A Phil Austin Story - This is the first audiobiography of Phil Austin I created shortly after his death.

Grateful Firesign - My 2nd Austin bio, this was inspired by an interview Phil did on WBAI about writing a screen play for the Grateful Dead. I combined it with Jack Kerouac's story, Visions of Neal and the 3 Stooges, considering how close Neal Cassady was to the Dead. Also featured, the Credibility Gap's portrayal of the 3 Stooges during a phone strike in LA in the early 70s. Various Beat generation folks make their appearances, and Bergman tells of losing a girl friend to Neal Cassady.

I Think We're All Bergmans On This Bus - As requested, an audiobiography of Peter Bergman, including stories of his death from a Phil Proctor interview.

Ossman Collage Graduation - Also upon request, an audiobiography of David Ossman on his 79th birthday.

The 6th Album (Part 1)
The 6th Album (Part 2)
David Ossman suggested I put the solo albums he and Phil Austin did together in 1973 with Proctor and Bergman's TV or Not TV (plus some extras from the TV or Not TV film) into one "album" Dave calls The 6th Album.

We're Doomed! Part One


HAPPY BIRTHDAY 2020:
Peter Bergman - Peter Bergman is born. World War 2 breaks out. Coincidence? Pete learns to make pretend butter. Goes to schools. Joins the Army. Starts the Firesign Theatre, Dies.
David Ossman - David Ossman unpacks his archives at a benefit for Hearts and Hammers at Langley, Washington's Clyde Theatre in 2019. The Not Insane 2020 campoon gets underway.

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Cars - In 2013, The Firesigns were given a digital radio station and needed programming. I created a series of 1-hour shows, collecting Firesign bits around a central theme. Considering the Firesign's interest in cars, or at least car ads, I created this piece. The whole series was called Freetime with the Cat Man, at Phil Austin's suggestion.

Cars A
Cars B
Cars C


Dope Humour - In 2013, Phil Austin asked us chatters for show ideas for the new Firesign Theatre streaming radio. I suggested some themed collages and then made 20 of them. Phil wanted the show to be called Free Time with the Cat Man. Here's a show I call Dope Humour. After listening to it, hopefully you'll go out and buy the brand new Firesign vinyl release Dope Humor of the 70s.

Firemusic - Columbia advertised the guys as the only rock group that doesn't need music. Maybe not "need" but they sure generated a lot of it. Since he was a small child, Proctor would burst into song at the drop of a hat, particularly if coins were thrown into that hat. All those Beatles references in their songs, not coincidental for, as the Library of Congress calls them, The Beatles of Comedy. "They" began as a musical act at Yale in 1960, Bergman writing lyrics and Proctor singing. Their last album The Bride of Firesign ended with a duet, which inspired the add-on mini-collage Cousins. Play on, 5th crazy guy! - Cousins

Food - Fantasy foods formulated by the Firesign Theatre. Swell libations too!

Rocket Bozos - Bozo boards his rocket ship and visits Australia, New Zealand, Planet X (it is after all, a Rocket Ship) and finally the middle east.  Not surprisingly, he finds the Firesign Theatre wherever he goes.

Rocket Bozos 2 - Bozo assembles a rocket ship with help from Phil Proctor.  Bozo then visits China, Russia and Mexico.

Power Show - The central message from all of the Firesign work has been Power, They want to empower YOU to resist the powers seeking to oppress you, To quote Phil Austin, "If you can laugh at it, it has no power over you."

Transportation - Based on a Firesign concert in Seattle in '94, which they dubbed The Transportation Museum.



Adventures In Hell - This is the first in a series of autobiographical collages, starting with events that happened in my early childhood. Beginning with my favourite Dylan tune, my story continues with a bit from Phil Austin's radio show Hollywood Nightshift, part 2 of their Train to Hell. Austin's song from Roller Maidens. The CBC comedy show The Debaters features a debate about the relative merits of heaven and hell, http://www.cbc.ca/radio/thedebaters. A clip from Dwarf is followed by Bergman's  radio free oz show from 1966, and finally my 1996 play Big Time with its debating angel and devil.

Death Takes A Holiday - Death Takes a Holiday is my second autobiographical collage, continuing from last weeks train ride to hell. It begins with Hellbound Train, by Savoy Brown. That's followed by my chinchilla tale, along with the Firesigns chinchilla piece from Dear Friends. Nearly getting killed is from an Hour Hour show collected on the Duke of Madness Motors compilation. It's followed by the Beatles' Day in the Life; Nick Danger, Electrician, Peter Bergman talking about death on an episode of his 1967 Radio Free Oz show; Give Me Immortality, a clip from the Magic Mushroom play Freak for a Week, a Radio Free Oz ad from their Pink Hotel Burns Down compilation, live Dwarf, Anythynge, Scrooge and a Neal Amid fragment. The Electrician finally shows up. He wants to see your passport.

Thanks Sputnik, Part 1 - This was inspired by seeing the program The Sputnik Moment that one of the chatters turned me on to, as part of the Making Sense of the 60s series.  An old Beatles single sums up what I remember of Kindergarten.  The Firesigns share their enjoyment of sleep as well. Also colouring books.  Eddy Murphy's Dr. Doolittle is reviewed.  Nick discovers a dog.  Science films prevailed.  Donald Duck discovers Math.  Hey, everybody.  Let's study science!

Thanks Sputnik, Part 2 - This is my 2nd collage about the effects of Sputnik on my education, this one focusing on the year 1959. Words from the Firesign Theatre from their Fools in Space satellite radio show.Vin Scully calling the 1959 World Series.  I Owe Russia $1200 by Bob Hope. More Fools in Space. The Peanuts album with Kaye Ballard and Arthur Siegel. Proctor interviewed by Clam Radio in 2002. How Can you be in 2 Places at Once. Monterey, by Eric Burden and the Animals, a song as good as the festival itself. How to tell real jade from fake, from You Tube. Bird of Prey Motors. The collage ends with the song Satellites by Rickie Lee Jones from her Flying Cowboys album.

Nukes - Even more frightening than the train to hell in episode one of my audiobiography and being a few hours from death in episode 2 was something that happened to me and every other life form on the planet in October, 1962. The Fighting Firesign Clowns have a song about it. Robert Klein recalls the 50s drop drills so we don't have to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tdT59cbwCs. An actual Civil Defence announcement. The Firesign's satelite show Fools in Space. The film The Man Who Saved the World, which everyone should watch and memorize.  https://video.search.yahoo.com/yhs/search?fr=yhs-mozilla-001&hsimp=yhs-001&hspart=mozilla&p=the+man+who+saved+ther4+world%2C+youtube#id=2&vid=16401bf736ec79fdb4bbc7b1815a1733&action=click Vasily Arkapov is the only reason life still exists on this planet. Bergman's story about No More Hiroshima Day in Finland, 1961. In the absence of a camera, I recorded my impressions of Hiroshima in 1974 from its train station in the middle of the night. More comedy from the Firesigns, from their Duke of Madness Motors collection of their radio shows. The end of my family's vegetarianism, thanks to the Cuban Missile Crisis. A song from Bergman's pal, Dana Lyons.

Carleton - Yet another autobiographical collage, this one deals with the years 1969-70. The year 1969 began with me moving back from LA to Saskatchewan. Added are bits from Firesign's In the Next World, You're On Your Own, and the Star Trek theme. The story of my first radio show in Ottawa is matched by a bit of the song Old Brown Dog, from the Running, Jumping, Standing Still album by Spider John Koerner and Willie Murphy. A rejected screen play leads to my introduction to a popular herb. Something even the elves don't know about. Steve Miller's Song for Our Ancestors, from his Sailor album shows me the potency of the herbs, as does a televised hockey game. My room mate C. Dale visits the Le Dain commission and is warned about seeds. A beautiful plane ride is remembered, with help from Firesign memories of flying back from New York to LA. In LA, I meet the Firesigns and share a smoke. The Firesigns remember Taj Mahal's piano player, John Simon, whether they want to or not. John plays Taj's tune Ain't Gwine Whistle Dixie no more. While covering Parliament, I hear an atrocious reason not to alleviate starvation. The Firesigns remember Biafra. I revel in the beauty of Ottawa. Dylan also watches a river. A memory of some strangeness on LA freeways is serenaded by Eric Anderson. Memories of the two Steves. One of them makes a fine omelet. Be-bop craves eggs. A memory of listening to Vince Guaraldi at Grace Cathedral. While I'm kicked off a plane for not volunteering for Vietnam, Country Joe celebrates my decision. I end up going to LA via Saskatchewan, in time to tape the last 6 episodes of Hour Hour.

Saskatchewan (Part 1) - "Recently, I heard Marc Maron interview Canadian comedian Brent Butt who was promoting the animated version of his popular TV show Corner Gas. Brent tells Marc about Saskatchewan, where he and I were born. Marc had never heard of the place. He's not alone in that. A clip from Corner Gas. Elmertown, from Boom Dot Bust. A TV biography of Tommy Douglas, Premier of Saskatchewan when I was born and voted Greatest Canadian of all time. The Firesigns have fun with religion. Tommy's life continues. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4_v2701GMg  Mouseland and a land with lots of mousers. A plague of Firesign mice. Back to Brent, talking about his brother, the clock fixer. Proctor tells highway jokes. Women are finally allowed into bars. Not  always a good idea, if the Giant Rat of Sumatra is involved. No longer waiting for the electrician in Saskatchewan. Nor the plumber. Another Sasktchewan native, Joni Mitchell sees a farm house burning, and is inspired to write Coyote. She sings about hitch hiking in Saskatchewan, which I've done, but mentions freeways, which do not exist there. Maybe she picked up a poetic license at the DMV. "

Saskatchewan (Part 2) - Marc Maron continues his interview with Brent Butt. The Firesigns explore Steel Hat, Nebraska. The Beatles salute Ukrainian girls. I remember my Ukrainian grandmother's culinary advice. A bit of Neal Amid about Saskatchewan farming. Bee stories Tommy Douglas luckily doesn't lose a leg. Dr. Whiplash gives bad advice. Tommy has a good idea. The Canadian way and the American way diverge. A bit from my play Radio Free Booze riffing on Bergman's mistaken idea of Tommy Douglas's first name and his radio show taken over by Hollywood Provo in 1967. More goodies from Tommy. While other politicians cozy up to Hitler, only Tommy sees him clearly. Hitler's doctor. Tommy sees the folly of the Vietnam war. Firesigns get a good review out of it. Brent gets a gig in Saskatoon. While a student there in 1970, I observe strange things in the sky. George Harrison explains them. A wondrous fall farm scene. Brent explains the success of Corner Gas. Prince Albert escapes his can. The CBC radio comedy show The Debaters debates whether Saskatoon is a tourist destination. The Guess Who, from next door province Manitoba, sing about Saskatoon. Better tune than city.

History And Firesigns - This is about my own history, the history of the Firesign Theatre, and how we have interacted from the late 60s until 1999. It begins in 1959, with me being assigned to write a play in 3rd grade, while Proctor and Bergman were having an early collaboration at Yale: the play Tom Jones. A change of schools in 61 brings to my mind Bergman and his mother collaborating on comic poetry when he was in Elementary School, as he talks about in Fools in Space. Bozos references Charlie Brown, my main literary inspiration in the pre-Firesign days. A high school friend turned me onto Peter Bergman's Radio Free Oz show after it moved to KRLA in 67. Another high school revelation was how ignorant real DJs were about what was popular among their audience. Austin tries to summon the spirit of Boss Radio and Peter Bergman's high school 45, Attention Convention from 1956. I study and take part in radio in University, before going to Japan for work in 71. A friend sent me the Bozos album, as monkeys cheer. Later, I meet the owner of King Records who instructs his engineers to listen to Dwarf. The government radio station NHK invites me to babble about Bergman, and play Echo Poem. Real English is spoken on the American military radio station F.E.N., even though they also offer Japanese lessons. The long years in Japan were livable thanks to my Firesign collection, as I continued to write and record skits. Fat Freddy's Cat goes fishing. My then 3-year-old daughter expands her English vocabulary. The Bonzos don't exist. Back in Vancouver, I turn on a local Science Fiction radio programme to Firesigns and help them interview Ossman. No retirement checks for him. The internet connects me to Elayne and then the lads. Elayne and David discuss By the Light of the Silvery on WBAI sometime in the 90s. Elayne, her then husband Steve and I drive down to Whidby Island to meet David. I wonder if the Firesigns could do a radio show in Japan, as the Pythons did for German TV. Apparently the only Firesign visit to a World's Fair, 2 year old David in 1939 leads to Bozos. Phil and Melinda invite over to their house in LA and suggest I once more write for radio. Adbusters' Joe Chemo leads to Camel on the Lamb. A meeting with Peter Stenshoel begins a period where I wrote radio plays. His The Philip K Dick Van Dyke Show is here: http://zxquniverse.com/the-philip-k-dick-van-dyke-show/
The 1996 Big Internet Broadcast features George Tirebiter talking to the George Burns of Chimpanzees (played wordlessly by Proctor) but unfortunately, this doesn't lead to Ossman's job in a real World's Fair. I use the word “later” too much. Phil Austin offers to replace me in my next play. Phil and Melinda briefly summarize the Russian Revolution. My 19-year old daughter acts the part of King Tut's priestess in Neal Amid. Many Firesign fans meet in Seattle in 1999. Pete offers some comforting words to me, and then to everyone else.

Meetings With Mr. Fong - I met Dextre Fong twice, both in New York City. The first meeting, mostly involving art, was in 2005, http://seemrealland.blogspot.ca/2005/05/, scroll down to Saturday, May 21.
The 2nd time was in 2010. I stayed with Dex and his wife Myrna at their place in Manhattan. Dex was able to get us reservations at hard-to-get-into restaurants Le Bernardin and Per Se, which I filmed. Dex didn't want any pictures taken of his face so we only see his hands occasionally, but thankfully, his voice could be heard so I could make this collage. http://seemrealland.blogspot.ca/2010/10/  scroll down to Monday, Oct 18th. As some chatters may know, there was an explosion in the apartment next to Dex which destroyed the room his computer was in. He never got around to replacing it, which is why he left chat a few years ago. His many years on chat will be remembered by those of us who so enjoyed his company here.

Cat Meets France (part Un) - I remember 1964 for more than just the World's Fair. It was also the year I was first exposed to French: the language, the food and the films. I supplement my memory with Dwarf, some DOMM bits, The Beatles, The Bride of Firesign, Giant Rat, a fragment of a Carnation Instant Breakfast ad, Praise the Hoove from the Dear Friends album and Chef Entree from DOMM. My memories of cooking French food in 1964 segues into the food I encountered on my most recent trip to France in June of this year. I am joined in celebrating this moveable feast by Radio Free Booze, my friend Maurice Gauthier reading the menu from Le Jules Verne in French, the whole Carnation ad, SCTV presents Martin Short as Jerry Lewis in Paris, Upper Middle Class Wine from Austin's Hollywood Nightshift, Popeye, Nick Danger's sponsor Vino Bros, the Beatles in French and another DOMM fragment where-in Peter reads a letter from Paris. 

Cat Meets France (part Deux) - Parisian-for-a-week Cease decends into serious food porn (cuisine erotique), narrowly escapes death by eel, feasts on divine tarts, celebrates Spring with pigeons, sees his reflection in Monet's pond and says Au Revoir. The audio verson of www.seemrealland.blogspot.ca



VEGAS ATE, SUNDAY - This is the story of my 8th trip to Vegas, Feb, 2019. I go there to eat, hence the title. Vegas Ate. As I narrate and navigate Vegas, I am accompanied by Steely Dan's Show Biz Kids. The Firesigns visit The Land of the Pharoahs. Danny returns from ancient Greece. Proctor and Bergman advertise Sneezer's Chicken. Organ Leroy plays on, The fruit and vegetables get their own village. The French Fresh Chef does potatoes. Brian Gyson remembers meeting William Burroughs for the first time. My daughter Bit greets Tutankhamun. Steve Martin does the Egyptian. Hal and Ray eat crocodile croquettes in Vegas. Dr. Memory riffs on phonemes. King Tut struts back to Babylonia. Babble on.

VEGAS ATE, MONDAY - A few weeks after I returned from Vegas, my wife found a letter our daughter Bit had sent us from Vegas when she went there with her friend Steph and Steph's folks in 1993. Bit's friend Lara reads the letter. It segues into The Who riding their magic bus. Apricots take on new importance to me. The Firesigns advertise stuffed crust pizza from Pizza Hut. Tirebiter has trouble getting a pizza delivered. The Nigerian war ends. Monty Python is a lumberjack and he's ok. Hummus learns Turkish. Jim Morrison sings the 3 Penny Opera. The bartenders at Sparrow and Wolf make me some wonderful cocktails using Yuzu, a Japanese citrus fruit.

VEGAS ATE, TUESDAY - I discover wonderful eggs at the 4 Seasons. I try and cut smaller and smaller pieces of the frittata. The Antelope Freeway approaches the Zeno off-ramp. The ancient Monsanto pavillion at Disneyland sends me shrinking into the realm of the atom, from my play Inside. A hamburger plays "spin the pickle." Great Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama delights me at the Bellagio. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=Yayoi+Kusama%2C+youtube&t=ffhp&atb=v156-6b_&ia=videos&iax=videos&iai=iT360Glhb9o
Fleetwood Mac's Hypnotised captures her weirdness nicely. You've got to put Yayoi's mirrored bowling balls on the other side. Gypsy Doctor sees the present. I dine in Mordor. Not a good idea. Thankfully, I escape to Edo Tapas. It's mushroom and cauliflower dish is the best thing I eat during 5 days of continual eating. The Firesign Theatre turn into mushrooms during the 2000 Rose Parade. Back at the Luxor, I try their blackberry cocktail at the central bar. It was a mistake. Proctor makes the same cocktail mistake in Russia.

