My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - Celebrity Hometowns with Phoebe Bridgers

Episode Date: December 15, 2021

For a special treat, Karen and Georgia sit down with celebrity guests to hear their stories, from hometown murders to personal accounts of mayhem to legendary family lore. Today's guest is Phoebe Bridgers.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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And welcome. To my favorite murder. Celebrity Hometown Edition. Where we talk to our really popular friends about their own hometowns and stuff that got them into true crime or out of true crime or near true crime. That's right. It's very exciting this week because we have such a famous friend on the zoom. Highly famous friend.

She's killing it. That's right. You guys, it's Phoebe Bridgers. Yeah. Hello. Hi. I'm so excited to be here. Thank you guys.

I've been listening for a long time. So this is pretty sweet for me. Now Phoebe, is that the kind of thing a lot of musicians do on the road as they turn to podcasts in their times of travel and isolation? Would you say? Yeah, because there are days on tour where you couldn't pay me to hear more music, you know. So you just walk, it's weird because I have, I feel like I have associations with this show in specific cities that the murders aren't based in. Like I remember exactly where I was when you talked about like the, was it the Led Zeppelin concert? Oh yeah.

The Who. It was The Who. Oh, it was The Who. Yeah. I was walking in Rhode Island. I just have like very like weird pictures of things along with episodes, which is strange. That's very cool. It's so weird to be in a musician's head since like we have songs that we associate with certain places and like to have a podcast sometimes correct, sometimes not correct podcasts in your head.

I'm honored to be there. Yeah. Yeah, it's great. It's great. What else do you do when you're on the road? Like how do you kind of fill that time aside from podcasts? Or anything you want to share with us? Well, COVID was weird.

Like I just got off tour. Yeah. And you're in such a bubble. I mean, like obviously it's great to be safe, but if the health of the entire tour rests on every individual, like we weren't allowed to go to restaurants. Yeah. We're all like so respectful of each other and, you know, curbside coffee pickup is the closest to an adventure you can do, but. Wow, that's a huge change, right? Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Because I feel like mostly you pick an errand and you make it take all day on tour because you just need like an excuse for some alone time or something. Yeah. I mean, there are lots of lots of just like aimless wandering and we all got a lot closer and stuff. Mark, who is my guitar tech handmade like 3D printed a board game. What? Because he's a fucking nerd and everybody played it like in hotel rooms. Oh, I love that.

It kind of is like D&D, I feel like is what it like it's it's kind of like role play game. He's made up an entire role play game on his own as while doing his hard job. Yes. He was like, let me go quickly. Wow. Very, very rock and roll. That's very rock and roll. That's so cool.

Are the audiences, do you feel how much more excited they are to be at a public venue watching music comparatively? Oh, yeah. Yeah. It's crazy. It's just it's also like I don't think I was expecting as young a demographic because I feel like I've opened for a lot of people and I'd been on my own tour but they were all kind of like people my age. Yeah. I feel like was my thing and then I think I like I saw so many kids where it's like their first concert or like the last concert they went to is with their parents. Wow.

And people like dress up all crazy it was so it was so different from from what I expected. Like I feel like when I was a kid, it like wasn't cool to dance. It wasn't cool to like try hard. Like he tried to it was like in the grime. I feel like it was so popular when I was a teenager. Yeah. And now it's like you're allowed to come to a concert with like crazy glitter all over your face and with your five friends and it's just so it's so cool. Like enthusiasm is cool again.

Exactly. Like like Ernesty is cool again. Yeah. Which is. Ernesty. That's your next album. Ernesty. Yes.

How about Ernesty goes to camp? Totally. Oh, that's amazing. Should we drop the bomb that Phoebe you and I dressed up as the same thing for Halloween? We literally did. I was I was Megan Fox and my boyfriend was machine gun Kelly for Halloween. Yes. I got to see the picture.

