May 31, 2025 • 41 mins
Lo Carmen converses with Jason Leach from And Vinyly about living on beyond the groove and becoming a record after your death and Charles Chafer from Celestis Memorial Space Flights about making dreams come true and sending 'ashtronauts' on the ultimate trip to space...
'Death Is Not The End' theme music was written, recorded and performed by Peter Head.
'Death Is Not The End' sting, performed & recorded by Peter Head, composed by Bob Dylan
'Put Another Record On' by Lo Carmen, from the album Lovers Dreamers Fighters
'Into the Universe' performed by Holiday Sidewinder from the album Face of God, composed by Holiday Sidewinder, Nick Littlemore, William Jay Stein, used with permission from Lab 78.
'Go Your Own Way' performed by William Tyler, used with permission. Composed by Lindsey Buckingham.
'Fly Me To The Moon' performed by Peter Head. Composed by Bart Howard.
'Space Cowboy' version by Lo Carmen.
Answer machine message by Aden Young.
Répertoire licensed by APRA AMCOS.
Death Is Not the End was created, written, recorded and edited by Lo Carmen
© Black Tambourine Productions.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Lo Carmen (00:00):
Look, despite the name of this podcast, we all
know that when confronted withdeath, it really is very final,
(00:20):
and finding a way of acceptingthat is often tremendously
difficult for many reasons.
So finding a special way tocelebrate and send off our loved
ones or planning for our ownspecial future death care is one
way to help us move through ortowards this transition with
more positivity, even somethingto be joyful about.
(00:41):
In recent years, there's beenan explosion of things that you
can do with cremated remains.
Cremains is the funeralindustry term for this or what
we regular people generally callashes.
They can now be grown intodiamonds.
Yes, real diamonds.
They can be used to createother kinds of memorial
(01:03):
jewellery or glass paperweightsor tactile stones that you can
hold in your hand and takeanywhere with you.
They can be exploded infireworks or bullets.
The mind truly boggles with theamount of things that you can
do with cremains.
They can also be used to creatememorial reefs that help
(01:26):
regenerate ocean life.
And approximately 18 years ago,while sitting on the couch in
the middle of the night with mynew small sleepless baby surfing
the World Wide Web, I cameacross an article about a
company called And Finally.
that would sprinkle ashes intoa real playable vinyl record.
(01:48):
Now, for those of you that haveended up here somehow but don't
know me, hi, I'm your host,Lowe Carmen.
I'm a musician and music is mylife.
So my immediate reaction wasjust total relief with the
recognition that yes,hallelujah, that's what I want
done with my remains when I go.
(02:10):
I want to be a record.
The thought of that just filledme with a kind of peace and
satisfaction.
The idea of being buried orhaving my ashes scattered had
just never sat right with me.
I didn't have any particularplace that was super meaningful
to me, and like many of us, I'djust never come to terms with
(02:33):
the idea of dying, really.
And that's what I'm wanting todo here with Death Is Not The
End.
Like I said, I'm a musician anda writer, a songwriter, I'm not
an expert, but I am deeplycurious and I do love to
research and explore anddiscover things.
So I'd love for you to join meon the journey I'm going to take
(02:55):
through all the different wayswe can approach the inevitable
finale of our stories.
And as I began the process ofpondering all of this, of making
this podcast, I thought back tothat very first article about
the ashes in the records And Iwondered if perhaps I'd just
hallucinated the whole thing.
After all, it was a long timeago and I was severely sleep
(03:18):
deprived at the time.
So I let my fingers do thewalking and I discovered and
finally was indeed real.
It still existed.
And Jason Leach was the name ofthe man behind it.
So Jason was the very firstperson that I reached out to and
he kindly agreed to aninterview.
I'm in Sydney, Australia andhe's in Scarborough, England.
(03:39):
So because of our timedifferences, I spoke to him
bleary-eyed at 5 a.m., He'd justfinished work and was sitting
down with a beer.
I could give you anintroduction to his story and
set it all up, but I canguarantee you that hearing the
story from Jason himself isgoing to be far more
entertaining and enjoyable.
(04:00):
So here we go.
Jason Leach (04:03):
And Vi nyly is now a company.
It was originally an idea forsomething I wanted to do myself
where I got to the point in mylife where I realised I was
going to die.
I wouldn't live forever.
I was sure I would for quite along time.
Very much later than I shouldhave done.
I would refuse to admit it.
(04:24):
And my mum suddenly out of theblue got a job at Funeral
Directors.
She's Swiss, so she's verystraight up and organised and to
the point, shall we say.
And I was in my, what was I,maybe about...
I suppose, 35 or something likethat, at that age.
And she was saying, look,there's lots of young men your
(04:44):
age, young men, middle-aged men,who are coming through here and
you need to get yourself, youknow, you need to start thinking
about what will happen.
Oh,
Lo Carmen (04:52):
right.
So she wasn't suggesting it asa business idea.
She was just saying, you needto think about your life.
Jason Leach (04:57):
Yeah, you need to think about what's going to
happen.
Yeah, what's going to happen.
Lo Carmen (05:02):
Did you have a family at that point?
Jason Leach (05:03):
Yeah, just very young, very, very young family.
And So she was saying, youknow, you've got to think about
these things and stop pretendingit's not going to happen.
So that was going on.
What was your reaction to that?
Well, I mean, this is part ofit.
My reaction was I just didn'twant to think about it.
I was like, stop it.
(05:24):
I don't want to talk about it.
And afterwards I thought, youknow, why am I like that?
Why do I, why am I sort of...
palming it off why don't i wantto talk about it or think about
it and it's obviously becauseyou're frightened about it and
because you've not been faced byit i you know i i started
thinking more and more about itand then when i spoke to my
(05:45):
friends and peers they were likei was they didn't want to talk
about it i mean literallythey're like oh god downer You
know, we're here at the pub.
I was like, yeah, but I wasjust wondering, you know, what
do you...
And some people actually getangry if I pushed them a bit
about what they thought aboutit.
They just didn't want to thinkabout it.
So I started to get interestedfrom that side.
Lo Carmen (06:07):
So would you literally be saying things like,
have you thought about what youwant to do when you die?
Jason Leach (06:11):
Yeah, I started saying, well, mum's been telling
me that there's loads of peopleour age, you know, the shocking
amount, actually, that arecoming, people who just hadn't
considered it and thought aboutit.
And it becomes a problem, youknow, and, you know, what are
you going to do?
And people just didn't want tothink about it.
And, you know, we've grown upwithout being exposed at all to
(06:34):
it.
Our grandparents andgreat-grandparents lived in
villages.
Yeah, they were, you know, theywere surrounded by it, really.
Regularly, there'd be somebodythey knew who passed away or
died.
So it wasn't something thatthey were pushing to the back of
their mind.
and um so i started thinkingwhy wow this is weird and this
(06:55):
was in about 2005 2006 so yeah35 36 i was and around that time
i think i saw on the newshunter s thompson had um put his
ashes in fireworks and ithought wow that's really cool
Lo Carmen (07:11):
The American writer and gonzo journalist Hunter S.
Thompson asked his friendJohnny Depp to make sure that
his funeral wishes were carriedout after his death.
He wanted his ashes to beexploded from fireworks, shot
from a cannon sculpted as a red,white and blue clenched fist,
holding a peyote button.
(07:33):
This is his signature symbol.
Johnny paid $3 million for theevent, which included building a
150-foot tower on the groundsof Hunter's Colorado Ranch.
Johnny said, I just want tosend my pal out the way he wants
to go out.
Anita Thompson, Hunter's wife,planned to then build a memorial
(07:54):
pond on their land with aheadstone inscribed with one of
Hunter's favourite sayings.
It never got weird enough forme.
Jason Leach (08:04):
I do like that.
It's something you can plan andit's fun.
People can watch somethinghappen.
So I kind of like that idea.
And I was just thinking aboutit.
I thought, well, you know, I'dlike my
great-great-grandchildren to beable to play a record and hear
my voice hear what I wasthinking at the time, what was
important to me maybe, whatmusic I liked, maybe a joke at
(08:27):
the time, I don't know, anythinglike that.
