DISGRACELAND

DISGRACELAND

You know the myths. You’ve seen the biopics. But if you’re the kind of music fan who craves the rest of the story—the stuff they buried or cleaned up for streaming and theaters—this is your podcast. DISGRACELAND is the award-winning show that reveals the deeply human, highly dramatic, true crime–fueled chaos behind legendary musicians like Amy Winehouse, Jerry Lee Lewis, Sean “Diddy” Combs, the Grateful Dead, Blondie, and more. While we dig into the dark side, we do so with reverence for the artists—and an understanding of the extreme highs, lows, and personal costs that come with fame and making great art. This is music history like you’ve never heard it—edge-of-your-seat stories exploding with drama and the kind of information that’ll make you dangerous at dinner parties. New, fully scripted and sound-designed episodes drop every Tuesday. On Thursdays, we hand the mic to you—and feature listener voicemails, texts, and emails in our interactive bonus episodes. And on Fridays, we revisit the wildest stories from our 250+ episode archive with “Rewind” drops that’ll transport you back into music history’s most entertaining moments. DISGRACELAND is not a journalistic podcast—it’s an entertainment podcast inspired by true events. Certain dialogue and scenes are occasionally fictionalized for dramatic effect, as is common in scripted entertainment based on real stories. Sources and credits for each episode are available at www.disgracelandpod.com. To hear every episode ad-free—and get access to exclusive monthly episodes, weekly bonus content, and stories too wild for the main feed—become a Disgraceland All Access member at www.disgracelandpod.com/membership.

Episodes

The Beach Boys Pt. 2: Endless Bummer, Hollywood Paranoia, Onstage Fist Fights, Incest, and Cocaine

September 1, 2025 • 42 mins
In the aftermath of the Manson Family murders, Hollywood was gripped with fear. Various investigations stitched together a deluded White Album-inspired explanation of the killing spree. But Dennis Wilson knew the truth—that he had made a terrible, irreversible mistake and that now, the sunny dream of the '60s was over. The nightmare it brought about haunted him to his final days. For a full list of contributors, see the show notes...
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The Beach Boys Pt. 1: Endless Summer, LSD, Orgies, Charles Manson and a Steve McQueen Man-Crush

August 31, 2025 • 44 mins
In the summer of 1968, the Beach Boys’ drummer Dennis Wilson invited a hippie guru and his grungy harem to squat in his Pacific Palisades home. Dennis was the handsome California surfer that his brother Brian wrote all those hit songs about, while the hippie cult would soon be infamous the world over as the Manson Family. What happened when the Wilsons met the Mansons would forever change Dennis, the band, and American history itse...
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Gram Parsons: A Stolen Body, Heroin, More Rolling Stones and Cosmic American Music

August 29, 2025 • 43 mins
Gram Parsons is one of the most influential musicians in rock ‘n’ roll that you’ve maybe never heard of. He created a form of music that has been copied by everyone from the Eagles to Ryan Adams. He directly influenced the Rolling Stones’ greatest album, possibly the greatest rock ‘n’ roll album of all time, Exile on Main Street. And when he died his body was stolen and unceremoniously disposed of. This is the story of Gram Parsons...
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Bonus Episode: Compton, Conspiracies, and Mercy

August 28, 2025 • 36 mins
This week in the After Party, Jake takes a look at the important musical history of Compton. Plus, your voicemails, DMs, and emails on subjects ranging from mercy to Lemmy to Frankie Goes to Hollywood(?). On Tuesday, we're bringing our episode on the late Brian Wilson, and Jake wants to know: Who is the best example from music history of a "tortured genius?" Share your thoughts at 617-906 6638, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠disgracelandpod@gmai...
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Kendrick Lamar: The Streets, the Studio, and the Struggle for Mercy

