September 16, 2025 • 20 mins
From Rock 'n Roll to Rocket Scientist, Philip Taylor Kramer's life had many twists and turns, but the most unexpected was his death.
Thank you The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, People Magazine, Ultimate-Guitar.com, AXS-TV, officialRandyJackson.com, Ultimate Classic Rock, Rhino Records, and Wikipedia for information contributing to today’s story.
Do you have any comments, or a case you’d like to suggest? You’ll find a comment form and case submission link at LordanArts.com.
This is not intended to act as a means of proving or disproving anything related to the investigation. It is a conversation about the current known facts and theories being discussed. Everyone directly or indirectly referred to is innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
LordanArts 2025
Thank you The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, People Magazine, Ultimate-Guitar.com, AXS-TV, officialRandyJackson.com, Ultimate Classic Rock, Rhino Records, and Wikipedia for information contributing to today’s story.
Do you have any comments, or a case you’d like to suggest? You’ll find a comment form and case submission link at LordanArts.com.
This is not intended to act as a means of proving or disproving anything related to the investigation. It is a conversation about the current known facts and theories being discussed. Everyone directly or indirectly referred to is innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
LordanArts 2025
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
The year is nineteen sixty eight. The air is thick
with the smell of pechuli and the sound of electric guitars.
The generation is in full blown rebellion, and the music
of that rebellion is being crafted by bands with names
that sound like they were imagined in a drug fueled haze,
like Jimi Hendrix, The Doors, and Iron Butterfly if you
(00:42):
know them at all. It's for a song so iconic
it's practically a legend, A sprawling seventeen minute and five
second sonic journey that was so immense it took up
the entire side of an album. The track was a
blockbuster seller, later certified four times platinum. Fans remember it
as the one with the drum solo. So epic it's
a legend in itself. The song is called Inegata da Vita.
(01:08):
The title is a garbled version of in the Garden
of Eden, a slurred late night mispronunciation that somehow stuck.
But it became more than a song. It was a
cultural touchstone. It was a trip, a mantra, a monument
to the psychedelic era. But what if the life of
one of the men who helped create that sound, The
(01:30):
man who would later become the band's bass player, took
a turn so seriously mysterious that it made the very
lyrics too in Agata Davida seem normal. He was a
brilliant musician who traded his life as a rock star
for a new career as a rocket scientist, then vanished
into thin air and left behind a trail of whispers
(01:50):
about government conspiracies and secret technology. I'm John Lord, and
this is the story of Philip Taylor Kramer, a rock star,
a genius, and, according to many, the victim of a
dark and deeply unsettling conspiracy. Philip Taylor Kramer or Phil
(02:10):
was born in the bustling steel town of Youngstown, Ohio,
on July twelfth, nineteen fifty two. From a very young age,
he was a curious mix of two seemingly contradictory passions.
On one hand, he had an innate feel for music.
He was drawn to the rhythm and grooves of the
bass guitar, spending countless hours practicing and perfecting his craft.
(02:31):
On the other hand, he was a natural with numbers
and technology, a budding computer engineer who could understand complex
systems with an almost effortless ease. He was the kind
of kid who could talk about the intricacies of a
bass riff and then, in the next breath, explain a
complex mathematical formula. It's not unheard of for musicians to
(02:53):
have strong connections to math and science. Dexter Holland, lead
singer and guitarist for The Offspring, holds a pa hd
in molecular biology, and Brian May, the guitarist for Queen,
has a PhD in astrophysics. There are many musicians without
formal degrees who are also described as technical or mathematical geniuses.
Bono frequently describes U two guitarist The Edge, as the
(03:16):
band's personal mister Spock. Phil was lucky enough to grow
up in an environment that nurtured both sides of his personality.
His father, Raymond Kramer, was an inventor who was obsessed
with something that he called faster than light communication. He
was convinced that Albert Einstein's theory of relativity had a flaw,
and he spent decades trying to prove it. This pursuit
(03:38):
of the unconventional and the seemingly impossible was a defining
influence on young Phil. It taught him to question established
beliefs and to look for answers in places where others
wouldn't dare to look. By the mid nineteen seventies, Kramer
had made a name for himself as a talented and
dynamic bassist, and his unique style caught the attention of
(03:59):
the legendary rock band and Iron Butterfly. The band was
already famous for Inegata da Vida, and Kramer's energetic, hard
rocking style helped them create some of their most memorable music.