I thought, you know, I want tobe in a record.
So I started a website with afriend of mine and really it was
fun.
It was full of really bad punswhich are still some of them
still last like live on frombeyond the groove and riv and
resting vinyl but
Lo Carmen (08:48):
on that site great ones on the website i'd like to
see all the outtakes as well you
Jason Leach (08:53):
really i wish a flash is gone now but the
original site is like i say itwas not a business it was not
meant to be it was really mesort of coming to terms and sort
of dealing with this to sellany it was just fun you know fun
with a sort of dark humor yesand we We had 10 steps to
immortality with the first stepbeing dying.
(09:14):
So that's how it started.
But it got huge coverage in thepress just from being there and
people spotting it and thenjust people passing it around.
And this is very...
Still, it's not very early daysof the internet, of course, but
it was well before things likeTwitter and things like that.
Lo Carmen (09:35):
Yeah, before everyone was 24 hours a day connected.
Jason Leach (09:38):
Exactly, yeah.
So we were getting...
Lots and lots of peoplecontacting us from magazines and
newspapers and radio showstalking about it.
And I put the price just sortof phenomenally high at the time
because I didn't want to.
It was never meant to be abusiness.
And at the time I was trialing.
you know, using ashes fromfires and things like that and
(10:01):
trying to make records and seehow I can make them work for
myself because that's what I putin my will.
That's what I want to happen tome because
Lo Carmen (10:09):
I've decided.
Right, so you wanted to see howashes in vinyl work because
people put all kinds of crazythings in vinyl, don't they?
Well,
Jason Leach (10:15):
they can do, you can do.
Lo Carmen (10:16):
Paint and what other kinds of things?
Jason Leach (10:19):
You can get coloured vinyl and you can get,
I mean, there's all sorts ofthings that can be done.
I mean, ashes is a bit of afunny one.
Depending on what it is theashes are of, they can be quite
gritty or sometimes they're softand that's fine.
So you've got to make sure it'sgoing to work.
you know, it's going to play.
Vinyl at the time was verymuch, very unpopular, like I
(10:42):
said, and felt like it might beon its way out.
I actually started a recordlabel at the time called Death
to Vinyl, which was, you know,sort of ironic really because I
love vinyl, but I was sort ofthinking, well, you know, it's
probably on its way out andended up doing it.
And now I'm doing it regularlyand I've got arrangements set up
around the world with funeraldirectors who are open-minded
(11:05):
enough want to offer it and afew sort of intermediate parties
that offer different things youcan do with ashes and so yeah
we're doing it sort of globallynow and um it's something that
i'm doing regularly on a regularbasis from day to day i'm
working on it sort of prettymuch all the time so it's a
(11:25):
crazy crazy situation reallybecause like i say it was not
planned but it's just ended upbeing the case
Lo Carmen (11:33):
wow so people can send you ashes from all around
the world is that right
Jason Leach (11:38):
yeah i mean the thing is when we make a record
we we we use it's about ateaspoon a record you can't put
too much in because it won'tplay or you risk it not playing
you and you want to put enoughin so you can see it most of our
vinyls are clear vinyl or trenda colored clear vinyl because
you really want to be able tosee the ash in there.
It's
Lo Carmen (11:59):
very pretty, isn't it?
Yeah,
Jason Leach (12:02):
it sort of spreads out.
So it looks quite good.
And every one's different.
Every single one, obviously,it's sort of random because it's
going through a pressingprocess.
So you can't plan how it willcome out.
It's not the whole urn.
So it's not restricted.
You've always got to check whatthe rules are in your areas.
But generally, if you're tryingto send an entire urn, you've
(12:24):
got a lot of red tape in mostcountries and you know sending
it through customs and there'squite a lot involved some
countries more than others butwe're not dealing with that
we're dealing with a with a verysmall amount generally most
people have between one and tentwelve is about the maximum um
maybe twenty and often it's oneor three or four the first One
(12:52):
we did with Human Ashes was aFrench lady whose husband had
passed away.
He was actually younger thanme.
It was quite sad.
And often it is, you know,they're often very touching
stories.
But they're really cool peopleoften because, you know, to like
their idea, they're obviouslyof a certain ilk, you know.
And I think actually he'd seenthe website.
(13:16):
He was unwell.
And he said, that's what I wantto do.
And she was one of the ones.
I mean, we're in the U.S.
and she's in France so sheactually came over with a friend
they got the ferry and I metthem and picked the ashes up and
then we did the records andthen we met them again and gave
her the rest of the ashes so wedid that one sort of like that
very much hands-on that was thefirst one we did So it was quite
(13:39):
nerve-wracking becauseobviously, like I said, I
Lo Carmen (13:42):
never...
Handling human ashes for thefirst time.
Jason Leach (13:44):
Well, not so much that.
It was that I hadn't, becauseit wasn't meant to be a
business, I hadn't, you know, Ihadn't thought, right, well, if
I'm going to be doing this, I'vegot a responsibility to deal
with people who will be mourningand et cetera.
And it sounds sort of bad tosay, but I'm very pleased,
relieved and proud to say that,you know, I've managed to deal
(14:06):
with it very well and Everybodyso far has been very, very
happy.
I mean, more than when we getfriends and family, lots of
people who just say thanks somuch.
Particularly sort of friendsand extended family, maybe, who
wouldn't normally have somethingto remember them by.
These are great because theymight mean more to a friend
(14:29):
who's spent the last 20 yearswith them than maybe their mum
or something like this.
The mums, obviously, and theirvery close family, it's a very
different situation and thevinyl might not mean anything to
them they might still have thevast majority of the ashes that
they either keep or they'vesprinkled or whatever but for
friends and maybe extendedfamily who spent more time
(14:52):
socializing with them morelatterly you know it happened to
me I've had two friends whoI've made music with pass away
in the last sort of 10 years andone of them particularly I'd
spent the last sort of 20 oddyears almost literally we lived
above each other we went and andtouring together and spent
every minute of every day for 20years but I didn't know his
(15:12):
family you know it's a hard jobto even get along to the service
that was offered you knowbecause they didn't know it
wasn't their fault but theydidn't know I'd never gone and
met them I'd never spent anytime at his home so of course I
wasn't actually invited so Imight not even go to the service
or be able to be part of sortof the farewell as it were So
(15:36):
when contact from friends whomaybe don't know a close family
of someone, they're soappreciative of having something
that they can keep and, youknow, remember their very close
friend by, you know.
So these are things that Ididn't expect, which we're
learning about, you know, aswe've been doing what we do.
Unknown (15:56):
Thank you.
Lo Carmen (16:18):
What kind of things do people put on the records?
Them talking or?
Jason Leach (16:23):
Yeah, all sorts.
It might be them singing a songat Christmas somewhere.
It might be their answer phonemessage.
It might be their favouritesong.
They might be a musician.
It might be their music.
It might be recordings thatwere taken, maybe when they were
recording their children, forexample.
But they happen to be in thebackground.
(16:44):
They're often very good onesbecause they weren't thinking of
recording themselves.
You need really get somebodythen we literally had people let
their message they left ontheir phone things like that are
quite quite good and you knowthey're profound really when you
you hear that on a vinyl
Answering Machine Message (17:05):
hello hello sorry i can't take your
call i'm probably just well whoknows where i am might be down
the shop so it could be at thepub it could be anywhere
couldn't I? Go on, leave me amessage.
I'll get back to you, maybe.
Jason Leach (17:17):
If someone really liked, I don't know, let's say
fishing, for example, we'd say,well, look, go where they like
going.
Record the sound of it.
You know, even if the wind'sblowing on their microphone, you
know, things like that, I thinkare great because it's really
good to think about What wouldmean something to your
great-great-great-grandchild?
And, you know, definitely yourvoice moving the air in the room
(17:40):
is a beautiful thought.
You know, I think probably theclosest we'll get to time
travel, at least for a fewhundred thousand years, I don't
know.
Lo Carmen (17:57):
Let's slip into a...
Jason Leach (18:07):
People always say, well, what are you going to have
on yours?