August 26, 2025 • 38 mins
Before Kendrick Lamar became one of the greatest lyricists of his generation, he was K.Dot—a kid from Compton with a front-row seat to trauma, loyalty, violence, and survival. This is the story of good kid, m.A.A.d city and the real-life events that fueled it. It’s about a drive-by shooting that changed Kendrick forever. About a murder. About a robbery. About friends who vanished and others who couldn’t be saved. It’s about escapin...
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Willie Nelson (Pt 2): Grifters, Con Men, Thieves, and the Reinvention of the Outlaw

August 24, 2025 • 36 mins
Willie Nelson left Nashville and reinvented himself in Austin, Texas as the ultimate outsider. It was a metamorphosis from freak flag flier to mainstream mainstay that is rife with tales of drug smuggling, arson, and international run-ins with Johnny Law. Not to mention a lifelong association with grifters, con men, and thieves, and how that led not only to one of the most publicized busts of a superstar in the 20th century, but al...
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Willie Nelson (Pt 1): A Shootout, a House Fire, and the Ballad of the Red-Headed Stranger

August 22, 2025 • 38 mins
Broke and depressed, Willie Nelson almost joined the 27 Club on a snowy Nashville street late one night – before he’d even sold a single song. He drank, smoked, and cheated his way through multiple marriages. He was nearly beaten to death by an angry husband in a parking lot. He wielded a shotgun and a rifle during a shootout on his own property. And after ten years of trying to make it on Music Row, he had the courage and the conf...
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Bonus Episode: 80s Metalheads, Life-changing Concerts, and Ozzy Osbourne

August 21, 2025 • 38 mins
This week in the After Party, Jake looks into some of the rumors and conjecture surrounding the death of Ozzy Osbourne. Plus, we hear from you about your concert going experiences! On Tuesday, we're bringing our episode on Kendrick Lamar, and Jake wants to know: What artists have shown mercy, forgiveness or kindness? Share your thoughts at 617-906-6638, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠disgracelandpod@gmail.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, or on socials @disg...
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Motörhead: Speed, Sex, and Revenge

August 19, 2025 • 40 mins
Motörhead influenced some of the most important acts in heavy metal and punk rock history. Led by the inimitable Lemmy Kilmister, they invented a sound and a style that didn’t exist before the original trio went into the recording studio for the first time. The story of Motörhead is also a story about speed, revenge, good and evil, a brutal murder, and some of the greatest – and meanest – rock ‘n roll ever committed to tape. This ...
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David Bowie: The occult, cocaine, orgies, arrests, exorcisms, a weird flirtation with fascism and a dead body.

August 15, 2025 • 42 mins
No musical artist better personified the hedonism of the ’70s than David Bowie. He captivated the imaginations of music fans all over the world with a dizzying array of creative alter egos; Major Tom, Ziggy Stardust and the Thin White Duke among them, and his obsession with occultist Aleister Crowley drove him down a dark, excessive hole filled with cocaine, orgies, arrests, fascism, death and madness that very nearly destroyed him...
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Bonus Episode: Suspicious Deaths, Small-Town Myths, and the Record Store That Helped Make Me

August 14, 2025 • 38 mins
This week in the After Party, we’re digging up the stories they didn’t want told. Jake throws back to a formative encounter with a record store burnout who unknowingly set him on the path to Disgraceland. Jake talks AC/DC, Bon Scott, and the rock and roll myths that shaped him (and you)—and tees up a deeper dive in the bonus section into some of the most suspicious musician deaths of all time. From Elliott Smith’s stab wounds to Al...
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The Temptations Pt 2: The Tammi Terrell Tragedy

August 12, 2025 • 38 mins
When Motown singer Tammi Terrell died at the age of 24, Marvin Gaye was the only one from her label allowed at her funeral. The rest – especially her former boyfriend, the Tempations’ David Ruffin – were banned. So what happened between them? The answer lies in a story of fame, furs, cocaine, and a scandal that still casts a shadow over soul music. To see the full list of contributors, see the show notes at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.disgracelandpo...
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The Temptations: Fame, Drugs, and Paranoia

