Mystery on the Rocks

A live edition of our favourite game! And joining us in an echoey room to an intimate crowd is returning friend of the show and host of the fantastic Evil Men podcast, Michael Balazo! Who will win this round and which VHS treasure will be unearthed? An extended version of this episode, along with a huge back catalogue of exclusive bonus content such as videos, outtakes, minisodes and bonus episode...

Following the catastrophic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79AD Pompeii was devastated by an intense burst of intense heat, smoke and ash, leaving many of the thousands of people killed preserved in their final positions. Cue much sniggering when one man was discovered in the position of apparently pleasuring himself. But was that really what he was doing? If you enjoy Mystery on the Rocks then plea...

This week we take a look at the 1994 murder of former marine David Cox. David had been missing for 3 months when his body was found next to a river in Massachusetts, killed execution style with 4 bullet wounds. But what possible motive could there have been? His killer has never been discovered but his past may be more well known than first appears... Hosted by Masud Milas, Chris Stokes, and Sooz...

The next episode in our occasional new series called Sooz Kempner's One Hit Wonders where Sooz takes us through the story of some of the very best (and worst) one hit wonders. Where are they now? Why did their one hit hit so hard and then other songs fail to replicate the success? For this second episode, Sooz tells us the brilliant story of Billy Paul and his soul hit 'Me & Mrs Jones', as wel...

Two creepy (and possibly) connected crimes this week and we take a look at the Cape Intruder, a man whose identity remains a mystery, who broke into people's houses in Cape Elizabeth, Maine in 2005 to... Watch them sleep. Upon his prey awaking, he would bolt out of the house and evade capture completely. This photofit was issued to help identify the Cape Intruder, to no avail. We then fast forward...

Happy New Year! The second in our festive episodes is a brief curio - in the English town of Warminster at Christmastime in 1964, plenty of independent witnesses experienced a bizarre wave of sonic attacks, for which there remains no explanation to this day... Hosted by Masud Milas, Chris Stokes, and Sooz Kempner Mystery on the Rocks is a high concept comedy and true crime/unexplained phenomena po...

'Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house... Possibly one of the most famous Christmas verses yet itself the subject of a pervading mystery. Submitted anonymously to a New York newspaper in 1823, any potential author didn't come to light until over 20 years later. But then, an ownership contest began... Join us for the first of this year's Christmas Specials as we get merry for th...

Joining Sooz Kempner's One Hit Wonders as another occasional new series, our favourite game returns! Discovered during the recording of our Gentleman of Heligoland episode, VHGuess sees Chris and Masud have to guess which particular VHSes are in a bundle Sooz finds at random on eBay. With new rules, structure and lifelines added, join us as we play Mystery on the Rocks panel game VHGuess! Hosted b...

Will Duggan becomes the first ever returning guest on Mystery on the Rocks as he joins us while we go through the bizarre story of the mysterious Kaspar Hauser. Found wandering the streets of Nuremberg in 1828, Kaspar was apparently sixteen years old and had about his person two letters which offered little in the way of identification beyond his name and age. He claimed to have grown up in captiv...

In 1996, Gary Triano is murdered - a pipe bomb explodes his car. It takes a decade for justice to be served. So what on Earth took so long? Hosted by Masud Milas, Chris Stokes, and Sooz Kempner Mystery on the Rocks is a high concept comedy and true crime/unexplained phenomena podcast set in a fictional mystery-solving bar with real cocktails!. The focus of the show is to attempt to crack a real, u...

Something a little different this week as we begin a new occasional series called Sooz Kempner's One Hit Wonders where Sooz takes us through the story of some of the very best (and worst) one hit wonders. Where are they now? Why did their one hit hit so hard and then other songs fail to replicate the success? For the first episode, Sooz tells us the story of John Parr and his almighty anthem 'St E...

This week, we take a look at the brutal murder of Japanese businessman and high stakes gambler Akio Kashiwagi, stabbed (potentially up to 150 times) in his home in January 1992. One of the world's greatest gamblers, he rinsed several casinos enough to give them cause for concern that, for once, the house might not win... As well as delving into which enemies he may have made enough to kill him, we...

We know we spent last week's catch-up episode wanking on about the US election so you may wonder why we don't mention the outcome here. Recorded before the projections trickled in, this is our first case in well over a year. And with a twist! While recording the episode The Murder of Kyllikkii Saari Chris noticed it was the second most notorious homicide case in Finland. So what was the first? Rat...