And it's like, well, it's anever-changing compilation.
which will be whatever it iswhen the time comes, because it
will never be right.
I'll always, if you can lookback, God, I wish I hadn't put
that on there or whatever, butit's too late for that.
And every, you know, you'll getsomething will change in your
(18:32):
life.
And this is what I liked aboutthe idea is it's like, well,
what do you want to leave?
And it just thinking like that.
kind of changes the way youlive for the better because
you're like, well, how do I wantto be remembered?
And the beauty of it is you candesign your artwork, you can
design your label, you candecide what audio is going to go
on there.
and if you've if you've madegot to that point which like i
(18:56):
say i don't think i ever willyou can actually we'll make
everything we'll print thelabels print the sleeves we'll
even make records that areplayable so you'll have finished
copies of exactly what you willbe in and you'll have
everything ready the plates willbe done all the cost is done so
all that needs to happen is topress the records with the ashen
with your involvement as itwere at the end so we can plan
(19:20):
them they're really good in thatregard and people really enjoy
the process of planning itdesigning the sleeves and doing
it is a kind of a good it's areal nice way of um sort of
considering and facing theinevitable.
Yeah.
And I'm actually working witha, it's a, it's a guy used to,
yeah exactly.
(19:41):
And there's a guy used to workfor, I used to play for in
Switzerland, a really good clubthere, Bikini Test, it was
called.
And he used to organize theparty.
He always used to work at anold people's home and he works
there full time now.
And he's actually working thereplanning something like six or
seven and vinylies with theseold people who just love it
(20:03):
because he's It's giving themsomething to think about and
they're choosing what goes onand they're looking through
their photos.
And I want this one on there ofme.
And these are people who aresort of, you know, being looked
after really in homes.
They might not have family leftor they might have some, but
they can't help them orwhatever.
They all just love it.
It gives them something to sortof focus on and enjoy creating
(20:26):
really.
And so he's like recording themnow and asking them about what
they did and memories and, Soall sorts of things will come
out of the woodwork, I'm sure.
My favourite ones are the oneswhere there's a lot of personal
sort of spoken words orenvironments or those ones I
(20:47):
think are amazing becausethey're going to mean a lot to
people.
You know, I often think, God,I'd love to have my great,
great, great granddads from, youknow, 1700s, you know, and I'm
going to be able to leavesomething that won't rot away.
It will last.
It doesn't take up too muchspace.
There's always going to be arecord player and someone in 200
(21:08):
years who's one of mydescendants will be able to put
me on and play me.
It's pretty cool.
Lo Carmen (21:16):
Now everybody's asking me But maybe becoming a
record is not for you.
(21:37):
Maybe there's something elsethat you'd like to do with
yourself or with the remains ofthe person that you love.
Like Hunter S.
Thompson, Timothy Leary, theAmerican psychologist, futurist,
writer, researcher and advocateof psychedelic experiences,
(21:59):
faced death with an inspiringkind of vigor and sense of
adventure.
Before his death he wrote, Letus have no more pious, wimpy
talk about death.
The time has come to talkcheerfully and joke sassily
about personal responsibilityfor managing the dying process.
And he wrote about findingcreative alternatives to, as he
(22:22):
put it, He described this kindof approach as designer dying
and said, it's a hip, chic,vogue thing to do.
It's the most elegant thing youcan do.
(22:43):
Even if you've lived your lifelike a complete slob, you can
die with terrific style.
One of my favorite things thathe said was that you've got to
approach your death the way youlive your life.
with curiosity, with hope, withfascination, with courage and
with the help of your friends.
(23:03):
I agree 100% with that and Ifind it very beautiful.
And so after exploring amultitude of alternative
options, what did Mr TimothyLeary choose to do when he died?
Well, he asked his close friendCarol Rosen to find a way to
send him to space.
(23:23):
She was beside him as he diedand reported that his last words
were, Why not?
Why not? Why not? Thoughdetermined to find a way, she
had no idea how to make hisspace dreams come true until she
heard about Celestis MemorialSpace Flights and signed him up
(23:46):
for their inaugural rocketlaunch in April 1997.
Charles Chafer (23:57):
Our very first mission ended up being very high
profile.
We had the Star Trek creators,Gene Roddenberry's ashes, and we
had the 60s icon, TimothyLeary's ashes on board.
and when we did the launch weactually flew out of the canary
islands and it caught theworld's imagination we really
(24:22):
had a lot of media coverage wewere on the front page of the
new york times cnn covered itlive around the world and so
being able to kind of getnoticed early on really helped
the process also.
Since then, Celestis has sentthe remains of more than 1,700
(24:42):
people into space.
They call their customersastronauts.
For so many people who havespent their lives looking at the
stars and wondering what's outthere, it's not only a thrilling
way to go, but a dream cometrue and a spectacular
celebration of life for thoseleft behind.
In a 2023 New York Timesarticle that had interviewed
(25:20):
people who had opted for what issometimes called space burial,
even though it's actually only asmall portion of ashes or DNA
that goes to space, a pharmacistnamed Kathleen is quoted as
saying, I love new things.
I love trying new things.
To me, it doesn't really feellike an end.
Another interviewee explainedthat they didn't want to end up
(25:43):
underground further inside theplanet when they died, that that
seemed like the wrong directionto go.
And they stated, I'm interestedin looking into the unknown,
going into the unknown.
This is another adventure.
Lo Carmen (25:58):
This is CEO Charles Schaefer that we're talking
with.
Charles Chafer (26:03):
We launch a symbolic portion.
of cremated remains humans orpets or dna samples into space
and we do that to four differentdestinations in space we have a
suborbital service that fliesto space and returns the
(26:23):
individual capsules creating aflown keepsake we fly to earth
orbit we fly to the moon and wealso fly to deep space and
service includes a three-dayactivity at the launch site
where families from around theworld converge and we conduct a
(26:45):
number of activities includinglaunch site tours memorial
services and then of courseultimately witnessing and
watching the launch of a lovedone into space on a final
journey
Lo Carmen (26:58):
sounds incredible how did you begin your involvement
with it?
Was it your concept?
Charles Chafer (27:05):
I traced the idea back to science fiction, at
least the 1800s, which isn'tsurprising given that as you
think about humans travelinginto space, inevitably you think
about, well, people are goingto pass away.
What do you do?
And that was the source of somescience fiction.
(27:25):
But the idea really came to usin the mid 1980s from a group in
Florida that had the idea.
I was in the rocket businessthen, launching satellites and
everything else.
And this group came to us andsaid, we have this idea to
create something space funeralsand ultimately they weren't
(27:48):
successful.
But in the mid 1990s, I waslooking for something that I
thought would be interesting todo that would advance humanity
into space and that would be agood business to be in.
So a partner and I founded thecompany in 1994.
I
Lo Carmen (28:07):
can't imagine at that time that there was very many
alternative burial options wasthere?
Charles Chafer (28:13):
That's true.
I think we were one of the veryearly of what is now a tsunami
of alternative options outthere.
But we were almost even beforethe internet.
I think we had probably one ofthe first e-commerce websites in
history as well.
Lo Carmen (28:32):
Wow.
Charles Chafer (28:33):
So yes, we've seen well, all of the various
alternatives that are growingrapidly now.
And we just happened to get outin front of that trend.
Lo Carmen (28:45):
Was there resistance to the idea of people using
cremated ashes to memorializetheir loved ones to begin with?
Charles Chafer (28:53):
Some, yes.
I think probably any new ideahas people that are doubters.
But I think at the time, thecremation rate in our country
was only 13, 14 So there were alot of people that thought
cremation was bad, even at thatpoint.
When you get past that, thenthere were some level of
(29:16):
religious objections, not agreat amount, and then just
other people going, I don't getit.
And of course, we've never saidour service is for everyone,
but for every person thatwondered, What are you doing?
There were at least anotherperson saying, that's the
coolest thing I've ever heardof.
And that's how I want tocelebrate my loved one's life.
Lo Carmen (29:39):
Yeah.
Do you have a lot of peoplethat sign up themselves prior?
