My Story

Anna Carson talked to Matt Bowden about Spike Detox, Steward Ownership of Xtralife Health Science, and building a new health system one cell at a time.

      November 2023 I spoke with Natalie Cutler-Welsh on Reality Check Radio about coming out of the Thailand exile, having a strong sense that my work was not done in New Zealand. From 20 years running a pharmaceutical company and the last 5 specifically negotiating with government on toxicology testing I was concerned…

April 2023 profile piece from Kelly Dennett on “Everything that happened after: Former party pill king Matt Bowden on going broke, and his new business idea.” Lawrence Smith’s pictures are awesome! Visit Stuff.co.nz

December 2022, Wilhelmina Shrimpton’s Award winning Today FM piece High & Die: The Fentanyl Problem, picked up Radio New Zealand award for best long form documentary. Fentanyl began appearing in New Zealand Emergency Departments as predicted, so it was time to talk about alteratives to drug war again. You can view the full doco by…

  28 May 2022, Vice UK checked in with us to report on the important contribution NZ made to global drug policy. Is the World’s Weirdest Drug Market In New Zealand? | The War on Drugs A very positive piece which quickly racked up 3.5 million views stating the global war on drugs was almost…

2021: Josie Adams’ “How NZ lost it’s head in the BZP Party Pill Experiment” form Spinoff and also ran in NZ Herald. I had arrived back in New Zealand and the regulatory safety system we had been setting up had been sabotaged, and 80 young New Zealanders tragically died as a result. This was the…

2018, This RE:NEWS interview from my exile period in Thailand, after our drug safety testing systems were removed in New Zealand and a dangerous new drug came and had killed 20 people at that point, as I have predicted would happen. “It should have been rats that were killed, not young humans.” Lots of cool…

July 2016: Hamilton’s Pharmacopeia: The Synthetic Marijuana Steampunk Rock Opera Friends told me Shane Smite was talking to Joe Rogan about what we were doing in NZ, Hamilton Morris phoned and said he wanted to come and film our new lab. Next minute 5 of them flrew from New York and showed up on my…

March 2015 Maia Svalavitz, American neuroscience journalist who covers drugs, addiction and public policy flew down to NZ and spent some time with us and wrote this beautiful piece for Pacif Standard. https://psmag.com/social-justice/the-drug-lord-with-a-social-mission-also-performs-under-the-alter-ego-starboy

December 2012. GoTV is a 24 hour Music TV Channel based in Vienna Austria, This story is in German and focuses on the music.  

“Designer Drugs” Feb 2012. When I got the message that National Geographic were sending a team from UK to investigate me I felt like I was a blue toed frog or something being catalogued as an anomally or fascination of nature.

2011 Australia 60 minutes’ Liz Hayes came to New Zealand to compare what we were doing with the failed war on drug efforts in Australia. This was my 3rd 60 minutes. To be honest when they asked if I was comfortable I was getting really uncomfortable. I disliked the idea of smoking products, disagreed with…

A well made documentary featuring Dr Steve Miller. Steve was Clinical Director for AngelCare, an American Psychologist who had been to Woodstock, served in Vietnam, developed nursing syllabus at Massey University and was a dear friend. There is a quote I used in a song I wrote for him on INDUCTION EP called “Last Mile”…

May 2005, Veteran broadcaster Paul Holmes interviews me with Minister Jim Anderton. Both these men were national treasures who I really enjoyed working with. RIP guys. Paul loved what we were doing and understood the politicians needed to have pressure kept on. I knew I was doing the right thing and would eventually get my…

2004. Looking at the AngelCare service we provided for ‘munter support’ in nightclubs and dance parties. Flipside was a youth news and entertainment talk show that aired on TV2 from 2002 to 2004. It was hosted by Mike Puru and this episode they came out and talked to our AngelCare volunteers. We set up a…

2004, Sex, Drugs & Hard House .. Here is where it all began. Must watch! This was my first media experience and the highest rating 60 minutes episode of the year. It was immediately pirated and streaming everywhere. You can see thepurity of intention we had, the clinical response to the STOP P product, AngelCare…