He toured the world, played to sold out arenas, and
lived the fast paced, high stakes life of a rock star.
But for a man with a mind like his, music
(04:20):
was only a piece of the puzzle. In nineteen eighty,
Film made a decision that must have shocked his fans
and his bandmates. He left the music world to pursue
a new career. He went back to school, earning a
degree in engineering. He would go on to work with
some of the biggest names in the aerospace and technology industries.
He even had a brief stint at Northrope, a company
(04:42):
that does contracted work for the US Defense Department. He
had National security clearance and worked on the guidance systems
for the MX missile, a key part of the US
Cold War arsenal. The rock bassist was now quite literally
a rocket scientist. It was a path that seemed to
make little sense for a rock star, but for Kramer,
it was the next logical step. It was the other
(05:04):
half of his brilliant mind finally playing the lead in
his life. But it wasn't his sole focus. Phil also
found and married his wife, Jennifer in nineteen eighty seven,
and they started a family together. By all accounts, he
was a devoted husband and father. It said that he
would serve his wife coffee in bed every morning and
spent plenty of time with his son and daughter. He
(05:26):
was successful, brilliant, and seemingly happy. But in the early
nineteen nineties he started a company called Total Multimedia. This
venture was started with another musician, Randy Jackson, brother of
Michael and member of the Jackson Five. Total Multimedia was
on the bleeding edge of something that would later become
a huge part of all of our lives, and it
(05:48):
might have been responsible in some way for taking Phil's
Total Multimedia was working on digital compression, the act of
taking a large file and shrinking it so that it
(06:10):
could be processed or transferred faster. At the time, Kramer's
team was focused on playing back full quality video from
CD ROMs. That's a technology that could invalidate the need
for other large storage data formats that would come later,
like DVD or Blu ray, but it was also a
precursor for sending high quality video over regular telephone lines.
(06:32):
To put this in perspective a bit, this was still
the era of dial up Internet, when even a simple
picture could take minutes to load. Kramer's technology, if it worked,
would have easily paved the way for video conferencing and
something that we are all extremely familiar with nowadays, video streaming,
just like we do with Netflix. Phil was a visionary
(06:53):
and convinced that his technology was going to be the
next big thing. Obviously he was right, But alongside this
groundbreaking work, Phil was said to also be pursuing something else,
something that might be described as a bit far out.
He was reportedly helping his father with research into faster
than like communication and other psychic phenomena. Kramer allegedly developed
(07:17):
a theory that the human brain could be used as
some kind of antenna, capable of instant communication across vast distances.
Some people even believe that he was trying to create
a communication system based on the principles of what's known
as remote viewing, a psychic practice that was being experimented
with by the US military at the time, particularly by
(07:38):
Stanford Research Institute. The idea was that the mind, with
proper training, could be used to see objects or events
from a distance. Kramer, it was said, was attempting to
apply his engineering knowledge to this paranormal concept to build
a machine that could enhance or even facilitate this kind
of mental communication. And this is where Kramer's story sort
(08:01):
of splits into two. Was he really a brilliant but
eccentric genius who was prone to chasing far fetched ideas,
or was he on the verge of a true technological breakthrough,
both in the digital world and touching into the fantastical.
In truth, both advances would be something that many other
people would want to get their hands on. But there
(08:23):
was another reality that we know he was dealing with.
By nineteen ninety five, Kramer's life was a pressure cooker.
His company Total Multimedia had been reorganized under bankruptcy, and
he was working incredibly long hours to try to save it.
He was, also, according to his family. Becoming increasingly paranoid.
(08:43):
He started talking about people who were bothering him, people
who wanted what he was doing, and had even threatened him.
His father, Raymond, recalled a chilling warning that Phil had
given to him. If I ever say I'm going to
take my own life, don't you believe it? And we
seem to hit another fork on the road with the story.
