stuart pearson

“Purgatory, Missouri” is a radio drama in seven parts (the first season). At first, it will only be in English. If there is enough interest, we will explore other countries and translations into their native tongues. If you hear the series in the coming months and think it would be of interest in your country, please let us know! French will probably be the first translation, but we’re open to suggestions!  The series is a little autobiographical, and a little psychodrama.

 

As a child, I had many epileptic seizures (petit mal). I would collapse, fall asleep and stop breathing. At 15 years old, I experienced my last major seizure and drowned in my brother’s pool

 

During the time between my family discovering me floating face down and (I think) my brother or brother-in-law restarting my heart, I experienced something similar to what my seizures were like as a child. It was a black, almost gauze-like void that I could slowly move through, like an invisible molasses. Imagine a visual version of that slight buzz you hear after long, loud sounds suddenly go silent. I remember waking up with a tube down my throat, then passing out again.

 

Fortunately, that was my last major seizure and I’m one of the lucky people who “outgrew” epilepsy (although I still get severe head spins from time to time). I have always had an acute awareness of the human clock ticking, as if my next project would be my last, so I better get to it. I’ve had a taste of how thin this veil is.

 

I have always wondered; when we sleep, do we sometimes visit some kind of afterlife? Can we communicate with each other? What about the people who are sleeping who can’t wake up? Is the sleep state completely different for each and every sleeper? Is the death experience different for everyone? What if sleep and death collide?

 

“Purgatory Missouri” is an attempt to answer these questions for myself, using the songs from our Dark Americana series. Each episode will explore different songs from our albums, “American Gothic”, “Mojave” and “Stories and Songs.” It takes place in a vast, decaying carnival, which, to me, is the perfect setting for Purgatory. No one is sure what this carnival is or how to get out. In each episode you’ll run into Carnies yelling “Step right up!” at newcomers who are struggling to understand where they are. You’ll bump into people the Carnies call “Boogiemen”; souls who are trapped in panicky loops of their final moments, stumbling through the carnival like zombies. “Ain’t no nuthin’ good in this Carnival!”