The Shadow Of The Man
Why do people go to Burning Man year after year, some for decades? Isn't it all a big party or is there more to it than that? The Shadow Of The Man show explores the impact and influence Burning Man has had on people over time in their own words. New long form interviews from a wide range of participants come out weekly. You will hear from the founders to key volunteers to regular participants. No one person has the answer to what Burning Man is all about but by listening to these series of interviews you get a clue to the glue that binds all of these diverse people (from all over the world) together. Everyone who has been says Burning Man has changed their lives, are you curious to hear what that is all about? #burningman #blackrockcity #burningmanpodcast
Episodes
Episode 99 with Matt Conlon is out now! Meet Matt Conlin, also known as "Jackass," as they reflect on their decades of profound involvement with Burning Man. Matt initially discovered Burning Man through early counterculture and art projects, subsequently transforming from a hesitant novice into an active participant who embraced the community's signature collaborative spirit, humor, and unique traditions like megaphone antics. He ...
Episode 98 with Caroline Miller is out now! Meet Caroline Miller, a long-time participant and webmaster for the famous art collective, the Flaming Lotus Girls. The interview explores Caroline's journey from moving to America from the UK in 2002 to becoming deeply involved in large-scale fire art, detailing the meticulous technical processes, safety measures, and evolution of the collective. She describes the spirit of community, me...
Shadow Shorts #21 is out now! Recorded at UnSCruz in 2026 participants were challenged to explain BM‘s impact in 5 minutes or less. Each Shadow Short is one person’s story, please enjoy this short story of how Burning Man has impacted and influenced people over time.
Meet Shine, who shares how Burning Man transformed her life. Shine discusses her decades of involvement, which include constructing large-scale art installa...
Episode 96 with Curtis Coleman is out now! Meet Curtis Coleman as he reminisces about his transformative experiences at the annual Burning Man festival. His story explores deep human connections and community-building, illustrating how the event acts as a powerful catalyst for personal reinvention and authentic social interaction. Andi and Curtis talk about how they co-created CORE in 2011. He showcases how the unconventional deser...
Episode 95 with Ashes is out now! Meet Ashes who explores the transformative journey of finding lifelong community through Burning Man and its behind-the-scenes labor force known as the Department of Public Works (DPW). Ashes shares her unconventional path from arriving at the desert by herself to ultimately building iconic structures like the Man base and working on the Ranch Crew in Black Rock Station. Throughout the conversation...
Shadow Shorts #20 is out now! Recorded at UnSCruz in 2026 participants were challenged to explain BM‘s impact in 5 minutes or less. Each Shadow Short is one person’s story, please enjoy this short story of how Burning Man has impacted and influenced people over time.
Meet Steve, also known as Razer Beck, who shares his long-standing involvement with the Burning Man community and regional events. Steve reflects on how the...
Episode 93 with Stephen Payne is out now! Meet Stephen Payne, a filmmaker who documented the Burning Man festival during its formative years in the early 2000s. The conversation highlights the logistical and artistic challenges of early independent filmmaking in the desert, specifically Payne’s rapid process of shooting and editing the film Burn Baby Burn on a tight deadline. Beyond the technical history, his story explores t...
Episode 92 with Lara Hopwood is out now! Meet Lara Hopwood, a project manager for the Burning Man Regional Network, who discusses the global expansion of the event’s culture. Lara explains that her role involves supporting a worldwide ecosystem of local communities and volunteer contacts who bring the ten principles to life outside of the main desert gathering. The conversation highlights how Burning Man has evolved from a si...
Shadow Shorts #19 is out now! Recorded at UnSCruz in 2026 participants were challenged to explain BM‘s impact in 5 minutes or less. Each Shadow Short is one person’s story, please enjoy this short story of how Burning Man has impacted and influenced people over time.
Meet a veteran participant known as Dr. Slide who talks about the transformative power of radical self-expression and the importance of building a gif...