(09:04):
Was he really being threatened or had the pressure of
his failing business started taking a toll on him? Mentally,
when someone is under extreme stress, the brain's alarm systems
can go into a type of overdrive. Elevated cortisol and
adrenaline can keep your body in fight or flight mode,
and over time that state can distort thinking. Ordinary interactions
(09:26):
may be filtered through a lens of constant fear, and
the person can begin interpreting neutral events as threatening. This
can resemble symptoms found in anxiety disorders or even depression
with psychotic features. In the most severe cases, the combination
of chronic stress, paranoia, and hopelessness is known to increase
(09:47):
the risk of self harm. His wife was also noticing
that Phil wasn't following his usual sleep patterns. Quote it
seemed like he was going without sleep entirely for days.
If all that wasn't enough, some alleged that phil was
also hired to analyze a grainy videotape related to the
oj Simpson murder trial. As a well known expert in
(10:09):
digital video and compression, his involvement in this high profile
project could have added to the sense that he was
being watched. I mean, the whole world was watching that trial,
if this claim is true. It was February twelfth, nineteen
ninety five, a Sunday. Philip Taylor Kramer, then forty two
years old, left his home in Thousand Oaks, California, around
(10:32):
eight thirty in the morning. His plan was to drive
to Los Angeles International Airport to pick up a business
associate named Greg Martini and Greg's wife. He was driving
his green nineteen ninety three Ford Aerostar minivan, definitely a
sign of the times, and the plan was for him
to get the Martinis, come back home and pick up
(10:52):
his wife, Jennifer, and then the four were going to
head to Santa Barbara for dinner. But the plans, it seems, changed.
He called his wife, Jennifer and told her that he
had told the Martinis to take a cab to a
hotel near the Kramer home and that he and Jennifer
would meet with them later. He promised his wife that
he was going to show up with some big surprise.
(11:14):
From here, his phone records tell a bizarre story. Kramer
made it to the airport, and he remained in the
area for over forty five minutes. He was making a
flurry of calls from his cell phone, seventeen in total.
He called his former Iron Butterfly bandmate Ron Bushy and
told him that he loved Ron more than life itself.
(11:35):
He was sounding agitated and frantic. He called his wife
again and said, whatever happens, I'll always be with you,
and then he made one final chilling call. Phil was
on the one oh one in the San Fernando Valley
and right before noon he called nine one one. According
to the Washington Post and the La Times, the call
(11:56):
was brief and chaotic. The dispatcher heard Cram's voice, frantic
and seemingly in distress, saying, this is Philip Taylor Kramer,
and I'm going to kill myself and I want everyone
to know that O. J. Simpson is innocent. They did it,
and then silence his cell phone went dead, the line disconnected.
(12:20):
Phil Kramer was never seen or heard from again. A
massive search was launched. Police, friends, family, and even television
shows like America's Most Wanted and Unsolved Mysteries took up
the case. They plastered Kramer's face on billboards and television screens,
but there was no helpful information coming in, no trace
of the missing man or his minivan. It was as
(12:42):
if he had driven off the face of the earth.
For four agonizing years, the case of Philip Taylor Kramer
remained a complete mystery. His wife had to scale back
the searches and flyer efforts and focus on keeping her
house together and caring for their children while working as
a real estate agent, but the theories and speculation ran wild.
(13:04):
The official theory was suicide. The nine one one call
and the events going on in his life certainly pointed
in that direction. But what about the warning to his father,
don't you believe it? And what about the bizarre edition
of the O. J. Simpson comment? To many, it was
thought to be some type of coded message, a desperate
(13:24):
attempt to point to some larger conspiracy that Phil had uncovered.
Who exactly was the they that he had mentioned. His wife, Jennifer,
was also convinced that Phil would never take his own life,
saying he would never, for any reason or under any circumstance,
allow himself to completely abandon the family that he loves
(13:45):
more than life itself. The next theory was a much
darker one, and that was that he had been murdered.
