On the Block Radio with Andrew Gurevich

On The Block Radio was founded on the belief that a podcast about transformation would be relevant and engaging for a diverse modern audience. The show emerged from a simple idea, a question really: What is the relationship between creativity and transformation? This show is the beginning of an answer to that question. An answer that has as many facets as there are authentic experiences. Tune in, engage and hopefully be refreshed. There are some amazing people in this world, often closer than you think.

Can you Taste the Hate? 06/08/2022

On the Block with Tom Krattenmaker 09/12/2017

On the Block with Tom Krattenmaker Been a while since we've been with you, lovelies. The world continues to end. Or is it just continuing to transform itself? This show has always been about borders. About intersections. About the boundaries out on the edges of the Self where subject and object, self and other, start to blend. Now, it seems more than ever, we need to engage the great, maligned and feared "other" rather than succumbing to the constant barrage of media that seeks to make us minimize and simply dismiss that which isn't "Us." Our guest this episode is a person that seeks to change that orientation. Tom Krattenmaker is a writer specializing in religion in public life and author of the new book Confessions of a Secular Jesus Follower (Convergent, 2016). His first book, Onward Christian Athletes (Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), examined Christianity in professional sports. The book was a winner in ForeWord Review’s 2009 book awards and a finalist in the Oregon Book Awards. Krattenmaker’s second book, The Evangelicals You Don’t Know (Rowman & Littlefield, 2013), on the “new evangelicals” in post-Christian America, was a winner in the best books competition of the Religion Newswriters Association in 2014. Krattenmaker writes regularly for USA Today’s op-ed page as a member of the newspaper’s editorial Board of Contributors. His column-writing was honored by the American Academy of Religion in its 2009 Journalism Awards program, receiving praise for challenging popular misconceptions about evangelicals “and showing that something new, something more complex and subtle is going on — a great goal for religion commentary.” His work has also appeared in recent years in the Washington Post, Religion News Service, and Huffington Post, among numerous other media outlets. Krattenmaker’s numerous media appearances include Fox & Friends, the documentary “Lord Save Us From Your Followers,” National Public Radio, the New York Times “Idea of the Day” website, ESPN’s “Outside the Lines,” the Christian Broadcasting Network, The Nation, Christianity Today, Air America, the Michael Smerconish Show, the Michael Medved Show, Portland Monthly, and radio networks/stations including Fox, the Canadian Broadcasting Company, and numerous regional and local outlets. Named the 2009 Mendenhall Lecturer at DePauw University, Krattenmaker has also spoken at college campuses including Yale, Harvard, Georgetown, Baylor, Lewis & Clark, Willamette University Law School, the University of Portland, Portland State University, Missouri State University, and Springfield, Swarthmore, and Haverford, and Kilns colleges. He was a recipient of the 2009 “Friend of MET” award from the Portland-based Muslim Educational Trust and, in April 2013, was honored by Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon with its Hunderup Award for Religious Education. He resides with his wife in New Haven, Connecticut, and serves on the Board of Directors of the Yale Humanist Community. We recorded this episode a few months ago. Before the Trump era had fully taken hold. It is interesting to listen to the perspective of a cultural critic sitting on the front end of what was to come. We tend to avoid the overtly political here at OTBR. But in these times, even the exploration of consciousness seems to be a political enterprise (in that it involves people coming together to build consensus and mutual understanding). Tom is a great example of what a version of this understanding and mutuality might look like going forward. We were delighted to speak with him. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141177

On the Block with Joel Bakst 05/28/2017

On the Block with Joel Bakst Joel David Bakst is a teaching rabbi and scholar of Talmud and Kabbalah who, while living in Jerusalem for 20 years, studied and taught in Orthodox yeshivot. Raised in a Southern California Conservative Jewish home, Joel became a ba’al teshuva (newly religious) at the age of 20 bringing full circle his lineage from a long line of rabbis. Both his grandfather and uncle were Orthodox rabbis, his great grandfather was chief rabbi of St. Louis, MO and his great, great grandparents made aliyato Eretz Yisrael and are buried on the Mount of Olives. He is the 8th generation of Rabbi Avraham Ragoler of Skhlov, the brother of Rabbi Eliyahu, the famed Gaon of Vilna, whose unique teachings and School of Kabbalah, have been a focus of Joel’s esoteric studies. Joel’s spiritual search through comparative religions led him to Israel in 1971 where, upon enrolling in a traditional Eastern European style yeshiva, he became part of the original Ba’al Teshuva movement, the initial great wave of assimilated Jews returning to traditional Judaism. For 10 years he pursued a path towards rabbinical ordination and studied Talmud, Halacha (Jewish Law) and mussar (Jewish Ethics). During the next 10 years, while continuing his Talmudic studies, he also began a search into Hassidic and Kabbalistic literature. He studied under Sephardic kabbalists (Moroccan and Tunisian) along with Ashkenazic teachers and colleagues versed in Kabbalah. Uncommonly, Joel has had the honor of having immersed in all four of the great rivers of Kabbalah that flow from the holy Arizal (Lurianic Kabbalah): 1) R. Yisrael Ba’al Shem Tov (the Besht), 2) R. Shalom Sharabi(the Rashash), 3) R. Moshe Chaim Luzzatto (the Ramchal), and 4) R. Eliyahu ben Shlomo Zalman, the Gaon of Vilna (the Gra). Joel continued his rabbinical education and continued on a path of intense Torah study and practice as well as teaching the traditions he received . He has lectured and taught in Israel, the United States and India. Joel is the author of numerous works on rabbinical methodology, esoteric Judaism, the prophetic confluence of Kabbalah with the new sciences and the messianic role of the maps and models pouring forth from modern technology. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141183

