May 3, 2026 • 36 mins
A deranged fan. A deadly package. And one of the most innovative musicians on the planet. This is the true story of obsession, art, and attempted murder. This is Björk in Disgraceland.
This episode contains themes that may be disturbing to some listeners, including depictions of suicide. If you or a loved one are thinking about suicide, help is available 24 hours a day at the 988 Lifeline.
What do you think is the most wild and deranged story of an obsessive fan in music history? Tell Jake at 617-906-6638, disgracelandpod@gmail.com, or on socials @disgracelandpod.
To see the full list of contributors, see the show notes at www.disgracelandpod.com.
This episode was originally published on June 10, 2025
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Disco's Welcome back for another trip into the Disgraceland archive,
this time to pay a visit to the Icelandic Princess
b York and one of the most harrowing true crime
stories and near misses from music history. This was one
of those stories that I completely missed when it happened,
and I don't know how This story, the story of
Ricardo Lopez, is deadly obsession with a pop star who
(00:23):
was seemingly everywhere at the time, back in nineteen ninety six.
This story must have been hard to miss, but somehow
I did, probably because I was rolling around America in
a crappy van with a bunch of smelly bandmates and preoccupied. Anyway,
once I finally did hear about this story years later,
I couldn't believe how weird and eerie it was. And
(00:43):
of course, once I launched Asgraceland, I knew i'd one
day tell this story in an audio format, So here
it is. This story has been depicted all over YouTube
and in some pretty sensational ways. I tried to do
a better job than that. I tried to lean into
the thriller aspect of this story. I tried to really
show who Buorck was as an artist and how she
used her home terrain literally the land and the elements
(01:07):
from Iceland to form her singing style. And I also
tried to dramatize the fact and focus on the fact
that there was a ticking time bomb in this story
that was about to go off, one that was set
to kill one of the biggest pop stars in the
world at that moment. That seemed those things at least
seemed as interesting to me as the weirdness of Ricardo
(01:30):
Lopez's grease paint and shirtless body that you're going to
find on YouTube anyway. We released this one not too
long ago, back on June sixth, twenty twenty five, but
seeing that we got a lot of new listeners coming
into the feed at the moment, I thought it would
be cool to pull one of my favorites out, if
for no other reason, and then to make sure that
this Buick episode doesn't get overlooked in our massive archive.
(01:51):
Like I said, released back in June of twenty twenty five,
not too long ago, so nothing really new to report
on this story at the moment, but that shouldn't matter.
This story is wild, buckle up and enjoyed Byork in Disgraceland.
Disgraceland is a production of Double Elvis. This is a
(02:21):
story about obsession, about art, about death, about a high
stake search in low down hate. It's also about love, mercy,
and creativity. This is a story about a deranged fan
and the musician he obsessed over. Buyork, a musician who
(02:42):
made great music. Unlike that music I played for you
at the top of the show that wasn't great music,
And that was a preset loop from my melotron called
Grease Paint Assassin MK two. I played you that loop
because I can't afford the rights to Macarena by Los
del Rio. And why would I play you that specific
(03:06):
slice of Come On Man, not the song again Cheez?
Could I afford it? Because that was the number one
song in America on September twelfth, nineteen ninety six, And
that was the day that Ricardo Lopez went to his
local post office with a gun in his pocket and
a package in his hand, setting off one of the
(03:26):
weirdest and potentially disastrous chapters in music history. On this episode, Obsession, Hey, Creativity,
A deadly package. Ricardo Lopez in the Icelandic drum 'd
bassed Princess York. I'm Jake Brennan. In this this disgraceland.
(04:16):
All Byork wanted to do was create, and sometimes it
seemed like all the world wanted to do was prevent
her from doing so. Especially in nineteen ninety six. Buzzing
about her London apartment, the thirty year old singer was
attempting to piece together music that would bridge the excellence
of her first two solo albums, Debut from nineteen ninety
(04:38):
three and Post from nineteen ninety five, to some sort
of as yet unimagined artistic evolution. Drum and bass music
blared throughout the apartment and ceedy jewel cases were scattered
about most of the flat surfaces. A giant projector screen
was set up for future film viewing Japanese independence in
(05:00):
stimpy cartoons. The video cassettes and books were strewn about everywhere,
and her bed was upstairs, as was the bed belonging
to her ten year old son, and the dad was
in the picture. Speaking of pictures, Buyork's face adorned the
covers of numerous magazines laying about Vox and Emmy and
(05:21):
CMJ from the States, also from America Interview magazine with
an ageless Goldie Hawn on the cover, and a Byork
interview within on the wall a telephone which Byorke made
a habit of not answering. In most stories about artists,
this is the point where the storyteller would say, since
(05:43):
breaking onto the scene in the year blah blah blah,
Byork had blah blah blah and blah blah blah, but
Byork was practically always on the scene. She'd broken through
at the age of eleven in her home country of Iceland. Granted,
Iceland back in the time of Bork's break through in
nineteen seventy seven, had only a population of about a
(06:03):
quarter million people. But still, fame is fame, and no
matter how atomized, pressure is pressure. Buyor' hippy parents recognized
early on that their daughter could sing, and soon after
a performance of young Buork's the recording of which was
arranged by her parents to be broadcast on national icelandic radio,
led to a recording contract and an album was released
(06:25):
in December of nineteen seventy seven. A series of punk
bands followed for Buyork as she developed her voice, a
voice like no other. As the teenage Bork strolled through
her icelandic Homeland bundled up on her way to and
from school. She cut through the raw, frozen landscape and
the icy mountains shooting up out of nowhere, and along
(06:48):
the jagged coastline, and passed the bulging glaciers and floating icebergs,
and through the fertile lowlands and over the black sand beaches.
This dramatic landscape gave way to wik winds, winds that
whipped up in sneaky fits and starts that were there
in an instant and then gone as soon as they arrived.
As Byork walked through this maze of natural drama, she
(07:11):
sang to herself, and when the winds gusted, she'd have
to raise her voice to hear herself, And when the
winds disappeared, she'd drop her voice to a whisper so
as to not be heard by any curious passers by.
In this way, she developed one of the most unique
singing styles in all of pop music. To hear Buyork
(07:32):
sing is to hear the voice of a true original,
and that originality was born of Iceland's dynamic terrain. Just
like the singer herself, Buorke's voice sores, it shoots up
out of nowhere like an iceberg, and then quickly sinks
below the waterline, submerging itself in the Mystery of the Deep.