Some members of his family believed that the people bothering
him were real and that they wanted his technology. Was
he killed for his digital compression research, which could have
been worth billions, or was it more of the esoteric
(14:07):
research that made him a target. Some people, including members
of Kramer's family, believed that he had discovered a way
to do something like faster than like communication, and it
was that secret that a corporation or even a government
agency was willing to kill for. This theory gained traction
in certain circles, with many on late night radio shows
(14:29):
taking up the cause. They painted the story of the
brilliant rock star turned scientist who was silenced by a
shadowy government agency. The story so compelling that a remote viewer,
a psychic who claims to be able to see things
from a distance, told Kramer's sister that his body had
been moved to Montana. This information, completely unverified, added a
(14:50):
new layer of intrigue to the case. It was a
classic rock and roll mystery with a sci fi twist,
but for four agonizing years, it remained just that a mystery.
Until May twenty ninth of nineteen ninety nine, four years
after his disappearance, two photographers, a father and a son,
were hiking in the remote Decker Canyon area of Malibu, California.
(15:14):
The canyon is known for its steep, winding roads and
treacherous ravines. As they hiked, they were looking for a
good vantage point to take photos, and as they moved
through the dense brush, they saw something out of place.
Tucked away down a deep embankment, hidden by dense brush
and almost impossible to see from the road, was a rusted,
(15:34):
mangled vehicle. It was a green Ford Arrow star min event.
The photographers called the police. When the authorities arrived, they
had to repel down into the ravine to get to
the vehicle. The scene was grim. The van had gone
over a four hundred foot embankment and landed on its roof,
a mangled mess of twisted metal inside the van, where
(15:57):
the skeletal remains of a man. The remains were largely intact,
a testament to the fact that the van had been
untouched for so long, as were the man's personal effects,
his wallet, his ID, his wedding ring, all still there
with his body. Dental records would be the final confirmation needed.
It was indeed Philip Taylor Kramer. The Los Angeles County
(16:21):
Sheriff's Department immediately ruled the death a probable suicide, a
seemingly tragic end to a bizarre story about his final days.
They believed that Kramer, in a moment of distress, had
intentionally driven his van off the road, putting an end
to everything. Chuck Carter, a former LA cop and Drug
Enforcement Agency agent, was hired as the Kramer's private investigator,
(16:42):
and he worked the case for about a month. He
points back to the forty five minutes at lax and
says something happened during that time, either in his head
or at the terminal, And I'll tell you, I haven't
a clue. The guy didn't have an enemy. The guy
was a dedicated family man. But for many, the discovery
(17:03):
of the van and remains only deep in the mystery.
The location where the van was found was not on
his route home. The police concluded that he had driven
the van intentionally into that ravine. But why would he
have driven so far out of his way to this
specific remote canyon. If the point was to end his
pain quickly, this was not the easiest way to do so.
(17:24):
I used to also live in Thousand Oaks and drove
Malibu canyons frequently, and there are endless cliffs and windy
roads between the Pacific Coast Highway and the one to
oh one. But maybe the goal wasn't to end it quickly.
Maybe it was to make sure that he wasn't found.
If that's the case, it raises the question of was
someone else involved. The car was found in a place
(17:47):
that was nearly invisible to search and rescue teams. It's
the kind of place you'd have to know about to find.
And what about that phone call? Was he being chased?
Was he trying to get away from someone? The state
of the remains and the vehicle after four years in
the wilderness, made it impossible to determine exactly what happened.
There was no conclusive evidence of foul play found, but
(18:10):
there was also no conclusive evidence that it was simply
a suicide either. Some have suggested that his mention of
OJ Simpson is actually the key to unlocking this case,
that he had discovered something on that video footage that
implicated someone powerful, and that his disappearance was a direct
result of that discovery. Others still believe that it was
(18:31):
tied to his research into faster than like communication. What
we're all left with is a mystery that has endured
the years. The case of Philip Taylor Kramer is strange
and unsettling. A nineteen seventy five note attributed to Kramer
and written on stationary from a holiday inn, says quote,
this feeling of hope is so strong within me it
(18:54):
almost shatters my fears. This is the story of a
man who lived too life, and in the end, both
of those lives, the rockstar and the rocket scientist, collided
in a tragic moment, leaving a deeply unsettling confusion. We
can still listen to his music, analyze his words, and
appreciate his genius, but in the end, the question of
(19:16):
what really happened to Philip Taylor Kramer on that canyon
road remains seriously mysterious. Do you have any comments or
a case you'd like to suggest, feel free to send
it to me. You can find a case submission link
at lordenarts dot com. Thank you The Washington Post, The
Los Angeles Times, People Magazine, Ultimate Guitar dot com, AXSTV Official,
(19:39):
Randy Jackson dot com, Ultimate Classic Rock, Rhinol Records, and
Wikipedia for information contributing to today's story. This episode was
written by John Lordon and produced by Lorden Arts. Thank
you to our seriously mysterious financial supporters at PayPal, Patreon,
and Coffee. Most of all, thank you for listening. I'm
John Lordon. Please join me again next week for another
(20:01):
case I know you'll find seriously mysterious
The year is nineteen sixty eight. The air is thick
with the smell of pechuli and the sound of electric guitars.