Yeah.
Charles Chafer (29:46):
In the language of funeral service, it's called
prearrangement.
And we actually have offeredthat service where people make a
decision.
This is what I want.
I want to take the burden offmy family when I pass away.
I want to make sure that it'sdone the way I want it to be
done.
And so they sign a contractwith us and we have a trust
(30:08):
account where we put themajority of the funds that they
send us into a trust account.
so that everybody knows whenthe time comes, the funds will
be there to perform the service.
And that's actually beengrowing fairly significantly in
the last two or three years.
(30:29):
I think, as we mentioned, nowthat there are several
demographic factors, thecremation rate in this country
is now, in most places, over50%, and it will be...
people predict 80% within adecade.
So that's a trend.
Then there's the trend of babyboomers and making decisions
(30:51):
differently than say theirparents.
So the notion of, you know,bury me next to grandma and the
family plot in the churchcemetery, that's not as popular
with people now as, hey, I wantto do something that's
meaningful to me.
And I have that option.
And that's the change is all ofa sudden there are options to
(31:14):
do things differently so you putall three of those things
together it's I think quitepredictable in hindsight
obviously but we also saw itcoming that the service would
appeal to people I say itappeals to anybody that walks
out on a starry night and looksup and says that's where I want
(31:34):
to be I
Lo Carmen (31:35):
think it's also such a beautiful thing when kids look
up to the sky all the time andgo there's grandma It makes that
very real.
Charles Chafer (31:43):
Yes, it does.
I think that's a big motivationfor people.
Because, you know, funerals arefor the living, after all.
And so the fact that peoplegain comfort.
And I, you know, our launchevents are really pretty
amazing.
And if you've never been toone, it's hard to put into
words.
(32:03):
But I tell people you don'tever see as much cheering and
high-fiving at a funeral as youdo at one of our services.
because there's a genuinethrill of, you know, mom's going
to orbit kind of thing and wecan all be there to wish her
off, which you just don't get inthe more traditional choices.
Lo Carmen (32:23):
No, it must change the focus so much from...
I mean, obviously, there'sstill sadness, but it must add
such a celebratory angle to it.
Charles Chafer (32:32):
Exactly.
You know, we can't get rid ofgrief.
Grief is still a part of whateverybody goes through.
But we bring a lot of joy andfulfillment to the ceremony.
And that makes everybody feelgood.
And I think that's why peoplechoose it.
Lo Carmen (32:49):
Yeah, that makes complete sense.
Who were the early adopters?
What kind of people?
Was it people that werefascinated by science fiction
and space?
Charles Chafer (32:57):
Yeah.
The people that have alwaysbeen interested in the space
program.
Same people that make the...
Smithsonian Air and SpaceMuseum here in America, the
second most visited museum inthe world.
Certainly those folks werenatural for airline pilots or
(33:17):
airplane pilots.
We all call each other spacegeeks because I'm one.
There are the people that havefollowed Star Trek and science
fiction and that all theirlives.
And that's a pretty big groupalso.
And then there's just the folksI call the New Agers, which are
just just the folks that saythat, you know, that's where I
(33:38):
belong.
Lo Carmen (33:39):
There's a connection between death and space in that
they're both so unknowable andmysterious and they kind of go
beautifully together, don'tthey?
Charles Chafer (33:47):
I think so, yeah.
And, you know, there's theinfinite frontier and the sort
of opportunity to just be a partof something that's infinite
that appeals to folks also.
Lo Carmen (34:00):
To become part of the cosmos.
Charles Chafer (34:02):
Right.
It's very similar to in someways to people that want to be
scattered at sea it's the samesort of feeling of being part of
something that's organic andlarger than you and not
necessarily being under theground somewhere I think those
(34:24):
are all elements that the folksthat do choose our service I
think that's pretty universally
Lo Carmen (34:32):
true a great sense of release and being at one with
the universe.
Charles Chafer (34:37):
Exactly, yeah.
Lo Carmen (35:09):
Can people do it years after somebody's died with
the ashes?
Does that happen much?
Charles Chafer (35:16):
Oh, sure.
In fact, when we first put ourbusiness plan together, we had
built all of these assumptionsthat it would be white, male,
aerospace people living on thecoast.
The first person that boughtour service was a woman in
Nebraska who had her father...
(35:38):
in an urn for 10 years.
And she heard about us and saidthat would just be perfect for
dad.
So he never knew that that waswhat was going to be, but it
really appealed to his daughter.
And 10 years later, he went tospace.
Lo Carmen (35:54):
Is it something that you will do for yourself?
Charles Chafer (35:56):
Yeah, I fit all of our models.
I've been interested in spacemy whole life.
I've been in the space industrymy whole life.
I've definitely chosencremation as my final
disposition.
And I can't imagine a moreappropriate service, even if it
wasn't my company.
I'm sure I would seek it outand do it.
Lo Carmen (36:20):
How often do space flights happen?
Do you have to plan, waitadvance?
Charles Chafer (36:25):
We're what always fly is what's called a
secondary payload and what thatmeans is we are not the primary
reason that anybody's doing alaunch and so we kind of have to
recognize our spot in line andwe therefore have to have
everything prepared and ready togo months six months, seven
(36:46):
months, eight months in advanceof the launch.
And then once we've turned itover to the provider, be it a
satellite or a launch vehicle,then we have to do a fair amount
of preparation for thethree-day events that we hold at
the launch site.
And of course, launches movearound.
And we don't dictate when thelaunch goes.
(37:08):
It goes whether we're ready ornot, or sometimes it goes after
we're ready.
If you're looking for aguaranteed time that this is
going to launch into space youneed to look elsewhere how does
it work do you put the dna orthe ashes in a small like test
tube size capsule yeah yeah yeahit's pretty close to that so
(37:31):
each person gets an individualwhat we call flight capsule and
now we do have a service two canfly to get husband and wife
want to fly together interminglewhatever we we offer that but
typically it's in a capsule thatranges in size and people
decide because we only launch asmall portion of the ashes it's
(37:55):
more memorialization than finaldisposition people decide if
they want the what I would calla fat watch battery size ranging
up to a lipstick container sizeand once they've selected that
we'll engrave the name or nameson that capsule seal it and then
we actually aggregate, howevermany people are on that flight.
(38:18):
And that's then turned over towhoever is doing what's called
the integration.
And that's the attachment ofour capsules, either to a
satellite or directly to arocket.
We do both.
And then from there on, we havenothing to do with it.
(38:38):
We're not allowed to touch themachinery.
The head of the satellitecompany came out and said, we
don't consider your loved onesas passengers, we consider them
as crew.
And the reason for that isbecause they use the weight of
the whatever we provide to helpbalance the spacecraft.
(39:00):
Spacecrafts have to spin andthey have to be properly
balanced.
And so they often actually putextra weight on to make sure
everything's balanced.
In this case, our folks wereserving the function of
balancing the spacecraft andfamilies love that because not
only are their loved ones goingbut they're an integral part of
(39:22):
a real mission
Lo Carmen (39:23):
there's nothing nicer than to be of use is there
Charles Chafer (39:26):
that's right
Lo Carmen (39:27):
Now, probably the most important things I've
learned from exploring thewonderful world of things that
you can do with cremains inthese conversations with Jason
Leach of And Vinyly and CharlesSchaefer from Celestis Space
Services is that death is forthe living.
There are ways to move the airin the room long after you're
(39:50):
gone.
Space really might be theplace.
and that the only way to go isto go your own way.
Death Is Not The End wascreated, written, recorded and
edited by me, your host, LoCarmen, and produced by Black
Tambourine Productions.
(40:10):
Conversations have been editedfor clarity and time.
The Death Is Not The End thememusic was written, recorded and
performed by Peter Head.
Thank you so much to HolidaySidewinder and Nick Littlemore
for permission to use their songInto the Universe from their
(40:31):
album Face of God and to WilliamTyler for letting me use his
instrumental version of Go YourOwn Way, originally recorded by
Fleetwood Mac.
