About.
Who’s behind the work, what it’s for, and why we keep making it weirder than the algorithm wants us to.
The universe
An independent home for the weird.
Stay Weird Witches is a creator-owned home for witches, watchers, and weirdos — and the films, audio, rituals, and writing we make together. The brand started in Salem and grew outward. The body of work is what binds it.
We make audio dramas, daily videos, microdramas, films, and a weekly podcast about real witchcraft, real history, and all the weird, sulking, thick darkness lurking beneath every day life. We take the dark seriously. We treat the occult as something serious people have always taken seriously, and we try to be worthy of the lineage.
The work is independent and intentionally cinematic. No algorithm-chasing. No jump scares. No costumes. Just craft, and time, and the willingness to sit in mystery long enough to see what’s actually there.
Founder · Host · Witch
Joel Austin.
Recording out of Salem, MA.
The host
A witch who happens to make movies.
I started making content about Salem, witchcraft, and the occult on YouTube in 2018. Since then there have been seventy-seven videos, two seasons of an audio drama recorded inside the houses where the trials happened, a daily video series, and the beginnings of a microdrama universe.
What started as a tour-guide channel about a town I love has slowly become the thing I always wanted it to be: a small studio that takes the occult seriously enough to make great art out of it.
I practice what I make videos about. I read the trials in the original Latin. I record audio dramas with a full cast inside the same houses I’m researching. I make Daily Witchery for the same reason a monk lights a candle in the morning — because the practice makes the work better.
Stay Weird Witches is the next chapter. The same sensibility, made deeper. I’m glad you’re here.
" There's a reason every culture has witches. And we need them now, more than ever. "
— From the channel intro
The host
Four things we believe.
i.
Take the dark seriously.
Most witchcraft content online is either tourist-y or beginner-y. We treat the occult as something serious people have always taken seriously. Real research, real practice, real reverence — and the willingness to admit when we don’t have the answer.
ii.
Make great art out of it.
The point isn’t the spook. It’s the work. Cinematic audio, original scores, recorded on location, written by people who actually read the source material. Pieces you’d recommend to a friend who doesn’t even like horror.
iii.
The coven includes everyone.
Most witchcraft content online is either tourist-y or beginner-y. We treat the occult as something serious people have always taken seriously. Real research, real practice, real reverence — and the willingness to admit when we don’t have the answer.
iv.
Build a body of work that. lasts
Daily Witchery is daily, but we’re playing the long game. Twenty years from now there will be a catalog of audio dramas, films, articles, podcasts, and rituals worth coming back to. We’re making things on purpose, for that reason.
The simplest way in
All are welcome.
All are weird.
Join the newsletter for letters from the studio, or come deeper as a member. Either way — welcome.
Letters from the studio.
New episodes, behind-the-scenes, the occasional invitation. Free. Not too often — just enough.