The Burning Nerve Ending Magic Podcast :: A Sun City Girls Story

About The Burning Nerve Ending Magic Podcast :: A Sun City Girls Story

The world doesn't necessarily need another podcast, or maybe it does, who's to say? It's hard to tell these days, but one thing is for certain: if something is worth doing, it's worth going all the way. An indescribably specific band and spiritual institution of sound comes to mind that not only deserves a poetic platform to be consistently celebrated but also acknowledged for its atmospheric alchemy, which continues to push the boundaries of music, art, and the cosmic nature of the world. Of course, I'm talking about the Phoenix/Seattle-based outfit Sun City Girls. As an obsessed fanatic, it is my honour and deep privilege to announce that The Self Portrait Gospel will be launching a brand new podcast, "The Burning Nerve Ending Magic Podcast - A Sun City Girls Story," completely separate from our weekly show, that will be entirely dedicated to the harmonious history and liberating legacy of the band's multi-decade run. Join us as we take a deep, dark, and dystopian dive into the esoteric environment and liberating landscape of perhaps one of the most frighteningly original groups to have shattered the subconscious since Sun Ra and John Coltrane walked the earth. From Tempe to Thailand, Seattle to Singapore, let's take a trip around the world as we connect with the band's critical community of cosmic collaborators, friends, engineers, and much more.

Publisher

The Self Portrait Gospel

Category

music · music

Language

en

Explicit

Yes

First episode

11 Aug 2025

Latest episode

11 Mar 2026

Latest episodes

22 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   11 Mar 2026

   Season 2 - Ep. 10 :: "Schoolhouse Acid Rock! w/ Scott Mansfield, Bob Thomas, and feat. Joe Thomas"

   The year was 1978 at CMU in Mount Pleasant, MI, the U.S. was in a period of "Deep Standby" after the end of the horredndous Vietnam War in 1975, there was the Jonestown Massacre, the beginning of the Iranian revolution, and a historic blizzard that took place in January, which caused over 20 deaths, 100,000 cars to be abandoned on highways, prompting President Carter to declare a disaster area, forcing CMU to close for the first time in 140 years. It was also the same year that Cheech and Chong's subliminal stoner classic Up in Smoke took over drive-ins all across America, as well as Halloween, Bob Dylan's Street Legal, and the same year Charlie Chaplin's remains were stolen from Corsier-sur-Vevey, Switzerland. But within those school walls, a couple of teenagers shared a dorm room, a hall, and became fast friends theough the prophetic power of music. Roommates Scott Mansfield, Bob Thomas, Alan Bishop, and their neighbor Jim Genette quickly connected and began jamming in the cosmic confines of their sonic space, where time seemed like an illusion and the future burned brighter than a UFO parallel-parking on 1200 S. Franklin St. On this episode, we chat with Mansfield, who had the pleasure and honor of witnessing a young Alan Bishop learn how to play the guitar, Thomas, and his son, Joe, who interviewed Bishop some forty years later for a college project, about their critical connection to a preexisting world that had not yet been influenced by the Sun City Girls, and their metaphysical magic. As we near the end of season two, join us on for this epic expedition into the Salad Days, where the Dire Straits, Bob Dylan, Farrah Fawcett, and anti-draft rallies helped pave the way for our spiritual story to begin.

2. 

   4 Mar 2026

   Season 2 - Ep. 9 :: "Soft Focus Eggshell Minds w/ Ian Folke Svenonious"

   Ian Folke Svenonius is a multi-instrumentalist, author, filmmaker, and host of the acclaimed web video series Soft Focus in the late 2000s. A legend in the Washington, DC, punk/hardcore movement that shaped the radiating subconscious of the American youth during Regan's destructive reign in the 1980s, Svenonius has lead groups like the mighty Dischord Records' band The Nation of Ulysses, Weird War, XYZ, and his most recent outfit, Escape-ism, whose album "Charge of the Love Brigade," was released last year with radical reception. Where Svenonius comes into the fractalated fold of the Sun City Girls' legendary lore is the mighty interview he conducted with the Bishops in November 2008, not long after Charlie had passed the previous winter. Taped before a live audience at Cobb's Comedy Club in San Francisco's North Beach neighborhood, the three, along with a mysteriously masked Mark Gergis, whose piercing presence remained frozen like a statue, set off on a dystopian dialogue through the tonal trenches and spiritual side streets of two of the most celebrated artists of their time.

3. 

   25 Feb 2026

   Season 2 - Ep. 8 :: "666 HR. Photo w/ Kim Campisano"

   Campisano has an incredibly interesting relationship and a cosmic connection to the Sun City Girls and its members, in particular, the late, great Charles Gocher. While attending Arizona State University (ASU) in the 1980s, she received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography, but not without its creative challenges. Many may not know this, but Gocher worked in the school cafeteria through Marriott Hotles, and would often pull "pranks" on the more deserving students, but not Campisano! Often seen in the library or lounge area, hidden behind a spiritual smoke screen from his esoteric exhales, reading various books on jazz, art, etc. Gocher gave alchemical advise to the young student, and it had nothing to do with going to school to be an artist. All the tools we need to achieve the essence of expression are available all around us, and that's exactly what Campisano has done with her career. Having captured some of the most subliminal shots of the band over the years, Campisano's photography and participation in the scene are critical to the culture and the electrifying energy that birthed the Girls, and several others. While music holds the merciless magic of the human spirit, it's the photos that freeze everything in time, safe from sickness and death, and the reaper that patirently waits.

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.9 / 5

17 ratings

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Guest appearances

Books guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.