I’ve always been able to drive long distances and not fall asleep, I’ll do 24 hours straight in order to get from point a to point b. This usually means long hours spent listening to whatever station I could tune in at 2:30am. So I have great experience with Art Bell and his kind.
Driving back and forth to see my in-laws for XMas my wife woke up to some nut explaining how to walk to the ‘inner core’ of our hollow planet and how the little sun that resides there works. She asked me, “What the hell are you listening to?” And to be honest I could not explain what the hell I was listening to. I just said “This is the Art Bell show (but Art has either left or had the night off) it’s Radio for crazy people.”
Was I wrong? Do others ever tune in to hear this stuff? The funniest things I’ve ever heard in my life are the guests and callers to these shows. But are there people out there who listen because they think it’s real? How much of the audience is made up of people like me who are laughing hysterically the whole time?
I work lots of nights (not as many as I used to, thankfully) and the Art Bell show (been replaced by George Nory now) is always good entertainment.
The really great shows are the ones when he has a legitimate (meaning sane) guest on. Nothing better than listening to a NASA engineer desperately trying to cope with the call-in questions from the show’s regular listeners.
(Well, I also like the guy who claims to have a real, honest-to-goodness bottomless pit in his backyard. He found it behind his house, then the CIA hounded him until he was forced to flee the country. He took the bottomless pit with him. After a couple of years, he returned. Naturally enough, he brought the bottomless pit back with him. And yes, he has scientific proof- I’ve heard the recordings!)
I have one memory of Art Bell, only caught it once due to my typical sleep pattern, but I LOVED IT. We left Portland OR at about 10:00 pm after attending a funeral, hoping to have a quite drive while sick our kids slept. By 1:00 am, eveyone was asleep and I found Art on the AM. I’ll always remember it. Some kook had built a time machine by stealing a bunch of power transformers and linking them together to generate a massive energy field. His first test was to throw a handful of screws through the energy field and they disappeared for a few seconds before reappearing on the other side. The callers were incredible! I laughed my self awake for a few hours and it was a great way to pass the time. Killer radio!
Everytime I’ve ever had to pull Staff Duty Officer ( i.e. normally there is at least a couple joes awake, at all times, in every Army headquarters, at all levels, usually a NCO and an Officer)
So whilst out driving around checking building at 2am I would listen to Art Bell.
So of the the funniest and most wacked out shit I’ve ever heard…
It’s like the Radio station for the people who run the Little ALe’ Inn out in Rachel Nevada, a stones throw from Area 51… great Chilli but damn if they aren’t all certifiable
My mom works for the Nye county school district in Nevada (the same county art bell lives in). He sued the school district and her (by name) as well as a few others. So lucky me I know exactly who art bell is, I love crazy people (normal crazy not stab you in the neck crazy) they make every day more fun.
It is my belief that ALL car radios are programmed so that no matter where you are, or whose car you are in, if you are driving at 2AM, the ONLY thing that comes in clearly is Art Bell Alien-Abduction Conspiracy-Theory Bigfoot-Chupucabras of Loch Ness Talk-Radio.
His son was exchanging sex for drugs with a male teacher at a high school (his son was not at the school he was in his 20’s I think). He sued the school district for hiring the gay teacher thereby putting his son at risk. My mom’s defense was if you ask if someone is gay during the job interview you get fired. The school district won and the case was dismissed.