, that John Travolta. I just like to see a straight guy give a, give a lady a shot. Straight as a dildo. That John Travolta. I mean, I mean, he's fucking, I mean, in the hairspray. He's an incredible drag queen. Oh, really is. Incredible in hairspray. Yeah. I'm trying to figure out how to do it. Oh. Oh. Oh. LaVay also said that he took such a shining to Travolta that he did a satanic success ritual for John Tra during filming. And sure enough, shortly after Travolta did indeed book the role that would make him famous. That's when he booked Vinny Barbarino on Welcome Back Carter. And that is why John Travolta is in the opening credits because between the filming of the movie and the release of it, he got on Welcome Back Carter and was immediately famous. Wow. all the time. Such a funny thing to do a ritual for a giant satanic ritual to get welcome back Carter. To become a sweat hog. Let me just hear that name. Let me hear you do it one more time. I just need to hear to make sure I was. Yes, I can see it now. Chavonta was brutal and carry though. He was. He very much was. Yeah, but that wasn't way wasn't brutal looking back Carter. No, shouldn't have been that. But you know, he got he had his little taste of Satanism. I think he was able to channel it in the other place. There's many people that have had a run in with both. Mm hmm. But while John Tross and counter with Anton Leve is one of those forgotten pieces of Hollywood trivia, the celebrity relationship that has become legendary over the decades is Anton's long friendship with the singer, actor, and entertainer Sammy Davis Jr. Mr. Bo Django. I love a Sammy Davis. Oh, how could you not love him? He's amazing. Now, I always thought that Sammy Davis Jr's reputation as a satanist was a joke, a passing fancy overblown throughout the years, because it is objectively insane that a member of Frank Sinatra's rat pack was a devoted satanist. But while it is insane, it is also very true. And it shockingly makes a lot of sense. It does. Was it public at times? Yeah, he would talk about it. He wrote about it in his books. He would Sinatra knew. Sinatra, well, we're going to get to that here in a bit about Sinatra's opinions on it and how it may have affected Sammy Davis Jr's relationship with Anton Leve. Oh, okay. Yeah, it's interesting because it also brings Anton Leve one step closer to Don Rickles again. Yeah, right. By the way, the information about a Sammy Davis Jr. and Anton Leve mostly comes from this fantastic Rolling Stone article written a couple of years ago called Inside Sammy Davis Jr's secret satanic past by Alex Bata-Chargey. And it's fucking, it's a really great read. And I watch a great documentary on him. And he, Sammy Davis Jr's just won what a complicated figure. Extraordinary. Yeah, complicated. His song The Joker is a must for any comedian. It is. Mr. Bojangles is in quite, I love, I love the song Mr. Bojangles. Yeah, yeah. But, you know, but Sammy Davis Jr. was a singer, not a writer. He just did a fantastic version of Mr. Bojangles. And his version of Mr. Bojangles was sad. Yes. Yeah. That was nitty-gritty dirt band, I believe, the real Bojangles. That's what I'm going to say it is without Googling. It was either them Jerry Jeff Walker, maybe Bob Dylan. I don't know. But to understand how and why Sammy Davis Jr. was so drawn to Satanism, you got to understand Sammy Davis Jr. And in understanding Sammy Davis Jr., you might understand why a lot of people are drawn to the Church of Satan. See more than even most performers, Sammy Davis Jr. was driven and defined by a constant and desperate need for acceptance, which came mostly from the complications and humiliations that he had to deal with as a black American born in 1925. Hailing from Harlem, Sammy Davis Jr.'s parents were both Vodville entertainers, but while his dad was black, his mother was Cuban and strangely incredibly racist. Sammy's own mother would hurl racist remarks at Sammy from birth. Telling him that he looked like a little monkey and not in a cute way. No, and his mother never let him forget how dark his skin really was She did it. That's that's a lot Complicated, the complicated and he was he was one of those where he never went school. No, he can barely read or write natural entertainer So they're performing at the age of three you say natural entertainer, but they also kind of forced it on him But he also was never fuck school. Exactly. Hey Babe Ruth was good at school. You think Bruce Lee fucking did math It's 2026 people need to go to school Good now. I ain't going to fucking schools. You know you're not anymore You went