In today’s episode, Scott “Sourdough” Power discusses his decision not to attend Burning Man this year—an annual pilgrimage that has long been a cornerstone of his creative life. Known for its jaw-dropping installations and rebellious artistic spirit, the festival holds a special place in Scott's heart, particularly for the cherished memories made at Camp Corny, “the friendliest fucking camp in the universe.”

As he explores the reasons behind his absence, Scott balances nostalgia with the realities of life. This year, his daughter’s milestone 13th birthday coincides with the festival, forcing him to weigh family commitments against the allure of the Playa. He candidly shares the bittersweet feelings that come with stepping away from an experience woven into the fabric of his identity.

Scott also reflects on the evolution of Burning Man amid the rise of social media and technology, particularly the introduction of internet service provider Starlink. He questions the impact of these changes on the festival's essence and whether they dilute the very magic that draws so many to the desert. Finally, Scot considers what it means to dance to your own beat, even when the rhythm of life pulls in different directions. 

For more information, please visit https://notrealart.com/why-im-not-going-to-burning-man

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All right, so it's August, and as you might have heard, we're doing something different this August.

We're doing Augustorials.

As you might recall, the last week of every month I drop an auditorial.

An auditorial is just me getting on my little soapbox, ranting and raving about something that's near and dear to my heart, something on my mind, and sometimes it's me being selfish and self indulgent.

Well, that's always the case, right?

Anyway, but hopefully whatever I'm talking about is of value to you.

It has some, some relevancy or utility for you.

And if not, well, I'm sorry, maybe wait till next month, there would be something.

But this month.

Because if it's summer, it's the dog days of summer.

Everyone's busy.

Things slow down in August in a lot of different ways.

And, and I wanted to think about what to do in August.

I'm actually traveling a lot this month and you know, historically we've used August to, you know, typically talk as I Said to the world's most creative people, this is what art, not relart, is.

You know, every week we drop a podcast where I'm talking to an amazing artist or creative professional.

And in the last week of every month, I drop an auditorial with my soapbox.

So this August, I thought I would do something different and drop an auditorial every week.

I've declared this August Augustorial month the month of augustorials.

And each week I'm going to be dropping an auditorial, something near and dear to my heart, on my mind.

And we're going to today talk about something that's always near and dear to my heart because, you know, historically, last few years, I think in August, we always take time to talk to a fellow burner, someone from the Burning man organization.

Because of course, Burning man is, you know, the last, you know, week of August, Labor Day week.

And, you know, I am a core member of a beloved camp, Camp Corny on Playa there.

And so Burning man is something that I love and, you know, been, you know, sort of just, you know, I don't know, I just love it, fucking love it.

And I'm.

And I go every year usually, or I try to, and this year, however, I'm not going.

And I'm going to talk about that a little bit because it's sort of.

I'm very conflicted about it and it's.

But it is what it is.

I'm not going to Burning man, people.

I'm not.

And it's a little weird, I have to say, because my fellow camp mates, my fellow Cornians, are preparing for camp and I'm not with them.

This year I did make it to spring clean.

You know, every, every spring we do a big spring clean.

We have two 40 foot containers full of stuff that, that we take onto Playa every year to build out our camp.

Camp Corney, the Playa's only spirit animal adoption center, we use state of the art technology.

NASA may or may not have been involved in the development of that technology, but we, using the state of the art proprietary technology, we help our fellow burners connect with their spirit animal and then use that spirit animal and take that spirit animal and forge a bond and create their party pole.

Because of course, spirit animals are only nourished and only fed with the dance.

You have to dance with your party pole if you want your spirit animal to thrive and be healthy and give it the, the, the nutritious sustenance that your spirit animal needs to.

To be happy and be healthy.

You have to you have to dance, people.

You have to dance.

And you have to take your party pole with your spirit animal and you get out there and shake your thing, shake your booty and.

Yeah, I said Buddha.

So Camp Corny is a beloved camp.

We've given thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of.

Of.

Of stuffed animals away.

And by the way, these are upcycled stuffed animals.

We, we rescue stuffed animals from thrift shops and secondhand shops around the country.

We bring them to Burning Man.

We give them a second life by connecting them with their spirit, with their adoptive parent, connecting our fellow burners with their spirit animals.

So it's just a lot of fun.

It's just good, funky fun.

And of course, we have killer DJs that come in and play, and people bring their party poles and dance and drink their day away.

And it's because these are day parties as well, which is always kind of fun.

So obviously I love my camp.

I love my camp mates.

I love going to Burning Man.

I've often said that it's required reading for every artist.

I mean, if you're an artist or, or creative professional, going to Burning man is, I think, a required reading.

You've got to go at least once to check it out.

There's a lot of confusion about Burning Man.

There's a lot of criticism about Burning Man.

Some of it is warranted.

Most of it is not.

But you.

If you don't go, you can't know.

And it's easy to criticize shit you don't understand or don't know.