(07:54):
You could hear this style rounding into form in Buork's
first real project of international consequence, her The Sugarcubes, a
band that garnered critical acclaim in the UK and in
the US with their single Birthday and their Electra Records
distributed album Life Stute Good. In nineteen eighty eight, The
Sugar Cubes appeared on Saturday Night Live in the States,
(08:15):
but by nineteen ninety the band was broken up and
Byork was now a young single mother, having given birth
to a son by the Sugar Cubes guitarist Dora Elden,
and she soon launched a solo career through a creative
collaboration with Soul the Soul Alum and Massive Attack co
conspirator Nellie Hooper, and the fruit of this relationship led
(08:35):
to the release of Byork's first proper solo album debut
in nineteen ninety three with its massive hit Human Behavior,
and the album was an international commercial success, which quickly
led to more success, including the brit Awards and a
collaboration with Madonna for her nineteen ninety four album Bedtime Stories,
and before anyone could take a beat to appreciate the
(08:57):
whirlwinds swirling around b York, the artist continued creating Now
in collaboration with producer DJ Trickey in eight o eight
States Graham Massey, and by nineteen ninety five, Buyorke had
a second, even more successful solo album on her hands
called Post. Post was in a way of perfect sophomore effort.
(09:20):
It reinforced every promise made on Buick's debut. It doubled
down on the sounds Buyorick first presented with excellent singles
Army of Me and It's Oh So Quiet, and the
album solidified Buorck as a one of a kind visual
artists with her videos for those tunes, each one presenting
a new vision imagined by the artist and the groundbreaking
(09:41):
director she chose to collaborate with Michelle Gondry and Spike Jones,
among them. It was a vision that cast Buorick as
a generational artist, a venerable pixie five foot four but
full of roar and the slack generation's female answer to
the Man Who Fell to Earth, but with feats and
a total babe boom. By this time, Byorke's fame was
(10:04):
not atomized. By nineteen ninety six, Byork was an explosive
international pop star. Nineteen ninety six was a much different
time for pop stars than twenty twenty five. Nowadays, artists
pay a premium for people's attention. The premium they pay
is their privacy. In exchange for relevance, Artists open up
(10:26):
their private worlds to show the public their authentic cells,
and no moment is too sacred for some and for others,
even the most innocuous peak behind the curtain can result
in millions of views, like shares and new followers. In
nineteen ninety six, it was very much the opposite. In
the nineties, artists put a premium on privacy. Once an
(10:48):
artist broke through, there was no need to open themselves
up because the media at the time was completely different.
Small armies of publicists and agents and managers ensured that
the public saw exactly what the arts, artists and celebrities
wanted them to see, spoon feeding publications to keep their clients'
names in the public long enough to maintain continuous relevance.
(11:09):
What canned photo ops, pre arranged Q and A interviews
could only go so far. It was then as now natural,
if you'll excuse upon human behavior to want to know
more about the artists who inspire us enter. The paparazzi,
pesky photographers, and gossipy so called journalists still exist as
(11:31):
they always have. It's just it today they're more of
a utility than a nuisance. In this digital age war
for our eyes and ears, artists and celebrities court attention
and thus the paparazzi for clicks, follows and relevance. In
the naval gazing nineties, artists loathed the attention of the paparazzi,
going to extremes to avoid their cameras and questions lest
(11:55):
their raw commets and unwanted candids would end up in
the pages of check outline trash. So an Itty Bitty
Buorck went full Sean penn On a member of the
paparazzi in a Bangkok airport in early nineteen ninety six,
attacking a reporter with her fists in front of her
young son and also in front of numerous other cameras.
This behavior was not seen as something beyond the pale.
(12:18):
It was only a bad moment for Byorke, who had
just completed an international flight. It was likely sleep deprived
in a bit beyond herself in the moment. Buick eventually
apologized and the incident wasn't in the least bit damaging
to her career. Still, the images of Buick's attack were
(12:38):
broadcast all over the world. For culture vultures, this was
a delicious peak behind the curtain at Buorck's authentic self,
a young Tiger mom defending her privacy. Most people could
sympathize with that, including a fan all the way over
in the United States, an obsessed fan, a fan who's
(12:59):
obsessed and was bending toward derangement. A fan who is
in love with Byork, A fan who wrote countless letters
to Byork, letters that went unanswered. A fan who had
to know that Buyork knew who he was. A fan
who was sick, A fan who was racist, A fan
who could not accept that his obsession, this snow white
(13:19):
picture of creative purity, was now in a relationship with
the UK DJ Goldie, a black man. This demented fan
believes he had to do something about this agreement, this insult.
If b York wouldn't answer his letters, if Buorke wanted
to debase herself. If Buorke wanted to embarrass fans of
hers like him, well, then he would just have to
(13:42):
introduce himself to Byork. He'd have to make sure that
Byorke knew who he was, and he'd do so formally
with a letter, a letter inside of a package, a
package that, come hell or high water, Buyorke would open
and by doing so Byork would learn exactly who he was,
(14:04):
and seconds later Byork will be violently blown to bits. Dark,
(14:37):
syrapy and persistent. That's how the housing manager at the Hollywood,
Florida Van Buren apartments would describe the substance seeping into
the ceiling. If there was a smell to it, he
couldn't tell. But whatever it was, it didn't seem like
the substance was done with the cheap acoustic ceiling tiles.
(14:57):
Slowly it persisted through the floor or from the apartment
above and down into this concerned tenant's apartment. There are
those moments in life when the world is one way,
but then you know if you open your mouths and
say what you're about to say, then nothing will ever
be the same again. The housing manager didn't know exactly
(15:20):
what the substance was, but he knew that this was
one of those moments. He had to do it. One
phone call and the police were there in minutes. Ricardo
Lopez seen Byorke's Human Behavior video on MTV three years earlier,
and it changed his life. Byork was an unimaginable beauty
(15:41):
to Ricardo, who even to himself was an unimaginable beast. Eighteen,
extremely overweight and hopelessly unable to speak to girls, Ricardo
had to some extent already given up on the world.
A Uruguayan immigrant and helpless mama's boy who's mother lived
on another continent in his home country, Ricardo's life consisted
(16:04):
of unsteady work with his older brother's Southeast Florida extermination company,
Miami Mice, and increasingly locking himself away in his tiny
Van Buuren apartment and obsessing over celebrities. Ricardo saw himself
as a celebrity someday, not as an artist. Though he
did paint and illustrate and wasn't without talent, he did
(16:26):
not see art as his ticket to fame, but simply
as a way to occupy his hands. In his overactive mind,
no celebrity would come to him by other means. Ricardo
had no desire to accomplish anything in exchange for his fame.
He just wanted to be famous for the sake of
being famous. MTV, tabloid magazines nineteen ninety, celebrity culture in general,
(16:50):
red carpets, gossip disguised as entertainment news shows. Ricardo Lopez
lived for all of it. More and more. He saw
himself as a part of this machine, alongside some of
the biggest names in Hollywood, Bruce Arnold sly Naturally, then,
Ricardo needed a celebrity girlfriend. At first, he settled on
(17:11):
Geena Davis. She was adorable, if not terribly original. But then,
upon seeing Byorke blast across his television screen one night,
Ricardo Lopez fell in love.
Speaker 2 (17:22):
B York has been an obsession. Look at his beautiful face,
as cute, innocent, sweet and shy thing.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Ricardo poured his love into the pages of his diary,
hundreds of pages detailing the endless appeal of the Icelandic songstress,
pure as the Nordic snow Byorke's beauty promised just as
much as God does on the first day of Spring.