On the Block with Dan Merchant 03/30/2017

On the Block Radio with Andrew Harvey 03/07/2017

On the Block Radio with Andrew Harvey Andrew Harvey is Founder Director of the Institute of Sacred Activism, an international organization focused on inviting concerned people to take up the challenge of our contemporary global crises by becoming inspired, effective, and practical agents of institutional and systemic change, in order to create peace and sustainability. Sacred Activism is a transforming force of compassion-in-action that is born of a fusion of deep spiritual knowledge, courage, love, and passion, with wise radical action in the world. The large-scale practice of Sacred Activism can become an essential force for preserving and healing the planet and its inhabitants. Andrew was born in south India in 1952, where he lived until he was nine years old. It is this early period that he credits with shaping his sense of the inner unity of all religions and providing him with a permanent and inspiring vision of a world infused with the sacred. He left India to attend private school in England and entered Oxford University in 1970 with a scholarship to study history. At the age of 21, he became the youngest person ever to be awarded a fellowship to All Soul’s College, England’s highest academic honor. By 1977, Harvey had become disillusioned with life at Oxford and returned to his native India, where a series of mystical experiences initiated his spiritual journey. Over the next thirty years he plunged into different mystical traditions to learn their secrets and practices. In 1978 he met a succession of Indian saints and sages and began his long study and practice of Hinduism. In 1983, in Ladakh, he met the great Tibetan adept, Thuksey Rinpoche, and undertook with him the Mahayana Buddhist Bodhisattva vows. Andrew’s book about that experience, Journey in Ladakh, won the Christmas Humphries Award. In 1984, Andrew Harvey began a life-long exploration and explication of Rumi and Sufi mysticism in Paris with a group of French Sufis and under the guidance of Eva De Vitray-Meyerovitch, the magnificent translator of Rumi into French. Andrew has written three books on that subject: The Way of Passion, The Celebration of Rumiand Perfume of the Desert, an anthology of Sufi mysticism. With Llewellyn Baughn Lee, he founded the Sufi Conferences, which have played a prominent role in uniting Sufis of all persuasions during the past six years. He has close connections with great Sufi teachers in America, Africa, India and Pakistan, and a very clear, comprehensive grasp of the state of modern Sufism in both the west and the east. In 1990, he collaborated with Sogyal Rinpoche and Patrick Gaffney in the writing of The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. In 1992, he met Father Bede Griffiths in his ashram in south India near where Andrew had been born. It was this meeting that helped him synthesize the whole of his mystical explorations and reconcile eastern with western mysticism. Andrew has since lived in London, Paris, New York, and San Francisco, and has continued to study a variety of religions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, and Christianity. He has written and edited over 30 books. Other honors he has received include the Benjamin Franklin Award and the Mind Body Spirit Award (both for Mary’s Vineyard: Daily Readings, Meditations, and Revelations). Among Harvey’s other well-known titles are: Dialogues with a Modern Mystic, Hidden Journey, The Essential Mystics, Son of Man, The Return of the Mother and The Direct Path. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141201

On the Block with Rick Strassman 01/01/2017

On the Block with Rick Strassman Dr. Rick Strassman was born in Los Angeles, California in 1952 (although presumably he wasn’t a doctor at that point, at least not a credentialed one). As an undergraduate, he majored in zoology before transferring to Stanford University, where he graduated with departmental honors in biological sciences in 1973. He attended the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University in New York, where he obtained his medical degree with honors in 1977. Dr. Strassman took his internship and general psychiatry residency at the University of California, Davis, Medical Center in Sacramento, and received the Sandoz Award for outstanding graduating resident in 1981. After graduating, he worked for a year in Fairbanks, Alaska in community mental health and private psychiatric practice. From 1982-1983, he obtained fellowship training in clinical psychopharmacology research at the University of California, San Diego’s Veteran’s Administration Medical Center. He then served on the clinical faculty in the department of psychiatry at UC Davis Medical Center, before taking a full-time academic position in the department of psychiatry at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine in Albuquerque in 1984. At UNM, Dr. Strassman performed clinical research investigating the function of the pineal hormone melatonin in which his research group documented the first known role of melatonin in humans. He also began the first new US government approved and funded clinical research with psychedelic drugs in over twenty years. Before leaving the University in 1995, he attained the rank of tenured Associate Professor of Psychiatry, and received the UNM General Clinical Research Center’s Research Scientist Award. He has published nearly thirty peer-reviewed scientific papers, and has served as a reviewer for several psychiatric research journals. He has been a consultant to the US Food and Drug Administration, National Institute on Drug Abuse, Veteran’s Administration Hospitals, Social Security Administration, and other state and local agencies. In 2007 he founded the Cottonwood Research Foundation, with Steve Barker and Andrew Stone,. From 1996 to 2000, while living in the Pacific Northwest of the United States, Dr. Strassman worked in community mental health centers for Washington State in Bellingham and Port Townsend. For the next four years, he had a solo private practice in Taos, New Mexico. After two years working on the edge of the Navajo Reservation in Gallup NM, he returned to northern New Mexico in 2006, where he served at a mental health center in Espanola. Since mid-2008, he has been writing full-time. And has completed THREE books and is working on another seven most likely. He currently is Clinical Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141216