VEGAS ATE, WEDNESDAY - More wondrous eggs. Nick Danger agrees. So does Gen Curtis Goatheart. I ponder the impossibility of perfection in food. Is it all worth it? A great Greek lunch and useful blackberrry cocktail, then a serious dissappointment at the sangria bar. A bus delivers me to the Gehry bldg downtown. The Bride of Firesign offers some architectural comment. The Downtown Cocktail Room continues the beverage bummers. A Lyft takes me to The Palms, a new hotel for me. New Italian joint Vetri has better view than food, while Mr and Mrs Austin discuss pork. Some military metaphors come to mind. I re-visit Partage instead of going out for swordfish. A bad idea. Only John Goodman is friendly. Tirebiter campaigns for the ape vost. The Sparrow and Wolf yuzu drinks remain excellent. The Firesigns celebrate Easter,1970. Leon Russel helps them roll away the stone.

VEGAS ATE, THURSDAY AND FRIDAY - On the 5th day of my Vegas excursion, fruit replaces toast at Veranda, to my delight. The Brunts share my mirth. I find myself in a mislabeled food court, with Kip Addotta. The Firesigns experience Japanese cooking. Europe is pummeled by rain. So is Vegas. Julian insults apricots. Hockey deflates sangria. I am attacked by cantaloups. Anyone want to contact VD? Fidel liberates the Hilton. Michael Mina assaults the very idea of food. Phil Austin's school lunch menus offer more serious sustenance. Crab gets limed. Before catching my return flight on Friday, I have a final egg feast at Veranda. Home at last.

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Fair Worlds - Seattle - My first World's Fair, 1962 Seattle. Firesign on the road in Berkeley, 74, escaping shadows.  Elvis serenades a girl younger than his guitar on their way to the Seattle World's Fair.  Stupid Belgian waffles.  Some actual Worlds Fair audio, from assorted pavillions.  Ain't the internet great?  What a piece of ass fault!  The Science Pavilion movie.  You could talk like that to millions and expect them to understand.  How different from now.  The Bozos album, maybe the closest to my heart.  A Piddle Diddle Disneyland from Negativland,1993.  I loved the Tiki Room but also love to learn its secrets.  Artie Choke makes a joke.  My first radio play, Inside.  Monsanto's journey into inner space was my favourite ride.  I was involved with the Orangutan Foundation and the Great Apes Project at the time, which is all too obvious.

Fair Worlds - New York - C. Simril and Tom O'Neil's excellent adventures at the 64-65 New York World's Fair. Edwin Newman's World's Fair Diary: https://video.search.yahoo.com/yhs/search?fr=yhs-mozilla-001&hsimp=yhs-001&hspart=mozilla&p=Edwibn+Newman%27s+Worlds+Fair+Diary%2C+Youtube#id=1&vid=20d08029caf1a22cf5ac2781f2d09811&action=click
The General Motor's Pavillion. Austin's House of Little Men. D.O.M.M. Austin's Roiller Maidens - Come On Jesus. Bozos. TV or Not. Negativeland's A Piddle Diddle Disneyland. Ford's Wonder Rotunda. Austin's Yesterday's News. Traveller's Insurance pavillion. IBM. Giant Rat. Pepsi's Small Worlds. Zippy the Pinhead. Lincoln. Bill Maher show, Sept. 17, 2017, and C'est La Vie by Robbie Nevil.

A Fair for Al, and No Fair to Anybody - A phone conversation between Airship Al Gross, Tweeny and me from late September, combined with bits from How Time Flies, EYKIW, Lenny Bruce's Christ and Moses, Give me Immortality, my play Inside, Nick Danger's Case of the Missing Shoe, the Martian Space Party, Nick Danger's first caper, the Free Mexican Airforce, more EYKIW, Proctor interviewed on Jimmy Church's Fade to Black podcast ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYse660lCbo ) and Jennifer Warnes singing the late Leonard Cohen's First We Take Manhattan.

Fair Worlds - Montreal - Canada celebrated its 100th birthday by having a Worlds Fair in Montreal. I celebrated by attending that fair and then traveling across the country.  Thankfully there are a lot of You Tube sites to jog's ones memory of that fair. I found these podcasts particularly useful: https://www.concordia.ca/events/conversation-series/thinking-out-loud/expo67.html, the Thinking Out Loud series from Concordia University in Montreal. The women who do the podcast are just as passionate about Expo 67's flilms as I was when i saw them. Some of the information I used on this collage is from brochures given to me at the fair, or found online. Aside from the usual collection of Firesign goodies, musical additions to the collage come from Jim Morrison, Sgt Pepper, C.J. Li and Linda Ronstadt. Paul Krassner offered hjis Expo 67 story from his autobiography, Confessions of a Raving Unconfined Nut. Our own DJ Tweeny and My North Van neighbour Maurice Gauthier (whom you heard as Monsier Verne, and reading the French menu at Le Jules Verne restaurant on previous collages) remember their visits to the fair. Eventually, screens take over the world.

Fair Worlds - Tsukuba - When my family was living in Japan, in 1985, the country decided to have a World's Fair. This was near the height of Japanese economic ascendancy, and what better party to throw?  Tsukuba Science City wasn't world famous, maybe a Worlds Fair will put it on the map. It was a long trek for us to an obscure site inconveniently north of Tokyo. My wife and her friend took our daughter and her friend's son to the fair, but they only played on the toy trains and other adventures of interest to 7 year olds. Later, my friend and I went. He says he remembers nothing. I remember the Jamaican pavilion, tiny even by Japanese standards, which seemed to exist only to sell Bob Marley cassettes. After waiting in long lines, we got into, maybe 2 of the popular industrial pavilions, which entranced easily entranceable eyes with 3D flowers floating tantalizingly in front of them, for a few minutes. SONY had a TV you could probably view from the moon. Thanks for the memories to the US Armed Forces Far East Network, every English-lover's link to that beloved language on Tokyo radio in the decades before the internet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avn87a4VS9A

Fair Worlds - Vancouver - Expo '86 - My last Expo led me to my home, Vancouver. Thanks to our public broadcaster, CBC for its documenting Expo 86.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-pXFx4d-Yk
Contributions by The Firesign's Give Me Immortality, Waiting for the Electrician, and the Martian Space  Party, Papa Oo Mao Mao, Red Shift, Neal Amid, act 5, Developmental Valley School Lunch Menus from Phil Austin's Tales of the Olde Detective, EOBE, Humboldt, Terry Hadland, my review of the Firesign concert on the pier at Seattle, 1994, for Elayne's zine, Proctor interviewed by PsiOp radio, on November 22, 2017; a bit from Vancouver, No Fixed Address from the provincial  Knowledge Network, Dreamer by Supertramp. Thanks, Expo.

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Peace Pipe - Toward the end of 2009, I had a dream where Phil Proctor's daughter (whom I have never met) called me lazy. Lazy, eh? I reacted to that by creating the following collage. I had recently heard an interview with Carlin (archival) talking about memorizing the lyrics to Pass that Peace Pipe in 1947 when he was 10. I thought the song was written for the Duckman cartoon, which I saw in the late 90s. I asked Phil Austin if he knew the tune but he said he didn't, or at least didn't recall it. Still, Austin's 1967 radio play A Shadow Move Upon a Land and the Peace Pipe song are very similar in their listing "Indian" tribal names as a musical device.

Home - John Hockenberry's NPR show Heat, from 1990, was almost Firesonian good. Not surprising, as it featured Proctor and Bergman. The Firesign wanted to create an album based on Homer's Odyssey. Is this it?

Waiting For The Mortician - Bergman was way into death on his 1967 Radio Free Oz show. Now he's dead. Coincidence? I think not...


McLuhan-1 - Marshall McLuhan was a great inspiration to the Firesign Theatre. His bright comet passed over public consciousness in the late 60s just as they were beginning to deconstruct media in real time. He even made an album, The Medium is the Massage with Firesign pal John Simon in 1967, while they were writing Electrician and Sgt Pepper was filling the air. This collage takes the first 5 minutes of that album and mixes it with other things, just as it was a collage of Marshall's voice and Simon's production ideas. This will be the first of an intended series of meditations on Mcluhan. Perhaps he will give us a clue to surviving a world of alternate facts and a true madman with his finger on the button.

McLuhan-2 (Temporarily McLuhan Rag) - Marshall McLuhan suggests that we're living in the rear-view mirror and trying to live in the past. or at least enough of us are to elect Trump.  The Firesign Theatre explains how this didn't work out so well for the "American Indians."  Steely Dan also explores nostalgia, though a bit more tunefully.

McLuhan-3 (McLuhan's McLuhan) - McLuhan's McLuhan is Harold Innis, a contemporary of McLuhan at the University of Toronto and a media theorist very influencial on Marshall's thought.  This collage is based on part 2 of a 1994 CBC Ideas series about Innis, written by prolific Ideas creator David Cayley. I've also included more of Tom Wolfe's biographical talk about McLuhan that mentions the Innis-McLuhan connection.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzBPmRPa7ls  I used part of this in an earlier McLuhan collage. Also featured, Samantha Bee's interview with Russian journalist Masha Gessen, from http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=Masha+Gessen% 2c+Samantha+Bee&view=detail&mid=FA4F0D420A1775DDBD19FA4F0D420A1775DDBD19&FORM=VIRE
Thanks also to Judith Stamps' book Unthinking Modernity: Innis, McLuhan and the Frankfurt School.

Vegas (part 1) - Vegas, Part 1 is about my first two nights in Vegas from my 4-day trip in February. The music on the streets and in the hotels is always my kinda music, but I was particularly delighted to hear a rather obscure favourite, Donald Fagan's IGY when I was walking down the street. Billy the Mountain decides to take his wife Ethel the Tree to Vegas, where they find themselves at Bob's Brazerko Lounge. Stephen Paddock checks into the Mandalay Bay. I eat at Rivea in the Delano Hotel, which is part of the Mandalay Bay complex. The John Dory isn't frozen. A strange piece of basil appears on my gnocchi. A cab takes me to the Paris hotel's new sangria bar Alexxa. Get the Bubbly. Even Steve Miller wants one. The Pirates of the Carribbean enjoy the Rojo more than me. I check out the new Japanese restaurant Zuma and am glad I did. The Firesigns riff on fish. Paddock uses the service elevator.
Day 2: Bouchon at the Venetian serves a dissappointing crepe and an undrinkable pot of tea. Thankfully the Le Guin novel The Dispossessed cancels Keller's restaurant bummers. The Deuce bus delivers me to a dispensary, and I emerge with some kiwi slices. The CBC-AM show about marketing Under the Influence offers the history of this tasty fruit. http://www.cbc.ca/radio/undertheinfluence  Lunch at the great Greek restaurant Milos. Superb shrimp and much visual entertainment. I remember my daughter's love of shrimp and my glasses fogging up in Ottawa 50 years ago. Back to the Paris hotel with the Youngbloods, I make a lunch reservation for the following day, but misplace my shades. Timbuk 3 offers me a new pair. I read a few chapters of Ossman's latest novel. Five o'clock reservation at Le Cirque, with How Time Flys and TV or Not TV. The Petrossian Bar has no idea what it's advertising. Dog dolls bring back intense memories. The menu alterations I request are observed at le Cirque and I dine magnificently. Back to Alexxa, I sip a dissappointing cidre sangria, a tasty one called Moonshine, and a drink that tastes more like Kool Aid then a proper sangria. My favourite bar Vesper delivers more mint than necessary. A young lady from Borges-land brings me some tasty mushroom croquettes at Jaleo. Fools in Space sample other croquettes. Back to my hotel room and needed sleep, I am alarmed when a door opens. George Tirebiter comes in and out. Paddock goes back home to reload.

Vegas (part 2) - Donald Fagan continues his future dreams from 1982 as I relish the original International Geophysical Year and what it did to my schooling. Day 3 begins with one of the best omelets I've ever eaten. The fact that it contained lobster may have been a factor. The Eiffel waffle causes resistance. A vast shrimp cocktail summons forth Jimmy Buffet. The very first shirmp cocktail is recalled with a serious cocktail and the rodents race. A limey gets juiced. Ursula K Le Guin is summoned. A cidre called Easy eases into David Ossman's Maxwell Morgan, Crime Cabbie while I read his latest murder mystery. Corns, now we can make whiskey! Robots rules of orders are applied. Knees are powdered. Chubby Checkers plays Fats Domino. Twist foods pour forth. A mushroom dish conquers the Mt Everest of my palate's sense of eternity. An apple pie follows it up. An annoying voice booms. Great tea accompany's far too many sweets. Kiwi replaced by Sauron. A mirror comands me to go the Aria inspite of obvious intoxication and listen to Bob sing opera. Alexxa meets Orson and John. Good and bad oriental culinary influences.  You so smaat! Pumpkins are great! The Firesigns attend a wine testing. I sleep well. Suitcases are moved.

Vegas (part 3) - Fagan celebrates freedom. I mistake a chia pudding for food. Tapas are explored. Hockey helps Vegas heal. I return to the mellowness of the Mandarin for enchanted tea-based cocktails. I visit a new bar, but forget my phone back in my hotel. The sun splash goes un-photographed. A friend is encountered at Prime. Picasso pretends to serve me good food. The Grassroots Gourmet visits All Things Considered. Le Cirque comes through again. Bergman orders Mr. Picasso Potatoe heads at the Digital Diner. They might be giants, or Turks. Your book is followed. Peter goes to Turkey and earns a poem. Ken Kesey explains the fallacy of gambling. The Fools in Space disparage Kiwis. The Young Radicals salute me. Plans are made for my next Vegas food trip, which won't include The Excalibur. Pythons sings their approval of that decision. Paddock keeps stockpiling At the airport, I fill up on a Caesar Salad wrap while recalling what her friend Steph Scott said about her unfortunate adventures with my daughter and the mistaken Caesars. The Firesigns celebrate Caesar Chavez Day. Fagan fades out.


We Await Tristero's Empire - In his 1966 novel The Crying of Lot 49, Thomas Pyncheon imagines a sinister alternate postal service, The Tristero, which uses WASTE recepticles as its Post boxes by inserting periods between the letters, becoming an acronym for We Await Silent Tristero's Empire. The recent TV movie Wasted http://www.cbc.ca/passionateeye/episodes/wasted-the-story-of-food-waste  by Anthony Bourdain shows the need for the world to come up with a better definition of waste. Two recent Ideas programmes also explore this necessity: http://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/the-hidden-power-of-food-finding-value-in-what-we-eat-1.4414810  Another recent Ideas show about restaurants offers some good advice: http://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/the-restaurant-a-table-divided-1.4669493.  The Ontario Public Interest Research Group came up with an audio piece called The Supermarket Tour Show in 1990. The Who's Baba O'Riley from their Who's Next album contributes the appropriate music for this series of collages. As always, the Firesigns make us laugh.

W.A.S.T.E. 2 - Part 2 of my Food Waste Quartet is called From Pork to Beans, much more oriented towards vegetables than meat. We learn some lessons from Canada's First Nations, and hear a couple of bits from my play Red Shift.

WASTE 3 - So You Don't Go To School - "Let's all go to school."

WASTE 4 - Red Famine - The first three parts of my Food Waste Quartet look at how modern agricultural policies are bringing us not only an epidemic of obesity, but continued starvation. Part 4 is based on another Ideas programme, this one about the Ukrainian holocaust of the early 30s http://www.cbc.ca/listen/shows/ideas/episode/15542897 where Stalin forcibly starved millions of Ukrainians, including my relatives. Food waste indeed.


Kaput-alism (Pt 1) -This collage is based on the 6-part TV series Capitalism, particularly episode 4, What if Marx was right? Also, from The School of Life on YouTube, from their series Political Theory, Karl Marx. Captain Capitalism meets Captain Equinox. Haunting with Karl and King Bernardo. No one's gonna have to be a slave all the time no more. Opium Gum creates the industrial revolution. Cars for commies. Don McLean does an ad for libraries. Bob Dylan, the Bircher. Capitalism creates a world after its own image. Dr. Marx diagnoses its problems. Bergman does some tie dying. Paint the town red. Expendable people. Barney has to clone. Andrew T.P. Lungett invents the cotton magnet. Profit is theft. Look at the mouth of that gift horse. Derivatives in your daily life. Sorrows of marriage. Capitalism colours our world, so let's start a theme park. Capitalism rots the mind. Leisure for everybody. Lots of varied jobs for Lili Bergman, Karl Marx and Captain Equinox. Wendell Pierce tells Marc Maron that he's a capitalist. Billy Bragg sings North Sea Bubble.

Kaput-alism (Pt 2) - This is the 2nd part of my 3-part collage series, Kaput-alism, which started with Karl Marx and now moves on to another economic visionary, Karl Polanyi. Two, Two, Two Karls in one. Certs is a breath mint! No, it's a floor wax. Professor Nancy Fraser explains why he's important. Mutt and Smutt put the "Is" in Capitalism. Al has 3 Faces. Multiple-Identity Poster Girl Rosie Rottencrotch. Mesopotamian secrets revealed. Bergman's dog Nurgi is an Assyrian god. A bit of biography from the 6-part TV series Capitalism. Polanyi's daughter speaks of smoke and where there's smoke, there's WORK. Bill Sprawl loses his assets. How did Europe collapse and what can be done to rebuild? Stop worshiping the Free Market, for one. Morse Science High turns into a wasteland. What are all these Mexicans doing here? The 1939-40 New York World's Fair turns into the Firesign's City of the Future. The market is embedded, along with Porcelain.

Kaput-alism (Pt 3) - Continuing the story of Karl Polanyi, ancient tablets reveal economic life in distant times. Tiny Dr. Tim has other tablets. Not traders but bureaucrats. Did you remember to carry the bum? Sumer declares debts all forgotten. The Firesigns celebrate the Jubilee.  What is it about debt?  Tennessee Ernie laments. Al Capone collects. Early Firesign Freak for a Week introduces Flower Child gangsters. Debts are always negotiable between equals. Scrooge is approached by a debtor. Mythical commodities. Smoky the Bear helps out. Society vs The Economy. The golden age of consumption benefits Mutt and Smutt. Karl dies, but his ideas live on. Louis Marshman speaks. Debt is the currency of fear and that's where we're rich.