In one day, Ricardo's love would be reciprocated Byorke would
come to love him the way his mother did, but differently,
(17:59):
in the way that Ricardo imagine only artists can love,
tapping into the same deep reservoir of empathy and sensuality
they mined for their work.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
Most people are puckelo, just me being one of them.
If you look around you, I'm a piece of shit, okay,
how dirty, sloppy, fat, disgusting. Okay, I'm a piece of shit.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
But celebrity giveth and celebrity taketh away. January nineteen ninety six,
Ricardo's Entertainment Weekly arrived in the mail. At first, the
magazine sat untouched on his makeshift plywood desk, amid the
squalor in his small apartment, dirty styrofoam takeout containers, sticky
empty soda cans, filthy clothes, paint supplies, old newspapers, trash bins,
(18:43):
overflowing wet towels hanging over various pieces of cheap furniture,
all of it barely masking the layer of real filth
below it, all covering his entire living space, and on
the walls numerous paintings, drawings, and posters of captured in
what Ricardo Lopez believed were better days, because, as his
(19:05):
Entertainment Weekly had just informed him, Bjork had changed these days.
Byork was dating a black man, the producer in DJ Goldie.
And there they were, right there out on the town
and the pages of his magazine. Look at the way
he dressed. What the hell was that all about? Didn't
(19:27):
Goldie have any class? Didn't he know he was the
luckiest man on the planet to be on the arm
of such a pure soul. But Bjork was no longer pure.
Bjork was damaged. This was a betrayal that Ricardo was
certain Buyorke could never recover from. After this, after being
with this man, with Goldie, the purity was gone, and
(19:51):
Goldi knew it, and now Ricardo knew it. And now
Ricardo had to make sure that Buorke knew it. So
Ricardo took his pen to paper he found Byorke's London
address and wrote Byorike countless letters, and not one of
them was returned. And this further fueled Ricardo's rage. After all,
(20:13):
he'd given her the best of him. Why wouldn't she
acknowledge him? Why wouldn't she write back? Did she think
she was better than him? And there was that old
song Murder. He said. It was the B side to
the original version of It's Oh So Quiet, the song
Buorke covered and released on her second album. The actress
(20:34):
Betty Hutton first recorded the American version back in nineteen
fifty one, Murder, He said the song. Buorke must have
heard that song, and that song was this situation that
Ricardo now found himself in. In that song, the singer
makes fun of the man pursuing her. The singer thinks
her suitor is beneath her because of the way that
(20:54):
he talks. Murder, he says, like some classless buffoon, not
knowing how to converse in polite society. That's what this was.
Bjork the celebrity, Byork, the famous artist, Bjork, the stylish
white songstress fashionably dating the black DJ thought Ricardo the
part time exterminator. He was the classless buffoon in this situation,
(21:17):
and that must have been it, just like that old song. Yes,
just like that he was beneath her. But how could
she think that way? Byorke didn't know him. Byorke didn't
know what made him think the way he thought, or
love the way he loved. How could she she didn't
return his fucking letters? Did she even read them? Did
she even care at all about him? Why? Why didn't
(21:39):
she return his letters? Ricardo Lopez slipped into madness and
thought murder. He said, okay, then one final letter to
my love.
Speaker 2 (21:52):
I am Angel of Death.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
The authorities thanked the housing man for making the call
and politely asked him to vacate the premises, but not
to go too far in case they needed him for
anything else. The League crime scene investigator saw the video
camera set up in Ricardo's apartment, and he immediately delegated
a junior officer to start reviewing the tape to get
to the bottom of just what the fuck it was
(22:18):
that had happened in this hell hole of an apartment
over the past few days. In no time, the authorities
discovered on that tape a reality far worse than the
horror show they were currently standing. Smack dab in the
middle of. One of the camera's videotapes revealed that Ricardo
Lopez had indeed drafted one final letter to his love
(22:38):
to the international pop star Buyork, and that Ricardo Lopez
had placed that letter in a box, which, upon opening,
would trigger an explosive device that would spray deadly sulfuric
acid all over Byorke's face. Before this happened, though, Byorke
would know from the letter in the box who Ricardo
Lopez was, and that was the point she had to
(23:01):
know before Buyork died. She had to know who he was.
And now it was only a matter of time before
that happened, because that letter and that letter bomb, that
package was on its way via international mail the Buorck's
London apartment and it would arrive and no more than
four days. We'll be right back after this word we're, we're.
(23:33):
What you're about to hear is the actual audio from
Ricardo Lopez and the moments before mailing his letter bomb
to B York.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Package package will be sent to her when she is there.
Speaker 2 (23:48):
Okay, she's going to receive their package. Oh.
Speaker 1 (23:54):
On September twelfth, nineteen ninety six, Ricardo Lopez mailed his
package bomb to Byork USPS express mail takes about three
to five days to deliver a package from Southeast Florida
to London, England. Aside from a gig at Webley Stadium
on September thirteenth, nineteen ninety six, B York was not
scheduled to be anywhere but home in her London apartment
(24:15):
with her young son. Over the course of the next week,
the clock was ticking. Florida police, who had discovered the
existence of the bomb and pieced together its intended target
across the pond, notified New Scotland Yard. Immediately, New Scotland
Yards sprung into action. A specialist operations group is assembled
to counter this potential crime of terrorist obsession. The only
(24:38):
problem was that at the moment, with the package in transit,
there was little investigators could do to thwart this deadly
threat except wait and pray. With the package tucked away
in a cargo plane high above the Atlantic Ocean, authorities
went to work in forming local London mail sorting stations
of the situation and what type of package to be
on the lookout for. They did not inform b York
(25:00):
authorities were confident they'd locate and destroy the deadly package
long before it reached its destination. It was decided, for
the time being, anyway, that there was no need to
notify byorke of the impending danger. If any pesky journalists
or paparazzi were to find out, it would be a
much bigger, much harder to control public crisis. For now,
(25:21):
the situation seemed contained, but time was of the essence.
After her Wembley Stadium gig, Byork settled into her cozy
apartment with her son for a couple of days off,
investigators got a lead on which plane the package might
be arriving on. A bomb squad was dispatched to Heathrown Airport.
The plane was searched and nothing, No sign of the package,
(25:47):
no sign of a bomb. At the same time, Byorke
and her son went about their daily routine in her apartment, oblivious,
completely unaware of the threat against her life.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
You see all that damage, that sulfuric auser. I burned
myself a little bit in the tongue because I wanted
that blue and this is Sofia Guessa. That was diluted
big ten with water.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
Instantly it touched me.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
Now I both washed it off real good.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
It takes time for this shit to burn, at least
a minute to do some serious devenue.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
New Scotland Yard dispatched investigators to London sorting stations where
mail passed through on its way to Byork's neighborhood. The
package was now either on a truck heading from the
airport closer to a sorting station, or in the mail
bag of a postal worker on its way to Byork's house. Finally,
authorities moved to inform b York, but as of yet
(26:48):
there was no confirmation that Buorck had actually been contacted.