On the Block with John Voelz 12/23/2016

On the Block with Reema Zaman 12/18/2016

On the Block with Reema Zaman Reema Zaman says this about her work: "Why else do we write or read but to invoke a loving voice in the dark, to alleviate our loneliness, to forge solidarity, to make sense of our inherent, stunning madness?" Reema was born in Bangladesh, raised in Hawaii and Thailand, and moved to the US to attend college. She has a BA in Women's Studies, a BA in Theater, and a minor in Religion. After graduation, she worked as an actress and model in New York for 8 years. Now, she writes narrative nonfiction, is a life-coach and writes for "Dear Reema," where she responds to letters sent in by readers. Her first memoir, I Am Yours, is written as though she's speaking to her imaginary best friend from childhood whom she never released. Some know their inner voice as God, a guardian angel, or a long deceased ancestor. Reema knows this as a presence she met when she was 3, a friend named "Love" - Love is her voice in the dark. "I Am Yours" is her story of stubborn perseverance through an unstable childhood, anorexia, disownment, rape, marriage, betrayal, divorce, the acting and modeling industry, racism, sexism, classism and more, with the help of ever loyal Love. For Reema, Life has not been simple but it has been full. I Am Yours is an intimate, comprehensive study in identity, loyalty, integrity, and authenticity. Zaman explore her past and present refracting selves: child, daughter, sister, wife, actress, Bangladeshi, immigrant, commodity, artist, woman. On Dear Reema, the main intention is to serve others. She ceases being the main character and focuses on the reader's journey. Reema sources from her own life to explore similar topics as those found in I Am Yours: our connective, collective trials, childhood wounds, addiction, ambition, body image, sex, dating, love, relationships, self-empowerment, ownership, spirituality, recovery, healing, humility, purpose. For her, writing is service. Writing alchemizes our pain into poetry. Through it all, her mission is to be a conduit of love, a voice for those without one, to inspire and empower others to fill into their truest, boldest, brightest self. Reema believes we are one story and that all we truly need, we hold within. "Pain, insecurity, trials, anger, confusion, the near-reckless desire to love and be loved deeply, these are our common specialties. Our fault-lines are where our paths intersect, where your shards align with mine. Reasons to never feel less or better than anyone. Reasons to never feel alone. How lovely that being human soothes the ache of being human.” /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141225

On the Block with David Jay Brown 12/10/2016

On the Block with Fernando Viciconte 12/04/2016

On the Block with Fernando Viciconte Argentina-born Fernando Viciconte came of age musically in L.A. fronting the popular hard rock band Monkey Paw. He moved to Portland, OR, in 1994 and released Season in Hell, a downbeat collection of country rock. Almost immediately, he became a Northwest musical institution. In 2001, Fernando founded his own label and released Dreams of the Sun and Sky, a gorgeous collection of gauzy, narcotic tracks with Latin and country-folk accents. The Oregonian named this album a top ten release of 2001. In 2006, Fernando returned from a hiatus from music and he delivered his most critically received record to date: Enter to Exit. For this project, Fernando teamed up with long time friends from the Eels, Jeff “Chet” Lyster (who also plays guitar for Lucinda Williams) and Derek Brown and Paul Brainard from Richmond Fontaine, Lewi Longmire and John Amadon to make what many critics called one of the best pop rock records of 2006. Magnet Magazine went as far as naming Fernando one of the best new artists of 2006 in their year end issue. The album also garnered glowing reviews from Billboard, Paste, Amplifier, No Depression, and MSNBC.com. Fast forward to 2015, with Fernando's most recent release, Leave The Radio On. Leave The Radio On features a virtual who’s who of Portland’s finest musicians, including Peter Buck and Scott McCaughey as well as members of M.Ward, Elliott Smith, Richmond Fontaine and The Delines. This is a new chapter in Fernando’s ever-evolving musical trajectory, a career marked by creative integrity and an almost painful honesty which attracts fans that still believe in the redemptive power of rock and roll. Fernando was also be inducted into the Oregon Music Hall of Fame in October of 2016. We have been following his career since it began and are so excited to finally have him on the program. A truly unique artist, he is a troubadour, a story teller, a traveling musical monk who reflects the grit, the devastation and the transformational beauty of a life lived in service of rhythm, harmony and the melodic sensations of our shared emergence. His music is familiar because it reminds us of deep, latent truth hidden in the storehouses of our collective experiences. He is a musical mirror for us to see ourselves in a new, yet utterly recognizable, manner. We hope you enjoy him as much as we do. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141234