We also heard a song of mine,Put Another Record On, from the
album Lovers Dream as Fighters,and that's my weird little
bedroom version of Space Cowboyby Casey Musgraves, because I
(40:55):
couldn't afford to use the realthing.
I'll leave all the info fromtoday's episode in the show
notes, and you can find meonline at lowcarmen.substack.com
where I write about music,culture, life and death and all
the juicy stuff that makes theworld go round.
(41:15):
And you are more than welcometo come join the conversation.
If you enjoyed Death Is Not TheEnd, please share it with
someone or leave a review.
It really helps spread theword.
And I hope you'll join me nexttime for more explorations and
discovery on Death Is Not TheEnd.
Look, despite the name of this podcast, we all
know that when confronted withdeath, it really is very final,
(00:20):
and finding a way of acceptingthat is often tremendously
difficult for many reasons.
So finding a special way tocelebrate and send off our loved
ones or planning for our ownspecial future death care is one
way to help us move through ortowards this transition with
more positivity, even somethingto be joyful about.
(00:41):
In recent years, there's beenan explosion of things that you
can do with cremated remains.
Cremains is the funeralindustry term for this or what
we regular people generally callashes.
They can now be grown intodiamonds.
Yes, real diamonds.
They can be used to createother kinds of memorial
(01:03):
jewellery or glass paperweightsor tactile stones that you can
hold in your hand and takeanywhere with you.
They can be exploded infireworks or bullets.
The mind truly boggles with theamount of things that you can
do with cremains.
They can also be used to creatememorial reefs that help
(01:26):
regenerate ocean life.
And approximately 18 years ago,while sitting on the couch in
the middle of the night with mynew small sleepless baby surfing
the World Wide Web, I cameacross an article about a
company called And Finally.
that would sprinkle ashes intoa real playable vinyl record.
(01:48):
Now, for those of you that haveended up here somehow but don't
know me, hi, I'm your host,Lowe Carmen.
I'm a musician and music is mylife.
So my immediate reaction wasjust total relief with the
recognition that yes,hallelujah, that's what I want
done with my remains when I go.
(02:10):
I want to be a record.
The thought of that just filledme with a kind of peace and
satisfaction.
The idea of being buried orhaving my ashes scattered had
just never sat right with me.
I didn't have any particularplace that was super meaningful
to me, and like many of us, I'djust never come to terms with
(02:33):
the idea of dying, really.
And that's what I'm wanting todo here with Death Is Not The
End.
Like I said, I'm a musician anda writer, a songwriter, I'm not
an expert, but I am deeplycurious and I do love to
research and explore anddiscover things.
So I'd love for you to join meon the journey I'm going to take
(02:55):
through all the different wayswe can approach the inevitable
finale of our stories.
And as I began the process ofpondering all of this, of making
this podcast, I thought back tothat very first article about
the ashes in the records And Iwondered if perhaps I'd just
hallucinated the whole thing.
After all, it was a long timeago and I was severely sleep
(03:18):
deprived at the time.
So I let my fingers do thewalking and I discovered and
finally was indeed real.
It still existed.
And Jason Leach was the name ofthe man behind it.
So Jason was the very firstperson that I reached out to and
he kindly agreed to aninterview.
I'm in Sydney, Australia andhe's in Scarborough, England.
(03:39):
So because of our timedifferences, I spoke to him
bleary-eyed at 5 a.m., He'd justfinished work and was sitting
down with a beer.
I could give you anintroduction to his story and
set it all up, but I canguarantee you that hearing the
story from Jason himself isgoing to be far more
entertaining and enjoyable.
(04:00):
So here we go.
Jason Leach (04:03):
And Vi nyly is now a company.
It was originally an idea forsomething I wanted to do myself
where I got to the point in mylife where I realised I was
going to die.
I wouldn't live forever.
I was sure I would for quite along time.
Very much later than I shouldhave done.
I would refuse to admit it.
(04:24):
And my mum suddenly out of theblue got a job at Funeral
Directors.
She's Swiss, so she's verystraight up and organised and to
the point, shall we say.
And I was in my, what was I,maybe about...
I suppose, 35 or something likethat, at that age.
And she was saying, look,there's lots of young men your
(04:44):
age, young men, middle-aged men,who are coming through here and
you need to get yourself, youknow, you need to start thinking
about what will happen.
Oh,
Lo Carmen (04:52):
right.
So she wasn't suggesting it asa business idea.
She was just saying, you needto think about your life.
Jason Leach (04:57):
Yeah, you need to think about what's going to
happen.
Yeah, what's going to happen.
Lo Carmen (05:02):
Did you have a family at that point?
Jason Leach (05:03):
Yeah, just very young, very, very young family.
And So she was saying, youknow, you've got to think about
these things and stop pretendingit's not going to happen.
So that was going on.
What was your reaction to that?
Well, I mean, this is part ofit.
My reaction was I just didn'twant to think about it.
I was like, stop it.
(05:24):
I don't want to talk about it.
And afterwards I thought, youknow, why am I like that?
Why do I, why am I sort of...
palming it off why don't i wantto talk about it or think about
it and it's obviously becauseyou're frightened about it and
because you've not been faced byit i you know i i started
thinking more and more about itand then when i spoke to my
(05:45):
friends and peers they were likei was they didn't want to talk
about it i mean literallythey're like oh god downer You
know, we're here at the pub.
I was like, yeah, but I wasjust wondering, you know, what
do you...
And some people actually getangry if I pushed them a bit
about what they thought aboutit.
They just didn't want to thinkabout it.
So I started to get interestedfrom that side.
Lo Carmen (06:07):
So would you literally be saying things like,
have you thought about what youwant to do when you die?
Jason Leach (06:11):
Yeah, I started saying, well, mum's been telling
me that there's loads of peopleour age, you know, the shocking
amount, actually, that arecoming, people who just hadn't
considered it and thought aboutit.
And it becomes a problem, youknow, and, you know, what are
you going to do?
And people just didn't want tothink about it.
And, you know, we've grown upwithout being exposed at all to
(06:34):
it.
Our grandparents andgreat-grandparents lived in
villages.
Yeah, they were, you know, theywere surrounded by it, really.
Regularly, there'd be somebodythey knew who passed away or
died.
So it wasn't something thatthey were pushing to the back of
their mind.
and um so i started thinkingwhy wow this is weird and this
(06:55):
was in about 2005 2006 so yeah35 36 i was and around that time
i think i saw on the newshunter s thompson had um put his
ashes in fireworks and ithought wow that's really cool
Lo Carmen (07:11):
The American writer and gonzo journalist Hunter S.
Thompson asked his friendJohnny Depp to make sure that
his funeral wishes were carriedout after his death.
He wanted his ashes to beexploded from fireworks, shot
from a cannon sculpted as a red,white and blue clenched fist,
holding a peyote button.
(07:33):
This is his signature symbol.
Johnny paid $3 million for theevent, which included building a
150-foot tower on the groundsof Hunter's Colorado Ranch.
Johnny said, I just want tosend my pal out the way he wants
to go out.
Anita Thompson, Hunter's wife,planned to then build a memorial
(07:54):
pond on their land with aheadstone inscribed with one of
Hunter's favourite sayings.
It never got weird enough forme.
Jason Leach (08:04):
I do like that.
It's something you can plan andit's fun.
People can watch somethinghappen.
So I kind of like that idea.
And I was just thinking aboutit.
I thought, well, you know, I'dlike my
great-great-grandchildren to beable to play a record and hear
my voice hear what I wasthinking at the time, what was
important to me maybe, whatmusic I liked, maybe a joke at
(08:27):
the time, I don't know, anythinglike that.
I thought, you know, I want tobe in a record.
So I started a website with afriend of mine and really it was
fun.
It was full of really bad punswhich are still some of them
still last like live on frombeyond the groove and riv and
resting vinyl but
Lo Carmen (08:48):
on that site great ones on the website i'd like to
see all the outtakes as well you
Jason Leach (08:53):
really i wish a flash is gone now but the
original site is like i say itwas not a business it was not
meant to be it was really mesort of coming to terms and sort
of dealing with this to sellany it was just fun you know fun
with a sort of dark humor yesand we We had 10 steps to
immortality with the first stepbeing dying.