It was just before four pm on September sixteenth, nineteen
ninety six, not quite tea time at Byork's, but it
was time to check the mail hall. September sixties, nineteen
(27:31):
ninety six. Bjork and her son remain at home, absorbed
in the lethargy that a rare off day provides, reading,
watching films on the projector, listening to music, daydreaming, drinking tea.
All is calm, All is peaceful. There is no hint
of the world shattering destruction making its way to b.
(27:52):
York's apartment. Out on the streets of London, New Scotland Yard,
authorities are frantically trying to weave through traffic to get
to Byorg in time before the bomb does and warn
her of the threat. Authorities have also descended upon mail
sorting stations and are frantically searching for the package from
Ricardo Lopez back in America. US authorities were still piecing
(28:15):
together Ricardo Lopez's madness. Some people give and some people take.
Ricardo Lopez felt that he had given the best of
himself to Byork, and she'd taken plenty and given back nothing.
This was, of course insanity. Buork had no idea who
Ricardo Lopez was, or that he'd been trying to contact her,
(28:38):
or that he felt aggrieved in any way, and had
she known any of this, She was under no obligation
to give Ricardo Lopez anything. In fact, Buyork had given plenty.
She was an artist, a prolific artist, not some charlatan
who worked her way up the creative arts ladder of
success and manufactured pap for shock value, fabricating headline news
(28:59):
every couple of months to keep the journalists and paparazzi
hooked in order to maintain a certain level of relevance. Instead,
Yorke was constantly creating. She constantly walked through the world,
thinking about the next bit of music she was going
to make, the next image she was going to subvert,
the next statement she was going to drop. She was
forever absorbing other people's music, films, books, fashion, processing it
(29:21):
all and finding ways to take elements, to improve upon,
to break down, to discard, and then tapping into the
greater infinite intelligence to create her own music and art
r that was truly novel. This is love to create,
to bring something new into the world that brings joy
to others, or that provokes thought, or that compels some
other sort of positive action. As an act of love.
(29:44):
It's one of the most impactful things we as humans
can do in this world. Monsters do the opposite. Monsters destroy,
Monsters take.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
I want'll be the biggest influence on her life, the
most important person would change your life more than anybody else.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
We live in the world of monsters. Do you understand that?
The world of monsters? On September sixteenth, nineteen ninety six,
five days after Ricardo Lopez mailed his lethal package to
Bjork's London apartment, Byork decided it was time to retrieve
her mail. She headed out her front door and walked
(30:23):
leisurely down the path to her mailbox, and the sun
burned back the London overcast, and the birds above sang
over the sounds of rush hour traffic, traffic that authorities
were stuck in. Authorities who were desperately trying to reach
Buorick and warn her about the impending threat on her
life at the hands of an obsessed madman. After Ricardo
(30:44):
Lopez mailed his letter bomb to Byork, he returned to
his apartment. He shaved his head. He took red and
green grease paint and painted his bald skull and face
a la Martin Sheen's captain Benjamin Willard in Apocalypse, now
snaking his way up the river toward the unimaginable and
on her way to her mailbox. Byork was taking a
(31:05):
completely different path. And back in Ricardo's apartment, Ricardo shaved
and painted for battle. Stripped down, he grabbed his gun,
certain he'd accomplished all he would in this life, and
then Ricardo put Byork's song I Remember You on full blast.
Ricardo looked into the camera. Ricardo breathed heavily in quick
(31:28):
burst to juice his resolve. Byorck blared in the background.
Ricardo put the gun in his mouth. Ricardo drew quicker,
heavier breaths, psyching himself up for what was to come.
Then b York stopped singing. The song had ended. It
all ended. As the camera rolled, Ricardo Lopez bit down
(31:51):
on the barrel of his thirty eight caliber revolver and
pulled the trigger. Once at her mailbox, Byorick held the
package in her hands. She contemplated it, what it meant,
who it was intended for, and why it needed to
be sent, its impact when received, and what people would think.
(32:17):
And that didn't matter so much. What mattered was how
they felt, how they felt now, and how they felt
in the future. This wasn't some grand gesture or a
work of art. It was just a package, a letter
accompanying the flowers that she was sending to the family
of Ricardo Lopez, expressing her condolences for the loss of
(32:39):
their son, who had just killed himself while trying to
kill her. That dark syrapy persistent substance seeping down through
the ceiling of one unlucky tenant's apartment back in Hollywood, Florida,
That substance that was reported to authorities by the Van
Buren apartment's housing manager. That was Ricardo Lope as his blood.
(33:02):
Five days earlier, Ricardo Lopez had videotaped his own suicide
hours after mailing the package he intended to kill Byork with.
Upon discovering Lopez's body. The authorities in Florida discovered a
video camera on a stand just a few feet from
the corpse, as well as the previously mentioned trove of
recorded videotapes. When they reviewed the tapes, they saw Ricardo
(33:25):
Lopez and all of his madness unraveling into a storm
of murderous rage, hell bent on killing Buork. The tapes
revealed the exact date and time Ricardo mailed his package,
and from there the authorities were able to trace, track down,
and ultimately destroy the package before it got to Byork. Buorke,
(33:47):
of course, lived and continues to create and remains a
relevant artist to this day. Ricardo Lopez shows a different
path hate and destruction, and he died in Disgrace.
Speaker 4 (34:02):
I'm Jake Brennan in this this Disgraceland.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
All right, hope you dug this episode.
Speaker 5 (34:22):
Apple podcast listeneries, make sure you have auto downloads turned
on so you never missed an episode of Disgrace Sland.
This week's question of the week is what is the
wildest story of fan obsession.
Speaker 1 (34:32):
From music and or Hollywood history? All Right? Was it
York's Ricardo.
Speaker 5 (34:36):
Lopez or was it someone else? Six one, seven, nine,
oh six six six three eight, leave me a voicemail,
send me a text to be.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
A part of the show.
Speaker 5 (34:43):
We play and read some of your answers on the
after party bonus episode coming up right after this in
your feed. You can also hit me on Instagram, Facebook,
x and disgracelamdpod at gmail dot com. Leave a review
for the show on Apple Podcasts or Spotify and you
might win some free merch al Right here comes some
credits was created by Yours Truly and is produced in
partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be
(35:05):
found on the show notes page at disgracelampod dot com.
If you're listening as a Disgraceland All Access member, thank.
Speaker 1 (35:12):
You for supporting the show. We really appreciate it. And
if not, you can become a member right now by
going to disgracelampod dot com slash Membership. Members can listen
to every episode of Disgraceland ad free, Plus you'll get
one brand new exclusive episode every month, weekly unscripted bonus episodes,
special audio collections, and early access to merchandise and events.
(35:35):
Visit disgracelampod dot com slash membership for details, rate and
review the show and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter
and Facebook at disgracelampod and on YouTube at YouTube dot com,
slash at Disgracelandpod, rock a rolla. He then all right,
(35:57):
just goes, what did you think of this bu Yorick episode?