On the Block with Max Dashu 11/27/2016

On the Block with Paul Devereux 11/13/2016

On the Block with Paul Devereux Paul Devereux is: A Founding Co-editor of Time & Mind - Journal of Archaeology, Consciousness and Culture; A Research Affiliate at the Royal College of Art; A Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts; A Senior Research Fellow at the International Consciousness Research Laboratories (ICRL) group at Princeton; And an Honorary Member of the Scientific and Medical Network. He's also a friend and one of the world's leading researchers in the emerging field of archaeo-acoustics. But Paul started out as a painter, having a degree in Fine Art. He participated in numerous group exhibitions in Britain such as John Moores, Liverpool, and the Royal Academy Schools, plus travelling shows under the auspices of the Arts Council. He also exhibited in Germany. His painting became increasingly inspired by the geometry and numinosity of ancient monuments and this began to lead him deeper into an interest in archaeology. This resulted in him turning more toward writing and research with the consequence that he slowly shifted from painting and gradually relinquished his formal teaching of painting, drawing and photography. Paul’s research interests in archaeology focus especially on “cognitive” aspects, trying to “get inside” the prehistoric mind, and this has broadened into the study of anthropological themes, especially what is known as “the anthropology of consciousness”. This in turn led him to become involved more generally in what is loosely termed “consciousness studies”. He has frequently combined these themes – such as writing a prehistory of the use of mind-altering substances, andexamining anomalous phenomena of various kinds, especially supposed psi phenomena. This mix of archaeological, anthropological and consciousness studies interests has led him to co-founding and co-editing a new peer-reviewed, academic publication, Time & Mind: The Journal of Archaeology, Consciousness and Culture. For 20 years (1976-1996) he edited and published the legendary The Ley Hunter journal, eventually deconstructing the modern myth of “leylines”, for which he has not been forgiven in some quarters! But his authentic and documented research into spirit and death roads across archaic landscapes developed directly from his early ley interests (see SPIRIT ROADS in the On-line & Mail-order Book Sales pages). He has given a great many presentations on various aspects of his multidisciplinary range of subject matter to specialist, academic and general audiences in Britain, Ireland, the USA, Canada, Germany, Norway, Holland, Switzerland, Italy and France. Venues have ranged from Glastonbury New Age “fairs” to some of the most prestigious universities and institutions in England and America. His portfolio of written work includes 26 published English-language books (plus numerous foreign-language editions), many articles for popular and specialist magazines (including being archaeology columnist for Fortean Times magazine), plus a range of peer-reviewed academic papers. He has, additionally, conceived, co-produced, or appeared in television documentaries in the UK and the USA. He is currently a research affiliate with the Royal College of Art working on an audio-visual study of Mynydd Preseli, the source area in Wales of the Stonehenge bluestones (see the Landscape & Perception pages on this website). The world recently turned upside down. Regardless of what "side" you are on, the work Paul is doing helps to re-connect us to some longer, larger cycles of human activity. From this view, our differences fade into a rhythmic, shadowy dance of shamanic intuition and planetary consciousness. From Brexit to Trump, the old paradigms are starting to collapse. Perhaps we can look to even older models of human organization for some clues on how to move forward together with empathy, compassion and shared vision. One can only hope... /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141243

On the Block with The Dinner & Bikes Tour 11/08/2016

On the Block with The Dinner & Bikes Tour Well, well, well. What's been up in your lives, lately, America? Any news you'd like to discuss? This week, we bring you a conversation with the members of The Dinner and Bikes Tour. The Dinner & Bikes is a month-long tour of the U.S. to bring people together to eat delicious food and get inspired about bicycle transportation. Here’s what happens at a Dinner and Bikes event: As the audience arrives, they serve themselves from chef Joshua Ploeg’s seven-course gourmet vegan and gluten-free buffet spread. While the audience is eating, local advocates discuss their work and local issues and initiatives over the first fifteen minutes. Then, Elly Blue and Joe Biel co-present a new interactive discussion and presentation including eight short films about Groundswell movements, incidences where people demand better neighborhood conditions and successfully implemented them. Stories include how Reading, PA came to be 13th on the East Coast for bike commuting without any advocacy or government spending, former gang members riding bikes to raise awareness about gang violence, Mexico City’s superhero of the streets, Peatonito, the story of the League of American Bicyclists’ equity council, how the City of Portland’s Sunday Parkways worked as a response to gentrification, and how cyclists are representing themselves and creating their own voices all over the world. Throughout the evening there are plenty of opportunities for discussion, questions, and browsing the Microcosm pop-up book and t-shirt store. Joe Biel is the co-producer/director of Groundswell, the director of the feature documentary Aftermass: Bicycling in a Post-Critical Mass Portland as well as over 100 short films. He is also the author of half a dozen books, including Good Trouble: Building a Successful Life & Business with Asperger’s. He founded Microcosm Publishing in his bedroom closet in 1996 and has since published over 350 nonfiction books, zines, and movies. He lives in Portland, Oregon. Elly Blue is the co-producer/director of Groundswell and the author of Bikenomics: How Bicycling Can Save the Economy and Everyday Bicycling: How to Ride a Bicycle for Transportation (Whatever your Lifestyle). When she isn’t writing, she is the marketing director of Microcosm Publishing, producing books and zines about all aspects of feminism, self-empowerment, and bicycle transportation. She lives in Portland, Oregon. Joshua Ploeg is the the traveling vegan chef. When not touring the world, he is a personal chef and delighter of secret cafe goers in Los Angeles. His eighth and newest cookbook is This Ain’t No Picnic: Your Punk Rock Vegan Cookbook. He lives in California. As the country and the world move into unprecedented and scary territory, we are heartened by the kinds of young people that Joe, Elly and Joshua represent. They are not looking for a savior or a political party to make the world a better place for them. They are hitting the ground and making it better themselves. They are building community and empowering marginalized voices and advocating for a world that does not constantly run itself adrift under the weight of its own hubris and apathy. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141246