Fireheads (Part 1)
Fireheads (Part 2)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt13973190/  Can't Get You Out of my Head is a 6-part BBC documentary series by Adam Curtis from earlier this year. I've  blended the first episode with the usual Firesign stuff as well as couple of songs, Bob Dylan's John Birch Society Blues and Switchblade Pitchforks from Phil Austin's Roller Maidens.  Also, George Monbiot on the looting of India and the fiction of capitalism. https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/why-george-monbiot-is-fighting-to-build-a-politics-of-belonging-to-better-our-world-1.5720535

Fireheads 2 (Part 1)
Fireheads 2 (Part 2)
The second Fireheads collage is based on episode 2 of Can't Get You Out Of My Head.  There's a Sikh born every minute. Learning to play the dream flute. They're such little devils! Fu sings. Certs is a candy mint! Sell those demons!  Nazi Goring. President Shickelgruber. Bottoms up! World War 3? Power riffs. Deputy Dan will beat you up!  But Mom, I'm not hungry. Eyeball this! My Doors have seen you. The holy Trinitron. Un-revolutionary TV. Mr. Blank. Carry that bum! Live in the future Now! Look at the stars, man. You sold out!

Fireheads 3 (Part 1)
Fireheads 3 (Part 2)
For the 3rd episode of Cant Get You Out Of My Head, we feature Storm Clouds, Carlin, Sack O'Duck, Methedrine, La Bomba Shelter, Bergman's Woody dream, Valhalla gasoline, a poem by Mao, It had been night, Siberia, Coal, More Valhalla, Mr Foster Freeze, Halloween in Hollywood, the American Pageant, Humboldt County, new currency, Electrician, the fresh chef, Giant Rat, Radio Free Oz podcast, more RFO, Eddie are you Kidding from the Mothers of Invention album Just Another Band From LA.

Fireheads 4 (Part 1)
Fireheads 4 (Part 2)
Everyone in New York is a communist. Moscow memories. Anythinge You Want. Because News meows. Fascism gets voted in. Those beasts! Bait and switches. The Big Internet Broadcast of 1996. Paul Krassner from Brain Damage Control. The pie on your tie. Swell Pizza. Live from the Senate bar. Pete hates factories. The Old Grid building. Ghosts

Fireheads 5 (Part 1)
Fireheads 5 (Part 2)
Part 5 of Can't Get You Out of my Head mixed with The Pink Hotel Burns Down, Charlie Chance, Deputy Dan, Trouble Coming Every Day by the Mothers of Invention, A Shadow Moves Upon a Land, Nick and Guido hate cops, Giant Rat, The Whispering Squash show, Monty Python's Holy Grail, Lenny Bruce, Roosterama, Josh Johnson, Parallel Hell, Danger Down Under, Opium Gum, Fools in Space, Mr Magoo's Christmas Carol, How Time Flys, Tony the Tiger, Radio Free Oz, Abbey Road and finally All Things Firesign.

Fireheads 6 (Part 1)
The last episode of Can't Get You Out Of My Head is the longest so I'm going to break it up into 3 parts. For Part 1 tonight, we feature La Brea Man and  and family from Bozos, Bing Crosby on Teenagers. They'll eat shirkers but they won't eat workers. The Saturday Night Gun Mart. Violent Juvenile Freaks. Nick Danger learns how radio works and Bergman in Vegas. 

Fireheads 6 (Part 2)
Continuing with Cant Get You Out Of My Head, part 6, Adam Curtis is joined as always by The Firesign Theatre. Mr Acme knows what to do. He want to know yes or no. Creeping socialism. We all live in a yellow sub. Dive. Putin is razzed on KBOO.  Freak for a week. You're naked, Miss Dudley. We tortured Harry Shearer. 

Fireheads 6 (Part 3)
Can't Get You Out of my Head part 6 is 2 hours long, so I've cut it up into 4 pieces. This is part 3. Firesign bits you'll hear are: Out of the fog, Valhalla Gasoline, Temporarily Humboldt County, The Firesign Rose Parade, a clip from my new play Vegas/Egypt, the Whispering Squash Show, the Bonzo Dog Band, Boom Dot Bust and Deputy Dan.


Fireheads 6 (Part 4)
Finally, the end of Can't Get You Out Of My Head. The BBC documentary series finale is mixed with Back in the USSR, Sodom and Jubilee, Lawyer's Hospital, How Time Flies, Nick Danger, Fools in Space, more Nick, Let's Eat, Le Trente Huit Cunegonde, Garden Gnomes, The Fuse of Doom, Bride of Firesign, more Fools, more Bride and ending with the end of Bozos.



Lanier and Virtual Pete (Part 1) - On today's collage, we listen to Jaron Lanier interviewed on a recent episode of Ted and Phil's Sexy Boomer Show, KPFK, Tuesdays from 1-2. It's not surprising that this pioneer of Virtual Reality should connect with Peter Bergman who rants about VR on his brief radio show The Digital Diner, May 26, 1994. The Crazy Commandos, from EOBE. The Pink Hotel Burns Down. DD lovers. Paul Krassner Live at MIT. Lenny Bruce, What I Was Arrested For. Lil Feat is Willin. Virgil "Gus" Grissom. W.C.Fields Forever. Airplane's White Rabbit. Goin' Down Slow by Bruce Cockburn. The National Toilet, from EOBE. Roll Away the Stone, from Leon Russel. 2,000 Light Years from the Stones. Canapa Seeds from Firesign.

Lanier and Virtual Pete (Part 2) - Pete's dream and Skinner boxes. David Crosby and the Airplane sail away. The Stones push the LIke button. Harry Shearer talks Chat GPT with  professor Gary Marcus. The world ended in Dwarfland. Lanier demystifies. Some music from David Ossman's Radio, Any Questions show, along with Pete's law. Fireplugs from Bride. Mr Blank takes the census. Buy the numbers, from Boom Dot Bust. Dr Memory is unhappy. Did you remember to carry the bum? Lanier is pissed off. Mark Time. Bear Whiz Beer. Polar Pro.

Lanier and Virtual Pete (Part 3) - Moving on to part 3 of the Sexy Boomer Show interview with Jaron Lanier, where are humans? They're right here to use the power of that ton of coke and make apps. Chat GPT inspires the CBC radio show Because News. Oh Nick, you're such a tool!. Tirebiter's Virtual Reality autobiography, from Digital Diner. Oh Blinding Light!  Politics with Pappoon. The Hot Dog deity. Ralph welcomes you to your new home. TIPS hotline, from All Things Firesign. Immortality sucks. The first sports broadcast, from the Firesign's History of Radio. Ask Dr. Whiplash.



A Firesign Vegas (Part 1) - My March, 2023 adventures in Vegas, First 2 days, with The Electrician, Bozos, Donovan's Fat Angel, Proctor and Bergman flying from NYC to LA, the Free Mexican Air Force, Storm clouds, Steve Miller, an Hour Hour, several pieces from a RFO from 1978, Ossman on the RFO podcast, a taste of Flamenco from You Tube, Carumba from Proctor and Bergman, Ray Charles drinks gin, DF: Live from the Senate bar, Louie's burgers, Bozos,carrots from 1997, Cannonball Adderly, Bob and Ray's slow talker, Shiya and Caira from Vegas/Egypt, Marc Maron and Laurie Anderson, a Tai Chi exercise tape, EYKIW, Giant Rat, Electrician, Bride, WC Fields Forever, DF's Roosterama, Nick Danger and the Pythons.

A Firesign Vegas (Part 2) - The Vegas trip continues with the Case of the Missing Shoe, Dionne Brand, Proctor and Bergman's Power, Ossman keeps a record, Park and Lock it, Sneezers, US Plus, The Little Flower Shoppe, Box of Time, Inside the Money Bubble. Bozos, Nick Danger, Odysseus returns from Rome, Caira, Giant Towed Supermarket, Bear Whiz, the last inspiration from this can, aliens know where milk comes from, a fragment from a 1978 Radio Free Oz broadcast, the Good Ship Lollipop, The Firesigns rewrite Heat Wave, swine are guarded. a Limey is juiced.

The Meow of the Wolf Movie - Celebrating my recent visit to Omega Mart in Vegas with appropriate Firesign bits. We begin with the Movie commercial we all know and love from Dwarf, only this time it's changed.The first of Many commercials for the store, created by Santa Fe, New Mexico art collective Meow Wolf. It that Really Willy Nelson? A big chunk of this collage is from the Youtube channel Food Theory. Shoplifters, from EOBE; a Firesign clip from their Let's Eat radio show, One of Many Omega Mart ads you can find online. A brief clip from Roller Maidens, OM meat ads, Joey's House from Lawyer's Hospital, School lunch menus from Phil Austin's Tales of the Old Detective, OM ads, Food Theory, Firesign radio bit about growing your own soup, Me in Omega Mart checking out their "soup." Camel on the Lam from Immortality, Rat in The Box from Missing Yolks, That Billvillle Sound from Doom Dot Bust.Unboxing on Twitch, Proctor and Bergman's Lemon Car, OM ad, me, In the Alley from Fighting Clowns, Presidential profiles in butter. The Carpetbagger's Youtube channel. Meow Wolf history. end of side one, Dwarf. Nick Danger on the Daily Feed, Smoke Spud, Opium Gum from 3 Faces of Al, OM Ad and finally US Plus.

Brand Firesign - I review an earlier incident from the Vegas trip. where my note taking of the delightful food is hi-jacked, dragged into the poetic realm as I read a review of the poet Dione Brand in the New York Review of Books. Online, I discover her on You Tube. Writing Against Tyranny and Towards Liberation at Barnard Centre for Researching Women, April 25, 2017. Listening to David Ossman read his poetry on Radio Free Oz and its different iterations has prepared my ears to enjoy poetry. May I see your passport, please?  I am officially in poetry-land now. Bruce Cockburn calls it democracy, from his World of Wonders album. David Ossman reads a poem on Fred Wiebel's radio show on WEPM Martinsburg, West Virginia on July 19, 1996. Come on Jesus, show yourself, from Phil Austin's Roller Maidens from Outer Space. Tips Hotline from All Things Firesign. You're Under Arrest. Phil Austin remembers a night in the train yard. You've got Jaundice. Give him the antidote, Judy. David Ossman's poems from An Autobiographical Evening.


PART 1 - A friend was visiting recently and suggested we watch some Eddie Izzard on Youtube. I'd seen Eddie live twice in Vancouver- probably the best 2 standups I've ever seen. Seeing him on TV is different, but still great. I found a 2-hour collection of Craig Ferguson's interviews with Eddie on Youtube that is the basis for most of this collage, though I begin with Eddie at Wembley, the only concert film in my North Vancouver library. Of course the AMERICAN Indian lad wants to be called Eddie on the first cut of the first Firesign album. Like Firesign, Eddie's comedy has Very High expectations of the intelligence of the audience, so they go together well, right? See for yourself (if you see with your ears).

Call Me Eddie 1 A
Call Me Eddie 1 B
Call Me Eddie 1 C

PART 2 - We begin with Eddie in a raven costume made by his mother, from the biopic Believe. Followed by 3 raven poems from David Ossman's An Autobozographical Evening. The Eddie Izzard show Glorious.Eddie gets into lists of creations. The Firesigns make a list of extinctions from their Dear Friends bit called Echo Poem. The Bozos list. Ossman's list poem Time Capsule. Austin's Developmental Valley School Lunch Menu from his Tales of the Old Detective. More Raven lists. Eddie from the Believe DVD. Proctor and Bergman's album TV or Not TV. Eddie's famous Wolf sketch. An Ossman poem and a Proctor dream of wolves. Ralph Spoilsport from the Firesign's University of Maryland show. Fools in Space: Eddie Lizard. Eddie  (Doc Technical) visits my play CAST. The flag joke from Dressed to Kill. More Believe. Everything You Know is Wrong. Glorious. Nick Danger. The benefits of Hopscotch.

Call Me Eddie 2 A
Call Me Eddie 2 B
Call Me Eddie 2 C

PART 3 - We begin with Eddie in a raven costume made by his mother, from the biopic Believe. Followed by 3 raven poems from David Ossman's An Autobozographical Evening. The Eddie Izzard show Glorious.Eddie gets into lists of creations. The Firesigns make a list of extinctions from their Dear Friends bit called Echo Poem. The Bozos list. Ossman's list poem Time Capsule. Austin's Developmental Valley School Lunch Menu from his Tales of the Old Detective. More Raven lists. Eddie from the Believe DVD. Proctor and Bergman's album TV or Not TV. Eddie's famous Wolf sketch. An Ossman poem and a Proctor dream of wolves. Ralph Spoilsport from the Firesign's University of Maryland show. Fools in Space: Eddie Lizard. Eddie  (Doc Technical) visits my play CAST. The flag joke from Dressed to Kill. More Believe. Everything You Know is Wrong. Glorious. Nick Danger. The benefits of Hopscotch.

Call Me Eddie 3 A
Call Me Eddie 3 B

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Free Huey, President Dewey - Phil Proctor's new podcast on Podbean allows us to hear his great autobiography, Where's My Fortune Cookie combined with the audio effects we expect from the Firesign Theatre. As I was reading the book, I could hear Phil speaking it in my head, having heard his voice so often from Firesign and numerous interviews but the effects add a dimension my Firesign-besotted brain lacked. After half a century of being inspired by the Firesigns, it's not surprising I was inspired to add some audio footnotes of my own to Phil's tales, and Bergman trying to get China out of his life. The book, living up to its title, begins with the gangland massacre Phil and Peter survived at the Golden Dragon restaurant in San Francisco. The reason for the massacre, as Phil explains, was retaliation for the death of a gang member named Huey. Free Huey, President Dewey and Louie Louie: Donald Duck's nephews? LA radio station KCRW has a podcast called Lost Notes. Their episode about the song Louie Louie is here: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/18-Lost-Notes-29152529/episode/louie-louie-the-strange-journey-of-29178595/ Mel Blanc drops by to announce train stops. A Youtube show (Cartoon Conspiracy, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_8kU0VCTCc)  about comic book characters provided the background for the duck nephews. From the Firesign's Hour Hour show, Jane does a duck voice she learned from Donald. Daffy runs for president, but isn't cartoony enough for American politics.

Phil's Miniatures - In episode two of my Proctor Podcast Collages, Phil creates a small world, and Disney doesn't sue him. They heard us talking and they changed their form. Randy Newman insults midgets. Nate Eagle celebrates them. Zippy shrinks. Marc Maron visits Robin Williams and is sworn to secrecy about his toy soldier collection. Robin's biographer explains the fascination. The Firesigns descend into the humous. Peter sees an educational film about oil. You can trust your car to the man who wears the horns. Nazi's Berry Farm. Phil's tolerant parents. Steve Martin does drugs. The Jefferson Airplane asks Alice. Phil Austin's Scaled Down Danger. A king of infinite space. I steal Monsanto's Journey to Inner Space from Disneyland for my play Inside. A Plastic Fantastic Airplane soars. A catalogue model intrigues Austin.

Don't Crush That Phil - Just like Peorgie Tirebiter, Phil Proctor is off to school in this episode. As a child actor, Phil helps Uncle Danny read the funnies, while Uncle Underground tries unsuccessfully to find comix to read on the air. Elliot Gould provides the olives. Young Phil gets moody and tempermental, but still uses his linguistic gifts to find his way out of a dangerous situation. Shibboleth and other things get marched to. Dentistry is not Phil's destiny. Group W gets Benchleys. Mr Disner explores exploiting the Maya for fun and profit, from my play Box Of Time. Phil practices his Scottish accent on a primitive recording device, in preparation for a 1997 skit. Which reel is this?

Unconscripted - Phil does some fencing, and then acting.  John and Yoko give various pieces a chance.  Judy Garland serenades Acheson. Country Joe cheers on the dominoes.  Pete gets a good review.  Bourdain is besotted with Nam-land.  Arlo proceeds.  The organ recital from Bride of Firesign.  Napoleon sends Phil to the psychiatrist.  Hal and Ray endanger Dwayne's job.  Phil signs lots of papers.

Your Next 3 Words In Russian - The latest collage based on the Proctor Podcasts begins with Prokofiev'sTroika, the theme from the Woody Allen film Love and Death. Not surprising as this episode is about Phil's trip to the USSR in 1959 with the Yale Russian chorus. Phil demonstrates his fluency in the language from Electrician. Phil and Melinda relive the Russian revolution from my play Neal Amid. Bit asks a question. Robin Williams delights in Russian. I try and learn a new language. Fumiyo displays her linguistic skills. The Firesigns ask questions. From the Firesign show Questions and Answers, Firesign Theatre Live in Santa Cruz, 5/9/75. The Porridge bird lays an egg.  I ask Phil Austin a question at the Firesign Q&A on Whidbey Island, 2011.  Phil discovers Alla. More Love and Death. Elvis speaks as many languages as Phil. Vassily saves the world. Commercial goods on parade. Potemkin explains the facade of reality in Russia, from the TV series Waterfront Cities of the World. Yakov Smirnov smirks. The KGB gets beat up. Nobody listens to Phil.
Reagan fades away. 

Phil Manchu - Phil gets disoriented. Edward Said explains Orientalism. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aNwMpV6bVs  Phil meets a Korean speaker at a party. Cat watches a program reviewing restaurants in Las Vegas. There are gooks all around here. Grubs again. The landmarks of Phil's life change forever. Dr. Fu Manchu is sentenced to death. Dr Wu becomes a shadow. Charlie Chance solves a mystery while unhooking frogs. Harlan Ellison almost pukes when he smells chitlins in South Chicago. Pat Obrien delights veterans. General Blame remembers the war. Pete explains war movies. A non-submarine. A Japanese Zero gives Pat a bracelet. We all burst with happiness at Phil's tales.