to elementary school junior high and high school. I did graduate high school You went to a bunch of like way too many years of community college. I went there for a couple years and did nothing Yeah, I wrote on the school paper. That was my only class. That's nice Yeah, well Sammy Davis junior toward extensively throughout his childhood until he was drafted to fight in World War 2 in 1943 but after spending years absorbing cheers and applause from crowds He was now dealing in the army with racial slurs and physical violence from white soldiers Davis's nose was broken repeatedly. That's what gave him you know, he's got that flat bridge on his nose It came from soldiers breaking his nose over and over and over again But that wasn't you need a hard time in the army man. He's also a small guy. Yeah, he was five four He was a very small guy that wasn't even close to the worst of it soldiers would cover his body and white paint They'd write the inward on his chest once they even soaked him in urine the only time he wasn't abused He said was when he was performing for those same soldiers, which has got to fuck you up Also, it's crazy that he just ran with white dudes Like like well, this is the part of the complicated thing of Sammy Davis junior by the time he had us Sammy Davis junior wanted to make it in show business and he knew the complicated relationship He would have to string in order to make it make it make it which means he would need to be entered into Which is at this point a barred-off white person's world and he would need to be invited into it Which did happen and there were a couple of guys. There was that one that put his whole family on they put him on when they were younger And they put Sam and it was the first guy to ever touch a black man It was this guy it was I forgot his name. It was his host where he took Sammy Davis junior and he kissed him on the cheek and it changed Everything was a segregated show, but it took you had to ingratiate himself with a bunch of people who hated him Yeah, I'm dead. He made a lot of compromises and you know as we're about to get into like Gave him a really bad fucking reputation It did now after his discharge Sammy Davis junior returned to the stage and soon skyrocketed to start him But after the near fatal car crash in 1954 that gave him his trademark glass. I Sammy started questioning the nature of God and spirituality because Sammy Davis junior was a seeker of spiritual knowledge And he automatically understood this idea of oh God gives me these challenges these are just challenges and shit fuck you Why why now he started with Scientology, but thankfully moved on to Judaism with all due speed But reportedly after he told his Jewish friend the comedian Jerry Lewis that he'd converted to Judaism Lewis said and I'd like you to take this one Eddie. Well, you don't know problems already He is and apparently he's he learned Hebrew. Yeah, Billy Crystal said he would call him for Challenges of the soul. Yeah, he would call him as his rabbi. No, he was really good to Billy Crystal in the Tories Yeah, but while Sammy's fame was still rising He continually had to put up with bullshit from people who didn't accept him for who he was when he joined Frank Sinatra Dean Martin and the rest to form the rat pack in the fifties Davis found himself the butt of many a racist joke Sinatra routinely called Davis smoky and he said the Davis had to smile to be seen in the dark Dean Martin was fond of picking up the diminutive Sammy Davis junior Saying that he would like to thank the NAACP for this wonderful trophy. He was a prop Yeah, and he knew that he served a function within the rat pack and it became at first He thought he had power over it, but then the bigger the rat pack got the more it became like aimed at him Yeah, yeah, well those old roasts those old Dean Martin roasts were so racist. He was barely a part of him though Yeah, he didn't do any of that really. Yeah Sammy Davis junior had also married a white woman and his interracial marriage It caused quite the stir amongst the establishment. So when Sammy Davis junior entered the 1960s He was seen as too forward thinking for the whites But because of his association with the rat pack he was seen as too much of an uncle Tom for black radicals He was like a hardcore like guy before that. No, I mean he joined Martin Luther King junior at the March on Washington and in Selma He was on the KKK's kill list, but the black power radicals of the 60s They saw Sammy Davis junior as an assimilationist and they were none too fond of him marrying a white woman either So after divorcing