On the Block with Karen Tate 11/06/2016

On the Block with Karen Tate As an independent scholar, speaker, radio show host, author, and social justice activist, Karen Tate's body of work blends her experiences of women-centered multiculturalism evident in archaeology, anthropology and mythology with her unique academic and literary talents and travel experience throughout the world. Her particular emphasis is on the roles of women and the study of comparative religions and ancient cultures in a modern or reconstructed context, bringing the ideals and awareness of the Sacred Feminine into the mainstream consciousness. Tate's work has been highlighted in the Los Angeles Times, Seattle Times and other major newspapers. She is interviewed regularly in print, on television and on national public radio and hosts her own show, Voices of the Sacred Feminine Radio considered a treasure trove of insight and wisdom for our time. Her published articles have appeared in both domestic and international publications since 1995. Karen can be seen in the 2015 documentary, Femme, Women Healing the World, produced by actress Sharon Stone and Emmanuel Itier of Wonderland Entertainment. Most recently she was honored with opportunity to moderate a panel and give a presentation at the prestigious Council for the Parliament of World Religions in Utah. Karen spends much of her time giving interviews, teaching, and lecturing at private and public educational and spiritual institutions, temples and churches such as Joseph Campbell Roundtables, The Gaia Festival, Loyola Marymont College and the American Academy of Religion. As an ordained minster, she guest ministers at Unitarian Universalist Churches, The Goddess Temple of Orange County and at the invitation of other groups. She has received acclaim for reviving the Cakes for the Queen of Heaven curriculum as well as the Rise UP and Call Her Name course. An associate with the Joseph Campbell Foundation, Dr. Tate currently sponsors Joseph Campbell Round Tables in Venice and Irvine to perpetuate continuing adult education in the genres of mythology, history, sociology, archaeology, psychology, religion, anthropology and the related sciences. She was also the first person to ever put me on the air and has been a leader not only in the women's empowerment movement but also in Internet radio, starting one of the first shows ever on Blog Talk Radio. She is a mentor, a friend and a visionary and compassionate leader with the wisdom of the ages to fill her sails. Karen reminds us that the #imwithher hashtag should be a rallying cry not for any one political party or candidate, but for our strong solidarity with the women, girls and non binary folks in our culture who have been subjected to a lopsided power sharing program for many millennia at this point. We were so delighted to have her on the program, especially this last weekend before the presidential election. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141252

On the Block with Emily Bingham 10/28/2016

On the Block with Caleb Stephens 10/20/2016

On the Block with Dr. Catherine Svehla 10/14/2016

On the Block with Chuk Barber 10/08/2016

On the Block with Chuk Barber Playing drums since he was eleven years old, Chukinho has had sticks in his hands for over 40 years. A student of legendary jazz drummer, Hal Blaine, Chukinho was a grounding member in many garage bands in the early 60s. He founded the Virginia/North Carolina-based premiere jazz group “Heroes” in the late 70s. Moving to New Orleans in 1986, he co-founded “Casa Samba,” New Orleans’ first Samba School. After many trips to Rio de Janeiro and Salvador, Bahia, to hone his skills, Chukinho was picked from a handful of non-Brazilian born “bateristias” to accompany the World Champion Brazilian Soccer Team on a world-tour as part of their Samba Band or “Bateria.” A student of legendary jazz drummer, Hal Blaine, Chuk Barber has had sticks in his hands for over 40 years. He's played with some of New Orleans greatest musicians and bands including: Dr. John, The Neville Brothers, Sun Ra, Michael Ray and the Cosmic Krewe, Anders Osbome, Big Al Carson, Kid Merv, Jand onas Risin. Since 1997, he has been the percussionist for the Platinum Recording group WAR, (aka the LowRider Band). He taught Brazilian Drum and Dance, Capoeira and, along with Baba Kenyatta Simon, created the Academy of African Culture at New Orleans Charter Middle School. Since moving to Portland, Chukinho, along with another New Orleans musician, Tom Sandahl, and 5 of Portland’s finest, created the group Indigo, fusing Brazilian Bossa Nova with Jazz and funk. In 1997, Chukinho was called up to the “Big Leagues” to play alongside his musical heroes and is now a member of the 70’s and 80’s Funk/Soul Group WAR now called The Original Lowriders. Performing with The Lowrider Band He is a first time author and has written a wonderful story of strength and determination, entitled “Dear Xango.” In this conversation, we discuss how New Orleans changed for the worse after Katrina, how Gentrification in Portland continues to scrub the city of what little Black history and culture remains, and the importance of music in reclaiming identity for many young people of color. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141279