Wild Duck - Phil evokes an old film to describe his adventures with his friend Brandan De Wilde. Malcolm X John Lennon isn't hungry. The Byrds attend a Gathering of Tribes. A cut from the first Firesign album sounds alarmingly like the film Phil evoked. The Cabin restaurant sponsors the Firesign's radio show. Phil gets a job and girl friend at the same time. Jimi sings about the wonders of electricity. Benny wears electric boots. Phil tells the same story with more details. We find ourselves outside of Rochester. Phil promotes Himself. Salvador Dali picks up some threads. Electricity gets eaten. Pete explains the title of the first album. A button gets a coat sewed on it. Nothing presages Electrician. Diana reinvents herself, as HAL croons. We try and figure out change. See the USA through your turret bay. Phil's parking error causes problems, but dope and insurance get rid of them. Cop won't arrest child actor. A Jim High School reunion.

Cummings, Mother - This collage is about Phil's adventures with Bob Cummings and Peter Fonda. Phil gets raves, but Bob, though travelling with his wife and daughter, was having an affair with his secretary, territory explored in the Proctor & Bergman play Power. Bob was one of the first health food nuts in Hollywood, and we revisit Power for more potency riffs. Another of Bob's addictions leads to Firesign speed jokes, first from their stage play A Life in the Day and then from their album Dwarf, along with the same pills the chief's been on for a week. The ingredient's in Bob's shots evoke a bit from the Firesign's Eat or Be Eaten album. Bob's overacting becomes surreal as Bob's face dissolves, along with Dr. Firesign from Bride of Firesign. The Byrds get 8 Miles High, while Phil Austin talks about the Byrds' producer Gary Usher, also a creative force in Firesigndom, on a late night WBAI radio show. Peter Fonda introduces Phil to his guru, Jacques Honduras, evoking an episode of The Golden Hind. Guided meditation in search of a goal doesn't always work out as planned, for Phil or Mick Jagger. Hanging out with Phil's actor friends on the Sunset Strip puts them in the middle of a police riot. The LA Free Press has its parallel in the Firesign play Freak for a Week. As Mick sings about blowing a 50 Amp fuse, the Fiesigns perform The Fuse of Doom from their XM satelite radio show Fools in Space. Phil's East Village Other press pass protects him, as the blind newsboy from Bride of Firesign and Mr Kane from Boom Dot Bust add relavent audio. Buffalo Springfiled gets a good song out of the riot, while Phil's life is re-oriented.

Power To The Pupil, Er, People - Firesign Theatre is born on the radio, as a put-on film festival. Phil uses his French to create a film maker who has made a film following Fred for a week. Read about it in the Toilet, after Breakfast with the Brunts. Ossman pretends to throw cameras, for aesthetic reasons. Phil Austin pretends to be Neal Cassady and explains baseball. Joni Mitchell begs for help. Peter falls through the hole in the centre of the CD. PKD has less luck with the I Ching than David, the pretend film maker.  Austin pretends to be a pornographer. The phone lines light up at the thought of censorship. Things to do in the dark. The Beatles sing an anthem. Phil explains The Electrician. Taking the audience into outer space. Can we think for ourselves? A powerful question.  Elayne talks to David on the radio. Oh, heavenly grid. Power inspires madness. Who is going to empower you? Little Feat sing Day or Night. Most of the Firesign film festival discussion is from their appearance on the Les Crane TV show, immortalized on the Firesign DVD Everything You Know is Wrong.

Going Ape On The FM Dial - Phil settles into a mansion in Encino with, among other things, an ape cage. Bergman rocks out. Tirebiter seeks the ape vote. A racist runs for governor in Florida. Roll up a couple of bombers and put them in the shelter. 2 girls for every boy, and they all make commercials. The Firesign future is plotted, and then vaguely remembered on the steam-powered internet. The Firesigns do a benefit for striking DJs at original freeform SF rock station, KMPX. One of the DJs there, Rachel Donahue corrects Phil's memory. You Tube provides some more memories of KMPX and its successor, KSAN. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytQhf05aNsw Rachel's husband Tom weaves a countercultural spell on the radio. Quicksilver Messenger Service helps him out. Firesigns follow the snake. KSAN organizes a clean up of an oil spill near Frisco. Pete rhapsodizes the clean up. KSAN makes its own commercial. The KSAN movie gets promo'd. Carlos Santana can hear his long songs on the radio. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgaytaFuB8s Phil creates combinages to celebrate the moon landing. The moon does Zen. Phil learns about the moon's power while living at the House of Little Men. Echo Poem circles the earth. Phil explains the brain. Steely Dan celebrates the FM dial.

Car Town - The envelope for my collage Car Town is "C. William (Bob) Heeblehauser, A Profile" from Phil Austin's Tales of the Old Detective and Other Big Fat Lies. Some Firesign car babbling from their radio shows. Proctor relives his first car purchase. Pete's dream. Boom Dot Race. The Nash Rambler song. Jim Carrey and Bill Maher talk Trump. More car radio babbling.  From Proctor's podcast, memories of the Jack Poet ads. Harlan Ellison and Tom Snyder remember Ralph Williams. An outtake from Ralph's TV commercials. The whole Firesign Theatre comments on their Jack Poet ads from their EYKIW DVD. More car radio babbling: home is where the stash is. From Proctor's podcast, Pete's salacious Toyota ad leads to termination with extreme prejudice. Duke of Madness Motors ad. A YouTube bit about a Canadian pastry. And speaking of Canada, Take Off, eh.

Ants and Stamps - Back in Procto-land, this time with ants and stamps. Marx and Lennon get a stamp. Stamping and Seizing mechanisms. 30 year olds go crazy when the price of stamps goes up: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGaS2lsPHqw The Smithsonian's Youtube piece about stamp collecting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bu6vw5qlO3M. The last meeting of the philatelist club. Enkidu in space. A stamp sized movie screen. Fuddles sends a letter. I read from The Crying of Lot 49, Pyncheon's postal novel. Peter tells ants to leave his house. They leave. Thanks, Hopis. Enkidu and an eagle converse while turning Japanese. Family Guy's ants. Japanese cooking gets eaten. My history with reading. Eddie Murphy IS Dr, Doolittle. Rex Harrison begs to differ. Phil Austin's story The Money Hat. Its the bees and spiders again. Nick and Relent. Don't bogart that Smokey.

Orders - Phil explains the Firesign idea for Zachariah, and the whole idea of Westerns, the story of bringing order to disorder. Stones calls for violins. WC Fields Forever salutes the Western. Maron and Cleese exchange a joke about the West. Fighting Clowns talk bullets. More stories from Zachariah. Phil Austin brings disorder to art. Phil Proctor escapes death in Mexico. Steve Milller heads south. Stamp collecting brings order to disorder. Pete's suitcase disorders reality. Order your chocolate heads today! Mellow Jello heads the atheletic dept. Paul Krassner riffs on Tim Leary's head. And the Red Queen's, "off with your head." Henry Kissinger is standing by, awaiting your order for butter dishes. Christopher Hitchens makes a movie about Kissinger's disorder. Ordure in the court. The court room scene from Dwarf. No orders for Private Parts. A pizza is ordered, stuffed. Pizza toppings: the usual, and thanks to Austin, the Very Unusual. Order today!

Another World - This is the final collage based on Phil Proctor's podcasts. It begins with a bit of the Frank Lloyd Wright biopic by Ken Burns. Next, Phil Austin's intro to his play Danger Down Under. Peter Bergman torments his ex-wife from beyond the grave. Nanette, by Hannah Gadsby. Helen Fagin reads her letter to a young reader from the new book A Velocity of Being, by Maria Popova and Claudia Bedrick. Pete's favourite Firesign review. Phil remembers seeing Cheech and Chong and considers the purpose of comedy. Mandela, by Aaron Davis, from his album Neon Blue. May we all find other worlds to escape to.




The Magic Firesigns - Terry Southern was an important American writer from the 50s until his death in 1995. Magic Firesigns, the first collage in my Terry Southern Project, begins with Paul Krasser reading his Realist interview with Terry about his inspirations for writing his novel The Magic Christian. Funny enough for Paul to use as a stand up routine. John Cleese interviewed for Marc Maron's podcast, George Tirebiter's name is mispronounced. Back to the Cleese interveiw, Peter Sellers is remembered, starring in the film adaptation of The Magic Christian. Ringo can't help but amuse. A clip from the flick, about an imaginery British car. Phil Austin imagines an even stranger car. Ralph Spoilsport immortalises Ralph Williams. A tasty traffic ticket. A ticket to ride with the Beatles.Terry reads himself. Phil Proctor reads Terry. Peter Sellers and Ringo re-invent pornography. The Firesigns worry about words. Godless TV.

Sex and Death - A profile of Terry Southern from Open Road Media. Inside the Making of Dr. Strangelove. Peorgie contributes to the continuation of the human race. Uncle Underground tries to find something to read on air. A one-eyed snake invades the Pink Hotel. Terry reads from his screenplay for The Loved One. The snake is a river. Man's river vs god's river. Boomers on a Bench, with beavers. More "Inside Strangelove." Vegas, not Dallas. I read Paul Krassner. Terry reads from Blood of a Wig. Bergman promises to read it on the Zen Hi Jinks marathon. Terry really loves underpants, on the set of Easy Rider. Terry reads from Candy. A Firesign listener solves their weekly puzzle. I am a Walrus. Eat or Be Eaten. Bozos' predicts the future. Some calendar-inspired tunes.

Doctors - Terry Southern reads the beginning of his first novel, Flash and Filigree. Dr. Whiplash from Dear Friends. Beat the Reaper, from Waiting for the Electrician. I read from Flash and Filigree. Dr. Strangelove. Coal! Nino gets into holes. Sleep.. Dr. Strangelove again.  Boom Dot Bust on poisoned wells. Flint's poisoning isn't fiction. Jackson Browne's Doctor My Eyes, with exquisite guitar by Jesse Ed Davis.



By The Light Of The Silvery Harlan (Pt 1) - This is part one of a trilogy of collages about Harlan Ellison. As David Ossman tells a New York radio station, Harlan had asked the Firesigns to contribute to his Dangerous Visions series and Elayne helps him remember the name of the mushroom play, By the Light of the Silvery which they contributed. Harlan unlocks the secret of how to be smart. By the Light of the Silvery begins with ominous violins. Harlan is asked to talk about his Selma walk. Harlan wants a shot at fame, but on his terms. Tom Snyder wants to know why Harlan is always confrontational. Preparing for real life. An amazing story about Ralph Williams. Spoilsport's going out of body sale. Harlan explains why he lives in LA, despite the eggs. Where is Hare? The Beatles howl at the moon, just as they did in the first presentation of By the Light of the Silvery, in 1967.

By The Light Of The Silvery Harlan (Pt 2) - Ellison Firesignland: By the Light of the Silvery Harlan 2 begins where Silvery Harlan 1 ends, in the middle of the 1967 Firesign Sherlock Holmes parody. Harlan talks about marching with Martin Luther King in Alabama. P J Proby gets more references than he deserves. Harlan discusses Close Encounters with Peter Gzosky and guests on Pete's Canadian version of The Tonight Show in 1978. The Firesigns bring back Everything You Know is Wrong for a 1997 April Fool's Day broadcast. Harlan regrets what Star Trek did to his script. The Firesigns end their play with 1967 popular music references.

Biting Through With Sharp Teeth - Dreams with Sharp Teeth is a biopic of Harlan Ellison. Robin Williams appears in it, as he does in the Firesign's TV show Weirdly Cool. Everyone is doing the duck. Harlan and Phil Proctor seek to avoid violence. Peter Bergman's mother helps sculpt his future career as clever wordsmith. The U.S, Army fails to conquer Harlan or the Firesigns. Harlan isn't going to go through it anymore. TV dies, kills. Network rants. Pete loves himself on radio, from his 1995 Digital Diner. The snake with one eye will never look the same. Ossman presents, Radio Movies. Naomi loses weight. Dumb guys change countries. A kid meets his saviour at MIT. Stand behind yourself. Bricks get broken. Horatio Ellison revels in LA. When the smog lifts, it's another city. Everything makes Harlan angry. Even hot tubs don't help. May his words warm us forever.


Burroughing In - William Burroughs appears on Saturday Night Live in 1981. Dr. Benway reappears on the first Firesign album. Terry Southern discusses his friend in the movie Burroughs. Iggy Pop discusses Burrough's addiction on a BBC radio programme. A drug expert appears on the Firesign's Hour Hour radio show. Bob Dylan gets the nobel prize for drug use. Burrough's Do Easy discipline is made into a short film by Gus Van Zandt -  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoOUBETTyMI The Firesigns explain the Do Easy-esque concept of a Chinese Homer. Wyatt Earp walks into the Last Chant Saloon. Frank Zappa appears at the Nova Conference, talking about and reading from Naked Lunch. The novel buries unhip resistance.

Proctor and Bergman and Burroughs - LA based film maker Andre Perkowsky made a film based on Burroughs' novel Nova Express with Phil Proctor, Peter Bergman and Burroughs himself -  http://nightflight.com/andre-perkowskis-nova-express-phil-proctor-reads-the-subliminal-kid-and-the-control-machine/ With the end of the world nearing, the Firesigns interview a man doing things backwards on their Fools in Space satellite radio show. Gil Scott Heron reads the TV guide. The Jan 1, 2000 Rose Parade covered by the Firesign Theatre for Pacifica Radio. Turn off the sounds of your TVs and listen to the Firesigns instead. Iggy Pop talks about Burroughs on the BBC. Bill and Brian's excellent BBC adventures. Willy the Rat, in a box. Proctor talks about making collages in his autobiography, Where's My Fortune Cookie? McLuhan approves of unusual combinations. More Nova. Ossman appeals to your divided attention, from his show An Autobozographical Evening. Bergman vs the Death Dwarves. A game called The German Dwarf, from Hour Hour. Nat Eagle works for little people. The origin of the title, Don't Crush That Dwarf, Hand Me The Pliers. Memories of Burroughs.



Part 1: Babies and Bombs - In 1993, journalist David Halberstam released a book called The 50s, which I read at the local library. In 1997, it was turned into a 7-part TV series. Now it's this collage series. As the Firesigns and I were all alive during that distant decade, it seemed worth taking a new look at. While Halberstam opens his series with the fecundity of that time, David Ossman remembers his 1936 birth, and uses Harry Shearer and his then wife to create The Years in Your Ears about the 50s from his SF audio play, How Time Flys. I remember the Soviet nuclear threat from my years in elementary school in LA. hiding under my desk during drop drill. Ossman's play New Mexican Overdrive imagines that high end stereo could be weaponized in the early 50s. Oppy becomes Hoppy. Part of the continuing back story of George Tirebiter. Phil Austin, Frazer Smith and Michael C. Gwynne had a radio show in LA in the late 70s called Hollywood Nite Shift, which imagined Ed Teller as an atomic wimp. https://archive.org/details/Hollywood_Nite_Shift_16bit_44_1ksamp_sec
The Presidents in Hell, from Lawyer's Hospital. More Nite shift, then Coal, from Dear Friends. The best selling American author of that decade was Mickey Spillane, known as Mickey Speedway in New Mexican Overdrive. Terry Southern also wrote about him. Gotta hammer those Commies. The Beatles take us out with Paperback Writer.

Part 2: As Seen On TV - Continuing my exploration of the TV mini-series, David Halberstam's The Fifties, this episode focuses on TV and advertising. Tom Waits' song Step Right Up captures that spirit well.  While Tom promises to walk your dog, a popular tune of the era wonders about the price of the dog in the window. Mutt n' Cheops display the vast variety of goods available to the American consumer. They evolve into Mutt n' Smutt as the Firesigns peddle their wares on NPR's All Things Considered. Fears of returning to the great depression must be combated to show Americans the virtue of consumerism. Money and god share a car. You've earned the right to be Not Guilty. Maidenform cactus. TVs as currency, from Just Folks. A clip from David Ossman's show Radio, Any Questions? about the ubiquity of Amos and Andy.  A clip from Sara Cwynar's film Rose Gold. Bergman remembers reading The Puppet Masters. Vance Packard brings home the fear of manipulation, and Sara expands on the theme in her talk at the Art Institute of Chicago. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bxYwt7ynUU. If the Chinese commies can do it, what about American advertisers? A clip from The Organist podcast, about the Firesign Theatre and psy-ops. Who wonna 2nd World War, you so smaat? Television, the drug of the nation, by the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy brings the collage to a close.

Part 3: Bunnyland - Nichols and May start off the third part of Halberstam's The 50s. Sex Jail, from Paranoid Pictures. Hollywood Blvd. changes.  Phil's actress friend is shocked. The U.S.S. Censorship. Alfred Kinsey is obsessed. It comes in, it goes out like anything. From Freud to Kinsey. The marriage course. The Firesigns object. Heffner goes on a crusade. Dad is clean-minded. Desi Arnez talks to his son. Pick up the right accessories from Mutt and Smutt. Cloud 9 tantalizes Phil Austin in his story House of Little Men. Clouds of girls. Hugh Heffner and the 119 Associates. Vanity in a Lear Jet.

Part 4: Elvis Has Left The Building - Elvis rocks. The cross-roads are good to him. Memphis says, come on in. A juke joint beckons. Clothes make the king.  Sam is financially curious. Good ballad singer, hold for later. Nixon remembers Elvis's top half. She looks great with clothes on too. Dylan escapes Mobile. Elvis has a good hobby. John Lennon doesn't believe. Louisiana hay ride slides on down. Elvis rides a train. Support. and the Lone Ranger. Are you okay? Bananas are OK. Keeping up with the bop. Sir. No fighting for Elvis. Church spasms. Phil Austin channels Elvis, for the bad news tonight. A good looking white man sings the black. Doors open. Professor Mintz explores the world of teenagers, and their effect on reality. Bing explains. The young conquers all. Freedom, then prison in Graceland. Fun with guns. Nixon has to detente and open dialogue. Hoover's "gun belt" makes Elvis happy. FM promises nothing but Blues and Elvis, but that's not a bad thing.