his wife for unrelated reasons Davis chased acceptance in the black community by growing his hair into a big afro buying a few designer de Sheikies and Dating a black woman named Altevis Gore whom he eventually married now It must be said at this point that Sammy Davis junior had an inexhaustible sexual appetite Yeah, and Altevis Gore was fully accepting when Davis told her that the only way it was gonna work is if they had an open marriage Which is say Yeah, it must have both jungles. You can't just let him have one lane But despite his efforts Sammy Davis junior still spent the 60s as a pariah amongst his own people and a prop amongst the whites Plus because he wasn't a songwriter. He didn't have any money from royalties all of his movies Also flopped because his audience was aging and the kids in the 60s and give a shit about Sammy Davis junior So in a desperate bid to be wanted by anybody Sammy made an extremely ill-advised appearance at the 1972 Republican convention where he hugged a visibly uncomfortable Richard Nixon on stage Which you you know that fucker should have been thinking his lucky stars that Sammy Davis junior wanted to be Standing next to him and it's really fun. It's sad because he did it you fucked up Sammy Davis junior's whole life. Oh, yeah, and the whole rap pack was there. I imagine no, it was just Sammy Davis junior It was it was a it's the pictures real like it's Sammy Davis junior. He's hugging Richard Dixie's got his eyes closed and Nixon looks like he's a get the fuck off of me. Yes, it looks But it's bad for everybody in the backlash. Of course nearly ruined Sammy's career But after he appeared on an episode of the controversial sitcom all in the family in which he ad lib a shocking kiss with Archie Bunker the show's resident bigot Sammy Davis junior had a little bit of cultural cash and he wrote that whole thing. Yes, he didn't choose the prize all of them Davis, therefore got a meeting with NBC to discuss projects and Davis pitched an idea about a guy who worked for Satan dude. He did your pretty face. Go and we're going to get to that here. We're going to get to that here I said I have some questions about that and coincidentally, NBC already had a comedy with a similar concept with the working title beat the devil Written by the same guys who'd helmed bewitched so you know, they already knew a little bit about witchiness Satanism so on and so forth. Yeah, their idea was folded into Sammy's idea of a satanic comedy and thus a show called poor devil starring Sammy Davis junior as a damned soul named Sammy was born and put into production. Yeah, he couldn't be and be which because if he winked, he would have fell off The poor devil is in essence a satanic version of it's a wonderful life. Davis plays a damned soul working the coal furnace who wants a promotion in a business like hell in which he's been working for over a thousand years to earn his satanic wings so to speak He has to convince an accountant at a department store on earth played by Jack Klugman from the odd couple to sell his soul to the devil Played by none other than Christopher Lee Incredible cast. Hey, it sounds incredible. Also Adam West is in it But aside from a few entertaining moments, it is surprisingly bland It has good ideas, but it's still written like a 1973 NBC TV movie. It's got terrible pacing way too much filler and a lot of bad jokes They made him cut all the cool shit. Of course, but the way hell no piss rivers No, no piles of rapists playing basketball speaking of piss rivers the way hell the structured on the show is more of a business It's fairly similar to how your show your pretty face is going to hell is set up So do you know if fucking Dave Willis and Casper Kelly? Do you know if they ever saw poor devil? I'm literally emailing him right now I know I'm asked about them right now. I'm literally going to ask him right now I like how you were like mad when Marcus was describing the plot, but it's just like this obviously came out way before it's 73 73 was it call again poor devil poor devil Yeah, and it's you know, and it's an out it's about an hour ten minutes long and it's fully like it is say but like Sammy's character his you know damn soul character He even has like a girlfriend who works reception, you know, there's offices. It's pretty face. It's a great idea Yeah, I mean yeah, it's a great. Yeah, it's like a show. This should still be on television Some of the show could have continued for a bunch of years that the entire network continue to do exists You can't know because they destroyed the network and they they took the