We're back! The bar is back open and, easing back into the swing of things, we have a loose catch up and a discussion about the upcoming US election. But don't worry, it's not all serious, we're Mystery on the Rocks - there's enough pee and poop here to get the bar closed back down again for good on hygiene grounds. So join us for the usual disgusting silliness laced with an occasionally insightfu...

Unable to record an episode this week due to sudden diarrhea, we dig into the archives and dust off one of our earliest episodes. Bookended by some new chat from Chris and Sooz, we take a relisten to when fantastic comedian Nish Kumar joined us for the crazy tale of Clairvius Narcisse, who somehow LEGIT RETURNED FROM THE DEAD. _________ We're doing a live show! On November 3rd at 7pm we will be at...

It's 1992 and former (and unpopular) Polish Prime Minister lives in an almost paranoid level of security - his house is fortified by an 11 foot barbed-wire-topped wall and patrolled by a vicious Rottweiler, a dog which Jaroszewicz would walk while armed with a handgun. Nevertheless, he and his second wife Alicja are found tortured and murdered in their home, the motivation for the crime unclear. T...

The final (fingers crossed) in our trilogy (still keep em crossed) of duo episodes as Chris and Sooz tackle a mass poisoning of a French village in 1951, which led to 250 cases and 7 deaths, including a man who thought he was a plane and jumped from a second storey window. And want to hear about the government's policies on the distribution of flour in post-war France? Sooz didn't, so decided to c...

Needs must means the second in a trilogy of only 2 of us at the recording. This week, it's Chris and Masud who go over one of Finland's most notorious murder cases, the 17 year old Kyllikkii Saari in 1953... On her way back from a prayer meeting, Kyllikkii vanishes. Six months later, her remains are found in a bog. Three suspects quickly fall into the frame but which one did it? And what really ha...

Here is a fairly substantial shake-up to the formula as Sooz and Masud make up their own mystery based on what Chris told them it was called as he was away on holiday and unable to join the recording as planned. How close do they get? And in an episode which involves time travel, premature burial and gluten intolerant interdimensional beings, which come from the actual mystery and which come from...

In 1939 Barbara Newhall Follett vanishes without trace. She was 25 years old and disillusioned with her life. So what happened to her? And what about her extraordinary early life could have contributed to her being able to disappear so completely...? ____________________ We're doing a live show! On November 3rd at 7pm we will be at The Princess Victoria pub in London's Shepherds Bush as part of th...

The sensational story of the gruesome 1943 murder of Sir Harry Oakes - a baronet, philanthropist and incredibly wealthy owner of a gold mine who was living in the Bahamas at the time. Stabbed with a miner's pick, to disguise other wounds from an ice pick, and then doused in insecticide, set alight and covered in feathers. All of that in a story which also finds time to take in the actual King of E...

In one of the most ghoulish cases we've covered, in 1932 in Sweden a sex worker by the name of Lilly Lindeström is found dead in her apartment, naked and face down on the bed. Police had to break into her apartment and she had been dead for days. There are several sick elements to this case, not least that Lily's body had been drained of blood without a drop being spilled, except for traces on a s...

An unidentified man, beaten to death, is found floating in the sea 12 miles off a tiny archipelago, itself 43 miles off the coast of Germany. Dressed in smart clothes, he is known to this day only as The Gentleman... OK, so this week's mystery has so few clues and such little hope of ever being solved we kind of got very distracted... Distracted enough to invent a new game, play it through, have s...

It's October 1954 in Tuscany and local football rivals Fiorentina and Pistoriese are playing a derby in front of 10,000 screaming fans. But the stadium falls silent, the players stop playing and the ball rolls to a slow halt. Everyone is transfixed by cigar-like UFOs drifting up above, with strange materials trailing down far enough to be touched by the crowd and taken away to be sampled... So wha...

What happened to Lawrence Joseph Bader, the salesman riddled with debt who rented a fishing boat and promptly vanished in 1957? Does it have anything to do with the gregarious TV show host John Johnson who appeared elsewhere four days later? And what is pole sitting? Let's find out! Get early, ad-free access to episodes as well as cocktail recipes and outtakes plus whole bonus episodes over on our...