Part 5: Jack's gone. Real gone. - Elvis blends into Kerouac. Something strange was happening. New York City was pulsing. Jack plays the typewriter. Bird soars. Ginsberg explains. T-Bone Burnett explains the Beat generation to Marc Maron. Are we cool? Everyone was somewhat interested. The old detective recalls an old case, with spiders. Myths get created. Beat Street Jack emerges from the alley. Cafe Buddha, from my play Red Shift.  Ralph Spoilsport gets Babe on the road.  Kinsey recruits the Beats for his survey. Merv the Perv gets wound up. Al Howls. Another one for re-grooving. Help, it's the police.  Al is scorned, Jack is attacked. Sputnik spouts poetry. Alcohol drowns Jack. Bob Dylan and Allen Ginsberg visit his grave, during the Rolling Thunder tour.


Part 1 - This collage series is based on a 4-part BBC TV series from 1972 called Ways of Seeing, by art critic, novelist and painter John Berger. In it, Berger shows us how looking at 500 years of European oil painting can open our eyes to the ways we see. Can those revelations also be heard? Billy Flanagan thinks that's an insane question, from Firesign's XM satellite show Fools in Space. How many images can be made? 1? 2? 3? 40,000? Once unique place-dependent paintings are now wall paper.  Dwarf's Powerhouse Church of the Blinding Light probably has no Botticelli in it.  Seeing is more habit than we think.  The human eye can only be in one place at once, unlike the 2nd Firesign album. A Russian film theorist makes a movie to illustrate his theory. We can go back and change the past. Clone me, Dr. Memory.  The camera multiplies and destroys meaning. The corridor between you seeing a painting and the painter painting it is explained in the film version of Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse 5. Paintings become films. Relent barks. Ambiguity can be our friend. Art Snob, from Eat or Be Eaten. Berger show a painting of Jesus by Caravaggio to a group of school children, who see more deeply into the painting than most adults could.  Bisexuals OK with Jesus, from the end of Roller Maidens from Outer Space. Would art ever be the same?  Berger uses images for his own purposes. Sara Cwynar as well. Proctor's Leningrad girl friend offers him the key to understanding the Soviet Union. Be skeptical, but keep your mouth shut.

Part 2 - Berger continues his series with a comment about dreams. The Firesigns dream into existence a radioactive pillow, from their Give Me Immortality disc. Tom Wolfe remembers going to a topless restaurant in San Francisco with Marshall McLuhan. The Firesigns get hopelessly lost. A BBC art series called The Renaissance Unchained.  Sara Cwynar at New York's Museum of Modern Art. https://www.moma.org/magazine/articles/102?utm_source=social&utm_medium=bitly&utm_campaign=Magazine&utm_content=Photography%20Commission%20Cwynar A Netflix series called Explained talks about the mirror test. Phil Austin's Tales of the Old Detective. Nixon looks at a naked picture of Elvis's wife. Eddie's one of our prize students. Molly Bloom's soliloquy from How Can You Be. Ralph Spoilsport's Used and New Body Farm. Berger discusses his ideas with Anya Bostok, Eva Figes, Jane Kenrick, Barbara Niven, Carola Moon and Sara Cwynar. Louise Wong's balcony. Roller Maiden's Norwegian Tits. Proctor's character changes sex. Nancy and Dan get the wrong negative from Rococo. Phil Austin's House of Little Men. The Lone Ranger vs Your Developing Breasts. The doll drop. Peter Bergman's last words. Leon Russell's Magic Mirror.

Part 3 - In part 3 of his series Ways of Seeing, Berger talks about the European oil painting tradition as about consumption. We do love to consume. From Firesign's Fools in Space satellite radio series, Billy Flanagan teaches us how to produce valuable insane art. Art galleries are like banks, just like Tonto's money hole. Art has become religion, and Rev. Barnstormer sure knows religion. Some seductive dinosaurs. Sara Cwynar asks us to consider the museum. Art surrounds its owner better than music or poetry can. Oil paint or course, comes from oil. C. William "Bob" Heeblehouser is no fan of oil. Can a fluid steer anything? We only see the exceptional works of art. Brent Butt's brother loves to take things apart. Oil from Canada, etc. Columbus worships gold. Temporarily Humbolt County residents get religion. From a painting of the West African slave trade to Uncle Field Marshall Tom. More golden rule, less rule of gold, from the Netflix series Explained. Eat or Be Eaten's hunger. This is the portrait gallery, Nick. No portraits of the poor. Run away from poverty. Swimming in silk, and eventually drowning with the mayor.  Hamlet asks a question. Anthropology builds walls. Bob Hind welcomes visitors. Oil painting celebrates private possessions. US Plus owns it all.

Part 4 - John Berger dissects the promise of another world. Phil Austin helps him out. Berger attempts to persuade us that advertising should be called publicity. Proctor and Bergman sell us a car. We envy the president of the World Bank. Thanks, methedrine. We explore glamour. Princess Goddess helps. Proctor reads from The Greening of America, while Bergman scoffs. Dull jobs require an active imagination to survive. We dream. Tonight. The Firesigns boil in a hot tub. Splish splash. Skin. We dream for 1001 nights. The oasis of El Petrol beckons. Ancient castles. Prams get pushed a lot. Advertising is a philosophy. Reality is abused. An essay on public nudity. I never did plan to go anyway to Black Diamond Bay. Our needs are papered over. Green Christmas from Stan Freberg.
A Warm Naked Firesign - The first in a series I'm going to make, inspired by Firesign music, called The Firesign Jukebox. Hour Hour breasts. What was in that cigarette? Boobie Chew from a Firesign flick. Le Trente Huit Cunegonde. Eat or Be Eaten. Holy Modals like boobs a lot. A horny teenager named Phil visits Russia. Shakespeare. Milk. Molly Bloom. Violet Dudley. Pitchforking roller maidens. Desire in Furs. Hundred dollar Ben. More hour hour. A Shadow Moves Upon a Land. The Fugs search for electrical plugs.  Goat's Head pipe tobacco. Duckman buries the hatchet. All over the sky.

A History Lesson - This is the second in my Firesign Jukebox series, inspired by various bits of Firsign music and others. A History Lesson, brought to you by La Brea Man, Attila, Noni, some weird cooks, Vespucci, the little guy, Field Marshall Thomas Legree Quadroon, Chief Dancing Knockout, Nancy, young Tom Edison, Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, Billy Joel, a time capsule, Jim and Nellie Houseafire and finally old man ribba.

Saint Firesign - Welcome to the third installment of The Firesign Jukebox. We begin with Peter talking about saints from the Bridey Murphy Mushroom show from Halloween, 1967, Bob Dylan wears a crown of thorns and the airplane salutes the Crown of Creation. Pastor Flash is high alright, In the Free Mexican Airforce. Jerry stumbles toward the flaming Ford. Dick Privates finds too much light, Manfred Mann loses his sight and a blind newsboy makes an appearance. Jesus heads for Bakersfield. It's Krishna consciousness. Mystic, Connecticut meets Louis' Wipe-Out and the Gluttons chant. You must be the Indians. Grubs again.Firesign was just a little child baby in Hopi-land. The Smokey the Bear Sutra. Pete meets The Roshi.A helpful sailor from my play CAST. Pete Seeger hammers. Paul Blackburn's bike is safe. Frank Gehry has a plan. Paradise is The Future. Or is it Panorama Land 2000? My Client Curley from Norman Corwin. Down to seeds again with the birds. Human health food options. Zen Foods in New York City. More Corwin. Phil Austin answers my question.

3 Live Dwarves Go To Boston U - This is part 3, the final part of our celebration of the 50th anniversary of Don't Crush that Dwarf, Hand Me the Pliers. We begin with a cut from Firesign's Radio Now Live, a recording of the Portland stop on their 1999 tour. The Dwarf-inspired track is called Parallel Hell Redux. Next up, from their 2001 PBS TV show Weirdly Cool, a somewhat longer version of the same scene from Dwarf. The final live Dwarf is a much fuller version of the album, from their 1993 Back From the Shadows Tour. Then, from Peter and David's Radio Free Oz podcast from May 24, 2010, Dave reads an article about a Boston University graduation and it brings back the making of Dwarf, like the hot kiss at the end of a wet fist. Following these 4 segments, we re-visit A Life in the Day of KWKWT, a mixture of the source material they used to construct Dwarf. Happy 50th, little guy. You don't look a day over 49.

A Bee Road, Side One - Come Together features Chuck Berry inspiring the Beatles, Dr Martin Luther King Jr, Henry Aldritch, another Beatles tune, Electrician, 2 clips from Dwarf and Lenny Bruce.  Something features clips from 2 different Nick Dangers, Cut Em Off at the Past and Scaled Down Danger.  Maxwell's Silver Hammer features Maxwell Smart, Maxwell House Coffee, Max Mogan Crime Cabbie, an Hour Hour clip, Jack Benny, Neal Amid and Peter, Paul and Mary.  Oh Darling features Phil Austin as Akira Oh in the Underworld Olympics episode of Let's Eat.  Octopus's Garden features an Hour Hour clip, Dear Friends and Ossman's anti-Trump poem Garden Gnomes.  I Want You, She's So Heavy features Dwarf, Dear Friends, Vince Ptomaine, Down Under Danger, Hour Hour, Dwarf, Maxwell Morgan, Dear Friends, Giant Rat, Proctor and Bergman's Power, Bozos, Gabor Mate and the Martian Space Party.

A Bee Road, Side Two - Here comes the sun. He's not your son, Fred. It's going to be alright. Oh. It's the Ice Show! It's been a fundamentally better sun. Because the wind is high, it's in the Free Mexican Air Force. Joni's blue. Have a nice blue moss. Blue mutants. Open your funny papers, kids. Bergman dreams of Jagger. 1,2,3,4,5,6,7; Bergman's riff from '67. Mark Twain on heaven. Fleetwood Mac's Albatross. Louis the 14th makes an appearance. So does the giant rat. Echo poem. Many knows. Armies mixed Mr. Mustard. Father Time doesn't like mean time. Alice Barnes makes obscene calls. Loretta and Pam go trans. Real roller maidens. Jack Benny saves a dime. Let's see the war dance. I hate cops, Guido. Your money or your life. Tuesday Weld and Phil Proctor make a movie. Hockenberry goes home, without Homer. The Band's gonna carry that weight. I guess this is the end. Beatles brand bombs. A belly full of Pinot Cinema Noir.

A Cat In Denver - I celebrate my visit to Denver with Tom Waits' medly Jack and Neal combined with California, Here I Come. Finally, I am in Neal Cassady-land, fertile ground for the Firesign Theatre. The live parts of their album Lawyer's Hospital was recorded in Denver, which they mentioned freely in the performance. A fine mix of modern and old. There's a vacancy, from 2 Places. The Firesigns do a wine testing, from All Things Firesign. I quote Streetcar Named Desire. Nick Danger sniffs a perfume. Bergman is cold, from the  Eat or Be Eaten album. A clip from Neal Amid. How Time Flys. The Firesigns go to the LA Children's Zoo, Bree! Bree! Bree! Nick Danger smells a rat. Pete pigs out on Insect Chips in Denver. Let's get out of this mud. A clip from my latest play, Vegas Egypt. What are all these Mexicans doing here? Bozos are just a joke. Brick-breaking from Dear Friends. Marc Maron interviews Naomi Klein. US Plus does pork. Deposed heads of 1979, from darkest chocolate Africa. Low Riders, from WAR. Timbuk 3 needs shades. Nicks doesn't deliver to the hills.
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A Charlie Firesign Christmas - Vince Guaraldi is a personal god and Schultz's Peanuts was as important to me from the late 50s to late 60s as the Firesign Theatre has been since then. Put Peanuts and Guaraldi together and we have the perennial holiday classic A Charlie Brown's Christmas. Xmas in Ratland, from Firesign's Let's Eat radio show. As Pig Pen raises a cloud of dust, Phil Austin riffs on storm clouds. At a Firesign Q and A in 2010, Phil tells me of his fears. Buy land in Brazil today! I read from Schultz and Peanuts by David Michealis about Schultz awkwardly proposing to his mistress. What kinda car are you gonna buy me, Daddy? How about a Humbler? The Radio Movies Screen Test from David Ossman's Time Capsules.  From dog germs to The Plague. Peter Bergman named his dog after a Babylonian god. Do you want to be happy for the rest of your life? From the golden age of funny tunes. I share Charlie's skepticism that a bunch of kids dancing can be called a "play." Orson Welles reads from the Biblical book of Nixon. Would you buy a Chevy from Tricky Dicky? Merry Christmas, Russia. Christmas carols with The Doors.

A Firesign Christmas Carol (Part 1) - The Alistair Sims version of A Christmas Carol, Ralph Spoilsport's Going Out of Body Sale, Nick Danger, The Man Who Invented Christmas, How Time Flies, Mr Magoo's Christmas Carol, Electrician, Hour Hour, Python's Money song, EOBE, Popeye's theme song, A Charlie Brown Christmas, It's Money Randy Newman Loves, Just Folks, more Charlie Brown, It's Money That matters to Randy Newman, In the Next World, Marley the movie, Where's My Fortune Cookie, Catch and Release Whaling, Dwarf, More Nick, Humboldt County, 2 places.

A Firesign Christmas Carol (Part 2) - For Part 2 of A Firesign Christmas Carol, we're still with the ghost of Christmas Past, now visiting Scrooge in business. Mr Fezziwig declines to sell out to the Vest Without Sleeves (from the Firesign Theatre's Hour Hour), and the New Model Government machines but Scrooge follows the allure of lucre, meeting his new pal Jacob Marley, years before Mr. MacNee would star in The Avengers. Nick Danger looks for the servants. One shining steel hat. Where's the dead cat? Another clip from the Marley movie. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marley_(film) Everything You Know is Wrong! The Seance, from the Magic Mushroom shows. The blind newsboy, from The Bride of Firesign. Roosterama. A mighty hot dog is our Dwarf. Radio Now. George Tirebiter cleans his star, from Radio Follies. More Radio Now. Bob Marley observes the hypocrites. The future is fair. The Grassroots Gourmet, from All Things Firesign along with Mutt and Smutt. Shoes for the Dead. From the shadows. Marley sings in a cemetery. Bozos suck up appetisers. All Things Wine. He fell right over. Flying humbugs. Coal, you say? Let's go on vacation.

A Firesign Nixon - The Firesign Theatre span the administrations of LBJ to Obama but Nixon provoked their greatest outpouring of satire, not only AS Nixon (Phil Austin did a great immitation) but also as The President in Bozos and Nick Exxon on Roller Maidens. This is but a small sample of the Nixon parodies they did.

A Franticle For Lebowitz (Part 1) - The Netflix series about Fran Lebowitz, Pretend it's a City inspired me to look into this fascinating wit. In this 2-part collage series, Fran's witticisms are wedded to Firesign words and topics. First up, some juice is squeezed out of OJ. Spike Lee is more famous for his sports fan-ship than his movies. Sports are more appropriate for a 7-year-old. The agony of competition, from In the Next World. Then it's back to EYKIW for The Golden Hind. Chump Threads celebrates sports violence. Fishing for Fran. The first fight broadcast. Watch the man with the funny looking mustache. Fight as fashion show. The pimp soft ball team. People can fight but not chickens. Ellington and Mingus, and Judy Collins too. Angels 3, Robots 2. Charles leaves the band stand. Walks through China Town. Radio Free Booze looks into Chinese food. Charles learns Turkish. The national bird goes in the oven. Fran is imperiled by pizza. Backwards going, away from peril.

A Franticle For Lebowitz (Part 2) - Fran continues to talk to Marty, now about her life as a cab driver and the dawning age of electric cars. The Firesign explore similar terrors in their 1975 album In The Next World, You're On Your Own. Max Morgan, Crime Cabbie has it worse than Fran. A taxi to Out, from Electrician. No joint tips for Franny. She's not groovy. It's good for you, but no longer groovy. How about some road-apple red? Fran the artist, but work shouldn't be so much fun. Fran wrote for Andy Warhol but didn't get along with him. Billy Flanagan doesn't like Warhol either. Andy made fame more famous as a joke. An important audience. Last man standing leads to broader and dumber humour. Move to the Louvre to your basement. Artists need a place to hang out. Picasso is better at painting than you are at shopping. The blind art collector, and other stories. Fran's car is vandalized for an apple and a pack of cigarettes.  What do you expect? Fran gets an offer.

A Horse With No Beatles - I watched the first year of the Netflix series Bojack Hoseman a few years ago. Recently I had the opportunity for a free month of Netflix so I caught up with the 3 other years of the show. The first year was by far the best, before it got very dark. Seeing that show reminded me of the America song Horse with No Name, which then reminded me of Buzzin Fly by Tim Buckley (a guest on Radio Free Oz in 67), the Beatles song Rain, The Billy Bragg tune North Sea Bubble, Mr. Ed and some relevant Firesign bits. A short collage this week before some much larger collages I'm working on for later.

A Parade Of Roses - From CBC's Ideas programme, Rebecca Solnit, in conversation with Nahlah Ayed , about her latest book Orwell's Roses.The Firesign Theatre's 2000 Alternate Rose Parade. The surreal under trappings. Sarah Cwynar's video Rose Gold. Billville, from Boom Dot Bust. Bozos, where the vegetables are green. The Whispering Squash show. Phl Proctor reads Loren Eisley's The Judgement of the Birds. Coal, from Dear Friends. Valhalla Thunderbolt Gasoline. What was Rosebud? Factories are no fun, from The Greening of America. Hello, Rose? Richard Burton's 1984, Big Brother is Washing, You. A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Inquisition. The Firesign's Carnation Instant Breakfast commercial. The miracle ingredient, THC. Phil Proctor visits the USSR in 1959. Waterfront Cities of the World: St. Petersburg. Yakov Smirnoff. HIs name's Adolf. Do you remember the future? Pete springs some seeds.