(09:14):
So that's how it started.
But it got huge coverage in thepress just from being there and
people spotting it and thenjust people passing it around.
And this is very...
Still, it's not very early daysof the internet, of course, but
it was well before things likeTwitter and things like that.
Lo Carmen (09:35):
Yeah, before everyone was 24 hours a day connected.
Jason Leach (09:38):
Exactly, yeah.
So we were getting...
Lots and lots of peoplecontacting us from magazines and
newspapers and radio showstalking about it.
And I put the price just sortof phenomenally high at the time
because I didn't want to.
It was never meant to be abusiness.
And at the time I was trialing.
you know, using ashes fromfires and things like that and
(10:01):
trying to make records and seehow I can make them work for
myself because that's what I putin my will.
That's what I want to happen tome because
Lo Carmen (10:09):
I've decided.
Right, so you wanted to see howashes in vinyl work because
people put all kinds of crazythings in vinyl, don't they?
Well,
Jason Leach (10:15):
they can do, you can do.
Lo Carmen (10:16):
Paint and what other kinds of things?
Jason Leach (10:19):
You can get coloured vinyl and you can get,
I mean, there's all sorts ofthings that can be done.
I mean, ashes is a bit of afunny one.
Depending on what it is theashes are of, they can be quite
gritty or sometimes they're softand that's fine.
So you've got to make sure it'sgoing to work.
you know, it's going to play.
Vinyl at the time was verymuch, very unpopular, like I
(10:42):
said, and felt like it might beon its way out.
I actually started a recordlabel at the time called Death
to Vinyl, which was, you know,sort of ironic really because I
love vinyl, but I was sort ofthinking, well, you know, it's
probably on its way out andended up doing it.
And now I'm doing it regularlyand I've got arrangements set up
around the world with funeraldirectors who are open-minded
(11:05):
enough want to offer it and afew sort of intermediate parties
that offer different things youcan do with ashes and so yeah
we're doing it sort of globallynow and um it's something that
i'm doing regularly on a regularbasis from day to day i'm
working on it sort of prettymuch all the time so it's a
(11:25):
crazy crazy situation reallybecause like i say it was not
planned but it's just ended upbeing the case
Lo Carmen (11:33):
wow so people can send you ashes from all around
the world is that right
Jason Leach (11:38):
yeah i mean the thing is when we make a record
we we we use it's about ateaspoon a record you can't put
too much in because it won'tplay or you risk it not playing
you and you want to put enoughin so you can see it most of our
vinyls are clear vinyl or trenda colored clear vinyl because
you really want to be able tosee the ash in there.
It's
Lo Carmen (11:59):
very pretty, isn't it?
Yeah,
Jason Leach (12:02):
it sort of spreads out.
So it looks quite good.
And every one's different.
Every single one, obviously,it's sort of random because it's
going through a pressingprocess.
So you can't plan how it willcome out.
It's not the whole urn.
So it's not restricted.
You've always got to check whatthe rules are in your areas.
But generally, if you're tryingto send an entire urn, you've
(12:24):
got a lot of red tape in mostcountries and you know sending
it through customs and there'squite a lot involved some
countries more than others butwe're not dealing with that
we're dealing with a with a verysmall amount generally most
people have between one and tentwelve is about the maximum um
maybe twenty and often it's oneor three or four the first One
(12:52):
we did with Human Ashes was aFrench lady whose husband had
passed away.
He was actually younger thanme.
It was quite sad.
And often it is, you know,they're often very touching
stories.
But they're really cool peopleoften because, you know, to like
their idea, they're obviouslyof a certain ilk, you know.
And I think actually he'd seenthe website.
(13:16):
He was unwell.
And he said, that's what I wantto do.
And she was one of the ones.
I mean, we're in the U.S.
and she's in France so sheactually came over with a friend
they got the ferry and I metthem and picked the ashes up and
then we did the records andthen we met them again and gave
her the rest of the ashes so wedid that one sort of like that
very much hands-on that was thefirst one we did So it was quite
(13:39):
nerve-wracking becauseobviously, like I said, I
Lo Carmen (13:42):
never...
Handling human ashes for thefirst time.
Jason Leach (13:44):
Well, not so much that.
It was that I hadn't, becauseit wasn't meant to be a
business, I hadn't, you know, Ihadn't thought, right, well, if
I'm going to be doing this, I'vegot a responsibility to deal
with people who will be mourningand et cetera.
And it sounds sort of bad tosay, but I'm very pleased,
relieved and proud to say that,you know, I've managed to deal
(14:06):
with it very well and Everybodyso far has been very, very
happy.
I mean, more than when we getfriends and family, lots of
people who just say thanks somuch.
Particularly sort of friendsand extended family, maybe, who
wouldn't normally have somethingto remember them by.
These are great because theymight mean more to a friend
(14:29):
who's spent the last 20 yearswith them than maybe their mum
or something like this.
The mums, obviously, and theirvery close family, it's a very
different situation and thevinyl might not mean anything to
them they might still have thevast majority of the ashes that
they either keep or they'vesprinkled or whatever but for
friends and maybe extendedfamily who spent more time
(14:52):
socializing with them morelatterly you know it happened to
me I've had two friends whoI've made music with pass away
in the last sort of 10 years andone of them particularly I'd
spent the last sort of 20 oddyears almost literally we lived
above each other we went and andtouring together and spent
every minute of every day for 20years but I didn't know his
(15:12):
family you know it's a hard jobto even get along to the service
that was offered you knowbecause they didn't know it
wasn't their fault but theydidn't know I'd never gone and
met them I'd never spent anytime at his home so of course I
wasn't actually invited so Imight not even go to the service
or be able to be part of sortof the farewell as it were So
(15:36):
when contact from friends whomaybe don't know a close family
of someone, they're soappreciative of having something
that they can keep and, youknow, remember their very close
friend by, you know.
So these are things that Ididn't expect, which we're
learning about, you know, aswe've been doing what we do.
Unknown (15:56):
Thank you.
Lo Carmen (16:18):
What kind of things do people put on the records?
Them talking or?
Jason Leach (16:23):
Yeah, all sorts.
It might be them singing a songat Christmas somewhere.
It might be their answer phonemessage.
It might be their favouritesong.
They might be a musician.
It might be their music.
It might be recordings thatwere taken, maybe when they were
recording their children, forexample.
But they happen to be in thebackground.
(16:44):
They're often very good onesbecause they weren't thinking of
recording themselves.
You need really get somebodythen we literally had people let
their message they left ontheir phone things like that are
quite quite good and you knowthey're profound really when you
you hear that on a vinyl
Answering Machine Message (17:05):
hello hello sorry i can't take your
call i'm probably just well whoknows where i am might be down
the shop so it could be at thepub it could be anywhere
couldn't I? Go on, leave me amessage.
I'll get back to you, maybe.
Jason Leach (17:17):
If someone really liked, I don't know, let's say
fishing, for example, we'd say,well, look, go where they like
going.
Record the sound of it.
You know, even if the wind'sblowing on their microphone, you
know, things like that, I thinkare great because it's really
good to think about What wouldmean something to your
great-great-great-grandchild?
And, you know, definitely yourvoice moving the air in the room
(17:40):
is a beautiful thought.
You know, I think probably theclosest we'll get to time
travel, at least for a fewhundred thousand years, I don't
know.
Lo Carmen (17:57):
Let's slip into a...
Jason Leach (18:07):
People always say, well, what are you going to have
on yours?
And it's like, well, it's anever-changing compilation.
which will be whatever it iswhen the time comes, because it
will never be right.
I'll always, if you can lookback, God, I wish I hadn't put
that on there or whatever, butit's too late for that.
And every, you know, you'll getsomething will change in your
(18:32):
life.
And this is what I liked aboutthe idea is it's like, well,
what do you want to leave?
And it just thinking like that.
kind of changes the way youlive for the better because
you're like, well, how do I wantto be remembered?