Yeah. Did you do a wig or. I did. I went to party city like two days before the party and bought a wig that was one of the last basically like long sexy hair is what it said on the front and the girl when I got up to the counter the girl was like she held it up and very slowly said you can't return this after today. And I was like okay like I don't what are you doing and then I took it home and took it out of the bag and someone had absolutely worn it before. It smelled like someone else. It was a little bit like I had to brush it out. It had been used and they also they trim the bangs a little bit.

I just kind of like I just kind of looked at it and I was like shit. Oh well. Okay. Oh my God and bangs are historically inaccurate too. Yes, I had to cover them. I defold the longer hair over the bangs. Otherwise no one would know who you were. Yeah, exactly.

It'd be like we don't get it. We don't get which no one did. No one had any idea what I was doing because I wore the long wig and then I wore Fox ears. So I was like really giving them a hint and then I brought my dog Frank and he was supposed to be machine gun Kelly. But you know because he had he had a studded collar on. So rad. No one got it. I, yeah, I feel like I became, I don't know how you felt, but I became a completely different person.

Yeah, like I was my own alter ego. Right. Like I made out with my friend Lucy. We're like not even very physically affectionate with each other in real life and we've known each other for so long and we just were like, why have we never made out? I love it. So stupid. Oh my God Fred. I miss days of like, I feel like that's such a 20s thing is like make out with your friend at your best friend at a party.

Like that's just like, that made me miss parties. That's how you party. No, I need to, like everybody who saw me that night, like I need to hand out some NDAs for sure. And like nip slip constant. Yes. You looked really different though. The wig was like a life changer. It really was a complete image changer for you.

No, nobody knew who I was. I went to my friend's Halloween party and I could tell that she was like, hi, how's it going? Like, I'm supposed to know who this person is. And I was like, it's Phoebe. I literally didn't know you were Phoebe. They did not know you were Megan Fox. They knew I was Megan Fox. They did not know I was myself.

Hell yeah. You got to take advantage. Yeah. It's the best. I love that. Dream Halloween. Yeah. No, it was great.

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All right, should we do this? Yeah, I can't wait to hear as like someone who actually listens. It's really exciting to like hear your take on this. Yeah, well, I did not heed any advice because I feel like you guys talk a lot about how like, oh, it's supposed to be fun. And this is this is like the opposite of fun. What I know, great. We don't need fun. No, not at all.

It's so fucking dark. It's so dark. And and it's like the, you know, I feel like it's the general definition of a hometown. It's not my hometown. Great. But I was playing with city and color. I was opening acoustic with my friend Marshall who plays drums for me. And if you don't know city and color, like a folk band, like they're fun and like so sweet.

And it was the last night of this tour that I'd had a great time. And I walk into this club in Albuquerque called the Sunshine Theater. And yeah, it's like supposed to be fun. It's like your last night and it just like, it was totally off. It just felt like, like later in the night, for example, like someone broke a bottle over somebody's head. Wow. And again, it's like fucking, it's like if you did that at a fucking like me concert, it's just so, it's so off. Like city and color are folky.

Like it makes no fucking sense. Like get your shit together. And but it was just weird. Like people were too drunk and it was creepy. And then like, like when we got in the backstage, I was like, why does this feel so fucking weird? And I then was immediately embarrassed because I saw that someone who worked at the venue was right behind me. And like, you know, you don't nobody wants to know that their venue feels weird. Yeah.

So I was like, why does this feel so weird? And this woman goes, well, obviously it feels weird. Like, are you talking about what happened? Oh, no. I was like, I was like, what do you mean? And then she told me the story. Oh my God. And I haven't stopped thinking about it.

Oh my God. I'm nervous. So Marissa Matthews Wifler was a 16 year old girl from Santa Fe, New Mexico. She had dreams of becoming a fashion designer. She made all her own clothes at school. Like she wore her own clothes that she made, which is just like, we all knew that girl. She was so cool. Yeah.