Give us a call? Let us know six one seven
nine oh six six six three eight, voicemail and text
at Disgraceland Pod on the Socials. Coming up next to
Disgraceland our new episode on Ian Watkins from Lost Profits,
Don't Go Anywhere
Disco's Welcome back for another trip into the Disgraceland archive,
this time to pay a visit to the Icelandic Princess
b York and one of the most harrowing true crime
stories and near misses from music history. This was one
of those stories that I completely missed when it happened,
and I don't know how This story, the story of
Ricardo Lopez, is deadly obsession with a pop star who
(00:23):
was seemingly everywhere at the time, back in nineteen ninety six.
This story must have been hard to miss, but somehow
I did, probably because I was rolling around America in
a crappy van with a bunch of smelly bandmates and preoccupied. Anyway,
once I finally did hear about this story years later,
I couldn't believe how weird and eerie it was. And
(00:43):
of course, once I launched Asgraceland, I knew i'd one
day tell this story in an audio format, So here
it is. This story has been depicted all over YouTube
and in some pretty sensational ways. I tried to do
a better job than that. I tried to lean into
the thriller aspect of this story. I tried to really
show who Buorck was as an artist and how she
used her home terrain literally the land and the elements
(01:07):
from Iceland to form her singing style. And I also
tried to dramatize the fact and focus on the fact
that there was a ticking time bomb in this story
that was about to go off, one that was set
to kill one of the biggest pop stars in the
world at that moment. That seemed those things at least
seemed as interesting to me as the weirdness of Ricardo
(01:30):
Lopez's grease paint and shirtless body that you're going to
find on YouTube anyway. We released this one not too
long ago, back on June sixth, twenty twenty five, but
seeing that we got a lot of new listeners coming
into the feed at the moment, I thought it would
be cool to pull one of my favorites out, if
for no other reason, and then to make sure that
this Buick episode doesn't get overlooked in our massive archive.
(01:51):
Like I said, released back in June of twenty twenty five,
not too long ago, so nothing really new to report
on this story at the moment, but that shouldn't matter.
This story is wild, buckle up and enjoyed Byork in Disgraceland.
Disgraceland is a production of Double Elvis. This is a
(02:21):
story about obsession, about art, about death, about a high
stake search in low down hate. It's also about love, mercy,
and creativity. This is a story about a deranged fan
and the musician he obsessed over. Buyork, a musician who
(02:42):
made great music. Unlike that music I played for you
at the top of the show that wasn't great music,
And that was a preset loop from my melotron called
Grease Paint Assassin MK two. I played you that loop
because I can't afford the rights to Macarena by Los
del Rio. And why would I play you that specific
(03:06):
slice of Come On Man, not the song again Cheez?
Could I afford it? Because that was the number one
song in America on September twelfth, nineteen ninety six, And
that was the day that Ricardo Lopez went to his
local post office with a gun in his pocket and
a package in his hand, setting off one of the
(03:26):
weirdest and potentially disastrous chapters in music history. On this episode, Obsession, Hey, Creativity,
A deadly package. Ricardo Lopez in the Icelandic drum 'd
bassed Princess York. I'm Jake Brennan. In this this disgraceland.
(04:16):
All Byork wanted to do was create, and sometimes it
seemed like all the world wanted to do was prevent
her from doing so. Especially in nineteen ninety six. Buzzing
about her London apartment, the thirty year old singer was
attempting to piece together music that would bridge the excellence
of her first two solo albums, Debut from nineteen ninety
(04:38):
three and Post from nineteen ninety five, to some sort
of as yet unimagined artistic evolution. Drum and bass music
blared throughout the apartment and ceedy jewel cases were scattered
about most of the flat surfaces. A giant projector screen
was set up for future film viewing Japanese independence in
(05:00):
stimpy cartoons. The video cassettes and books were strewn about everywhere,
and her bed was upstairs, as was the bed belonging
to her ten year old son, and the dad was
in the picture. Speaking of pictures, Buyork's face adorned the
covers of numerous magazines laying about Vox and Emmy and
(05:21):
CMJ from the States, also from America Interview magazine with
an ageless Goldie Hawn on the cover, and a Byork
interview within on the wall a telephone which Byorke made
a habit of not answering. In most stories about artists,
this is the point where the storyteller would say, since
(05:43):
breaking onto the scene in the year blah blah blah,
Byork had blah blah blah and blah blah blah, but
Byork was practically always on the scene. She'd broken through
at the age of eleven in her home country of Iceland. Granted,
Iceland back in the time of Bork's break through in
nineteen seventy seven, had only a population of about a
(06:03):
quarter million people. But still, fame is fame, and no
matter how atomized, pressure is pressure. Buyor' hippy parents recognized
early on that their daughter could sing, and soon after
a performance of young Buork's the recording of which was
arranged by her parents to be broadcast on national icelandic radio,
led to a recording contract and an album was released
(06:25):
in December of nineteen seventy seven. A series of punk
bands followed for Buyork as she developed her voice, a
voice like no other. As the teenage Bork strolled through
her icelandic Homeland bundled up on her way to and
from school. She cut through the raw, frozen landscape and
the icy mountains shooting up out of nowhere, and along
(06:48):
the jagged coastline, and passed the bulging glaciers and floating icebergs,
and through the fertile lowlands and over the black sand beaches.
This dramatic landscape gave way to wik winds, winds that
whipped up in sneaky fits and starts that were there
in an instant and then gone as soon as they arrived.
As Byork walked through this maze of natural drama, she
(07:11):
sang to herself, and when the winds gusted, she'd have
to raise her voice to hear herself, And when the
winds disappeared, she'd drop her voice to a whisper so
as to not be heard by any curious passers by.
In this way, she developed one of the most unique
singing styles in all of pop music. To hear Buyork
(07:32):
sing is to hear the voice of a true original,
and that originality was born of Iceland's dynamic terrain. Just
like the singer herself, Buorke's voice sores, it shoots up
out of nowhere like an iceberg, and then quickly sinks
below the waterline, submerging itself in the Mystery of the Deep.
(07:54):
You could hear this style rounding into form in Buork's
first real project of international consequence, her The Sugarcubes, a
band that garnered critical acclaim in the UK and in
the US with their single Birthday and their Electra Records
distributed album Life Stute Good. In nineteen eighty eight, The
Sugar Cubes appeared on Saturday Night Live in the States,
(08:15):
but by nineteen ninety the band was broken up and
Byork was now a young single mother, having given birth
to a son by the Sugar Cubes guitarist Dora Elden,
and she soon launched a solo career through a creative
collaboration with Soul the Soul Alum and Massive Attack co
conspirator Nellie Hooper, and the fruit of this relationship led
(08:35):
to the release of Byork's first proper solo album debut
in nineteen ninety three with its massive hit Human Behavior,
and the album was an international commercial success, which quickly
led to more success, including the brit Awards and a
collaboration with Madonna for her nineteen ninety four album Bedtime Stories,
and before anyone could take a beat to appreciate the
(08:57):
whirlwinds swirling around b York, the artist continued creating Now
in collaboration with producer DJ Trickey in eight o eight
States Graham Massey, and by nineteen ninety five, Buyorke had
a second, even more successful solo album on her hands
called Post. Post was in a way of perfect sophomore effort.