Episode 90 with Yonderman is out now! Meet Yonderman aka Mark Stirling, a New Zealand professor who reflects on his serendipitous discovery of Burning Man while studying geology in Nevada during the 1990s. The conversation traces his journey from a chance encounter with naked cyclists in the desert to becoming a foundational figure in the global regional network by establishing Kiwi Burn, the first Burning Man event outside North A...
Episode 89 with Roxane Jessi is out now! Meet Roxane Jessi, a world traveler and author of Once Upon a Time in the Dust, who documents her global exploration of the Burning Man subculture. After a transformative first experience at the 2015 Black Rock City event, Jessi became obsessed with how the movement's ten principles manifest across different international contexts. She embarked on a spontaneous and ambitious "burn year," vis...
Shadow Shorts #18 is out now! Recorded at BRC in 2025 participants were challenged to explain BM‘s impact in 5 minutes or less. Each Shadow Short is one person’s story, please enjoy this short story of how Burning Man has impacted and influenced people over time.
Meet Mariah, who describes how the event replaced her rigid lifestyle with a newfound sense of emotional openness and service. A central theme of the conversati...
Episode 87 with David Date is out now! Meet David Date, a skilled fabricator who shares his decade-long evolution from a struggling entrepreneur to a prominent Burning Man artist. The conversation explores the technical and emotional challenges of bringing massive installations to the desert, specifically detailing the mechanical failures and "ego deaths" associated with his ambitious projects like the walking centipede and the spi...
Episode 86 with Absinthia is out now! Meet Absinthia, who reflects on her transformative decades-long involvement with the Burning Man festival. The conversation traverses the evolution of the event from its early, unmapped days in the mid-1990s to the more structured, high-tech gathering it is today, highlighting how the desert environment fosters radical self-expression and community resilience. A central theme is the intersectio...
Shadow Shorts #17 is out now! Recorded at BRC in 2025 participants were challenged to explain BM‘s impact in 5 minutes or less. Each Shadow Short is one person’s story, please enjoy this short story of how Burning Man has impacted and influenced people over time.
Meet Sarah, who describes the event as a vortex of creativity and a challenging environment that fosters resilience. A central theme of the conversation is the ...
Episode 84 with Will Roger is out now! Meet Will Roger, a co-founder of the Burning Man event, who reflects on the gathering's evolution from a small, anarchic camping trip into a global cultural movement. Roger details the early challenges of organizing in the Black Rock Desert, including the legal and logistical hurdles of designing a temporary city and the transition from a chaotic "zone trip" to a structured nonprofit organizat...
Episode 83 the Year In Review is out now! Host Andi reviews the evolution and future of Shadow of the Man, an independent, non-commercial audio project dedicated to exploring how Burning Man impacts and influences people over time. Moving into its third season, the show utilizes a sustainable, volunteer-driven workflow to document authentic stories through long-form interviews and "shadow shorts"—brief, unscripted testimonial...
Shadow Shorts #16 is out now! Recorded at BRC in 2025 participants were challenged to explain BM‘s impact in 5 minutes or less. Each Shadow Short is one person’s story, please enjoy this short story of how Burning Man has impacted and influenced people over time.
Meet Meet Lee who discusses her personal transformation, describing how Burning Man allowed her to shed her social inhibitions and embrace her "big creative per...
Episode 81 with Megan Miller is out now! Meet Megan Miller who explores the transformative power of the Burning Man event and its enduring impact on her personal and professional trajectory. The conversation details Megan’s transition from a government field representative to a central leader within the Burning Man organization, highlighting her accidental introduction to the event and her subsequent 12-year career as its com...
Episode 80 with Mark Day is out now! Meet Mark Day, a veteran Burner and filmmaker known for his long-form documentation of the Burning Man festival. The conversation explores Mark's creative evolution from capturing raw footage in the late 1990s to his modern "24 Hours at Burning Man" series, highlighting how he uses meta-fiction, catchphrases, and humor to create a sense of pilgrimage for his viewers. He discusses the generationa...
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