Red Bull: Risk Made Me Do It

Pasquale Rotella's love affair with electronic music began in an underground club. His fascination with spectacle had its roots in a youth spent on the Venice Beach boardwalk. As founder and CEO of Insomniac, his Electric Daisy Carnival is electronic dance music's top festival in the U.S. But all he wants is to make it bigger.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

How the premiere event for dance music in the US, the Electric Daisy Carnival, got its start in underground raves in warehouses in dangerous, and far-flung, corners of Los Angeles. Ahead of next week's guest, one of the most important names in dance music, we dive into the rise of a music festival that has cemented dance music's weird and carnivalesque reputation in the U.S.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Overcoming crippling dyslexia, Don Montague has become one of the chief innovators in the action sports space. A pioneering windsurfer and kitesurfer, his bizarre idea for a kite-powered sailboat eventually caught the attention of Sergey Brin and Larry Page, who became the founding investors in a company dedicated to creating a new energy source. Later this Summer, Montague and a small team will attempt to set a speed record sailing a kite-powered 60-foot trimaran from San Francisco to Hawaii. But the goal is bigger than that. By showcasing the benefits of kite power, Montague and his team hope to paint a future in which kites help power our energy grid.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Sure, there are the personal gurus and the private jets, but the ultimate status symbol of the Silicon Valley elite might just be a kite and a surfboard. We look at the Valley's peculiar obsession with kitesurfing, and the role Larry Page and Sergey Brin had in making it grow.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Rebecca Rusch has won nearly every extreme challenge she's tackled. But her evolution into the "Queen of Pain" began with a childhood struggle with her body. We speak to the top endurance athlete about her relentless drive to excel, the hallucinations that come with pain and the personal journey down the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Vietnam that forever changed her.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The Leadville Trail 100 is one of the most difficult biking races in the world. And yet it regularly attracts the top names in the mountain biking community and local heroes alike. Ahead of next week's podcast with top endurance athlete Rebecca Rusch, we dive into the race's particulars but also into the life of the charismatic founder who created it as an act of desperation.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Surfer, musician, on-camera talent, Sal Masekela has worn a number of hats in his two-decade (and counting) career. From commentating on the X Games to producing the VICE World of Sports, he talks to us about the through line in all of his storytelling. And the family history that helped shape him.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The first ever X Games featured competitive bungee jumping, kite skiers flying way off course and so, so much neon. We look back at the adrenaline-soaked birth of an industry.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Entrepreneur Tom Bilyeu used his family problem with obesity as the fuel to start a billion-dollar company. He’s since transitioned into a new line of work, querying entrepreneurs and empowering listeners on his successful podcast, Impact Theory.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Magician Adam Trent knows that his performance discipline isn't always fully appreciated. In a hilarious hour of conversation he talks the triumphs and humiliations of his life as a magician, his power to connect to an audience of any size, and a new series on RBTV which has him criss-crossing Europe with magic serving as his only currency.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

All of LA looks like a movie set at times. Even more so when you're standing in front of the Magic Castle. Ahead of next week's interview with magician Adam Trent we dive into the wild, weird history of the Gothic mansion near the Hollywood Hills where entrance is only guaranteed in formal wear and by invitation. Magicians have never felt so cool.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

When former happy-go-lucky pro surfer Jon Rose hit the skids in his personal life, a trip to Indonesia transformed him. We talk to the founder of the water filter nonprofit Waves4Water about selfishness, the problem with the 'humanitarian' label, and his recent decision to give up a permanent place of residence for a life on the road.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Ahead of our conversation with a surfing humanitarian, we take a look at the global issues around access to water and the unique group of nonprofits - and their personalities - looking to change that.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

When David Colturi steps to the edge of the 89-foot cliff diving platform, it takes everything he has in his years of experience to control and focus the fear coursing through him. Then it takes only 3 seconds for him to hit the water at speeds upwards of 52 mph. We talk to the former college diving champion and Red Bull Cliff diving athlete about his summer as a show jumper in the midwest, training his mind, and the challenge of building a career in a niche sport.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Ahead of next week's podcast with cliff diver David Colturi, we rewind the clock to a man named Teddy Stauffer. The Swiss-born big band leader fled the Nazis and created a nightlife paradise in the sleepy fishing village of Acapulco in the 1940s and 50s. The crown jewel? La Perla, where Frank Sinatra and Rita Hayworth gathered to party and watch the famed cliff divers of La Quebrada breathe new life into an ancient sport.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

When Dylan Bowman laces up his shoes to prepare for another 100-mile race, he's not chasing competitors, or split times, but silence. The ultra-runner is one of the bright young lights in the painful, and often dangerous, endurance sport. He tells us what he learned from overtraining, pushing the pain threshold and why his worst attributes serve him well on the trail.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

For a sport as odd as ultrarunning, it's somehow fitting that the first man to complete a 100-mile race is Gordy Ainsleigh. In 1974, the Vietnam-war protesting, free-love-having Northern California native decided to enter a horse race without a horse. And because of that, an athletic movement was born. We talked to Gordy about love, untrustworthy friends, and how the two forces conspired to create ultrarunning's grandaddy race, the Western States 100.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

A multi-instrumentalist at a young age, Tom Holkenborg never met a music genre he didn't like. He went from a Dutch new wave band to producer of the international mega-hit "A Little Less Conversation," with which he accomplished two things: getting Elvis Presley's estate to agree to the sample, and putting his name on the global charts. So what did he do next? Moved to Hollywood to start at the bottom as a film composer. Holkenborg stopped by and talked to us about the importance of failing and the slow, slow path to a career that now includes composing the soundtracks for Deadpool and Mad Max.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

In this age of Hollywood blockbusters, the star actors and merchandising possibilities often outshine the music. That was the case in 1933 as well, until a child prodigy rescued one of the potential biggest flops of its time - King Kong - with something called a film score. Ahead of next week's chat with musical talent and composer Junkie XL (Mad Max, Deadpool), we dive into the life of Max Steiner, who went on to compose the scores for Gone with the Wind and Casablanca, and ushered in a new era of film composition.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

A hell-raiser at a young age—when he got into knife fights and raced around in the hotrod scene—Robert Williams grew to become the leader of a rebel art movement. A painter of pornographic, eye-popping illustrations steeped in the counter-culture of the 1960s, Williams was creating work that put anyone who sold it at risk of imprisonment. But his faith that he would find an audience endured. And he did. The southern raconteur spoke about creating Juxtapoz magazine, the high stakes of the art game, and why the hell all of us have gotten so damn complacent.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.