(09:20):
It reinforced every promise made on Buick's debut. It doubled
down on the sounds Buyorick first presented with excellent singles
Army of Me and It's Oh So Quiet, and the
album solidified Buorck as a one of a kind visual
artists with her videos for those tunes, each one presenting
a new vision imagined by the artist and the groundbreaking
(09:41):
director she chose to collaborate with Michelle Gondry and Spike Jones,
among them. It was a vision that cast Buorick as
a generational artist, a venerable pixie five foot four but
full of roar and the slack generation's female answer to
the Man Who Fell to Earth, but with feats and
a total babe boom. By this time, Byorke's fame was
(10:04):
not atomized. By nineteen ninety six, Byork was an explosive
international pop star. Nineteen ninety six was a much different
time for pop stars than twenty twenty five. Nowadays, artists
pay a premium for people's attention. The premium they pay
is their privacy. In exchange for relevance, Artists open up
(10:26):
their private worlds to show the public their authentic cells,
and no moment is too sacred for some and for others,
even the most innocuous peak behind the curtain can result
in millions of views, like shares and new followers. In
nineteen ninety six, it was very much the opposite. In
the nineties, artists put a premium on privacy. Once an
(10:48):
artist broke through, there was no need to open themselves
up because the media at the time was completely different.
Small armies of publicists and agents and managers ensured that
the public saw exactly what the arts, artists and celebrities
wanted them to see, spoon feeding publications to keep their clients'
names in the public long enough to maintain continuous relevance.
(11:09):
What canned photo ops, pre arranged Q and A interviews
could only go so far. It was then as now natural,
if you'll excuse upon human behavior to want to know
more about the artists who inspire us enter. The paparazzi,
pesky photographers, and gossipy so called journalists still exist as
(11:31):
they always have. It's just it today they're more of
a utility than a nuisance. In this digital age war
for our eyes and ears, artists and celebrities court attention
and thus the paparazzi for clicks, follows and relevance. In
the naval gazing nineties, artists loathed the attention of the paparazzi,
going to extremes to avoid their cameras and questions lest
(11:55):
their raw commets and unwanted candids would end up in
the pages of check outline trash. So an Itty Bitty
Buorck went full Sean penn On a member of the
paparazzi in a Bangkok airport in early nineteen ninety six,
attacking a reporter with her fists in front of her
young son and also in front of numerous other cameras.
This behavior was not seen as something beyond the pale.
(12:18):
It was only a bad moment for Byorke, who had
just completed an international flight. It was likely sleep deprived
in a bit beyond herself in the moment. Buick eventually
apologized and the incident wasn't in the least bit damaging
to her career. Still, the images of Buick's attack were
(12:38):
broadcast all over the world. For culture vultures, this was
a delicious peak behind the curtain at Buorck's authentic self,
a young Tiger mom defending her privacy. Most people could
sympathize with that, including a fan all the way over
in the United States, an obsessed fan, a fan who's
(12:59):
obsessed and was bending toward derangement. A fan who is
in love with Byork, A fan who wrote countless letters
to Byork, letters that went unanswered. A fan who had
to know that Buyork knew who he was. A fan
who was sick, A fan who was racist, A fan
who could not accept that his obsession, this snow white
(13:19):
picture of creative purity, was now in a relationship with
the UK DJ Goldie, a black man. This demented fan
believes he had to do something about this agreement, this insult.
If b York wouldn't answer his letters, if Buorke wanted
to debase herself. If Buorke wanted to embarrass fans of
hers like him, well, then he would just have to
(13:42):
introduce himself to Byork. He'd have to make sure that
Byorke knew who he was, and he'd do so formally
with a letter, a letter inside of a package, a
package that, come hell or high water, Buyorke would open
and by doing so Byork would learn exactly who he was,
(14:04):
and seconds later Byork will be violently blown to bits. Dark,
(14:37):
syrapy and persistent. That's how the housing manager at the Hollywood,
Florida Van Buren apartments would describe the substance seeping into
the ceiling. If there was a smell to it, he
couldn't tell. But whatever it was, it didn't seem like
the substance was done with the cheap acoustic ceiling tiles.
(14:57):
Slowly it persisted through the floor or from the apartment
above and down into this concerned tenant's apartment. There are
those moments in life when the world is one way,
but then you know if you open your mouths and
say what you're about to say, then nothing will ever
be the same again. The housing manager didn't know exactly
(15:20):
what the substance was, but he knew that this was
one of those moments. He had to do it. One
phone call and the police were there in minutes. Ricardo
Lopez seen Byorke's Human Behavior video on MTV three years earlier,
and it changed his life. Byork was an unimaginable beauty
(15:41):
to Ricardo, who even to himself was an unimaginable beast. Eighteen,
extremely overweight and hopelessly unable to speak to girls, Ricardo
had to some extent already given up on the world.
A Uruguayan immigrant and helpless mama's boy who's mother lived
on another continent in his home country, Ricardo's life consisted
(16:04):
of unsteady work with his older brother's Southeast Florida extermination company,
Miami Mice, and increasingly locking himself away in his tiny
Van Buuren apartment and obsessing over celebrities. Ricardo saw himself
as a celebrity someday, not as an artist. Though he
did paint and illustrate and wasn't without talent, he did
(16:26):
not see art as his ticket to fame, but simply
as a way to occupy his hands. In his overactive mind,
no celebrity would come to him by other means. Ricardo
had no desire to accomplish anything in exchange for his fame.
He just wanted to be famous for the sake of
being famous. MTV, tabloid magazines nineteen ninety, celebrity culture in general,
(16:50):
red carpets, gossip disguised as entertainment news shows. Ricardo Lopez
lived for all of it. More and more. He saw
himself as a part of this machine, alongside some of
the biggest names in Hollywood, Bruce Arnold sly Naturally, then,
Ricardo needed a celebrity girlfriend. At first, he settled on
(17:11):
Geena Davis. She was adorable, if not terribly original. But then,
upon seeing Byorke blast across his television screen one night,
Ricardo Lopez fell in love.
Speaker 2 (17:22):
B York has been an obsession. Look at his beautiful face,
as cute, innocent, sweet and shy thing.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Ricardo poured his love into the pages of his diary,
hundreds of pages detailing the endless appeal of the Icelandic songstress,
pure as the Nordic snow Byorke's beauty promised just as
much as God does on the first day of Spring.
In one day, Ricardo's love would be reciprocated Byorke would
come to love him the way his mother did, but differently,
(17:59):
in the way that Ricardo imagine only artists can love,
tapping into the same deep reservoir of empathy and sensuality
they mined for their work.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
Most people are puckelo, just me being one of them.