Like everybody's jealous. She made her own prom dress. And she was part of the Gay Street Alliance. Like just awesome. Everybody said she was like the sweetest girl ever. And she was a huge, huge, huge atmosphere fan, which is so sweet. Like so fun. And so on Wednesday, July 16th, 2003, Marissa and her friends went to see atmosphere at

the Sunshine Theater in Albuquerque, which is where I played. And she was dancing barefoot, like having a blast with a bunch of other people doing that. But she cut her foot on a piece of broken glass, which is also strange because I just said someone broke a bunch of glass at the show. Yeah. So she cut her foot open and she's like, you guys, I got to go fix this, but they're all having a blast and dancing.

So she goes off to, you know, figure it out by herself. And then nobody sees her again for the rest of the night. And they are not with an adult. I don't think she was even supposed to go to the show. And they drove pretty far. So they wait for her for like an hour, no cell phones. So they have to go home and just immediately they tell their parents. But that's, it's been kind of a long time.

And they put up flyers and they report her missing and everybody's freaking out. And like everybody assumes for the next couple of days that she must have been abducted from the theater, but three days after she vanished, the police received an anonymous tip that led them to search the venue instead. And there they found the body of a young girl who was completely nude except for a tank top, which was wrapped around her neck. And it was confirmed to be Marissa and the cause of death was strangulation. Oh my God.

How fucked up is this? Yeah. The tip also led police to look into 22 year old Dominic Akers, a six foot tall, 380 pound man who worked as a janitor at the venue. And when police question him, he immediately confesses. Oh God. Holy shit. And the tip came from his dad.

No way. Oh man. Ugh. Yeah. It's so, it's so bad. So Dominic tells police that he told Marissa he was a security guard and offered to help with her foot injury and offered to introduce her to slug the atmosphere. Remember she had a crush on, which is the worst part of it.

Evil. He led her upstairs to the projection room in the back of the theater. He raped and strangled her. He left her body in the projection room. And then the next day moved it to a storage area and covered the entrance of the vending machine. And that's where she was found. Wow.

But this is where it gets just like, ugh. It's just, yeah. It keeps me up at night because one year before the concert Dominic pled guilty to raping and molesting his four year old relative, which should have sent him to prison for 33 years. But in July 2002, district judge Ross Sanchez agreed to suspend his sentence and instead it gave him five years probation. Wow, it's from 30 years to five years probation. Yeah.

For child rape. That's insane. For child rape. Yeah, for child rape. Meanwhile, like people obviously are in prison for like weed. Yes. Right. It's just so, it's so bullshit.

And then the venue when they hired him didn't take the like, you know, cost like a couple bucks to do a background check. And it would have taken like five minutes to do and they didn't do a background check. So Marissa's parents end up suing the Sunshine Theater for negligence because a bunch of people saw her clearly intoxicated, dancing around, needing help, and nobody did anything. Nobody said anything. So Dominic pled guilty to first degree murder and was sentenced to life in prison plus 37 years for Marissa's murder, as well as 33 years for violating probation when he killed her.

He is currently serving his sentence in New Mexico. He was quoted saying he had to kill her because he didn't want to go back to jail. When were you there? Yeah, I was going to say, compared to this crime, when were you feeling the vibe? I played, what, Marissa, what year was that? That must have been 20, 2015 or 16. Wow. Wait, wait, this is Googleable.

Oh, do you ever wonder out loud? Easily find out about facts. So over 10 years later, and you walk in this venue and you're like, something is fucking off here and you just immediately had bad vibes from it that much later? I could say that it's because it was haunted or creepy or something, but really I just meant too many drunk people too early. I wasn't saying, oh my god, this venue is so fucking haunted. It was like, these vibes are weird, and then the woman jumps the gun and is like, well,

you know what happened? Yeah. What year was it? Okay, 2016, so over 10 years later. Wow. But it is almost still this vibe of people are drinking too much more than they should. They're fighting at a music venue instead of it's not a fucking honky tonk, and I feel like you still picked up on these, something is off for everybody here.