The generation is in full blown rebellion, and the music
of that rebellion is being crafted by bands with names
that sound like they were imagined in a drug fueled haze,
like Jimi Hendrix, The Doors, and Iron Butterfly if you
(00:42):
know them at all. It's for a song so iconic
it's practically a legend, A sprawling seventeen minute and five
second sonic journey that was so immense it took up
the entire side of an album. The track was a
blockbuster seller, later certified four times platinum. Fans remember it
as the one with the drum solo. So epic it's
a legend in itself. The song is called Inegata da Vita.
(01:08):
The title is a garbled version of in the Garden
of Eden, a slurred late night mispronunciation that somehow stuck.
But it became more than a song. It was a
cultural touchstone. It was a trip, a mantra, a monument
to the psychedelic era. But what if the life of
one of the men who helped create that sound, The
(01:30):
man who would later become the band's bass player, took
a turn so seriously mysterious that it made the very
lyrics too in Agata Davida seem normal. He was a
brilliant musician who traded his life as a rock star
for a new career as a rocket scientist, then vanished
into thin air and left behind a trail of whispers
(01:50):
about government conspiracies and secret technology. I'm John Lord, and
this is the story of Philip Taylor Kramer, a rock star,
a genius, and, according to many, the victim of a
dark and deeply unsettling conspiracy. Philip Taylor Kramer or Phil
(02:10):
was born in the bustling steel town of Youngstown, Ohio,
on July twelfth, nineteen fifty two. From a very young age,
he was a curious mix of two seemingly contradictory passions.
On one hand, he had an innate feel for music.
He was drawn to the rhythm and grooves of the
bass guitar, spending countless hours practicing and perfecting his craft.
(02:31):
On the other hand, he was a natural with numbers
and technology, a budding computer engineer who could understand complex
systems with an almost effortless ease. He was the kind
of kid who could talk about the intricacies of a
bass riff and then, in the next breath, explain a
complex mathematical formula. It's not unheard of for musicians to
(02:53):
have strong connections to math and science. Dexter Holland, lead
singer and guitarist for The Offspring, holds a pa hd
in molecular biology, and Brian May, the guitarist for Queen,
has a PhD in astrophysics. There are many musicians without
formal degrees who are also described as technical or mathematical geniuses.
Bono frequently describes U two guitarist The Edge, as the
(03:16):
band's personal mister Spock. Phil was lucky enough to grow
up in an environment that nurtured both sides of his personality.
His father, Raymond Kramer, was an inventor who was obsessed
with something that he called faster than light communication. He
was convinced that Albert Einstein's theory of relativity had a flaw,
and he spent decades trying to prove it. This pursuit
(03:38):
of the unconventional and the seemingly impossible was a defining
influence on young Phil. It taught him to question established
beliefs and to look for answers in places where others
wouldn't dare to look. By the mid nineteen seventies, Kramer
had made a name for himself as a talented and
dynamic bassist, and his unique style caught the attention of
(03:59):
the legendary rock band and Iron Butterfly. The band was
already famous for Inegata da Vida, and Kramer's energetic, hard
rocking style helped them create some of their most memorable music.
He toured the world, played to sold out arenas, and
lived the fast paced, high stakes life of a rock star.
But for a man with a mind like his, music
(04:20):
was only a piece of the puzzle. In nineteen eighty,
Film made a decision that must have shocked his fans
and his bandmates. He left the music world to pursue
a new career. He went back to school, earning a
degree in engineering. He would go on to work with
some of the biggest names in the aerospace and technology industries.