If you look around you, I'm a piece of shit, okay,
how dirty, sloppy, fat, disgusting. Okay, I'm a piece of shit.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
But celebrity giveth and celebrity taketh away. January nineteen ninety six,
Ricardo's Entertainment Weekly arrived in the mail. At first, the
magazine sat untouched on his makeshift plywood desk, amid the
squalor in his small apartment, dirty styrofoam takeout containers, sticky
empty soda cans, filthy clothes, paint supplies, old newspapers, trash bins,
(18:43):
overflowing wet towels hanging over various pieces of cheap furniture,
all of it barely masking the layer of real filth
below it, all covering his entire living space, and on
the walls numerous paintings, drawings, and posters of captured in
what Ricardo Lopez believed were better days, because, as his
(19:05):
Entertainment Weekly had just informed him, Bjork had changed these days.
Byork was dating a black man, the producer in DJ Goldie.
And there they were, right there out on the town
and the pages of his magazine. Look at the way
he dressed. What the hell was that all about? Didn't
(19:27):
Goldie have any class? Didn't he know he was the
luckiest man on the planet to be on the arm
of such a pure soul. But Bjork was no longer pure.
Bjork was damaged. This was a betrayal that Ricardo was
certain Buyorke could never recover from. After this, after being
with this man, with Goldie, the purity was gone, and
(19:51):
Goldi knew it, and now Ricardo knew it. And now
Ricardo had to make sure that Buorke knew it. So
Ricardo took his pen to paper he found Byorke's London
address and wrote Byorike countless letters, and not one of
them was returned. And this further fueled Ricardo's rage. After all,
(20:13):
he'd given her the best of him. Why wouldn't she
acknowledge him? Why wouldn't she write back? Did she think
she was better than him? And there was that old
song Murder. He said. It was the B side to
the original version of It's Oh So Quiet, the song
Buorke covered and released on her second album. The actress
(20:34):
Betty Hutton first recorded the American version back in nineteen
fifty one, Murder, He said the song. Buorke must have
heard that song, and that song was this situation that
Ricardo now found himself in. In that song, the singer
makes fun of the man pursuing her. The singer thinks
her suitor is beneath her because of the way that
(20:54):
he talks. Murder, he says, like some classless buffoon, not
knowing how to converse in polite society. That's what this was.
Bjork the celebrity, Byork, the famous artist, Bjork, the stylish
white songstress fashionably dating the black DJ thought Ricardo the
part time exterminator. He was the classless buffoon in this situation,
(21:17):
and that must have been it, just like that old song. Yes,
just like that he was beneath her. But how could
she think that way? Byorke didn't know him. Byorke didn't
know what made him think the way he thought, or
love the way he loved. How could she she didn't
return his fucking letters? Did she even read them? Did
she even care at all about him? Why? Why didn't
(21:39):
she return his letters? Ricardo Lopez slipped into madness and
thought murder. He said, okay, then one final letter to
my love.
Speaker 2 (21:52):
I am Angel of Death.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
The authorities thanked the housing man for making the call
and politely asked him to vacate the premises, but not
to go too far in case they needed him for
anything else. The League crime scene investigator saw the video
camera set up in Ricardo's apartment, and he immediately delegated
a junior officer to start reviewing the tape to get
to the bottom of just what the fuck it was
(22:18):
that had happened in this hell hole of an apartment
over the past few days. In no time, the authorities
discovered on that tape a reality far worse than the
horror show they were currently standing. Smack dab in the
middle of. One of the camera's videotapes revealed that Ricardo
Lopez had indeed drafted one final letter to his love
(22:38):
to the international pop star Buyork, and that Ricardo Lopez
had placed that letter in a box, which, upon opening,
would trigger an explosive device that would spray deadly sulfuric
acid all over Byorke's face. Before this happened, though, Byorke
would know from the letter in the box who Ricardo
Lopez was, and that was the point she had to
(23:01):
know before Buyork died. She had to know who he was.
And now it was only a matter of time before
that happened, because that letter and that letter bomb, that
package was on its way via international mail the Buorck's
London apartment and it would arrive and no more than
four days. We'll be right back after this word we're, we're.
(23:33):
What you're about to hear is the actual audio from
Ricardo Lopez and the moments before mailing his letter bomb
to B York.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Package package will be sent to her when she is there.
Speaker 2 (23:48):
Okay, she's going to receive their package. Oh.
Speaker 1 (23:54):
On September twelfth, nineteen ninety six, Ricardo Lopez mailed his
package bomb to Byork USPS express mail takes about three
to five days to deliver a package from Southeast Florida
to London, England. Aside from a gig at Webley Stadium
on September thirteenth, nineteen ninety six, B York was not
scheduled to be anywhere but home in her London apartment
(24:15):
with her young son. Over the course of the next week,
the clock was ticking. Florida police, who had discovered the
existence of the bomb and pieced together its intended target
across the pond, notified New Scotland Yard. Immediately, New Scotland
Yards sprung into action. A specialist operations group is assembled
to counter this potential crime of terrorist obsession. The only
(24:38):
problem was that at the moment, with the package in transit,
there was little investigators could do to thwart this deadly
threat except wait and pray. With the package tucked away
in a cargo plane high above the Atlantic Ocean, authorities
went to work in forming local London mail sorting stations
of the situation and what type of package to be
on the lookout for. They did not inform b York
(25:00):
authorities were confident they'd locate and destroy the deadly package
long before it reached its destination. It was decided, for
the time being, anyway, that there was no need to
notify byorke of the impending danger. If any pesky journalists
or paparazzi were to find out, it would be a
much bigger, much harder to control public crisis. For now,
(25:21):
the situation seemed contained, but time was of the essence.
After her Wembley Stadium gig, Byork settled into her cozy
apartment with her son for a couple of days off,
investigators got a lead on which plane the package might
be arriving on. A bomb squad was dispatched to Heathrown Airport.
The plane was searched and nothing, No sign of the package,
(25:47):
no sign of a bomb. At the same time, Byorke
and her son went about their daily routine in her apartment, oblivious,
completely unaware of the threat against her life.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
You see all that damage, that sulfuric auser. I burned
myself a little bit in the tongue because I wanted
that blue and this is Sofia Guessa. That was diluted
big ten with water.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
Instantly it touched me.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
Now I both washed it off real good.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
It takes time for this shit to burn, at least
a minute to do some serious devenue.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
New Scotland Yard dispatched investigators to London sorting stations where
mail passed through on its way to Byork's neighborhood. The
package was now either on a truck heading from the
airport closer to a sorting station, or in the mail
bag of a postal worker on its way to Byork's house. Finally,
authorities moved to inform b York, but as of yet
(26:48):
there was no confirmation that Buorck had actually been contacted.
It was just before four pm on September sixteenth, nineteen
ninety six, not quite tea time at Byork's, but it
was time to check the mail hall. September sixties, nineteen
(27:31):
ninety six. Bjork and her son remain at home, absorbed
in the lethargy that a rare off day provides, reading,
watching films on the projector, listening to music, daydreaming, drinking tea.