And the beauty of it is you candesign your artwork, you can
design your label, you candecide what audio is going to go
on there.
and if you've if you've madegot to that point which like i
(18:56):
say i don't think i ever willyou can actually we'll make
everything we'll print thelabels print the sleeves we'll
even make records that areplayable so you'll have finished
copies of exactly what you willbe in and you'll have
everything ready the plates willbe done all the cost is done so
all that needs to happen is topress the records with the ashen
with your involvement as itwere at the end so we can plan
(19:20):
them they're really good in thatregard and people really enjoy
the process of planning itdesigning the sleeves and doing
it is a kind of a good it's areal nice way of um sort of
considering and facing theinevitable.
Yeah.
And I'm actually working witha, it's a, it's a guy used to,
yeah exactly.
(19:41):
And there's a guy used to workfor, I used to play for in
Switzerland, a really good clubthere, Bikini Test, it was
called.
And he used to organize theparty.
He always used to work at anold people's home and he works
there full time now.
And he's actually working thereplanning something like six or
seven and vinylies with theseold people who just love it
(20:03):
because he's It's giving themsomething to think about and
they're choosing what goes onand they're looking through
their photos.
And I want this one on there ofme.
And these are people who aresort of, you know, being looked
after really in homes.
They might not have family leftor they might have some, but
they can't help them orwhatever.
They all just love it.
It gives them something to sortof focus on and enjoy creating
(20:26):
really.
And so he's like recording themnow and asking them about what
they did and memories and, Soall sorts of things will come
out of the woodwork, I'm sure.
My favourite ones are the oneswhere there's a lot of personal
sort of spoken words orenvironments or those ones I
(20:47):
think are amazing becausethey're going to mean a lot to
people.
You know, I often think, God,I'd love to have my great,
great, great granddads from, youknow, 1700s, you know, and I'm
going to be able to leavesomething that won't rot away.
It will last.
It doesn't take up too muchspace.
There's always going to be arecord player and someone in 200
(21:08):
years who's one of mydescendants will be able to put
me on and play me.
It's pretty cool.
Lo Carmen (21:16):
Now everybody's asking me But maybe becoming a
record is not for you.
(21:37):
Maybe there's something elsethat you'd like to do with
yourself or with the remains ofthe person that you love.
Like Hunter S.
Thompson, Timothy Leary, theAmerican psychologist, futurist,
writer, researcher and advocateof psychedelic experiences,
(21:59):
faced death with an inspiringkind of vigor and sense of
adventure.
Before his death he wrote, Letus have no more pious, wimpy
talk about death.
The time has come to talkcheerfully and joke sassily
about personal responsibilityfor managing the dying process.
And he wrote about findingcreative alternatives to, as he
(22:22):
put it, He described this kindof approach as designer dying
and said, it's a hip, chic,vogue thing to do.
It's the most elegant thing youcan do.
(22:43):
Even if you've lived your lifelike a complete slob, you can
die with terrific style.
One of my favorite things thathe said was that you've got to
approach your death the way youlive your life.
with curiosity, with hope, withfascination, with courage and
with the help of your friends.
(23:03):
I agree 100% with that and Ifind it very beautiful.
And so after exploring amultitude of alternative
options, what did Mr TimothyLeary choose to do when he died?
Well, he asked his close friendCarol Rosen to find a way to
send him to space.
(23:23):
She was beside him as he diedand reported that his last words
were, Why not?
Why not? Why not? Thoughdetermined to find a way, she
had no idea how to make hisspace dreams come true until she
heard about Celestis MemorialSpace Flights and signed him up
(23:46):
for their inaugural rocketlaunch in April 1997.
Charles Chafer (23:57):
Our very first mission ended up being very high
profile.
We had the Star Trek creators,Gene Roddenberry's ashes, and we
had the 60s icon, TimothyLeary's ashes on board.
and when we did the launch weactually flew out of the canary
islands and it caught theworld's imagination we really
(24:22):
had a lot of media coverage wewere on the front page of the
new york times cnn covered itlive around the world and so
being able to kind of getnoticed early on really helped
the process also.
Since then, Celestis has sentthe remains of more than 1,700
(24:42):
people into space.
They call their customersastronauts.
For so many people who havespent their lives looking at the
stars and wondering what's outthere, it's not only a thrilling
way to go, but a dream cometrue and a spectacular
celebration of life for thoseleft behind.
In a 2023 New York Timesarticle that had interviewed
(25:20):
people who had opted for what issometimes called space burial,
even though it's actually only asmall portion of ashes or DNA
that goes to space, a pharmacistnamed Kathleen is quoted as
saying, I love new things.
I love trying new things.
To me, it doesn't really feellike an end.
Another interviewee explainedthat they didn't want to end up
(25:43):
underground further inside theplanet when they died, that that
seemed like the wrong directionto go.
And they stated, I'm interestedin looking into the unknown,
going into the unknown.
This is another adventure.
Lo Carmen (25:58):
This is CEO Charles Schaefer that we're talking
with.
Charles Chafer (26:03):
We launch a symbolic portion.
of cremated remains humans orpets or dna samples into space
and we do that to four differentdestinations in space we have a
suborbital service that fliesto space and returns the
(26:23):
individual capsules creating aflown keepsake we fly to earth
orbit we fly to the moon and wealso fly to deep space and
service includes a three-dayactivity at the launch site
where families from around theworld converge and we conduct a
(26:45):
number of activities includinglaunch site tours memorial
services and then of courseultimately witnessing and
watching the launch of a lovedone into space on a final
journey
Lo Carmen (26:58):
sounds incredible how did you begin your involvement
with it?
Was it your concept?
Charles Chafer (27:05):
I traced the idea back to science fiction, at
least the 1800s, which isn'tsurprising given that as you
think about humans travelinginto space, inevitably you think
about, well, people are goingto pass away.
What do you do?
And that was the source of somescience fiction.
(27:25):
But the idea really came to usin the mid 1980s from a group in
Florida that had the idea.
I was in the rocket businessthen, launching satellites and
everything else.
And this group came to us andsaid, we have this idea to
create something space funeralsand ultimately they weren't
(27:48):
successful.
But in the mid 1990s, I waslooking for something that I
thought would be interesting todo that would advance humanity
into space and that would be agood business to be in.
So a partner and I founded thecompany in 1994.
I
Lo Carmen (28:07):
can't imagine at that time that there was very many
alternative burial options wasthere?
Charles Chafer (28:13):
That's true.
I think we were one of the veryearly of what is now a tsunami
of alternative options outthere.
But we were almost even beforethe internet.
I think we had probably one ofthe first e-commerce websites in
history as well.
Lo Carmen (28:32):
Wow.
Charles Chafer (28:33):
So yes, we've seen well, all of the various
alternatives that are growingrapidly now.
And we just happened to get outin front of that trend.
Lo Carmen (28:45):
Was there resistance to the idea of people using
cremated ashes to memorializetheir loved ones to begin with?
Charles Chafer (28:53):
Some, yes.
I think probably any new ideahas people that are doubters.
But I think at the time, thecremation rate in our country
was only 13, 14 So there were alot of people that thought
cremation was bad, even at thatpoint.
When you get past that, thenthere were some level of
(29:16):
religious objections, not agreat amount, and then just
other people going, I don't getit.
And of course, we've never saidour service is for everyone,
but for every person thatwondered, What are you doing?
There were at least anotherperson saying, that's the
coolest thing I've ever heardof.
And that's how I want tocelebrate my loved one's life.
Lo Carmen (29:39):
Yeah.
Do you have a lot of peoplethat sign up themselves prior?
Yeah.
Charles Chafer (29:46):
In the language of funeral service, it's called
prearrangement.
And we actually have offeredthat service where people make a
decision.
This is what I want.
I want to take the burden offmy family when I pass away.
I want to make sure that it'sdone the way I want it to be
done.
And so they sign a contractwith us and we have a trust
(30:08):
account where we put themajority of the funds that they
send us into a trust account.
so that everybody knows whenthe time comes, the funds will
be there to perform the service.
And that's actually beengrowing fairly significantly in
the last two or three years.