He even had a brief stint at Northrope, a company
(04:42):
that does contracted work for the US Defense Department. He
had National security clearance and worked on the guidance systems
for the MX missile, a key part of the US
Cold War arsenal. The rock bassist was now quite literally
a rocket scientist. It was a path that seemed to
make little sense for a rock star, but for Kramer,
it was the next logical step. It was the other
(05:04):
half of his brilliant mind finally playing the lead in
his life. But it wasn't his sole focus. Phil also
found and married his wife, Jennifer in nineteen eighty seven,
and they started a family together. By all accounts, he
was a devoted husband and father. It said that he
would serve his wife coffee in bed every morning and
spent plenty of time with his son and daughter. He
(05:26):
was successful, brilliant, and seemingly happy. But in the early
nineteen nineties he started a company called Total Multimedia. This
venture was started with another musician, Randy Jackson, brother of
Michael and member of the Jackson Five. Total Multimedia was
on the bleeding edge of something that would later become
a huge part of all of our lives, and it
(05:48):
might have been responsible in some way for taking Phil's
Total Multimedia was working on digital compression, the act of
taking a large file and shrinking it so that it
(06:10):
could be processed or transferred faster. At the time, Kramer's
team was focused on playing back full quality video from
CD ROMs. That's a technology that could invalidate the need
for other large storage data formats that would come later,
like DVD or Blu ray, but it was also a
precursor for sending high quality video over regular telephone lines.
(06:32):
To put this in perspective a bit, this was still
the era of dial up Internet, when even a simple
picture could take minutes to load. Kramer's technology, if it worked,
would have easily paved the way for video conferencing and
something that we are all extremely familiar with nowadays, video streaming,
just like we do with Netflix. Phil was a visionary
(06:53):
and convinced that his technology was going to be the
next big thing. Obviously he was right, But alongside this
groundbreaking work, Phil was said to also be pursuing something else,
something that might be described as a bit far out.
He was reportedly helping his father with research into faster
than like communication and other psychic phenomena. Kramer allegedly developed
(07:17):
a theory that the human brain could be used as
some kind of antenna, capable of instant communication across vast distances.
Some people even believe that he was trying to create
a communication system based on the principles of what's known
as remote viewing, a psychic practice that was being experimented
with by the US military at the time, particularly by
(07:38):
Stanford Research Institute. The idea was that the mind, with
proper training, could be used to see objects or events
from a distance. Kramer, it was said, was attempting to
apply his engineering knowledge to this paranormal concept to build
a machine that could enhance or even facilitate this kind
of mental communication. And this is where Kramer's story sort
(08:01):
of splits into two. Was he really a brilliant but
eccentric genius who was prone to chasing far fetched ideas,
or was he on the verge of a true technological breakthrough,
both in the digital world and touching into the fantastical.
In truth, both advances would be something that many other
people would want to get their hands on. But there
(08:23):
was another reality that we know he was dealing with.
By nineteen ninety five, Kramer's life was a pressure cooker.
His company Total Multimedia had been reorganized under bankruptcy, and
he was working incredibly long hours to try to save it.
He was, also, according to his family. Becoming increasingly paranoid.
(08:43):
He started talking about people who were bothering him, people
who wanted what he was doing, and had even threatened him.
His father, Raymond, recalled a chilling warning that Phil had
given to him. If I ever say I'm going to
take my own life, don't you believe it? And we
seem to hit another fork on the road with the story.
(09:04):
Was he really being threatened or had the pressure of
his failing business started taking a toll on him? Mentally,
when someone is under extreme stress, the brain's alarm systems
can go into a type of overdrive. Elevated cortisol and
adrenaline can keep your body in fight or flight mode,
and over time that state can distort thinking. Ordinary interactions
(09:26):
may be filtered through a lens of constant fear, and
the person can begin interpreting neutral events as threatening. This
can resemble symptoms found in anxiety disorders or even depression
with psychotic features. In the most severe cases, the combination
of chronic stress, paranoia, and hopelessness is known to increase
(09:47):
the risk of self harm. His wife was also noticing
that Phil wasn't following his usual sleep patterns. Quote it
seemed like he was going without sleep entirely for days.