Yeah, at a fucking folk concert. It's like, grow up, people. So immediately following Marissa's murder, Marissa's friends and family began pressuring local politicians to pass new laws that would have prevented her murder. Two bills were put into place in New Mexico, Marissa's sunshine law, which required that sex offenders on probation must notify their employers, which is crazy that that wasn't true before. Right.

And Marissa's law, which reformed laws dealing with sex offenders, including mandatory minimum prison and parole sentences, as well as increased treatment, which is so cool. But I think it's so sad when, like, sorry to keep going about this. I think it's so sad that, like, if you were to glean a lesson from this, it's like, don't have fun and don't trust people who work at the venue. You're right. Like, that shouldn't be a lesson that anyone should have to learn. Right.

Totally. Because the poor dad, like Dominic, the murderer's dad, like, are you kidding me? Yeah. Like, there are so many survivors and, like, sad stories in this. Totally. Yeah. Wow. The stories that are so horrible and awful that then something comes out of them, which

is keeping other people safe in the future, is like the only silver lining we can look for. And I'm like, that's great. Yeah. Totally. And there's something charity called Calling All Crows, which is a nonprofit that I heard about forever ago, because I don't know about you guys, but, like, I had totally creepy experiences at concerts, and a lot of the time you're, like, going kind of behind your

parents back and nobody knows where you are. Yes. Totally. And, like, if somebody, if somebody fucks with you at a concert, like, you're totally on your own. Yeah. Right. So this charity called Calling All Crows, it's a nonprofit, and it's trained over

3,000 musicians, venue and festival staff about, like, prevention and response for sexual violence. Wow. Which is so cool. Yeah. So I thought, you know, you guys do this a lot, which I love, but I thought I'd make a donation in Marissa's name today for Calling All Crows. Beautiful.

I thought that would be cool. Maybe. That is amazing. Georgia. Georgia, we should do the exact same thing. Yeah, match it. We'll match it. And we'll all donate to it.

I love that. Hell yeah. Sweet. That's amazing. Oh, my God, I'm sweating, like, homework. You get, guess what? You get an A plus. That was really beautifully done.

You did great. That was beautifully done. That was really nicely told. And really, like, it is your hometown because it's something that, like, kind of personally affected you. That still counts. And it is, like, and it's your milieu. That's the world you're in.

And it's important to talk about stuff like that as horrible as it is. It's important to, like, talk about it and bring it to light to try to prevent it in the future. Really good job. Yeah. Totally. Thank you. Gorgeous.

Thank you so much. Phoebe, that was incredible. Very nice. Amazing. Phoebe, how many pages was that? How many pages did you print up? Just three. Nice.

Oh, my God, did I miss a whole other page? Now you know what it's like. Yeah, right. I missed a page. But no, no, no. You did great. No, no, we're good. That's great.

I'm going to plug the touring in 2022. See, I don't even know when that's happening. You're like, I did not agree to any touring in 2022. I'm like, what do you mean? That was amazing. Phoebe fucking Bridgers, thank you so much for being a celebrity guest on this podcast. Yes. Huge fans of yours, obviously.

We love you. It's our honor that you're here. Thank you so much for, you know, thanks for being a part of all of it. Thank you guys. Just follow Phoebe at Phoebe underscore Bridgers on Twitter and Phoebe Bridgers on Instagram and just follow her as a fan because she's the coolest. Follow her life. Pay attention.

Yes. Follow me home. No. Take a step back. Awesome. Yay. Thank you. Yay.

Thanks guys. Bye. Elvis, do you want a cookie? This has been an exactly right production. Our producer is Hannah Kyle Creighton, our associate producer is Alejandra Keck, engineered and mixed by Andrew Epid. Send us your hometowns at myfavoritmurder at gmail.com. Follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at myfavoritmurder and Twitter at myfavemurder.

For more information about the podcast, live shows, merch, or to join the fan cult, go to myfavoritmurder.com. And please rate, review and subscribe. Goodbye. Goodbye. Okay.