building down They they tore the building down where we did it all someone say it ran its course (laughing) - I loved it. I could have seen more, I could have seen much more. - It's definitely, you know, your best work. - Thank you. - Yeah, it is. - Closing this. (laughing) - You know, I actually have no problem agreeing with you. (laughing) - No, well, poor devil is not good. It does have far more satanic overtures than anyone watching at home may have realized. And that was all due to Sammy Davis Jr. The most entertaining part of the whole show, in fact, is Sammy Davis Jr. Mugging while flashing the devil horn salute. He's even got one little fingernail painted red. The executive producer of the show was impressed by these little details that Sammy Davis Jr. put into the show. Thinking that Sammy had merely done extra research for the role. But what nobody knew was that Sammy Davis Jr. had been dancing around the church of Satan for years and had even participated in satanic rituals in the late '60s. Hollywood used to be so much more fun. Hollywood used to be better. Sammy Davis Jr. himself, he wrote in 1968, back when the church of Satan was still hip. He got an impromptu invitation from a group of young actors who were all attending a church of Satan ritual in the Hollywood Hills. At the ceremony, Davis saw a hooded priest insert a massive dildo into a naked woman lying atop an altar and much to the approval of the famously horny Sammy Davis Jr. who also enjoyed his substances quite a bit. The whole thing ended in a drug-fueled orgy. - Yeah, I like the way this is going here, Kat. That's why Sammy Davis Jr. I'm trying to get it. - Yeah, it's hard to do, I was trying it on to, yeah. Yeah, Davis wrote, quote. - It was all fun and games and Dungeons and Dragons and the botrines. - Okay, I can't understand what you're saying. I can't understand what you're saying at all. - All right, I'll tell you. Yeah, 'cause I'm a fun and game. - Santa, that's just a dragon's and a botry. (laughing) - Okay, I'll tell you, I'll tell you. - It's all fun and games and Dungeons and Dragons and a botry, and as long as the chick was happy and wasn't really gonna get anything sharper than a dildo stuck into it, I wasn't gonna walk away from it. - That sounds like Sammy. - It does. - That's a real low bar. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, this is a low bar. - I think it's sharper than a dildo. - As long as we're not gonna burn it. - Yeah. - I'm here. Anything else? - Maybe all. - And as long as she's into it. - Yeah. - That sounds like as long as she's happy. But besides the sex, the point here was that the church of Satan had a policy of radical acceptance for better or worse. And Sammy Davis Jr. was a man who would spend his entire life searching for a place where he could be accepted and wanted for who he actually was, rather than what people thought he should be. - Well, you know, we went through Scientology first, even before Judaism. - Yeah, I mentioned it. - Yeah. - Were you listening? - Yeah. - No, I don't know if you'd say, he went, he got hardcore slightly in a Scientology very first. Then the Judaism hit and he liked Judaism and then he did that. - Yeah. - And then he really was just like, oh, he was just truly like, I just love this guy. The old school Hollywood guy who's just like spiritually seeking. - Yeah, and super mixed up and dropped into an incredibly hard situation and an incredibly hard time to be, you know, a black American. And the church of Satan made him happy. - Yeah, and they're saying, come here. - And they accepted him. - Yes. - Now, Sammy was, as we said, a natural born seeker. So he learned what he could about Satanism and later put those details into poor devil. But when the TV movie finally aired in 1973, set in San Francisco, no less, there was someone down at Lavais Black House watching poor devil with wrapped interest. That viewer was Diane Hagarity, co-founder of the church of Satan. And when Jack Clogman's character is trying to find Sammy halfway through the show, Clogman reached for the phone and exclaimed, - The church of Satan downtown. They'll know how to reach him. - And with that mention of the church of Satan on a mainstream TV show, Diane Hagarity later said that she nearly fell out of her chair. Two days later, Hagarity got a letter from Michael Aquino. He had also seen poor devil and he gave a gushing review calling the program, quote, a magnificent commercial for the church. - Lavais agreed and began formulating a plan to recruit Mr. Show business into the church of Satan. And that is where we will pick back