Your Dark Companion Podcast

In this episode of Your Dark Companion, Mike Rhyner welcomes Dallas music staple Chad Stockslager — better known as Mr. Chad — for a wide-ranging, funny, and deeply musical conversation about a life spent chasing the right notes.

Chad traces his journey from a childhood epiphany sparked by The Wizard of Oz to becoming one of the most in-demand keyboard players in North Texas. He shares stories from his early Terrell and Deep Ellum ...

In this episode of Your Dark Companion, Mike Rhyner sits down with acclaimed broadcaster Dana Larson for a wide-ranging conversation about preparation, authenticity, and what it really means to tell sports stories well.

Dana reflects on her journey from growing up watching football with her family to building a respected career covering the Dallas Mavericks, Texas Rangers, and some of the most meaningful moments in Texas sports his...

Some radio careers are planned. This one happened because someone needed a name on the spot — and said it confidently enough.

In this episode of Your Dark Companion, Mike Rhyner sits down with legendary radio architect George Gimarc for a deep, funny, and surprisingly emotional conversation about how alternative radio actually came to be — not as a movement, but as a series of accidents, instincts, and battles fought on the air.

Ge...

When the roads are iced over, the guests bail, and nobody’s going anywhere… you improvise.

In this episode of Your Dark Companion, Mike Rhyner, Grego, and Shoopy go full work-from-home mode as North Texas locks itself indoors under ice, school closures, and an “abundance of caution.” What was supposed to be a normal show turns into an OG weather emergency episode — and somehow still covers plenty of ground.

The guys start with froz...

Some careers are carefully mapped out. Others start because you needed gas.

In this episode of Your Dark Companion, Mike Rhyner and Grubes sit down with Matt Hicks, the longtime radio voice of the Texas Rangers, to trace a broadcasting journey that took more than two decades, dozens of towns, and one perfectly timed phone call to finally reach the major leagues.

Hicks walks through his path from a childhood spent reenacting games o...

For years, Tony Smith was exactly where you wanted him — behind the glass, keeping the lights on, the sound clean, and occasionally dropping a perfectly timed Dancing with the Stars reference that somehow became radio gold.

In this episode of Your Dark Companion, Mike Rhyner and Grubes welcome longtime Ticket engineer Tony “the Engineer” Smith for a candid, funny, and surprisingly emotional conversation about radio life, finding yo...

Watching one movie a night sounds relaxing. Watching eleven a day sounds like a cry for help.

This episode of Your Dark Companion finds Mike Rhyner and Grubes welcoming back James Faust, Artistic Director of the Dallas International Film Festival, as DIFF gears up for its 20th anniversary. From the brutal realities of screening thousands of submissions to the delicate art of choosing films that won’t make audiences flee the theater...

They’re called The Cars, but there’s no engine, no steering wheel, and no gas involved — just songs that still take people places.

In this episode of Your Dark Companion, Mike Rhyner and Grubes welcome author and musician Bill Janovitz to talk about his book Let the Stories Be Told, a deeply researched, clear-eyed look at one of the most influential — and quietly complicated — bands of the late ’70s and ’80s.

Janovitz walks through...

Mike Rhyner welcomes a new voice into the Sunset Lounge universe — and it’s one that knows more about dirt than just about anyone alive.

Howard Garrett, better known as the Dirt Doctor, joins the show to talk about his transition from decades of terrestrial radio into the podcast world, and the unlikely path that led him there. What starts as a conversation about gardening quickly turns into a deeper discussion about health, indust...

Covering sports in Dallas isn’t just about games — it’s about managing chaos, fan outrage, front-office dysfunction, and the occasional once-in-a-generation disaster.

In this episode of Your Dark Companion, Mike sits down with Sean McFarland of the Dallas Morning News to talk about what it’s actually like covering Texas sports from the inside. Sean walks through his path from New England to North Texas, the culture shock of Texas h...

The Cowboys’ season is officially over, the Super Bowl will once again proceed without them, and somebody has to explain how we got here. So Mike Rhyner, Grubes, and Joseph Hoyt of the Dallas Morning News sit down to do exactly that — calmly, rationally, and with just the right amount of disbelief.

This episode breaks down a Cowboys season that somehow featured one of Dak Prescott’s best years and one of the worst defenses the fran...

Welcome to the Best Of 2025 of Your Dark Companion — a beautifully chaotic time capsule of how this show somehow survived lightning strikes, live disasters, questionable fashion choices, deeply honest conversations, and more than a few moments where someone probably should’ve said, “hey, maybe don’t say that.”

This episode is part victory lap, part therapy session, part sports bar conversation that accidentally gets profound. You’l...

Recorded in March of 2025 at the EarthX Conference, this episode of Your Dark Companion features one of the most singular minds Mike Rhyner has ever sat across from.

Jeff “Skunk” Baxter is best known as a legendary guitarist for Steely Dan and The Doobie Brothers—but that’s only the beginning. Over the course of an expansive, thoughtful conversation, Baxter walks through a life that connects jazz chords, rock tours, missile defense...

It’s the last live hang before the holidays, and Your Dark Companion does what it does best: wanders happily from topic to topic, trips over nostalgia, and somehow lands on donuts, Rubik’s Cubes, World Series box scores, and the existential sadness of aging rock stars.

Mike, Grego, Shoopy, and Kevin (Expo) settle in at Dudley’s for a loose, laugh-heavy, very OG holiday episode. Shoopy drops a major life update, Expo casually solves...

Mike Rhyner and Grubes welcome Cliff McClelland, the creator/producer/head mad scientist behind A Creature Was Stirring—a PG Christmas zombie-apocalypse movie for kids, filmed mostly in Garland (because of course it was). Cliff explains how COVID, teaching theater at Richardson High, and accidentally growing a “surprisingly legit Santa beard” led to one big question: What does Santa do when the world shuts down and kids can’t even ...

Mike Rhyner and Grubes welcome Kirby Warnock—Texas music historian, documentary filmmaker, former Buddy Magazine guy, current West Texas ranch resident, and (because why not) candidate for Pecos County Judge, aka “the law west of the Pecos.”

From there, it turns into a love letter to the era when Dallas actually had a real music scene (yes, kids, before the algorithm), with deep dives into Kirby’s documentaries—especially Jimmy &am...

Mike, Grubes, and the Live at Five crew welcome back the grooviest cat in Dallas music history: Tim DeLaughter of Tripping Daisy and The Polyphonic Spree. They get into what it really takes to move an army of robed weirdos around the world, why a 28-person band actually “moves like a small band,” and how a nightmare power outage at David Bowie’s Meltdown Festival somehow turned into the Spree’s big bang moment.

Tim walks us through...

Mike and Grubes welcome back Elizabeth Whatley and introduce Nigel X, the team breathing life back into South Dallas’ legendary Forest Theater. From a liquor store-turned-headquarters to an $80-million-plus renovation and a week-long grand opening in November 2026, this episode digs into what it really takes to save a historic Black arts institution—and why it matters for seven generations to come.

Elizabeth breaks down the wild ca...

Mike welcomes two new residents of the Sunset Lounge universe: Signal 51 Chronicles hosts Jake White and John Henry, a former Fort Worth narcotics sergeant and a twice-laid-off Star-Telegram journalist who somehow turned bar stories into a true crime podcast. They break down what “Signal 51” actually means, why Fort Worth PD radio codes make for good show titles, and how a cop and a writer went from hanging out at the Mule Pub to d...