August 11, 2025 • 43 mins
The Temptations were one of Motown’s signature vocal groups, and they remain one of the most successful R&B acts of all time. But fame and drugs corrupted them from the beginning. Lineup changes were as frequent as their chart-topping hits. Eventually their rocky road led to drug addiction, crippling paranoia, routine backstabbing, and one of the most tragic deaths in the history of the Motor City. This episode contains themes tha...
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Britney Spears (Pt. 2): Lithium, Las Vegas, and a Long-Awaited Emancipation

August 9, 2025 • 39 mins
Britney Spears’ 13-year conservatorship was an arrangement so strict and unfeeling that it left her without any control of her career, loopy on lithium, and completely silenced for the sake of seeing her sons and boyfriend. As Britney suffered in silence, she worked nearly non-stop, generating more hits — and revenue — so her father could claim his cut of the profits. But after hundreds of shows in Las Vegas and $137 million in box...
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Britney Spears (Pt. 1): Trauma Pop

August 8, 2025 • 38 mins
No musician owned pop music quite like Britney Spears at the turn of the century. After graduating from Mississippi tween queen to full-fledged American superstar, her fame exploded at a time when tabloids circled celebrities like prey. 30 to 45 predatory paparazzi would follow Britney’s every move during 12 to 14 hour shifts, eager to document the collapse of her marriage and social circle. As her public image crumbled, it’s no wo...
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Bonus Episode: The Culture Changed Every Ten Years… Until It Didn’t

August 7, 2025 • 33 mins
From the Beatles to Nirvana to Pulp Fiction and Friends, every decade used to bring a cultural reset—new sounds, new voices, new aesthetics that changed the way we dressed, talked, and thought. But for the past 25 years, that cycle stopped. Why? In this week’s After Party, Jake takes us back to a time when artists shaped the culture—and breaks down how corporatization, consolidation, and the algorithm killed the artist as changema...
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Run-DMC (Pt. 2): Loyalty, Betrayal, and Who Shot Jay

August 5, 2025 • 36 mins
Run-DMC’s Jam Master Jay helped take hip-hop global, but behind the decks was a man under pressure – fiercely loyal yet financially strapped, and secretly entangled in a dangerous world he couldn’t spin his way out of. So when the music industry turned cold and the bills stacked up, Jay made choices that brought the streets back to his doorstep. This is the true story behind his murder: a tangled web of old friends, bad drug deals,...
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Run DMC Pt. 1: Innovation, Evolution and the Mysterious Death of Jam Master Jay

August 4, 2025 • 41 mins
Run DMC is directly responsible for elevating hip hop to previously unimagined heights. They took rap music into an entirely different direction and helped mainstream the genre. They were beloved as musicians, innovators, and people – none more than their DJ, Jason “Jam Master Jay” Mizell, which makes understanding his senseless murder near impossible. Who killed Jam Master Jay and why? And why are there literally zero suspects whe...
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Jay Z: Street hustle, a Nightclub Stabbing, a Near Drug Bust and the God MC

August 1, 2025 • 47 mins
Jay Z’s career defies easy categorization. His artistry and business sense are as influenced by his past career as a drug dealer as they are anything else. Jay Z has reached unprecedented heights as an entertainer and an entrepreneur, and it almost never happened. All because of a stabbing. A stabbing that was influenced by that same street hustle that created “Jay Z." To see the full list of contributors, see the show notes at ...
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Bonus Episode: Sanitized Biopics, California Wildfires, and Underrated Rock Stars

July 31, 2025 • 34 mins
This week in the After Party, Jake looks further into the CASSM (Corporate Algorithmic Studio Storytelling Machine) and explores the reasons behind the sanitized versions of music history that are served up everywhere but in Disgraceland. Plus, an update on the developments in the California wildfire benefit story, and your voicemails and DMs! On Tuesday, we're bringing you part 2 of our story on hip hop legends Run-DMC and Jake...
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