(30:29):
I think, as we mentioned, nowthat there are several
demographic factors, thecremation rate in this country
is now, in most places, over50%, and it will be...
people predict 80% within adecade.
So that's a trend.
Then there's the trend of babyboomers and making decisions
(30:51):
differently than say theirparents.
So the notion of, you know,bury me next to grandma and the
family plot in the churchcemetery, that's not as popular
with people now as, hey, I wantto do something that's
meaningful to me.
And I have that option.
And that's the change is all ofa sudden there are options to
(31:14):
do things differently so you putall three of those things
together it's I think quitepredictable in hindsight
obviously but we also saw itcoming that the service would
appeal to people I say itappeals to anybody that walks
out on a starry night and looksup and says that's where I want
(31:34):
to be I
Lo Carmen (31:35):
think it's also such a beautiful thing when kids look
up to the sky all the time andgo there's grandma It makes that
very real.
Charles Chafer (31:43):
Yes, it does.
I think that's a big motivationfor people.
Because, you know, funerals arefor the living, after all.
And so the fact that peoplegain comfort.
And I, you know, our launchevents are really pretty
amazing.
And if you've never been toone, it's hard to put into
words.
(32:03):
But I tell people you don'tever see as much cheering and
high-fiving at a funeral as youdo at one of our services.
because there's a genuinethrill of, you know, mom's going
to orbit kind of thing and wecan all be there to wish her
off, which you just don't get inthe more traditional choices.
Lo Carmen (32:23):
No, it must change the focus so much from...
I mean, obviously, there'sstill sadness, but it must add
such a celebratory angle to it.
Charles Chafer (32:32):
Exactly.
You know, we can't get rid ofgrief.
Grief is still a part of whateverybody goes through.
But we bring a lot of joy andfulfillment to the ceremony.
And that makes everybody feelgood.
And I think that's why peoplechoose it.
Lo Carmen (32:49):
Yeah, that makes complete sense.
Who were the early adopters?
What kind of people?
Was it people that werefascinated by science fiction
and space?
Charles Chafer (32:57):
Yeah.
The people that have alwaysbeen interested in the space
program.
Same people that make the...
Smithsonian Air and SpaceMuseum here in America, the
second most visited museum inthe world.
Certainly those folks werenatural for airline pilots or
(33:17):
airplane pilots.
We all call each other spacegeeks because I'm one.
There are the people that havefollowed Star Trek and science
fiction and that all theirlives.
And that's a pretty big groupalso.
And then there's just the folksI call the New Agers, which are
just just the folks that saythat, you know, that's where I
(33:38):
belong.
Lo Carmen (33:39):
There's a connection between death and space in that
they're both so unknowable andmysterious and they kind of go
beautifully together, don'tthey?
Charles Chafer (33:47):
I think so, yeah.
And, you know, there's theinfinite frontier and the sort
of opportunity to just be a partof something that's infinite
that appeals to folks also.
Lo Carmen (34:00):
To become part of the cosmos.
Charles Chafer (34:02):
Right.
It's very similar to in someways to people that want to be
scattered at sea it's the samesort of feeling of being part of
something that's organic andlarger than you and not
necessarily being under theground somewhere I think those
(34:24):
are all elements that the folksthat do choose our service I
think that's pretty universally
Lo Carmen (34:32):
true a great sense of release and being at one with
the universe.
Charles Chafer (34:37):
Exactly, yeah.
Lo Carmen (35:09):
Can people do it years after somebody's died with
the ashes?
Does that happen much?
Charles Chafer (35:16):
Oh, sure.
In fact, when we first put ourbusiness plan together, we had
built all of these assumptionsthat it would be white, male,
aerospace people living on thecoast.
The first person that boughtour service was a woman in
Nebraska who had her father...
(35:38):
in an urn for 10 years.
And she heard about us and saidthat would just be perfect for
dad.
So he never knew that that waswhat was going to be, but it
really appealed to his daughter.
And 10 years later, he went tospace.
Lo Carmen (35:54):
Is it something that you will do for yourself?
Charles Chafer (35:56):
Yeah, I fit all of our models.
I've been interested in spacemy whole life.
I've been in the space industrymy whole life.
I've definitely chosencremation as my final
disposition.
And I can't imagine a moreappropriate service, even if it
wasn't my company.
I'm sure I would seek it outand do it.
Lo Carmen (36:20):
How often do space flights happen?
Do you have to plan, waitadvance?
Charles Chafer (36:25):
We're what always fly is what's called a
secondary payload and what thatmeans is we are not the primary
reason that anybody's doing alaunch and so we kind of have to
recognize our spot in line andwe therefore have to have
everything prepared and ready togo months six months, seven
(36:46):
months, eight months in advanceof the launch.
And then once we've turned itover to the provider, be it a
satellite or a launch vehicle,then we have to do a fair amount
of preparation for thethree-day events that we hold at
the launch site.
And of course, launches movearound.
And we don't dictate when thelaunch goes.
(37:08):
It goes whether we're ready ornot, or sometimes it goes after
we're ready.
If you're looking for aguaranteed time that this is
going to launch into space youneed to look elsewhere how does
it work do you put the dna orthe ashes in a small like test
tube size capsule yeah yeah yeahit's pretty close to that so
(37:31):
each person gets an individualwhat we call flight capsule and
now we do have a service two canfly to get husband and wife
want to fly together interminglewhatever we we offer that but
typically it's in a capsule thatranges in size and people
decide because we only launch asmall portion of the ashes it's
(37:55):
more memorialization than finaldisposition people decide if
they want the what I would calla fat watch battery size ranging
up to a lipstick container sizeand once they've selected that
we'll engrave the name or nameson that capsule seal it and then
we actually aggregate, howevermany people are on that flight.
(38:18):
And that's then turned over towhoever is doing what's called
the integration.
And that's the attachment ofour capsules, either to a
satellite or directly to arocket.
We do both.
And then from there on, we havenothing to do with it.
(38:38):
We're not allowed to touch themachinery.
The head of the satellitecompany came out and said, we
don't consider your loved onesas passengers, we consider them
as crew.
And the reason for that isbecause they use the weight of
the whatever we provide to helpbalance the spacecraft.
(39:00):
Spacecrafts have to spin andthey have to be properly
balanced.
And so they often actually putextra weight on to make sure
everything's balanced.
In this case, our folks wereserving the function of
balancing the spacecraft andfamilies love that because not
only are their loved ones goingbut they're an integral part of
(39:22):
a real mission
Lo Carmen (39:23):
there's nothing nicer than to be of use is there
Charles Chafer (39:26):
that's right
Lo Carmen (39:27):
Now, probably the most important things I've
learned from exploring thewonderful world of things that
you can do with cremains inthese conversations with Jason
Leach of And Vinyly and CharlesSchaefer from Celestis Space
Services is that death is forthe living.
There are ways to move the airin the room long after you're
(39:50):
gone.
Space really might be theplace.
and that the only way to go isto go your own way.
Death Is Not The End wascreated, written, recorded and
edited by me, your host, LoCarmen, and produced by Black
Tambourine Productions.
(40:10):
Conversations have been editedfor clarity and time.
The Death Is Not The End thememusic was written, recorded and
performed by Peter Head.
Thank you so much to HolidaySidewinder and Nick Littlemore
for permission to use their songInto the Universe from their
(40:31):
album Face of God and to WilliamTyler for letting me use his
instrumental version of Go YourOwn Way, originally recorded by
Fleetwood Mac.
We also heard a song of mine,Put Another Record On, from the
album Lovers Dream as Fighters,and that's my weird little
bedroom version of Space Cowboyby Casey Musgraves, because I
(40:55):
couldn't afford to use the realthing.
I'll leave all the info fromtoday's episode in the show
notes, and you can find meonline at lowcarmen.substack.com
where I write about music,culture, life and death and all
the juicy stuff that makes theworld go round.
(41:15):
And you are more than welcometo come join the conversation.
If you enjoyed Death Is Not TheEnd, please share it with
someone or leave a review.
It really helps spread theword.
And I hope you'll join me nexttime for more explorations and
discovery on Death Is Not TheEnd.
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