And so I always encourage any artist or creative person to try to go to Burning man at least once so you can check it out.

Because, you know, you've got what, 60, 70, 80,000 people coming together, building a city from.

From nothing, from scratch.

And then, of course, leaving again and leaving no trace.

Because the community is very disciplined about cleanup and, and, and, and making sure that we pack out everything we packed in and on and on.

So it, you know, it.

It is a truly remarkable kind of event.

And, you know, going there is really the only way to understand it.

I mean, and you're always seeing something complet.

Been completely amazing.

And we looked up and saw this incredibly weird alien, like object in the sky that was morphing and, and, and, and expanding and shrinking and just, you know, just moving around in the sky.

And we thought my God, what is that?

What are we.

Are the drugs kicking in?

You know, what is that?

Turned out it was about 300 drones, and these drones were dancing in the sky, and this artist had programmed them to do so.

And in fact, that artist added 300 drones every night for the next five nights.

It was the first of its kind.

It was the first year that.

That this artist had ever done that.

First year that drones had ever been in the skies and artwork, and it was incredible.

Well, last year when I was there, we were dancing on Playa at some camp, having a hell of a time.

The drugs had definitely kicked in.

And we look up, and we see a plane.

We see a plane flying in this plane.

Well, let me back up.

We didn't know it was a plane.

It was actually.

It was.

It was very strange.

Again, kind of an unidentified flying object.

And.

But it was lit up.

It was lit up in such a weird way, because that's what confused us.

Well, wait a minute.

That's.

If that's a plane, that really is a unusual configuration for.

For an airplane with all the lights it had on and everything.

And then, of course, eventually, you realize, well, yeah, it is a plane, but what's going on?

Because it doesn't look like a plane, and there's all these lights on it.

And then about that time, this flying object started firing, shooting fireworks off the wings.

And for the next 15 minutes, this plane flew around and shot fireworks off its wings and off its body.

And it's, I don't know, 2,000ft above playa.

And it gave us the most amazing firework show.

And turns out it was the first time in aviation history that the FAA had ever given a pilot permission to shoot fireworks off the plane.

There's a little bit of a hazard, don't you think?

Little bit of date.

It might be a little dangerous.

Right.

But again, artists.

That's what artists do.

Artists push the envelope.

Artists, you know, create and innovate and do things that never been done before.

And.

And that's what Burning man is.

Burning man is.

Is.

Is an experiment.

It's every year, there are artists that are coming to create, innovate, do things that never been done before.

And so it truly is different every year in so many ways, but it's also the same in many ways every year.

And so.

And that's a little bit of the reason why I'm not going this year, actually.

And it's for me personally, Burning man always has come at a bad time because, you know, my kid, my, my kids go back to school that same time.

And also my daughter's birthday is August 30th, and that's always smack dab in the middle of Burning Man.

So historically I've always gone in early and left early to be here for her birthday or I've gone in after her birthday and stayed later.

I mean, because you always have to go in early to set up.

You have to stay later to break camp down.

And so historically I have only really been there half the time.

And it's, it's always just been kind of inconvenient because of course I don't want to miss my daughter's birthday.

Of course.

Well, this year my daughter turns 13.

It's a milestone year.

I can't believe, I can't believe it.

It's crazy.

She's 13.

But you know, I, and I don't want to miss a minute of it.

I don't want to miss a minute of it.

And so that's one of the reasons why I'm not going to Burning man this year.

And you know, that's, that's one of the reasons.

Another reason I'm not going to Burning man this year is because, you know, quite frankly, I'm the only burner in my family.

My kids are too young, at least at this point.

Although I like to joke, Burning man is made for two people, children and adults on drugs.

Because it has that kind of playfulness, that kind of kind of excitement.

Kids absolutely love Birdman.

Kids are there, families go.

I mean, there's a whole area for families that I want to bring their kids.

I mean, it really is a wonderful, wonderful experience for kids.

Some of my campmates bring their kids.

It's, it's just wonderful.

But anyway, it's, it's, it's, it's, you know, I'm the only burner in my family.

My wife doesn't burn and you know, God bless her, you know, to each their own, you know.

But quite frankly, you go, I go to Burning man.

My heart gets expanded, my mind gets expanded, my spirit gets expanded.

And then I come back to LA and nobody gives a shit, Nobody really cares.

And that's fine, to each their own.

But it's always a little anticlimactic and it's all, you know, re entry back into the so called default world is, is always hard, always hard for anybody.

But I've often found that for me it's, it's It's a little extra sad and depressing coming home after having seen so many awesome things and had so many awesome experiences with so many awesome people.

It's.

Ye.

I don't know.

It's a little depressing, a little anticlimactic for me.

And I've done that for many years.

And part of me just doesn't want to do that again.

Part of me doesn't want to feel that way again.

And.

And so that's one of the reasons why I'm not going this year.

And then last, I think, like, if there's another reason why I'm not going this year, this, this.

This won't stop me necessarily from going back.

