Americana (2012)

We spent a few days following a crew of Grayback forest-firefighters walk up the sides of what most people would consider a cliff to chop down underbrush in preparation for a controlled burn. This is what they like to call "project work," aka the light stuff in between fires, and yet it was still some of the hardest most least-rewarding work we have ever tried to do in our lives. Unless you consider 12-hour-plus shifts of backbreaking labor, virtually zero outside recognition, and occasional accusations of being shills for the timber industry rewards. Which we do not.

This bizarre, lawless land in the California desert is inhabited by drug addicts, eccentrics, army vets, hippies and just plain old weirdos. Slab City is referred to by its residents as "the last free place in America."

We went to Arizona to shoot some absolutely ridiculous and unnecessarily huge guns. Thomas gets a lesson in heavy artillery at the Big Sandy Shoot, where gun enthusiasts gather in Arizona's western desert to test their rifles, canons, and machine guns.

We tagged along with a squad of wilderness firefighters from the Oregonian boonies as they work to prevent their hometown from being torched to ashes like the super inflammable tinderbox that surrounds them on all sides.

We travelled to Muscle Shoals, AL, the birth place of R&B and home to some of the most celebrated recording studios in the history of American music. American artists like Otis Redding & Bob Dylan found their groove in Muscle Shoals, while international groups like the Rolling Stones were drawn by the allure of the place and the music it created. We had a chance to sit down and talk to these legends about the history of FAME Studios, the factors that shaped the Muscle Shoals Sound, and the future of their recording industry in the digital age.

We interviewed the founder of the notorious Michigan Militia to find out about its ties with Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bombing and more.

We went to the American Southwest and met up with some young Navajo cowboys to learn about the rodeo lifestyle.

Amy Ritchie is a hunter, a piano prodigy, and a champion taxidermist. We visited her in North Carolina and listened to her life story, which she told us while skinning a fox.

We went to a world-class firearms training facility near Las Vegas to fire off some rounds and discuss American gun laws.

Traveling from tea parties in Texas to "Oath Keeper" rallies in Massachusetts, VICE investigates whether the country is actually on the verge of the 2nd Revolutionary War.