On the Block with Willy Vlautin 09/30/2016

On the Block with Willy Vlautin Born and raised in Reno, Nevada, Willy Vlautin started playing guitar and writing songs as a teenager and quickly became immersed in music. It was a Paul Kelly song, based on Raymond Carver’s Too Much Water So Close to Home that inspired him to start writing stories. Vlautin has published four novels: THE MOTEL LIFE (2007), NORTHLINE (2008), LEAN ON PETE (2010), and THE FREE (2014). He is the winner of multiple awards, including the Oregon Book Award and the Ken Kesey Award for Fiction. Vlautin founded the band Richmond Fontaine in 1994. The band has produced nine studio albums to date, plus a handful of live recordings and EPs. Driven by Vlautin’s dark, story-like songwriting, the band has achieved critical acclaim at home and across Europe. 2014 will see the debut album from Vlautin’s new band, The Delines, featuring vocalist Amy Boone (The Damnations). He came to speak and read at the college where we work last year. While he was here, Vlautin spoke with us about his life as a writer and musician, the allure of the Drifter archetype, and why he is so drawn to stories of working class people trying to find themselves in the chaos and oblivion of modern America. “Willy Vlautin is one of the bravest novelists writing. Murderers, cheats, sadists, showy examples of the banality of evil, are easy, but it takes real courage to write a novel about ordinary good people. They don’t fit into the cynic’s little boxes — they’re way too big. The guy working two eight-hour jobs who still can’t meet the mortgage but won’t let his kids down, the hospital night nurse coping with her crazy mean father and trying to rescue a lost girl — common people, the ones who never get the breaks, the ones who need, and know, compassion. An unsentimental Steinbeck, a heartbroken Haruf, Willy Vlautin tells us who really lives now in our America, our city in ruins.” --Ursula K. Le Guin /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141282

On the Block with Dr. Bruce Damer 09/23/2016

On the Block with Dr. Bruce Damer Bruce Frederick Damer is a Canadian-American multi-disciplinary scientist, designer, and speaker. He works in evolutionary biology researching the question of the origin of life and the exploration and economic development of space. He also has a practice in the design of innovative software systems interfaces and a passion for collecting and curating historical archives in computing history and leading figures of the counter-culture. Dr. Damer performs as a storyteller on a range of subjects under the moniker science + vision = hope. He began performing in 2003 and is featured at venues such as Burning Man, and the Esalen Institute. He also performs at music and art festivals worldwide including Buddhafield, Symbiosis, Rainbow Serpent, Earth Frequency, and Lightning in a Bottle, covering topics ranging through science, space, deep evolutionary history, questions of origins, and the meaning and future of the human enterprise. Many of these talks many be found online through podcasts such as the Joe Rogan Experience, the Psychedelic Salon, the Biota Podcast, the Space Show, the Dr. Future Show, the C-Realm, the Midwest Real Podcast, and the Tink Tink Club. A good selection of Dr. Damer's talks and philosophy as well as conversations and featured guest speakers are collected together in his own Levity Zone podcast. In the late 1990s, Dr. Damer met the American philosopher and storyteller Terence McKenna and formed a collaboration investigating the connection between computer virtual worlds and the inner worlds experienced through alternative states of consciousness. Following McKenna's death in 2000 he worked with Lorenzo Hagerty to digitally remaster McKenna's talks and collect his last remaining papers. In 2006 he became an agent for the estate of Dr.Timothy Leary and received the remaining books, news archive, record collection, and ephemera from Leary's archives. Working with the Internet Archive he established several online libraries of historical materials: Psychedelia, which contains unique materials from counter-cultural figures and Archiving Virtual Worlds focused on the early history of virtual worlds, and games, built in collaboration with Dr. Henry Lowood of Stanford University. Dr. Damer is a follower of a scientific version of the philosophy of liminality occupying a liminal boundary between rational, reductionist, materialist approaches to reality but open to inspiration from alternative states of consciousness. He has built a practice of intentionally seeking visionary experiences through meditative states that can be grounded in scientific insights or guiding stories. He has refined this philosophy since childhood when he occupied himself entering imaginal worlds and expressing those worlds through his artwork. Dr. Damer is currently researching a book based on interviews with other practitioners of what he terms the "endo way", meaning insights sourced through endogenous methods who then pragmatically apply their insights to real world applications. Find Dr. Damer on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and videos on Vimeo and YouTube Some of Dr. Damer's scientific articles are listed on ResearchGate Google search on Bruce Damer /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141288