If all that wasn't enough, some alleged that phil was
also hired to analyze a grainy videotape related to the
oj Simpson murder trial. As a well known expert in
(10:09):
digital video and compression, his involvement in this high profile
project could have added to the sense that he was
being watched. I mean, the whole world was watching that trial,
if this claim is true. It was February twelfth, nineteen
ninety five, a Sunday. Philip Taylor Kramer, then forty two
years old, left his home in Thousand Oaks, California, around
(10:32):
eight thirty in the morning. His plan was to drive
to Los Angeles International Airport to pick up a business
associate named Greg Martini and Greg's wife. He was driving
his green nineteen ninety three Ford Aerostar minivan, definitely a
sign of the times, and the plan was for him
to get the Martinis, come back home and pick up
(10:52):
his wife, Jennifer, and then the four were going to
head to Santa Barbara for dinner. But the plans, it seems, changed.
He called his wife, Jennifer and told her that he
had told the Martinis to take a cab to a
hotel near the Kramer home and that he and Jennifer
would meet with them later. He promised his wife that
he was going to show up with some big surprise.
(11:14):
From here, his phone records tell a bizarre story. Kramer
made it to the airport, and he remained in the
area for over forty five minutes. He was making a
flurry of calls from his cell phone, seventeen in total.
He called his former Iron Butterfly bandmate Ron Bushy and
told him that he loved Ron more than life itself.
(11:35):
He was sounding agitated and frantic. He called his wife
again and said, whatever happens, I'll always be with you,
and then he made one final chilling call. Phil was
on the one oh one in the San Fernando Valley
and right before noon he called nine one one. According
to the Washington Post and the La Times, the call
(11:56):
was brief and chaotic. The dispatcher heard Cram's voice, frantic
and seemingly in distress, saying, this is Philip Taylor Kramer,
and I'm going to kill myself and I want everyone
to know that O. J. Simpson is innocent. They did it,
and then silence his cell phone went dead, the line disconnected.
(12:20):
Phil Kramer was never seen or heard from again. A
massive search was launched. Police, friends, family, and even television
shows like America's Most Wanted and Unsolved Mysteries took up
the case. They plastered Kramer's face on billboards and television screens,
but there was no helpful information coming in, no trace
of the missing man or his minivan. It was as
(12:42):
if he had driven off the face of the earth.
For four agonizing years, the case of Philip Taylor Kramer
remained a complete mystery. His wife had to scale back
the searches and flyer efforts and focus on keeping her
house together and caring for their children while working as
a real estate agent, but the theories and speculation ran wild.
(13:04):
The official theory was suicide. The nine one one call
and the events going on in his life certainly pointed
in that direction. But what about the warning to his father,
don't you believe it? And what about the bizarre edition
of the O. J. Simpson comment? To many, it was
thought to be some type of coded message, a desperate
(13:24):
attempt to point to some larger conspiracy that Phil had uncovered.
Who exactly was the they that he had mentioned. His wife, Jennifer,
was also convinced that Phil would never take his own life,
saying he would never, for any reason or under any circumstance,
allow himself to completely abandon the family that he loves
(13:45):
more than life itself. The next theory was a much
darker one, and that was that he had been murdered.
Some members of his family believed that the people bothering
him were real and that they wanted his technology. Was
he killed for his digital compression research, which could have
been worth billions, or was it more of the esoteric
(14:07):
research that made him a target. Some people, including members
of Kramer's family, believed that he had discovered a way
to do something like faster than like communication, and it
was that secret that a corporation or even a government
agency was willing to kill for. This theory gained traction
in certain circles, with many on late night radio shows
(14:29):
taking up the cause. They painted the story of the
brilliant rock star turned scientist who was silenced by a
shadowy government agency. The story so compelling that a remote viewer,
a psychic who claims to be able to see things
from a distance, told Kramer's sister that his body had
been moved to Montana. This information, completely unverified, added a
(14:50):
new layer of intrigue to the case. It was a
classic rock and roll mystery with a sci fi twist,
but for four agonizing years, it remained just that a mystery.
Until May twenty ninth of nineteen ninety nine, four years
after his disappearance, two photographers, a father and a son,
were hiking in the remote Decker Canyon area of Malibu, California.
