I am not that interested in speculation on whether aliens have ever visited the Earth. What I am excited about, however, are all the ways we have imagined them, from… Read the rest of the article: A catalogue and history of one of the most pervasive subcultures — UFO believers

See sample pages from this book at Wink. My own initiation into Freemasonry was one of the highlights of my adult life. The marvelous rituals and the delightful imparting of… Read the rest of the article: The art of secret societies: beehives, goats, and the all-seeing eye

Lots of myths have been used as fodder for science fiction and fantasy, and some of the more interesting ones turn the gods into cosmic entities, or extensions of our… Read the rest of the article: The biblical creation story told as space opera

They had me at Aurora. Nothing so perfectly captures the secret origin of my imagination than the Aurora line of snap-tite models from the 1970s, especially the Prehistoric Scenes and… Read the rest of the article: Aurora Monster Scenes: The Most Controversial Toys of a Generation

My own son will see every superhero movie with me, but no matter how I strategically litter the house with comics, he won’t pick one up.

Imagine a game where Gary Gygax had been possessed by Abdul Alhazred, the fabled author of the Necronomicon. This makes more sense than to believe Cave Evil was crafted by a bunch of game geeks in their basement.

There is still no better vehicle for total domination than the Super Bowl halftime show.

Here is a snapshot of my room in 1979: A box of Warren horror magazines, with assorted outliers such as Psycho and Scream; a stack of Dungeons & Dragons books,… Read the rest of the article: Forbidden Activities for Neglected Children celebrates the wonderful grotesquery of the late 1970s

There has long been a tension between the witch of legend and the modern day practitioner. The former has its origins mainly in polemical Christian ideas and folktales, where the… Read the rest of the article: Earth Magic – photography of witches at play and at ritual

My punk coming of age happened in the early 1980s, and by then the music had morphed into hardcore, with its shaved heads, flannel shirts tied around waists, and a… Read the rest of the article: Punk: The Best of Punk Magazine

In the 1970s, a new wave of bands looked beyond the drugginess of psychedelia to classical music as the true guide. Peter Bebergal explores the occult roots of the prog-rock genre.

It’s impossible to review the Dark Horse Comics collections of Creepy and Eerie without a few fond recollections. In the ’60s and ’70s, my father owned a men’s tailored clothing… Read the rest of the article: A collection of gory and ghastly Creepy and Eerie magazines

Peter Bebergal hasn’t been this impressed with anything bearing the D&D name since he first cracked open the original Player’s Handbook in 1978.

As Dungeons and Dragons became more rulebound and combat-oriented, some players revived older, more expressive forms of the game. But is the Old School Renaissance itself just more nerd fundamentalism?

Oh, those glorious gaming magazines! From Ares, to The General, to The Dragon, the original thrill and excitement of pen 'n' paper gaming is there to be experienced at the Internet Archive and other online haunts.

Some of the best music 2012 sounded a lot like the 1970s, replete with analog synths, occult pretensions, powery pop, ambient landscapes, and heavy guitars. 2012 felt like a dark… Read the rest of the article: Not for Nothing: My favorite music of 2012

This is one in a series of essays about enthralling books. I asked my friends and colleagues to recommend a book that took over their life. I told them the… Read the rest of the article: Enthralling Books: The Emigrants, by W.G. Sebald

This week, Boing Boing is presenting a series of essays about movies that have had a profound effect on our invited essayists. See all the essays in the Mind Blowing… Read the rest of the article: Mind Blowing Movies: Village of the Giants (1965), by Peter Bebergal

"My function is to raise the possibility, 'Hey, you know, some of this stuff might be bullshit.'" — Robert Anton Wilson I like to think of myself as a believing… Read the rest of the article: RAW Week: "Some of this stuff might be bullshit," by Peter Bebergal