On the Block with Pam Houston 09/16/2016

On the Block with Bob Walter 09/10/2016

On the Block Radio with Blacque Butterfly 08/31/2016

On the Block with Reverend Billy Talen 08/26/2016

On the Block with Reverend Billy Talen everend Billy and the Stop Shopping Choir is a New York City based radical performance community, with 50 performing members and a congregation in the thousands. They are wild anti-consumerist gospel shouters and Earth loving urban activists who have worked with communities on four continents defending community, life and imagination. Over the last 15 years of their "church," they describe the Devils that plague us as Consumerism and Militarism. In this time of the Earth's crisis - they are especially mindful of the extractive imperatives of global capital. Their activist performance and concert stage performance have always worked in parallel. The activism is content for the play. They have won an OBIE Award, the Alpert Award, The Dramalogue Award and The Historic Districts Council's Preservation Award (for leading demonstrations to save Manhattan's Poe House), and half of their singing activists have been jailed, most frequently during Occupy Wall Street. Reverend Billy has been arrested about 70 times. Reverend Billy and the SSC employ multiple strategies, including cash register exorcisms, retail interventions, and cell phone operas. Outdoors, they have performed in Redwood forests, between cars in traffic jams at the entrance to the Holland Tunnel, on the Staten Island Ferry, at Burning Man and Times Square and Coney Island, and on the roof of Carnegie Hall in a snowstorm. The Stop Shopping Choir is a diverse array of economic, ethnic, religious, and cultural backgrounds and has members from every continent except Antarctica, which they're working on. Among them are scientists, teachers, artists, therapists, welders, cyclists, builders, developers, hairdressers, dog walkers, actors, truck drivers, tech geeks, scholars and executives. The Choir has toured in Europe, Africa, South America and throughout North America. Here we discuss what drives the Reverend's tireless activism, the development of his persona and voice, and what it means to be an earth evangelist. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141300

On the Block with Dimitri Mugianis 08/20/2016

On the Block with Dimitri Mugianis Born in Detroit, to a politically leftist Greek American family, Dimitri Mugianis began writing poetry, music, and also using drugs at a very early age. As a teenager, Dimitri formed a band called The Leisure Class. After several years of local success, the band moved to New York City in 1983. There, Dimitri found a home at the Chelsea Hotel, and quickly developed close friendships, notably Beat legends Herbert Huncke and Gregory Corso. His relationship with cocaine, heroin and methadone would last over 20 years. By 2002, Dimitri had a daily habit of $150-200 worth of heroin, plus cocaine and 100 milligrams of methadone. By forty, he was surrounded by death, including his pregnant, common-law wife. Resigned that his life was nearing an end, using the last of his will to survive, Dimitri turned to a radical solution: Ibogaine. In 2003, he sought out an Iboga treatment center in Europe. Initially he planned to visit his ancestral home in Greece to die after the treatment, but Bwiti and Iboga had other plans. Iboga ended his dependency to drugs (without withdrawal) and started him on a journey of spiritual and emotional recovery. Returning home with an evangelical zeal, Dimitri sought out and met the father of the Ibogaine movement, Howard Lotsof, who quickly became his mentor. In an effort to bring the medicine that healed him to those without access, he attended to approximately 500 underground Ibogaine ceremonies and traveled to Gabon, West Africa, to become initiated into the Bwiti. In 2011, Dimitri was arrested by the DEA in a sting operation using a paid informant. After a protracted legal battle he was convicted with reduced charges. This experience was the impetus for his co-founding of the Universalist Bwiti Society, a state-registered religious institution. After six visits to Gabon, Dimitri opened a center in Costa Rica, IbogaLife. In addition to his work as an Ibogaine Detox Facilitator, performing hundreds of ibogaine treatment-ceremonies with desperate people, he currently works as an outreach counselor at the New York Harm Reduction Educators (NYHRE) in Harlem. His innovative group "We Are The Medicine" is propelling the conversation about spirituality and drug use. He also offers spiritual services and personal consultations with the culmination of his own training and practice. He is involved in numerous other projects including working on bringing Iboga to Afghanistan and Nepal. His is a story of profound transformation and recovery. The brokenness of addiction and the promise of the New Life that comes from an integrated, holistic healing model that is rooted in community, connection and deep spiritual practice are highlighted in his life and work. We are honored t have him on the program. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141306

On the Block with Ramez Naam 08/12/2016

On the Block with Ramez Naam Futurist, scifi author and former Microsoft executive Ramez Naam has some definite ideas about where we are heading as a species. And it might be in a different direction than you think. Ramez was born in Cairo, Egypt, and came to the US at the age of 3. He’s a computer scientist, futurist, angel investor, and award-winning author. He spent 13 years at Microsoft, where he led teams developing early versions of Microsoft Outlook, Internet Explorer, and the Bing search engine. His career has focused on bringing advanced collaboration, communication, and information retrieval capabilities to roughly one billion people around the world, and took him to the role of Partner and Director of Program Management within Microsoft, with deep experience leading teams working on cutting edge technologies such as machine learning, search, massive scale services, and artificial intelligence. Between stints at Microsoft, Ramez founded and ran Apex NanoTechnologies, the world’s first company devoted entirely to software tools to accelerate molecular design. He holds 19 patents related to search engines, information retrieval, web browsing, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. Ramez is also the award-winning author of five books: Nexus, Crux, and Apex (fiction). This trilogy of philosophical science fiction thrillers look at the impact of an increasingly plausible technology that could link human minds, and the impact such a technology could have on society and on the human condition, for both good and ill. The Infinite Resource: The Power of Ideas on a Finite Planet (non-fiction), which looks at the environmental and natural resource challenges of climate change, energy, water, and food, and charts a course to meet those challenges by investing in the scientific and technological innovation needed to overcome them, and by changing our policies to encourage both conservation and critical innovations. More Than Human: Embracing the Promise of Biological Enhancement (non-fiction), which looks at the science of enhancing the human mind, body, and lifespan, and the effects that will have on society. Ramez was awarded the H.G. Wells Award for his work on More Than Human. Ramez lectures on energy, environment, and innovation at Singularity University. He’s appeared on Sunday morning MSNBC, repeatedly on Yahoo! Finance, on China Cable Television, on BigThink, and Reuters.fm. His work has appeared in, or been reviewed by, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, The Atlantic, Slate, Business Week, Business Insider, Discover, Popular Science, Wired, and Scientific American. In his leisure, Ramez has climbed mountains, descended into icy crevasses, chased sharks through their native domain, backpacked through remote corners of China, and ridden his bicycle down hundreds of miles of the Vietnam coast. He lives in Seattle, where he writes and speaks full time. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141318