But, you know, last year when I came back, it seemed that there was so much posting on social media about Burning Man.

And by the way, let me take a step back.

One of the cool things about Burning man that I've always enjoyed is that you were off the grid.

You know, it was like, it was an extreme remote camping trip where you would go and there was no Internet, and at least there was to a certain point, and then they would shut it down, and then you had no Internet for the whole week.

Then eventually they did create a WI FI tent where if you wanted to connect to WI Fi, you could go ride your bike to the WI FI tent and connect on the Internet and, you know, send that email or check your email or call home or whatever you needed to do, which, okay, fine, get that.

You know, emergencies happen, things happen.

Sometimes you want to connect.

And I get that.

But the thing that really changed the game in recent years was the Starlink product created by the one and only Elon Musk.

And Starlink as a product is amazing.

Absolutely amazing.

But what's happened is, you know, feels like so many camps now have Starlinks.

And basically what that means is Bernie Man's on the grid now, and people are posting and emailing and connecting when, quite frankly, they should be unplugging.

And for me, that's a huge, huge point about Burning Man.

It's about, you know, unplugging from the default world and plugging in, so to speak, to this remote, isolated oasis in the desert and, and, you know, connecting with your.

With your fellow campmates and your community there.

And, and so the Internet, the Starlink product, I think, has, is.

Is.

Is a toxic element, honestly, to the.

To the culture and to the experience of Burning Man.

And because it's, you know, now people are carrying around their can, you know, their phones, they're posting and then what happens is, you know, I come home from this experience, and, you know, we used to say, you know, you have to be there, you know, to know it's all very ephemeral.

If you.

If you weren't there, then you missed it.

And.

But what happens is I come home now and I go on Instagram or I go on Social, and they're just photos and movies and images from Burning man all over the place.

And for me, it's.

It's just a little disappointing.

So it's like they take.

It's not special anymore, right?

Like.

Like I.

You.

It's very difficult to get there.

It's very expensive to go, and you want to feel like it was, you know, an effort that you made that was very exclusive in the way that it was, you know, had to make the effort to be there to see the stuff.

And.

And it was difficult.

It was expensive, yes.

But at least when you got there, you felt like, oh, this is worth the effort and it's very special.

And I'm here, and we're all here.

And so, you know, this is a little private kind of personal thing, right?

And then now when people are just posting and writing about on Social, it just.

I don't know, it's just.

For me, it sort of dilutes it, you know, and sort of ruins the.

The mystery and the.

And the personal nature of it and commercializes it.

And quite frankly, you know, one of the core principles of Burning man is decommodification.

And you know, as people are posting and putting things on Social, it commodifies, as far as I'm concerned.

And so that was one of the things that struck me last year.

I got back there, it just felt like there's so much more stuff on Social, and it's just been growing over the years.

And.

And I blame Starlink, quite frankly, and not the company per se, but the product.

And people, you know, we.

We seem to.

Can't, you know, we seem to be unable to live without the Internet anymore.

And people can't even go camping for a week and not want to post about it.

And so, again, to each their own.

All good.

But just for me personally, it was just something that was kind of made me a little sad.

And so, I don't know, between my.

My.

My daughter's birthday, this kind of anticlimactic feeling.

I have a little depression.

I have when I come home, and no one gives a shit.

And, And.

And number three, this.

This, you know, commodification, Starlink, you know, you know, Being on the grid on Playa with people posting and what have you, I just.

It's a bit of a turn off for me.

And so, I don't know, I just took.

I decided to take the year off.

And I love my camp.

I love my camp mates.

There's going to be so many amazing things that I missed this year and there will be people that I won't see this year because, you know, I only see them at Burning man once a year.

And so lovely humans, amazing people.

Smart, creative, fun, funny, tough, strong.

All these things.

And.

And I won't get to see them this year because I'm not going.

And so, you know, that's.

That's what it is.

And you know, this year's theme sounds amazing.

Tomorrow today.

Tomorrow today is today's theme.

This year's theme.

And so I guess.

I guess the irony is that because of all the social media posting, thanks to Starlink, I guess on a certain level, I won't miss it.

I'll just be able to follow it all on social.

Right?

Which is both a blessing and a curse, I guess.

More of a curse, really.

Well, that's it.

I don't know.

That's my soapbox for today.

I'm not going to Burning Man.

I'm sad about it.

I just wanted to rant about it and, you know, but I'm, you know, I'm sad about it, but I'm also cool with it.

I am.

I'm totally cool with it.

I just, you know, I wanted to share what was going on because usually in August we do something Burning man related.

And so this year I'm just going to talk about it on this little August torial that we're doing.

So.

Okay, enough of that.

I know many of you are rolling your eyes.

You know, it's like, sick of Burning Man.

I hate Burning Man.

Burning man burners are annoying.

Well, maybe I am annoying, but you know what?

That's okay, too.

And I don't know what else to say.

That's it.

All right, people, this is Sourdough.

Over and out Foreign.

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