up next week for our conclusion to our series on Anton Lavais. - And that's also at a couple of these nerds small little mistakes and little, like let's just say, the things that they left out that she would put in would lead to a lot of devastation in a way. We would actually see this will turn into, you got the church of Satan on one hand that will turn into some form political organization that's largely neutered. And then the temple of set that will spawn a bunch of evil fuckers. And we will get there. - Oh yeah, that's been a lot of fun. I appreciate you guys. I always wanted to learn about Anton Lavais but never cared to crack the book myself. - There we go, that's why we do this. - Yeah, that's why we're here. - Oh, go to Patreon.com/PodguessNatham. You can listen to the show. Ad free, you can also see last stream on the left live every Tuesday, 5 p.m. PSG, it's on the Patreon. You can also go over to L.P. on the left at both of the social media's. I'm gonna say both. - Yeah, both of them. - 'Cause I'm doing more than this. - No. - We're doing TikTok and Instagram. And that's it, if that. - No, I'm not doing anything else. And don't forget to watch Sun Netflix as well. - Please. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. And check out LPNTV on YouTube. We have HGX2 was about to reach the finals. And it's gonna be Henry versus Julie. And you're gonna see all of your judges come back. It's coming for your white. - It's coming for your white. - And I know you will. - No mercy at your white line. - I dare you to try and fight her 'cause she will whoop both of our asses. - He's like, she will actually is where I'm safe. - Yeah. (laughing) - Physically, she could take any of the fun. - No, no, no, no, no. She's quite strong. I've seen her with the rocks. - Very strong. - And if you watch the stream on YouTube, it premieres directly after that. And that's gonna be 7 p.m. PST on YouTube. And the stream, of course, comes out every Thursday at 6 p.m. - Great. - Oh yeah, and we're hitting the road. We got three JK Ultras left. That's it, you fucking animals. All right, so June 27th, Grand Rapids, Michigan, GLC live at 20 Monroe. And then the next night, Henry and I are going off to London, Ontario to do some side stories. Check that out. - Sweet, sweet. - Entireo Murder Capital of Canada. - Oh, great. July 17th, Tulsa, Oklahoma, Cain's Ballroom, July 18th, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. That's gonna be at the Tower Theater. And then I'm hitting the road. I'm doing a lot of standup. I got to show the very next night in Plano, Texas. I got a shit ton of shows in July. I'm gonna be in Bethlehem, New York, New York City, Plano, and then I'm gonna be all over the place. Go check it out. Just come see me live. Oh, here in LA. Henry and I are gonna do the comedy store. - Yes. - We're gonna be a blast. We're gonna do the Belly Room. They let us in. - We're gonna go in there and we're just gonna impress the hell out of these standups. - Yeah, so be sure. - Yeah, so be sure, it'll are seven friends on July 26th. Go check that out. And then I'll be in Chicago after that. - Go to editoros.com for all tickets. - Mm-hmm. Thanks. Hell Satan, y'all. - Oh, Hellgain. - Hell Tutsi. - Hellgah. - Hellgah. - Yeah. - Why do they always go so young? (laughing) Hellgah. - Hellgah. - Hellgah. - Hellgah. She had so much time to live. - I can't believe it, but honestly, you did good and you treated it well and you sent her off a nice way. - I did, I did. - She was a good baby girl. And when I get the ashes back, I'll shoot 'em out of a cannon. - It's Instagram or something. - Do they send those in the mail or is there a courier? - Sometimes they send them in the mail, but depends on where you go. I gotta go pick mine up. - Okay. - Yes. - And I did not, dude. - Got these at home. People who come and like-- - They try to, they charge like a motherfucker. - I took it to the vet, eight, two bucks. - At home? - At home. - You think the nation is like $1,000. I was like, I was not ahold. They're like, make your decision in the next 10 minutes. I was like, oh, fuck yourself. - And the key is you need to have an awning that you can put a noose over. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I was like, I don't fucking smell the room myself. - I thought you meant at home cremation. - No, no, no, that'd be fun. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Whoa, just like a fucking ceramic thing. You could just toss animals in. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's fine. Probably. - It probably would have had one of those. truck.