A Tape From The Future Fair - A tape from 100-125 years in the future, found in an elevator at 205 W. 57th Street in New York City on February 11, 1969.
Jerry Stearns - It was "found" and originally distributed by Clark Gesner (who later wrote the musical "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown), and it's assumed he wrote and performed it, though he never admitted to it.
Richard Arnold - David Ossman said it was the best piece of Science Fiction audio of the 20th century, after the Orson Welles production of War of the Worlds. I think Ossie is responsible for far greater Science Fiction audio; How Time Flies and Bozos for example, but his recent comment about this tape inspired me to make this collage. I got by with a little help from friendly Beatles and Jack Kerouac. You're a good man, future Charlie Brown. Do you remember the future?

Addition, Subtraction - I recently read The Biology of Desire by "cognitive neuroscientist and former addict" Marc Lewis arguing against the idea that addiction was a disease. I'd previously read Gabor Mate's In the Realm of the Hungry Ghosts and seen him often on Vancouver TV.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sO3zDOncbzc&feature=youtu.be
I wondered how Mate's experiences with addicts on the Downtown East Side of Vancouver corresponded with Lewis's ideas. Last year I read Chasing the Scream by Johan Hari, which inspired this great animation about Rat Park
http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=Rat+Park%2c+Youtube&view=detail&mid=153FE5349E434E753BF3153FE5349E434E753BF3&FORM=VIRE, f from another Vancouver professor, Bruce Alexander's ideas about addiction. Lots of ideas, but people keep ODing at an increasing rate here.

Afghanishow - What went wrong with the US invasion of Afghanistan? Harry Shearer finds the answers from Inspector General John Sopko in Le Show. https://www.congress.gov/117/meeting/house/114116/witnesses/HHRG-117-FA17-Bio-SopkoJ-20211006.pdf He has help from the Firesign Theatre. Ralph Spoilsport. The Hat Pack lands a gig, from Fools in Space. Operation Infinite bullshit. Yes we can't, from the Radio Free Oz podcast. Radio Free Pashtun.  Why don't the Afghans love us?  Tom Waits for no one. Afghan Gladiator. That Kooky Coke Show.. Jubilee. Mr President meets Barney. Read me Dr. Memory? Lady Anne. Karzai Talk, with Ralph again.

Alice's Berzerko Lounge - When I started doing long collages in 2015, this was one of the first ones I wanted to make. There are so many Firesign food references. Recently a chatter suggested I revisit this project. Here it is. Hope Arlo likes it, and I don't get sent to the Group W bench.

Asstrology - We begin with the Astrology episode from the Netflix series Explained. An Ossman poem from his Autobozographical Evening show. Dr Strangelove protects his precious bodily fluids. The Astrology Album, Phil Austin's narration of Gary Usher's project. R.I.P., from Chad and Jeremy's Of Cabbages and Kings album: Proc describes hanging out and recording with them and the Firesign contributions to Cabbages' Progress Suite. Dwarf Fred and a taste of the American Pageant from 2 Places. Hello Hans from Electrician. 7:00 News/Silent Night from Simon and Garfunkel. David Crosby from The Astrology Album segues into Draft Morning by the Byrds, Gary Usher and the Firesign Theatre. Mama Cass on Radio Free Oz, 1967, A bit of the Mushroom play A Shadow Moves Upon a Land. More Autobozographical Ossman. Dave on Richard Fish's radio show, Jan 8, 2023. Astrological Dylan, Bob Dylan at the Met from EOBE, James Austin Johnson's impressions of Dylan's 4 voices over the years. Dylan Reed from The Digital Diner. Proctor on Capricorn. Elvis meets Nixon, from Digital, along with Buddy DeMort and John Lennon. More from the Netflix show. Giant Rat, Boom Dot Bust and 2 Places. Voices from the Astrology album mixed with the Future voices from Bozos. Dwarf coffee. 1967 RFO and finally, Pete talking to Steve Allen.

Beatles! Christmas! Firesigns! - It's Christmas time and time to mix Firesigns with appropriate seasonal material. We were talking about and listening to some of the Christmas messages the Beatles recorded for their fans on my producer Tweeny's Tuesday radio show and I began formulating this week's collage.
We begin with the only Christmas-themed radio show the Firesigns did, that I know of. Xmas in Ratland from their 1971 Let's Eat series, which ends with the lads and their wives singing Good King Wenceslas, followed by the Beatles singing the same carol. The long (almost 70 minute) collage also ends with that song, from the Beatles final Christmas message from 1969.In between, we feature: the first Beatles Christmas message from 1963, mixed with Voice Prints of the 60s from Fools in Space, Phli Proctor's Candy song, Deposed heads of 1979 in chocolate, Chris Lawson's pot poem about gruel, Loostners from Nick Danger, a Carnation Instant Breakfast commercial and Phil Austin's "X" is for Christmas. From 1964, The American Pageant from 2 Places, Napalmolive from Dwarf. From 1965, Beatle gratitude is mixed with Eyore's birthday. Sally's list. Whiteness from the Mushroom play A Shadow Moves Upon a Land.
The 2nd part of the collage opens with 1966 Beatles mixed with Proctor and Bregman's Power. Dead John Lenon on The Digital Diner. Vino Bros. Eddie Izzard on banjo-playing tigers.. From 1967, The Firesign's History of Radio. Jam jars. A couple of cuts from Dwarf. The final part of the collage opens in 1968. The Mushroom play Sesame Mucho. The Martian Space Party. A mixture of Beatles and Firesign references from Nick Danger. I am a Walrus. CAST. A Life in the Day. Neal Amid. Stan Freberg. The final Beatle message, from 1969 features Jesus eating a hamburger and an ad for Louie's. Canapa seeds. How Time Flys. John Cleese tells Marc Maron about writing for Ringo. Like the Firesigns, the Beatles were hilarious, and profoundly theatrical.

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

We're All Begleys On This Bus - Phil Proctor interviewed his old friend Ed Begley Jr on Phil and Ted's Sexy Boomer Show recently. Ed was promoting his new autobiography, and guest host Ted Bonnit was staggered by the stories there-in.. Firesign clips include: Bozos, Dr Me from the Eat or Be Eaten movie, Dwarf, Fools in Space,  The Duke of Madness Motors collection, Fighting Clowns, more Dwarf.

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

Between Fire and Sign - The inspiration for this collage is yet another CBC Ideas programme, In a Liminal Space: https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-23-ideas/clip/15897775-in-liminal-space?subscribe=true. The Firesigns have explored liminal spaces for decades now, in between reality and surrealism. Phil Austin's It had been night. There's no one left to do the ceremonies. Desi Arnez counsels his 16-year-old son.  Wait til you see his costume. Proctor and Bergman's Halloween in Hollywood. A scene from my most recent play CAST. A clip from my old play Big Time. A Firesign clip from one of their Dear Friends radio shows. I just wanna get out. Symptom 6. Morse Science High- it's disappeared.  We're on the Other Side. Ossman does Brautigan doing Jesus. Why? Y2K. Things are beginning to unravel out there. Voices from the future, with Bozos. Let's just take a look inside your beautiful new home. Hungry Dwarf. Hungry Ossman poem. This hasn't happened to me since M. The whole Dada enchilada. Mickey Mantle Day. Echo Poem.

Bill McKibbenville - This collage is based on an interview with the great environmental writer Bill McKibben on Robert Scheer's podcast Scheer Intelligence: https://www.kcrw.com/culture/shows/scheer-intelligence/silicon-valley-doesnt-give-a-damn-about-earths-imminent-demise Naturally, it begins in Billville. Mr. Foster-freeze does Silicon Valley. Adam One Three is born in China. The Arctic melts and we go fishin for Snook. Planet X does not welcome visitors. Coca-Cola pop and pour. Mrs Presskey chooses the bag. Those Cooky Koch Bros. Bill Clinton is President Reagan's man. Proctor and Bergman explain nuclear power. Are we all caught in a time trap?

Blue Mutant Octopus - The envelope for this week's collage is a You Tube video for kids about the amazing octopus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmcdhDUQzik  I was inspired to explore this creature by a new poem by Maria Popova called The Age of the Possible : https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/06/02/octopus-poem/ and a Simpsons repeat about Lisa and her octopus friend I saw the same day as I encountered the Popova poem. Octoglomerate is from the Firesign's Nick Danger and the Case of the Missing Shoes mini-album. A blue mutant taste from the Chinchilla Show, from the Dear Friends album. I read from Rebecca Solnit's book A Field Guide to Getting Lost which segues into the Popova poem. Phil Proctor tells us How to Sing the Blues from his album A Visit to Planet Proctor. A clip from one of my Vegas trip collages that leads to the story of Kiwi marketing from CBC's Under the Influence by Terry O'Reilly. https://www.cbc.ca/radio/undertheinfluence. Peter Bergman visits New Zealand and suggests they change their mascot, from Firesign's Fools in Space show. The Going Out of Body Sale from Firesign's Give Me Immortality or Give Me Death. Tweeny requests a Beatles tune, from my play CAST. Ringo obliges. A fine garden, from the Dear Friends album. Be good to octopuses by stopping using plastic.

Borders - David Ossman wrote a poem for Peter Bergman who was in and out of Turkey while the Firesigns were writing their first album Waiting for the Electrician in 1967. A new song, Tease, by Toronto singer Ralph reminded me of KD Laing's Constant Craving. Peter has a poetic dream about a wonderful future. A short story, Neal in LA, the 2nd of my Neal Cassady tales, this one from 1981. Judy Collins sings a Donovan song about as well as anyone ever sang anything.

Borrowed Tunes - The Firesigns complain that Weird Al stole their idea but played his song Everything You Know Is Wrong on their XM radio show. The Everything You Know is Wrong Expo. Al is interviewed on the CBC radio show Q. Al does Michael. The Palombra, a fine old Mexican theatrical tradition. Kurt Cobain is happy not to have his song parody about food. Al as starving artist. Rocky runs a restaurant. Have the box lunch. Marc Maron's girlfriend is a vegetarian. We learn where Southpark comes from. Addictive twinkies. Mr and Mrs Weird Al don't pressure their daughter with tales of starvation. Maron pigs out in Vancouver. What was the word? Al does novelty music. Peter Bergman's 1956 novelty record Attention Convention. George Harrison is convicted. It's tune borrowing time. I think we're all Gene Autry on this bus. Kundun on the moon. George's jury gets a free concert. Alive as you or me, eh? She once was a true song of mine. Marlene Dietrich falls for the Firesign Theatre. Oklahoma gets bombed. George tries to stay positive. Paul helps him out.

Bozos Board The Wrong Bus (Part 1) - By request I mixed Bozos with EYK. The mix opens with the EYK Expo, from their 1997 April Fools spots. Lover dance with me, by Sonny Landreth. The cabin restaurant, Deputy Dan from DF and Aliens, Register Now fill out the mix.
Bozos Board The Wrong Bus (Part 2)

Bugged - Nick Danger gets to the bottom of President Bush. A bugged plane, from Fools in Space. Hillary and Bill Maher. Amy Goodman interviews Shoshana Zuboff about her new book The Age of Surveillance Capitalism. https://www.democracynow.org/appearances/shoshana_zuboff  Laurie Anderson explains Burroughs. What is surveillance capitalism? Sounds like something that leeked out of a Burroughs nightmare. The Giant Rat of Sumatra, Scene 5. Nudging predictions. Hideo Knutt's Boltadrome. Scraping up the data. Secret Agent Man meets Number 6. Google searches us. Doctor Memory can't answer a question, and we escape its power.

Bugged 2 - I was inspired to create this collage, revisiting the subject first explored in Bugged, when Harry Shearer interviewed Shoshana Zuboff on his Le Show programme. This time I brought in a couple more voices, the Welsh journalist Carole Cadwalladr and the Turkish sociologist Zeynep Tufeckci from their TED talks. https://www.ted.com/talks/carole_cadwalladr_facebook_s_role_in_brexit_and_the_threat_to_democracy?language=en
https://www.ted.com/talks/zeynep_tufekci_we_re_building_a_dystopia_just_to_make_people_click_on_ads?language=en
You don't have to be a famous detective like Hemlock Stones to see the problems with Facebook, and surveillance capitalism in general. Zizzing and Dripping with the Royal Air Force. Is Facebook as addictive as heroin? Shoshana talks to Harry. Car companies evolve into data vultures. Ralph shows you the extras. Crazy Rocky's smart house, from the Firesign flick The Case of the Missing Yolks. The alternate universe of smart homes past. Smart light bulbs amuse Harry. Hall and Oates are watching you. The Nest goes bad. Broadcasting to the universe from your bedroom. Smart fabric predicted by Phil's old girlfriend. Artificial Intelligence has risks. Ah Clem is followed around, like boots. Persuasion architecture. What information are we seeing? MacNam is unhappy.

Carlin Joins The Firesign Theatre - Carlin doesn't miss, but that can't be said of the English language: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdPy5Ikn7dw  His take on Washington DC political speech also hits the bullshit eye: http://speakola.com/political/george-carlin-political-speak-press-club-1999. The Firesigns were jealous of all the grammies he kept winning, while they kept losing. That didn't stop him from appearing on the Firesign's Weirdly Cool broadcast, praising them. The Beatles offer to drive Ralph Spoilsport's car.
Like the Firesigns, Carlin crafted decades of comedy reflecting on the funny ways we use the English language. Would a Japanese George Carlin have found as many hilarities in the Japanese language? Maybe all languages are equally hilarious. A long interview with George about his childhood fascination with language inspired my first collage of this millenium, called Peace Pipe. This latest collage was inspired by the two clips listed above which Facebook friends posted recently. I think are brains will continue to find inspiration from both Carlin and Firesigns as long as we speak English, and have access to their work.

Chariot Of The Globs - Chariot of the Globs, by Gilbert Shelton and Dave Sheridan, first appeared in Brother, Can You Spare 75 cents for The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers #4, which came out in 1975. In 1983, my wife and I converted the comic strip into an audio adventure. Featured in our version of Chariot of the Globs are, in order of appearance, The Firesign Theatre, Country Joe and the Fish, Cat, Brian Stewart, our 4-year old daughter Bit, Pink Floyd, The Bonzo Dog Band, Buffalo Springfield, Tony Rengli, Hisato Ota, B. Dylan, The Band, Tell-A-Story Presents Fun on a Rainy Day, Philip Tschiermer, B. Zimmerman, our cat Ernie, The Beatles, more Beatles, Mary Livingstone, Jack Benny, Mr. Kissel, Santana, Jackie Ikawa, Shinjiro Mori, Fumiyo, Jack Kerouac, Steve Miller, Philip's game machine, Joel Diamond, The Byrds, William Burroughs, a shortwave radio, George Carlin, Loudon Wainwright III, Gordon Lightfoot, The Loving Spoonfull, Pilot, Wolfman Jack, Sean Philips, Bruce Cockburn and ends with the song Old Brown Dog by Spider John Koerner and Willy Murphy. I had mentioned this song on my Carleton collage, identifying it as the theme song for my Carleton radio show, not because of the lyrics but because of the exquisite piano.

Chief Dan George Meets The Firesign Theatre (part 1) - I first learned about Chief Dan George from the movie Little Big Man, like most other people. For the past 27 years, my family has lived in the traditional territory of his people, the Tsleil-Waututh First Nation. I saw Loretta Todd's movie Today is a Good Day in the Vancouver Film Festival back in the 90s and taped it when it was broadcast on the CBC biography series, Life and Times, http://filmcatalog.nmai.si.edu/title/1399/. This collage was inspired by an exhibit about George which has been at the North Vancouver Museum for almost a year now, https://nvma.ca/exhibits/. The musical envelope of this collage and part 2 is the song Witchi Tai Toe by First Nations jazz musician, Jim Pepper,  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Pepper. Phil Austin wrote A Shadow Moves Upon a Land, first performed by The Firesign Theatre at the Magic Mushroom on the closest Sunday to American Thanksgiving, 1967. The story about the Shoshone lad is from that magical piece.  A number of bits from Firesign's Temporarily Humboldt County pepper the collage. George's granddaughter Charlene Aleck was interviewed by the local Vancouver CBC radio station about the Museum exhibit. Bees visit Bozos. Nick Danger gives some advice on remembering your lines. Bergman interviewed "Hopi messenger" Craig Carpenter on the same episode of Radio Free Oz as Shadow was broadcast. The remaining Firesigns (Proctor and Ossman) still talk about their contact with Craig. Even before they became the Firesign Theatre, Ossman, Austin and Bergman were doing radio programmes about the American Indian on KPFK and their influence on Firesign is obvious from their plays. http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=288.0  Like Bergman, Craig talked a lot and made up even more. Dylan visits The Gypsy. I segue from a discussion of George's connection to story tellers to the G.M. Pavillion at Expo 86 and a small clip from Firesign's Eat or Be Eaten. Jim Pepper ends the collage.

Chief Dan George Meets The Firesign Theatre (part 2) - As the Firesign describes "honest stories of working people as told by rich, Hollywood stars," Chief Dan George goes to Hollywood, for the love of his people. Dustin Hoffman and Arthur Penn share memories of George. The Firesigns march to dinner. George appears in Proctor and Bergman's Americathon. Some Berzerker who's prepared to die from Fighting Clowns. The chief blesses a commoner. Father Corona blesses Temporarily Humboldt County. Rancho Malario, from Dwarf and the malaria epidemic from A Shadow Moves. Clint Eastwood can't give George any directions. Two of David Ossman's poems about Raven, from his performance An Autobozographical Evening. Chief Dan George gives a speech, for Canada's 100th birthday: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PL9JedH5ngA with help from his youngest son Leonard. More Ossman poems from the above performance. Poems about the history of the Indians printed on playing cards, and then shuffled to make a new history, or not. Newspaperman Denny Boyd remembers Chief Dan George. Jim Pepper plays him out.

Cocteau - Today's collage blends my recent adventures in Las Vegas with a BBC documentary about Jean Cocteau, plus a discussion of his friend Coco Chanel and the usual mixture of Firesign clips including the Magic Mushroom play Sesame Mucho, Electrician, Proctor and Bergman's Lemon Car, Bozos, the Magic Mushroom play Freak for a Week, Giant Rat, Bozos, Roller Maidens, The Case of the Missing Yolks. Mommy spilled the tuna, 2 Places, Sesame Mucho again, 3 Faces of Al, TV or Not TV, and Mark Twain from Fools in Space.