On the Block Radio with Dorothy Allison 08/05/2016

On the Block Radio with Dorothy Allison Dorothy Allison grew up in Greenville, South Carolina, the first child of a fifteen-year-old unwed mother who worked as a waitress. Now living in Northern California with her partner Alix and her teenage son, Wolf Michael, she describes herself as a feminist, a working class story teller, a Southern expatriate, a sometime poet and a happily born-again Californian. The first member of her family to graduate from high school, Allison attended Florida Presbyterian college on a National Merit Scholarship and studied anthropology at the New School for Social Research. An award winning editor for Quest, Conditions, and Outlook—early feminist and Lesbian & Gay journals, Allison's chapbook of poetry, The Women Who Hate Me, was published with Long Haul Press in 1983. Her short story collection, Trash (1988) was published by Firebrand Books. Trash won two Lambda Literary Awards and the American Library Association Prize for Lesbian and Gay Writing. Allison says that the early Feminist movement changed her life. "It was like opening your eyes under water. It hurt, but suddenly everything that had been dark and mysterious became visible and open to change." However, she admits, she would never have begun to publish her stories if she hadn't gotten over her prejudices, and started talking to her mother and sisters again. Allison received mainstream recognition with her novel Bastard Out of Carolina, (1992) a finalist for the 1992 National Book Award. The novel won the Ferro Grumley prize, an ALA Award for Lesbian and Gay Writing, became a best seller, and an award-winning movie. It has been translated into more than a dozen languages. Cavedweller (1998) became a national bestseller, NY Times Notable book of the year, finalist for the Lillian Smith prize, and an ALA prize winner. Adapted for the stage by Kate Moira Ryan, the play was directed by Michael Greif, and featured music by Hedwig composer, Stephen Trask. In 2003, Lisa Cholendenko directed a movie version featuring Krya Sedwick. I spoke with Dorothy recently as part of my college's "Mouths of Others" creative arts speakers series. She is full of fire and story and looks right through you in that simple, razor sharp way that only Southerns can. I think you will dig this conversation. I know her writing will undo you. Transformation in a lightning bolt, presented for your enjoyment. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141333

On the Block with Kelly Carlin 07/29/2016

On the Block with Kelly Carlin Kelly Carlin has always been curious about the big questions of life. Watching her father, George Carlin, be an iconoclastic comedy legend certainly didn’t hurt too. Like him she loves to use humor to question the status quo, and she loves to seek out the unique angle into any subject she tackles. But unlike him, she brings a more personal and emotional tone to her work. With her personal story, pathos, emotion and psychological insight she reveals the joy and challenges that comes with trying to live an authentic life. As a child, Kelly explored her own creativity by writing skits and doing imitations (her Ethel Merman was quite good for an eight year old), but began her professional life in her teens working behind the scenes with her father and mother, Brenda, on various shows for HBO that continued into her twenties. In 1993, at the ripe age of 30, she graduated from UCLA, Magna Cum Laude, with a B.A. in Communications Studies. While at UCLA, Kelly discovered her voice as a writer, which led her to a career in writing for film and TV with her husband Robert McCall. After her mother’s death in 1997, Kelly found her true calling – autobiographical storytelling– through her first one-woman show, “Driven To Distraction.” In 2001, Kelly wanted to explore the intersection of human storytelling and one’s inner psychological life. She pursued her masters in Jungian Depth Psychology from Pacifica Graduate institute where she studied mythology, Jungian psychology and the nexus of art and the sacred. Kelly explores the big questions and the intricacies of being human in her many iterations. She is a public speaker, hosts both “The Kelly Carlin Show” on SiriusXM, and “Waking from the American Dream” on SModcast Network, tours her newest one-woman show, “A Carlin Home Companion,” and is now an author. Her memoir “A Carlin Home Companion,” was published by St. Martin’s Press to great reviews and success. In this episode, we talk about her ever-changing relationship to her father and his legacy, her path to rebirth through the myth of Demeter and Persephone and how because of her last name, wannabe comedians like me are driven to try out their shoddy "material" on her to solicit a laugh from the family of comic royalty. /episode/index/show/otbpdx/id/17141336

On the Block with Howard Bloom 07/20/2016

On the Block with Barbara J. King 07/15/2016

On the Block Radio with Andrew Gurevich

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