(15:14):
The canyon is known for its steep, winding roads and
treacherous ravines. As they hiked, they were looking for a
good vantage point to take photos, and as they moved
through the dense brush, they saw something out of place.
Tucked away down a deep embankment, hidden by dense brush
and almost impossible to see from the road, was a rusted,
(15:34):
mangled vehicle. It was a green Ford Arrow star min event.
The photographers called the police. When the authorities arrived, they
had to repel down into the ravine to get to
the vehicle. The scene was grim. The van had gone
over a four hundred foot embankment and landed on its roof,
a mangled mess of twisted metal inside the van, where
(15:57):
the skeletal remains of a man. The remains were largely intact,
a testament to the fact that the van had been
untouched for so long, as were the man's personal effects,
his wallet, his ID, his wedding ring, all still there
with his body. Dental records would be the final confirmation needed.
It was indeed Philip Taylor Kramer. The Los Angeles County
(16:21):
Sheriff's Department immediately ruled the death a probable suicide, a
seemingly tragic end to a bizarre story about his final days.
They believed that Kramer, in a moment of distress, had
intentionally driven his van off the road, putting an end
to everything. Chuck Carter, a former LA cop and Drug
Enforcement Agency agent, was hired as the Kramer's private investigator,
(16:42):
and he worked the case for about a month. He
points back to the forty five minutes at lax and
says something happened during that time, either in his head
or at the terminal, And I'll tell you, I haven't
a clue. The guy didn't have an enemy. The guy
was a dedicated family man. But for many, the discovery
(17:03):
of the van and remains only deep in the mystery.
The location where the van was found was not on
his route home. The police concluded that he had driven
the van intentionally into that ravine. But why would he
have driven so far out of his way to this
specific remote canyon. If the point was to end his
pain quickly, this was not the easiest way to do so.
(17:24):
I used to also live in Thousand Oaks and drove
Malibu canyons frequently, and there are endless cliffs and windy
roads between the Pacific Coast Highway and the one to
oh one. But maybe the goal wasn't to end it quickly.
Maybe it was to make sure that he wasn't found.
If that's the case, it raises the question of was
someone else involved. The car was found in a place
(17:47):
that was nearly invisible to search and rescue teams. It's
the kind of place you'd have to know about to find.
And what about that phone call? Was he being chased?
Was he trying to get away from someone? The state
of the remains and the vehicle after four years in
the wilderness, made it impossible to determine exactly what happened.
There was no conclusive evidence of foul play found, but
(18:10):
there was also no conclusive evidence that it was simply
a suicide either. Some have suggested that his mention of
OJ Simpson is actually the key to unlocking this case,
that he had discovered something on that video footage that
implicated someone powerful, and that his disappearance was a direct
result of that discovery. Others still believe that it was
(18:31):
tied to his research into faster than like communication. What
we're all left with is a mystery that has endured
the years. The case of Philip Taylor Kramer is strange
and unsettling. A nineteen seventy five note attributed to Kramer
and written on stationary from a holiday inn, says quote,
this feeling of hope is so strong within me it
(18:54):
almost shatters my fears. This is the story of a
man who lived too life, and in the end, both
of those lives, the rockstar and the rocket scientist, collided
in a tragic moment, leaving a deeply unsettling confusion. We
can still listen to his music, analyze his words, and
appreciate his genius, but in the end, the question of
(19:16):
what really happened to Philip Taylor Kramer on that canyon
road remains seriously mysterious. Do you have any comments or
a case you'd like to suggest, feel free to send
it to me. You can find a case submission link
at lordenarts dot com. Thank you The Washington Post, The
Los Angeles Times, People Magazine, Ultimate Guitar dot com, AXSTV Official,
(19:39):
Randy Jackson dot com, Ultimate Classic Rock, Rhinol Records, and
Wikipedia for information contributing to today's story. This episode was
written by John Lordon and produced by Lorden Arts. Thank
you to our seriously mysterious financial supporters at PayPal, Patreon,
and Coffee. Most of all, thank you for listening. I'm
John Lordon. Please join me again next week for another
(20:01):
case I know you'll find seriously mysterious
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