All is calm, All is peaceful. There is no hint
of the world shattering destruction making its way to b.
(27:52):
York's apartment. Out on the streets of London, New Scotland Yard,
authorities are frantically trying to weave through traffic to get
to Byorg in time before the bomb does and warn
her of the threat. Authorities have also descended upon mail
sorting stations and are frantically searching for the package from
Ricardo Lopez back in America. US authorities were still piecing
(28:15):
together Ricardo Lopez's madness. Some people give and some people take.
Ricardo Lopez felt that he had given the best of
himself to Byork, and she'd taken plenty and given back nothing.
This was, of course insanity. Buork had no idea who
Ricardo Lopez was, or that he'd been trying to contact her,
(28:38):
or that he felt aggrieved in any way, and had
she known any of this, She was under no obligation
to give Ricardo Lopez anything. In fact, Buyork had given plenty.
She was an artist, a prolific artist, not some charlatan
who worked her way up the creative arts ladder of
success and manufactured pap for shock value, fabricating headline news
(28:59):
every couple of months to keep the journalists and paparazzi
hooked in order to maintain a certain level of relevance. Instead,
Yorke was constantly creating. She constantly walked through the world,
thinking about the next bit of music she was going
to make, the next image she was going to subvert,
the next statement she was going to drop. She was
forever absorbing other people's music, films, books, fashion, processing it
(29:21):
all and finding ways to take elements, to improve upon,
to break down, to discard, and then tapping into the
greater infinite intelligence to create her own music and art
r that was truly novel. This is love to create,
to bring something new into the world that brings joy
to others, or that provokes thought, or that compels some
other sort of positive action. As an act of love.
(29:44):
It's one of the most impactful things we as humans
can do in this world. Monsters do the opposite. Monsters destroy,
Monsters take.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
I want'll be the biggest influence on her life, the
most important person would change your life more than anybody else.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
We live in the world of monsters. Do you understand that?
The world of monsters? On September sixteenth, nineteen ninety six,
five days after Ricardo Lopez mailed his lethal package to
Bjork's London apartment, Byork decided it was time to retrieve
her mail. She headed out her front door and walked
(30:23):
leisurely down the path to her mailbox, and the sun
burned back the London overcast, and the birds above sang
over the sounds of rush hour traffic, traffic that authorities
were stuck in. Authorities who were desperately trying to reach
Buorick and warn her about the impending threat on her
life at the hands of an obsessed madman. After Ricardo
(30:44):
Lopez mailed his letter bomb to Byork, he returned to
his apartment. He shaved his head. He took red and
green grease paint and painted his bald skull and face
a la Martin Sheen's captain Benjamin Willard in Apocalypse, now
snaking his way up the river toward the unimaginable and
on her way to her mailbox. Byork was taking a
(31:05):
completely different path. And back in Ricardo's apartment, Ricardo shaved
and painted for battle. Stripped down, he grabbed his gun,
certain he'd accomplished all he would in this life, and
then Ricardo put Byork's song I Remember You on full blast.
Ricardo looked into the camera. Ricardo breathed heavily in quick
(31:28):
burst to juice his resolve. Byorck blared in the background.
Ricardo put the gun in his mouth. Ricardo drew quicker,
heavier breaths, psyching himself up for what was to come.
Then b York stopped singing. The song had ended. It
all ended. As the camera rolled, Ricardo Lopez bit down
(31:51):
on the barrel of his thirty eight caliber revolver and
pulled the trigger. Once at her mailbox, Byorick held the
package in her hands. She contemplated it, what it meant,
who it was intended for, and why it needed to
be sent, its impact when received, and what people would think.
(32:17):
And that didn't matter so much. What mattered was how
they felt, how they felt now, and how they felt
in the future. This wasn't some grand gesture or a
work of art. It was just a package, a letter
accompanying the flowers that she was sending to the family
of Ricardo Lopez, expressing her condolences for the loss of
(32:39):
their son, who had just killed himself while trying to
kill her. That dark syrapy persistent substance seeping down through
the ceiling of one unlucky tenant's apartment back in Hollywood, Florida,
That substance that was reported to authorities by the Van
Buren apartment's housing manager. That was Ricardo Lope as his blood.
(33:02):
Five days earlier, Ricardo Lopez had videotaped his own suicide
hours after mailing the package he intended to kill Byork with.
Upon discovering Lopez's body. The authorities in Florida discovered a
video camera on a stand just a few feet from
the corpse, as well as the previously mentioned trove of
recorded videotapes. When they reviewed the tapes, they saw Ricardo
(33:25):
Lopez and all of his madness unraveling into a storm
of murderous rage, hell bent on killing Buork. The tapes
revealed the exact date and time Ricardo mailed his package,
and from there the authorities were able to trace, track down,
and ultimately destroy the package before it got to Byork. Buorke,
(33:47):
of course, lived and continues to create and remains a
relevant artist to this day. Ricardo Lopez shows a different
path hate and destruction, and he died in Disgrace.
Speaker 4 (34:02):
I'm Jake Brennan in this this Disgraceland.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
All right, hope you dug this episode.
Speaker 5 (34:22):
Apple podcast listeneries, make sure you have auto downloads turned
on so you never missed an episode of Disgrace Sland.
This week's question of the week is what is the
wildest story of fan obsession.
Speaker 1 (34:32):
From music and or Hollywood history? All Right? Was it
York's Ricardo.
Speaker 5 (34:36):
Lopez or was it someone else? Six one, seven, nine,
oh six six six three eight, leave me a voicemail,
send me a text to be.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
A part of the show.
Speaker 5 (34:43):
We play and read some of your answers on the
after party bonus episode coming up right after this in
your feed. You can also hit me on Instagram, Facebook,
x and disgracelamdpod at gmail dot com. Leave a review
for the show on Apple Podcasts or Spotify and you
might win some free merch al Right here comes some
credits was created by Yours Truly and is produced in
partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be
(35:05):
found on the show notes page at disgracelampod dot com.
If you're listening as a Disgraceland All Access member, thank.
Speaker 1 (35:12):
You for supporting the show. We really appreciate it. And
if not, you can become a member right now by
going to disgracelampod dot com slash Membership. Members can listen
to every episode of Disgraceland ad free, Plus you'll get
one brand new exclusive episode every month, weekly unscripted bonus episodes,
special audio collections, and early access to merchandise and events.
(35:35):
Visit disgracelampod dot com slash membership for details, rate and
review the show and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter
and Facebook at disgracelampod and on YouTube at YouTube dot com,
slash at Disgracelandpod, rock a rolla. He then all right,
(35:57):
just goes, what did you think of this bu Yorick episode?
Give us a call? Let us know six one seven
nine oh six six six three eight, voicemail and text
at Disgraceland Pod on the Socials. Coming up next to
Disgraceland our new episode on Ian Watkins from Lost Profits,
Don't Go Anywhere
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