Conan, Russel, Firesign (Part 1) - This is Russel Brand's interview with Conan O'Brien. I enjoy both comedians and it was a treat to hear them trade riffs. Who were they? Eddie Izzard reminds us that America has predecessors in predatory colonialism. My fellow redskins. Ossman explains Acme. The Bowel Oil Company. Gnawed wires no doubt. Hey Slim, why doncha get in. Proctor in Vegas. Bergman too. I have seen the Kabuki. Real Food Brand artificial food. Broth vs saliva? Stay tune for round 2.

Conan, Russel, Firesign (Part 2) - Part 2 of Conan O'Brien and Russel Brand talking on Conan's podcast Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend. Lenny Bruce echoes Conan's sentiments about the pitfalls of fame from his Thank You Masked Man routine. Joni Mitchell serenades the Cloud. The celeberazzis taking pictures of themselves from Immortality. Paul Krassner ends with his story on Peter Bergman's Digital Diner, of a strange encounter with fame after Paul appeared on Conan's TV show.

Coney Ossman of the Mind - Another collage based on an ideas programme, this one about Lawrence Ferlinghetti: https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-23-ideas/clip/15845543-the-last-bohemian-lawrence-ferlinghetti. The opening poem isn't by him but references him. Paul Krassner shares a memory of Coney from his autobiography. David Ossman's poem La Playa. Lawrence evokes the circus. Proctor and Bergman's Cirque Internationale. Ricki Lee Jones and Mr Motion. Chaplin inspires. Ossman is born. LF is adopted by a flapper. The Giant Rat wonders what's under the flap. We get a tour of his early life. Sartre's No Exit. LF visits Nagasaki and the presidents in hell. Nice Paisley horsey. Wacko in Paris. LF discovers San Fransisco. Upper Middle Class Wine, from Hollywood Night shift. McClure is impressed with LF's paintings at City Lights Bookstore. Art Snob sells art. Monty Python's book store sketch. Howl makes LF and Ginsberg famous. The Naked Lunch destroys unhip resistance. AG is interviewed by DO. LF mimics Lord Buckley. A taste of The Naz. Kerouac thinks of Dean Moriarty. Bergman's ecolition. Jerry Ford golf/rat shoot. Nick Danger. Chaplin's influence. Ossman reads poems during the Big Internet Broadcast of 1996. LF reminds us the world is a beautiful place. The smiling mortician comes for Ferlinghetti at last.

Corona Bob - My wife was watching Japanese news on her phone and then something on Youtube also about the Corona Virus. I heard the words chicken neck, and immediately thought of the Firesign Roosterama bit from Dear Friends. Dr. Duc Vuong is apparently famous for something. Bob for something else. Tubes. Aren't we all in the haunted space station now? Dylan's not yellow, he's chicken. CBC's Sunday Edition with Michael Enright. Alvin! Bob hasn't written a good song since Black Diamond Bay. Kiss em? An emergency room nurse speaks. Are we just like Italy? I wanna order a pizza to go, and, no anchovies. Mama! I'll be good. Who killed Davey Moore? Hey Paolo, he broke the president.

Could Be Green (Part 1) - This collage is a combination of Norman Corwin's 1949 radio play Could Be and a recent CBC Ideas programme called The Greenest Metaphor. https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-23-ideas/clip/15835019-the-greenest-metaphor Part one includes, of course, The Firesign Theatre, Van Morrison as Kermit the Frog, and author of A Good War, Seth Klein interviewed by Claude Schryer on the podcast Conscient.ca

Could Be Green (Part 2) - Could Be was produced by Corwin for the United Nation's radio division, and first aired on Sept. 11, 1949.  This docu-drama imagines a world in which nations approach peaceful coexistence- attacking hunger, disease, ignorance and poverty- with the same zeal with which they wage war against each other.  The liner notes to Could Be from the series Thirteen by Corwin, a product of The Lodestone Catalog.  Also more from The Idea programme The Greenest Metaphor https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-23-ideas/clip/15835019-the-greenest-metaphor, the podcast Conscient.ca, Firesign Theatre and a taste of Lenny Bruce's Thank You, Masked Man.

Crea9ivity - The comedian Victor Borge used to have a bit about replacing numbers in words with the next higher number. Lieutenant became lieueleventant for example. I've done this with a TV show about creativity here, called The Creative Brain by David Eagleman.  Are there any comedy groups more creative than the Firesign Theatre? It's a rainbow! Live it or live with it. Monty Python protects us from fruit. Giant Rat. How time Flys. Billy Flanagan from Fools in Space. Bendable community workers. Anythynge. Not Insane. 2 Places. Long John Baldry. The Andrews Sisters. 40 Unclaimed Melodies, from Dear Friends. David Ossman channels Lord Buckley. Electrician. Giant Rat does crime.

Part A
Part B
Part C - Finishing my collage based on the Creative Brain, those always creative Firesigns contribute bits of Giant Rat, Fools in Space, The Fresh Chef from their Hour Hour radio show, and Bozos. Some non-Fiersign material from the Flintstones and Bill Haley combine with bits from Dwarf and more Bozos. Dwarf excretions, Art Snob from Eat or Be Eaten, and ending with the Future Voices from Bozos.
 
Deputy Doppelganger (Part 1) - Deputy Doppelganger part 1. We begin with Marc Maron's interview with Naomi Klein. Then we go on to EYKIW Expo from the 1997 April Fools spot. A Dear Friends episode called Deputy Dan. A great CBC interviewer, Pia Chattopadhyay interviewing Naomi on her programme The Sunday Magazine, Dwarf, EOBE (where we get The Toilet), more EYKIW, Lawyer's Hospital, Nino the Mind Bender and Hole Finder, Maron again, Dwarf, Bozos, Dwarf, Temporarily Humboldt County, The Beatles,more EYKIW and it's still wrong, Proctor and Bergman's Power, Bozos, more Bozo, Fools in Space and finally, Dwarf.
Part 1 A
Part 1 B
Part 1 C

Deputy Doppelganger (Part 2) - Deputy Doppelganger Part 2 continues Jia Tollentino's interview with Naomi Klein from the New Yorker Radio Hour. A taste of Immortality, The Big Internet Broadcast of 1996. Phil Austin's play A Shadow Moves Upon A Land from the Firesign's first flowering at the Magic Mushroom in 1967. The audio version of The Tyee's Andrea Bennett's interview with Naomi Klein. Nick Danger surrenders. Kane, from Boom Dot Bust. Hitler, from 2 Places. Maron. The Pink Hotel Burns Down. W.C.Fields Forever. Proctor and Bergman's Power. The Tyee again. The sun takes acid, WC Fields Forever. EYKIW The child within, from Power. Dear Friends. Pia again. 2 Places's American Pageant. Nick Danger multiplies.

Part 2 A
Part 2 B
Part 2 C

Dinner On Mars With The Firesign Theatre - David Bowie asks a relevant question. CBC's Ideas programme ponders dining on the red planet: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/dinner-on-mars-how-to-grow-food-when-humans-colonize-the-red-planet-1.6604758. Firesigns riff on Mars from their Let's Eat radio series. Vino Brothers go Martian. Mark Time gets some solid Ersatz brothers coffee. Proctor and Bergman's Consumer WatchDog. Bark Bark!  Professor Zygote discovers THC. Tiberius was a very strange man. He didn't Tile it like it was. Another lesson about Mars from the Firesigns. We might all be Martians, suggests YouTube. Phil Austin is reincarnated as a Martian microbe. Some bits from my play Red Shift. Fleetwood Mac does their latest single. God, the co-pilot, from The Martian Space Party. Ray Bradbury's Mars. Ossman reads from War of the Worlds.His son impersonates Orson Welles. Billy Bragg knows what war is good for. Take the train to Mars. Bowie keeps questioning. A visit to Microorganism National State Park.

Does It Get UHF? - Today's collage was inspired by the New Yorker radio hour report on UFOs: https://www.newyorker.com/podcast/the-new-yorker-radio-hour/are-ufos-a-national-security-threat.

The Firesigns explored this topic thoroughly in their album Everything You Know is Wrong. We'll also hear George Tirebiter talking about Neptune, Proctor's adventures with the CIA, two cuts by Firesign-adjacent group The Byrds and a taste of the Bonzos. The President says, "Sell those demons!" Live from the senate bar. All Things Firesign is right on target. Aliens register now!

Dogged Runyon - A few years ago, I saw an exhibition by Art Spiegelman, famous author of MAUS and RAW. In the museum's gift shop, I found a book by Art called Open Me, I'm a Dog which I fell in love with and wanted to share with a young person. My grandson Phoenix Chand turned 7 last year so I thought it would be a good time to give him the book for Christmas. Here he is reading the book, along with the 1944 Norman Corwin play The Odyssey of Runyon Jones and some assorted Firesign dog bits. Bergman's French bull dog Nurgi had a big influence on early Firesign and Austin's love of dogs had a big influence on him.

Dreams - Some dreams of The Firesign Theatre. Some dreamy tunes. My 2nd radio play, Big Time, about a dream of Big Foot in 1996. A google search for the science of dreams led to this bit of youtubery: http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=The+science+of+dreaming%2c+SciShow&view=detail&mid=CDFF3881E360D9810E0DCDFF3881E360D9810E0D&FORM=VIRE
Dreams are supposed to make us less crazy. Jon Stewart explains to Colbert why that isn't so believable.

Eat Twice (Part 1)
Eat Twice (Part 2) - (no description available)

Elayne-A-Pallooza - For Elayne, the founder of the chat in 1995, I've assembled a few of the speaking parts she's done for David Ossman and me. After Penny Lane, we hear Elayne as a literary agent and her husband Robin as H.G. Welles in my play Red Shift. Next, Elayne by herself this time, playing a character from a Steely Dan song and teaching Yiddish in my Radio Free Oz parody Radio Free Booze. Following that, Elayne reads from Ossman's diary while creating Give Me Immortality, and then tells a tale of meeting him long ago. Following that memory, one of Elayne's lines from my 1997 play UNFair. The rest of her lines from that play are interspersed with her comments in Jim Freund's interview with Ossman on his old station, WBAI in the 90s. which we'll hear in the 2nd hour. Finally, Elayne's last reading and remembering for David's We're Doomed project from last year.

Endangered Democracy - This week's collage is based on CBC's The Current: https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-63-the-current/clip/15851196-afghan-interpreters-helped-canadas-military-face-death-threats. Anne Applebaum and Ben Rhodes discuss their new books, mixed with a ton of Firesign, a touch of Beatles, and endings with Bruce Cockburn's They Call it Democracy.

Fire Moon - Terry O'Reilly's CBC programme Under the Influence forms the basis for this week's collage. This particular episode deals with Moon Marketing, two things of great interest to The Firesign Theatre. JFK gets aspirational. Firesign's Hour Hour show. The New Frontier, from Donald Fagan's Nightfly album. Brubek takes 5. The Firesigns evoked the Old West in their first album, with the tracks WC Fields Forever and Temporarily Humboldt County. The Credibility Gap's on First. Phil Austin's story The House of Little Men. Pooh sticks, from Hour Hour. LBJ from the movie The Right Stuff. Life, from Boom Dot Bust. Some prices from Two Places. A memorable dream from Roller Maidens. Phil Proctor in Russia: the Communist Love Song. JFK Assassination Waltz, from Hour Hour. The Firesigns eat the moon. CBC's podcast Lets Make a Sci-Fi. The Firsign's 1967 Magic Mushroom play By the Light of the Silvery. Cambodian soldiers invade Hour Hour. A real ad from the Firesign Theatre for Carnation Instant Breakfast. Hoses on Hour Hour and the House of Little Men. Bob and Doug Mckenzie are hosers. Nick Danger beats the eagle off. Blue Moons. Brian Cox's Adventures in Time and Space. Lunar Firesigns. Neal Amid. A zen tale. The New Frontier closes.

Firesign Fungi (Part 1) - I recently saw a wondrous documentary called Fantastic Fungi on Netflix. The Firesigns riffed on mushrooms in their 2000 Rose Parade coverage. Virtual Davis Jr, from The Digital Diner. My daughter as King Tut's priestess from my play Neal Amid. How Time Flys. Everything You Know is Wrong.Temporarily Humboldt County. Hour Hour. Mark Time. Microorganism State Park. More HTF. Don't Crush That Dwarf.  Radio Free Oz, 1967. Bozos. Anytown, USA. Zappa's brown shoes don't make it. 2 Places. Dwarf. More Digital Diner. A Shadow Moves Upon a Land.

Firesign Fungi (Part 2) - Continuing on from last week, the documentary Fantastic Fungi augmented with the following Firesign inserts: Wolfman Jack in How Time Flys, Freak for a Week, Electrician, EOBE, 1967 Radio Free Oz, Immortality, more Freak, Ossman's poem for Peter Bergman (a Turkey tale), The Steam-Powered Internet, Tile it Like it is,  and 2 Places.

Firesign Motors - Jack Poet gets loaded. Rubber Tires. Valhalla takes acid. Eco-friendly and horny Jack. Picky Proctor needs a Humbler. Duke of Madness Motors. Honest Abe Chevy. Buried car. Car Hook. Valhalla wears the horns. I don wanna pickle, I just wanna ride my Ariel Square 4. Police Street. Austin's song Officer Midnight, from The Big Broadcast of 1976, a live show from Austin, Ossman and friends. Nearly killed. Jack Poet goes to war. Fidel Castro sells out. Pete's woody dream disappears. Is paradise always just a dream?

Firesignathon - Firesignathon evolved from Proctor and Bergman's Gothamathon and then the movie Americathon which evolved from their script, mixed with the Firesigns raising money for KPFK, an extra on their Duke of Madness Motors compilation and the Zen Hi-Jinx marathon, which is also part of that collection. Tunes were suggested by chatters on Tweeny's Tuesday show. The Beach Boys and the Beatles beg for help.  Bob Dylan bleats and begs. Randy Newman wants money too. Gil Scott Heron is not a TV director and Duckman is there too.

For David Samuel - I taught English at a school in Tokyo with David Samuel in the 1980s. He and his wife Patty are the most widely traveled people I have met Not only traveling, but living in different countries and cities, and learning from them all. David was a paragon of the international. Now he's gone to “the undiscovered country, from which no traveler returns,” to quote Shakespeare. I'm sure he'll be a paragon there too.

For Grown Ups - Dr Carl Hart, Chair of the Psychology Dept at Columbia University, recently gave a public talk in Vancouver called Drug Use for Grown Ups. https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/policies-restricting-drug-use-are-fueling-the-drug-crisis-says-dr-carl-hart-1.5164017
I did a collage last year on this topic called Addiction Subtraction and this seemed like a good idea to revisit. CBC's Ideas programme, often a source for these collages, has deleted his expletives for the sensitive ears of CBC listeners. Pico and Alvarado get back from patrol. What are we gonna do? Paul Krassner takes and talks drugs. Carl discovers life enhancement. The descendent of slaves wonders why he's still enslaved. He risked a flight to Vancouver to deliver this talk. Some risks are worth taking. We can't see the slides he shows, but we couldn't see the movies shown on Bergman's Radio Free Oz show where the Firesign Theatre was born. Mike Jay explains the birth of the peyote religion. Eddie returns from Indian School. The Governor of Main gets the racist vote. Carl calls for action. Proctor and Bergman explore the freedom to eat. Martin Luther King gives us good advice. Thomas Jefferson gives us a warning. Mankind Liberation Front sing Dope Dream(1999) from the soundtrack of Ronn Mann's film Grass.

Gambling on The Firesign Theatre - There is a confluence to these collages from Wave (Hunter Thompson) to Hunter and Bear to Magic Keys to Gambling on Firesign. I've been exploring themes well explored by the Firesigns, Ken Kesey, Paul Krassner, Owsley and others. When I started in radio in the 60s, I could listen to that kind of themed show all the time. Podcasting seems to continue that tradition. Whoever bet, in 1962, that Bob Dylan would win the Nobel Prize in 2016 would now be rich, and probably dead.

Geronimo Spoilsport - From before they were the Firesign Theatre, the lads were heavily into Native America, thought, politics, etc. Murphy's great tune goes well with their orientation.

Goats - My favourite Rolling Stones song is 100 Years Ago, on the Goat's Head Soup album. When I learned that Firesign Phil Proctor was in the studio watching it being mixed with Mick, I decided to make a collage out of the song and assorted goat references. Thanks to Chris Palladino for a copy of Austin's rightfully obscure Astrology disc. Elivs/Nixon is from a 2 episode radio show called Digital Diner Peter Bergman did in 1974. The information about goats is from this website, http://donate.worldvision.org/goat, one of several charities that provide goats to people. 

Great Pooh-1 - Inspired by a CBC comedy programme called The Debaters and the memory of the Firesigns acting out Chapter 6 of the Pooh book a 2-part collage. We begin with Mrs Presky's last deal. The Debaters, from Winnipeg, where the name Winnie comes from. Detailed dress circuits. Nino Savatte. Radio Free Oz, July 25, 1978. An acid stomach. Jane the Duck. How to sing the blues, from A Visit to Planet Proctor.  Bill Shatner on Marc Maron's podcast. Rainy Beatles mixed with Cats and Frogs, Phil Austin's storm clouds and Nick Danger goes swimming.

Great Pooh-2 - From the Dear Friends episode Happy Harry's Confession Booth, first broadcast on Dec 6, 1970 and collected in the Duke of Madness Motors collection. As Ossman and Bergman's birthdays were close together, they celebrated with this Winnie the Pooh tale.Monsieur Benway is a Canadian. Sweater pies from Eat or Be Eaten. Nick returns a door knocker. A sweet clip from the Disney movie Winnie the Pooh. It's the bees and spiders again. Dogs in a balloon, from Hour Hour. The motor-operated Push Over is invented. The Beatles serenade Eeyore.

