UFO Hunter Spent Thirty Years Playing Kraftwerk to Aliens in Space

Article by Patrick Hinton                                     September 7, 2020                                           (mixmag.net)

• John Shepherd, a UFO hunter from Michigan is the subject of a 16-minute Netflix documentary called John Was Trying To Contact Aliens. Shepherd spent nearly 30 years trying to contact aliens by broadcasting music into space, favoring “non-commercial music” such as jazz, reggae, Afropop, Kraftwerk, Fela Kuti, Steve Reich and Tangerine Dream.

• The film’s director, Matthew Killip, explores Shepherd’s journey from his upbringing with adoptive grandparents to inventing and building gigantic machinery called S.T.R.A.T. (Special Telemetry Research and Tracking) to transmit signals into deep space.

• Speaking about his musical selections, Shepherd said, “I like rock, but there’s plenty of it out there. It’s a pretty common broadcast. Rather than loud guitars just wailing away, I wanted to go towards where the soul was and have more meaning in that sense. I wanted something that explores human emotion in a warm and effective way. In sending out music, the idea was to communicate that sense of humanness, that feeling and drive, that ecstasy.”

• The film also explores challenges John faced such as the lack of a loving relationship with his single mother, loneliness, feelings of alienation in a conservative living situation exacerbated by his homosexuality, and eventually finding a connection on Earth that changed his life.

Netflix has released a 16-minute documentary called John Was Trying To Contact Aliens, telling the story of John Shepherd, a UFO hunter from Michigan.

Shepherd spent nearly 30 years trying to contact aliens by broadcasting music millions of miles into space, favouring “non-commercial music” such as jazz, reggae, Afropop, Kraftwerk, Fela Kuti, Steve Reich and Tangerine Dream.

Using new footage and archival imagery alongside commentary from John, the Matthew Killip directed film explores John’s journey from his upbringing with adoptive grandparents to inventing and building gigantic machinery called S.T.R.A.T. (Special Telemetry Research and Tracking) to transmit signals into deep space.

Speaking to Pitchfork about his musical selections, John Shepherd said: “I like rock, but there’s plenty of it out there. It’s a pretty common broadcast. Rather than loud guitars just wailing away, I wanted to go towards where the soul was and have more meaning in that sense. I wanted something that explores human emotion in a warm and effective way. In sending out music, the idea was to communicate that sense of humanness, that feeling and drive, that ecstasy.”

1:16 minute trailer for Netflix’ “John Was Trying to Contact Aliens” (‘Netflix’ YouTube)

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