Search For Hidden Messages Within David Bowie's Music

My name is Garrick King. I have a huge interest in the paranormal, having had MANY experiences in my life related to that subject. Having discovered a reversed EVP shortly after my father passed away I became interested in Reversed Speech. I'm also a huge David Bowie fan, and I know there are many more out there, so I decided to combine the two in my podcast BOWIE REVERSED, wherein each week I present to my audience Reversed Speech found in David Bowie's music. It must be understood that Reversed Speech is not the same as Backmasking. Backmasking is purely intentional, where as Reversed Speech is a natural occurring phenomenon that takes place every time we speak. My audience ranges from anyone interested in the music of David Bowie as well as those interested in paranormal activity and Reversed Speech.

I started podcasting about 2 months ago, so I am still relatively new. I do listen to a lot of podcasts ranging from the paranormal to just simple funny podcasts like Straight Talk With Ross Mathews.

Having found all of these Reversed Speech instances in the music of David Bowie, I thought to myself, how can I make more people aware of this, that Reversed Speech is real, so I decided that a podcast was the easiest way to get the word out.

When I first started analyzing David Bowie's music I thought I would only find maybe one or two samples of Reversed Speech on an entire album, but after analyzing his entire first album I soon realized that Reversed Speech takes place through nearly every single one of his songs, and on occasion, almost the entire song itself says something in reverse. A lot of it is very cryptic, but that is due to the fact that Reversed Speech is a direct link to our subconscious mind and we all have a lot of interesting things floating around in our subconscious.

I record the podcast right out of my home, I guess like most people. I use an app called Backpack Studio that allows me to record the show and play the samples at the same time all from my iPad, so if I needed to be mobile I could.

Once I decided I was going to do a podcast I had the first episode out within a week and have been fairly consistent on getting an episode out each week. There was one week I missed because I was debating on wether or not I should even continue after I found a very disturbing Reversed Message. I won't get into it here, but just listen to the episode where I cover the Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars and you'll discover the one I am talking about. After I decided to keep going I just told myself, you know what, it's not my place to keep these disturbing reversals from people. I'm going to release them and let people make up their own minds about what they think and how they feel about it.

I try and get an episode out every week, and as I mentioned before, I only missed one week, but I made up for it by putting out two episodes the following week, one being reversals I found in an interview with David Bowie and Russel Harty. It doesn't take very long to produce an episode. 1/2 a day maybe. Depends on how many times I stumble over my words and how many times I say, "Umm..." I'm the worst about that so I try and go in and edit all those out, but I record straight through ... even if I mess up, I'll just pause, then start again and edit out all the mistakes later.

Finding the time to podcast has been a challenge, because I have to first analyze each album that I will be covering, save out all the sound files, load them into Backpack Studio, and then find the time to create my show notes and record the show, all while working full time, but somehow I make it work.

I use anchor to host the show and then they distribute it to all the major platforms, i.e. Apple, Spotify, etc. It's a free service and has definitely served its purpose for met at least, but advertising is all on me, and I haven't really been able to do a whole lot of it. I did print some flyers and mailed them around to some music stores in the United States and I think that has helped a little, but still somehow I have managed to get listeners in Sweden, Iran, Finland, and all over really.

Podcasting for me is just something that I really enjoy and getting the message of Reversed Speech out into the world is something I really want to do. I have one commercial that plays during each episode, and it's just me talking about Anchor, and they pay me a penny each time it plays. LOL! Yeah, needless to say I won't be quitting my day job anytime soon.

I was interviews on the Infinite Fringe by Billy Ray Valentine and that helped me get a few more listens. I would love to get more, but my budget is so low that I practically have no budget, so outside of what I can do for free through social media, people basically just have to stumble upon my show and hopefully find it of interest.

I use several pieces of software to analyze the music - like Adobe Audition and this really cool one for the iPad called Hokusai, which I use a lot. It allows me to isolate samples then loop each one with the pitch changing on each loop which really helps in being able to hear the reversed speech. A lot of times it's difficult for people to make out the longer samples because we are not used to hearing and then understanding reverse speech, so I try and make it as clear and simple as possible, even if that means playing it one line at a time. I've gotten really good at finding the Reversed Speech, I guess because I've been listening so much, it's like learning another language. The more you hear it, the more it sinks in.

As I analyze a song I will listen straight through at first and make notes where I think Reversed Speech might be, then I go back and analyze each section thoroughly. Sometimes I have to slow the music down in order to reveal the Reversed Speech, but once I have determined that, yes, indeed it does say something, I will export out a forward version and then a reversed version. That way I can demonstrate to my audience what is being said forward, and what is being said in reverse.

My show, being what it is, doesn't necessarily require me to have a guest, but I thought about bringing friends on just to get their reactions on what I find, thing is not all of my friends are Bowie fans.

Listeners can find my show on Apple, Google, Stitcher, Spotify and really, just anywhere you listen to podcasts.

Instagram has been instrumental in getting listeners because I can tag each one of my posts with relative tags and that allows my posts to show up in searches of similar posts, plus I can post audio samples as well and that seems to peek curiosity a lot. People seem to be quite fascinated with the subject of Reverse Speech or 'hidden' messages in music ... but when they learn their own speech can be reversed and messages found, that's when they really become of interest ... and also a tiny bit freaked out. LOL!

The only advice I can really give is don't expect to start a podcast and start making tons of money at it because it just won't happen. Most every podcast I listen to, the host still has a day job, so the ones who have been able to do this full time and quit their jobs are rare. I would love to do this full time because it's fun, but the subject matter of my show is a very niche subject and I think to have a widely successful show you need a subject that a will appeal to the larger majority of people who listen to podcasts.

People can find me on instagram @bowiereversedofficial and on twitter @bowiereversed or they can send me an email at: bowiereversed@gmail.com