Halloween '17 - This is my 2nd Halloween show, the first being Gilded Love. This one features All Things Firesign, Halloween in Hollywood from NPR's 1990 show Heat, Roller Maidens, Boom Dot Devilmaster, Proctor's unnerving experience in New York from the D.O.M.M. collection, Sympathy for the Stones, More things Firesign, More Hour Hour from DOMM, a Halloweeny Mark Time, Yet More Things Firesign, Electrician, Death from DOMM, Give me Immortality, PP and DO interviewed by Steve Gilmour, Boom Dot Bill, Mark Twain in Fools in Space, more Fools and finally Peter Bergman's final words from his RFO Podcast.

Halloween 2021 - 3 short bits from Phil Proctor's autobiography, beginning with his experience at the Canadian border with props from Clark Wintergreen and then 2 spooky stories from Proctor and Bergman's lives on the road. 2 cuts from Proctor and Bergman on John Hockenberry's 1990 NPR show Heat, Halloween in Hollywood and Hubble Trouble which follow Scary Sale from All Things Firesign. Mark Time visits the haunted space station. Cable Town, also from All Things Firesign. Beat the Reaper. Pete contemplates his death on 1967's Radio Free Oz show. Ralph Spoilsport's New and Used Body Parts. Ossman and Proctor on Steve Gilmour's podcast. Mark Twain comes back to life and visits Fools in Space.

High Heel Firesigns - A great Traffic tune. The Firesign Theatre's favourite gay newsmen. Gun violence. Kind of a movie for the mind. A disturbed mind. 

Humpback Firesign - My latest collage was inspired by CBC's Doc Project about Humpback Whales: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/docproject/how-artists-are-making-new-music-inspired-by-the-mysteries-of-whalesong-1.5961102. Star Trek 4, The Voyage Home plays a prominent role in the collage. The song To the Last Whale is from Crosby, Still and Nash. The song was written by Graham Nash.  On You Tube, I found a lot of Humpback Whale recordings, as well as a piece about their songs called Understanding Whale Songs. Two instances of Humpback songs are from the CD Awakening-Whale Song, Beyond Infinity. Cuts 4, Tonga and 5, Maui They were recorded by Kai Pistachio. Poems for 2 Voices are from David Ossman's An Autobozographical Evening. Love in a Whale is from The Firesign Theatre's Radio Hour Hour episode, Yes Mistress. Also a scent of Nick Danger.

Hunter and Bear - I listened to an interview on CBC with Hunter's son Juan in July http://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/the-current-for-january-28-2016-1.3423319/hunter-s-thompson-s-son-on-fearing-loathing-and-loving-the-gonzo-journalist-1.3423337
shortly after I read an article someone posted on facebook about how the Steely Dan tune Kid Charlemagne was about acid democratizer "Bear" Owsley http://sfist.com/2015/07/20/san_francisco_show_and_tell_steely.php
Their twin lives called for a collage. I asked Paul Krassner, who knew both men, what they had in common and he said Bear gave the counter culture acid, Hunter gave the same culture gonzo journalism. I patched together some interviews and documentaries about Bear and Hunter from Youtube and read a few online articles. The edge has been pushed forward.

Into The Garden - A Child's Garden of Grass, the "Pre-legalization" comedy record from 1971, needed some serious updating after what happened in Canada yesterday. Phil Proctor's comments on Canadian legalization from the Firesign's Hour Hour radio series was also in need of updating. I found a Ted talk from psychologist Zach Walsh gave a more useful history of cannabis here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jv2GG_csUc8. A big chunk of my collage about going to Carleton University is included, which features Steve Miller's Song for Our Ancestors, and a Firesign meditation on Elves. Paul Krassner goes to the Cannabis Cup in Amsterdam, in his album Sex, Drugs and the AntiChrist. Then it's on to Belgium, from his book Pot Stories of the Soul. The Firesigns invite us to the Cabin Restaurant in Katmandu in between various courses from A Child's Garden. CBC's morning show The Current brings us to to date.
https://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/the-current-for-october-15-2018-1.4862884/the-ban-on-cannabis-in-canada-is-ending-do-you-know-how-it-started-1.4545802

Jackson Kent Firesign - There was a ton of great music happening in the late 60s-early 70s but the musician I listened to and enjoyed most in those years was Steve Miller, before he became rich and famous with Fly Like and Eagle. His song about the shootings at Kent State and Jackson isn't nearly as famous as CSNY's Ohio but a more interesting tune. Whether I've made it more interesting is up to you.

Keeping The Wolves Awake - Today we begin 2 weeks of celebrating the life of Nick Danger, also known as Phil Austin, who would have turned 80 on April 6th. In the 2nd hour, we'll listen to a kind of biography of Phil I did a few years ago. In this hour, we'll hear a show about Phil's favourite animal, dogs, and how they evolved from wolves. As with so many of my collages, this one begins with a CBC Ideas programme: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/from-scavenger-to-household-royalty-how-dogs-evolved-from-wolves-to-pampered-pets-1.5930345. The French expression for twilight leads to Phil Austin's piece It Had Been Night from a 1970 Hour Hour programme. The Howl of the Woof Movie. Puttin' on the dog, eh? Talkin' trash with the Firesign Theatre from their XM satellite show Fools In Space. No sleep for wolves. Ossman's pigeon tale. Mrs. Presky wants The Bag. Midden Heights. Building a dog. God is dog walking backward. Of course we're on the wharf. Cats and frogs. 5 dogs in a balloon. Ossman gets poetic, Proctor has a dream. Wolves are big, but not bad. Annalee barks. Useful animals. Even the cup holder has a cup holder. Dr. Firesign melts.  Charles "Sparky" Schultz used to be a dog. Comedian Charlie Demers feels sorry for coyotes. Dogs go to heaven.

Krassner Theatre - In the early 90s, a few years after starting the magazine Adbusters, I discovered an ad in Mother Jones for The Realist. I had no idea it was still around. I quickly subscribed and then interviewed Paul by fax. Around Xmas time, 1995, my daughter and I went to LA to visit my parents there. I drove over to meet Paul .One of the nicest people I've ever met. Later I contributed stories to 3 of his books and edited another. On the same trip, I was invited over to the Proctors, where Melinda suggested I start writing radio plays. Great trip, to say the least. And speaking of the Proctors, I also mixed in Paul's friend and Venice neighbour Gerry Fialca, Proctor's latest project, Phil and Ted's Sexy Boomer Show on KPFK-FM, there the Firesign was born.
    On this collage, taken from Paul's 6 comedy CDS, the usual mix of Firesign stuff. Also a taste of Paul's pall Lenny Bruce. In 1971, Groucho wrote to Paul's publisher, “I predict that in time Paul Krassner will wind up as the only live Lenny Bruce.” The collage ends with a conversation Paul had with Peter Bergman on Pete's Digital Diner show mixed with the Golf Rat Shoot from Lawyer's Hospital.

Lenny Firesign 1 - Lenny Bruce's Thank You, Masked Man. Elayne Riggs in my play Radio Free Booze. Come on, Jesus from Roller Maidens. The Lone Ranger and Tonto get stoned. A Firesign Flag Day. Dead Cat Soap, from Next World. Horse and eggs from Roller Maidens. The Lone Ranger and breasts. Las Vegas Tits and Ass. Norwegian tits, from Roller Maidens. Bergman and Ossman discuss prostitution. The Bust. No dirty words for Firesign. Neal Amid clip. Provocative words. The courtroom scene from Dwarf. Father Flotsky. The Devilmaster. Father Groper from  FIS. Lenny's Palladium bit. Irish Language Lab. Electrician. Stan Freburg. Ames guns. Ossman's birth poem. Lenny in 1965, Luke Kirby as Lenny in Mrs Maisel.
Lenny Firesign 2

Light Train - The great Pentangle tune Train Song, from their Basket of Light album mixed with "Carl Sagan" and "Albert Einstein" take you to the furthest reaches of the universe. Get your brain on board "now," whatever that is.

List-O-Mania - This collage begins with a bit from Borges' story The Aleph, from a 2-part Ideas programme about Borges: http://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/borges-buenos-aires-the-imaginary-city-part-1-1.4434230  Borges was a great influence on the Firesigns, particularly Bergman. They turned at least one of his stories into a radio play on Bergman's 1967 Radio Free Oz shows. My initial thought was to make a collage based on the Ideas programmes, but noticing how much this passage from The Aleph resembles Firesign poetry, I decided to concentrate on that. I've used Bergman's Dear Friends poem on quite a few collages, and will probably use it in more. Also a frequent bit in my collages, Echo Poem from their Dear Friends CD. Used it in my previous collage, about Chief Dan George. Dr. Memory speaks in lists. Ossman's Time Capsules poem, this time performed by the Firesigns. Austin's lists of school lunch menus, which they were still performing the last shows they did together in 2010. Raven makes a list in Ossman's poem from his time in Alaska. 2 Places list of talking signs. Tom Waits invites us to Step Right Up, with help from Nick Danger, McGog Brothers, Ossman in New Mexico, making lists of washing machines and their instructions. Mutt and Smutt list their inventory. Ralph's inventory from Immortality. Carlin, Duckman and Austin savour lists of tribal names. Living in the northern Japanese city of Yamagata in 1971, I make a list of things I encounter one day, as I prepare for a journey south. Gilbert and Sullivan's modern major-general makes a rhyming list. Firesign lists things to say goodbye and hello to. Borges returns. Dylan goes Subterranean.

Maddow vs Nazis - CBC's morning magazine show The Current recently interviewed Rachel Maddow about her new book Prequel, based on her podcast Ultra, about Nazis in the US in the 30s and 40s. The Firesigns discuss Nazis on Marshall Efron's WBAI show The Outside in 1970. More Hitler hilarity from Firesigns radio shows.Dear Friends. Young Guy. 2 Places. Dwarf. All Things Firesign. More Firesign radio. More Dear Friends. Nick Danger. The courtroom scene from Dwarf.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

Magic - My recent hearing Tom Power's interview with Penn Gillette on CBC's morning show Q, https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-50-q/clip/15857571-magician-penn-jillette-often-reveals-secrets-behind-tricks reminded me of Phil Proctor's 2-part interview with the same magician on Phil and Ted Bonnitt's podcast Phil and Ted's Sexy Boomer Show https://player.fm/series/phil-and-teds-sexy-boomer-show. Well worth a collage.
The collage envelope is two pennish experiences of mine, the first in Japan long ago, the 2nd with Penn himself after Phil Austin's death. Tom Power describes his delight at interviewing Penn with something his father told him about time, complemented by Proctor and Bergman's watch-eating routine and a nugget from the new Firesign release, Before They Changed the Water. Proctor is impressed with magic, and not just a little chromium switch. Hemlock Stones discovers the scientific revolution. Help, it's the Police!. Trust works for Penn, not Peorgie. From Phil Austin's Hollywood Niteshift: Tell her, Edward. Proctor explains The Firesign Theatre, from Ossman's production Still Waiting for the Electrician. Penn extrapolates, fearfully. A chunk of Dwarf elucidates. Groucho is against it. The Straight People, a Firesign single. Ossman's Trump poem. Bergman takes notes in Vegas. Pilot's magical single. Real magic would be the antidote. Phil's time trimming machine. Things to study. Bergman resents not becoming as big as Penn and Teller, from A Short History of Proctor and Bergman on the road. From carny trash to Life is a Carnival, thanks to The Band. Penn recalls first meeting Proctor, leading to my correspondence with Penn about that. Proctor chooses Immortality.

Magic Keys - My previous collage, Hunter and Bear featured a bit from a Rolling Stone article about Bear Owsley. The article had Bear, reacting to a bad trip at Kesey's place, accuse Kesey of meddling with the universe in a Howard Beale manner. This naturally made me want to do a collage on Kesey. I had help from chatter Llan and DJ Tween reading from that RS article and Tom Wolfe's Electric Kool Aid Acid Test. Chatter Lil convinced me to go with the current ending. Two of Marc Maron's interviews are also included.

Math and Science (Part 1) - We're all Bozos in this collage. Brian Green on the CBC Ideas program. Bergman falls in love with the Sphinx. Carl Sagan dissects love, from the Project Woo Woo podcast. Donald Duck in magic Land. Pythagoras drops by Woo Woo.  Did you remember to carry the bum? Carl isn't an atheist. American Pi. By the numbers. Ossman hears the music of the spheres. Pythagoras and Stan Freberg agree. A Shadow Moves Upon Phil Austin. The Beatles can count. A taste of Red Shift. Austin and David Cassidy as bums. Salute my boots.

Math and Science (Part 2) - Carl Sagan goes to the 39-40 New York World's Fair. Doc Technical remembers the 64-65 NY fair. Bozos infected by bees. Ricky and Polly go to the circus. Cirque Internationale. From the French TV series, Capitalism, the future according to General Motors from Carl's World's Fair. From the Firesign's Fools in Space show, the colour of the universe.  Everything happens inside Brian Green's head, so there is no Red. Peorgie chases a Red, with red hair. Have some red beans and reds. Brian goes to Amsterdam and changes his consciousness. Carl gets stoned in the shower, but isn't a pot head. Peorgie anticipates a productive Communist future. Pete also enjoys a stoned shower, from a Child's Garden of Degrasse Tyson, another toker. Dope Humour of the 70s. Michael Polan investigates. Carl is hard wired. No royalties for EMI from outer space. Here comes George Harrison. Stop torturing me, Ethyl. The sun dies. Woo Woo Lisa is star dust. Red Shift. Echo Poem.

Miss Firesign Pie - I first heard American Pie while hitch hiking in Japan in January,1972  A cop picked me up outside of Yokohama. American Pie was playing on the American Forces radio station, FEN. He took me to a station and told me not to do strange things in his country ever again. I did not take his advice, but did like the song. It has a Firesonian playfulness with the past. The Firesigns used to have a contest on their Hour Hour show and hoped to find an answer with Who Wrote the Book of Love, confluently with Don. I always thought there was too much religion in this song, even if Rock and Roll has a certain amount of origin in Gospel and later seemed to become a religion to many. Will Bergman's movie Flowers ever see the light of day? Well, it brought him to LA and KPFK and The Firesign Theatre and that's enough light for anything. The Firesigns sure got a lot out of LA car dealers on TV. Dylan wears his thorns like a crown, in both the song and a funny Firesign bit from Eat or Be Eaten which is especially delicious if you recall Bergman's intoxication with infallible Bob in his 67 RFO show. Austin's interview on WBAI's Morning Dew was brought about when the Morning dude showed up on chat while Austin was chatting with us and requested an interview, thankfully still in the archives of the show.  https://archive.org/details/PAOnMorningDew  Proctor reads a piece by one of my favourite writers, Loren Eiseley. It is a precipitous decline to again listen to Maclean. Rick Mercer reccommends whiskey. Richard Nixon sells Chevys, but not on the Levee. Good Bye is said. I played Echo Poem on the Japanese national radio station, NHK in 1975. Perhaps the cop heard it.

Monty Firesign's Flying Theatre - I had to wait for the release of The Firesign Theatre Live at the Magic Mushroom disc to make this collage. I'd long wanted to pair Firesign with Python and the Mushroom play The Sword and the Stoned is a perfect fit with Python's Holy Grail.  Whether you consider Python the UK's Firesign Theatre or vice versa, it makes sense to blend the two for further hilarity. The collage begins with the beginning of Sword. The knight's complain that the Fool's song should be more bawdy so we find ourselves in Castle Anthrax, with Ashcroft and then The Curse of India pub and back to the Sword for the first of many references of Henbane, the hallucinogen of choice in King Arthur's day. The comedians trade songs. The wrong president Johnson appears at a Seance. The War Against the Cows ends. Maidens aren't rescued. The black knight is bested. Coconut tunes. That limey is juiced. Silver birds had flown through the night. Bring out your dead, with Charles B. Smith. Mrs Presky makes an unfortunate discovery. A meeting at the Hashfire Inn. The quests begin. God makes a useful co-pilot. French Somaliland gets a grail. Off to the land of the Eiffel Tower. Professor Hare gets vicious. She looks like a witch. What has happened to your nose? It's become a banana. I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK. Papa said he'd seen a witch, riding on a broom. More French. President Pompy's Due. Oh light that blinds. I can see for tiles and tiles and tiles. The frozen eyes have it. You're a white man, you got to help us. The Blue Goose party. They'll eat shirkers, but they won't eat workers. Ewe too.

Naomi Klein Kicks Ass - Naomi Klein's books, articles and interviews show us that resistance is possible. Like the Firesign Theatre, she lights fires. You should too. - http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=Naoimi+Klien%2c+trump&view=detail&mid=73526303114E5FBCCCF773526303114E5FBCCCF7&FORM=VIRE

Night Cats - Facts About Cats, my favourite tune on the profoundly tuneful Welcome to Timbuk 3 by the musical couple of that name. Louis Armstrong speaks African. Pussys galore.

Not Trumped Yet - To survive the Trumpocalypse, The Firesign Theatre, Hunter S. Thompson, a poem by David Ossman, Mel Brooks, Noam Chomsky and Peter Bergman's final podcast offer analysis, humour and hope.

Nothing But Indians - This Firesign Theatre collage begins with my first collage, which I made to discover if the song Pass that Peace Pipe was the inspiration for Phil Austin's Mushroom play, A Shadow Moves Upon A Land. It wasn't, but they're certainly related. Then, travel back to the first Firesign Thanksgiving show from 1967, an interview with Craig the Messenger. I think it's about time to listen to Temporarily Humbolt County.  Part 2 of Craig's message, from the Radio Free Oz podcast archives. Pass the Indian Please from All Things Firesign. Proctor and Bergman give Chief Dan George a job. Ossman's two raven poems. Craig's last message. Skipper get's a Ghost Dance shirt. Ossman's History of the Indians shuffles us off.

Nothing But People Of Indian Ancestry - The Firesigns fell in love with Indian accents. The Mantras and the Chakras was supposed to be in Electrician, Marc Maron interviewed Vir Das, which led me to his Netflix specials. The Gluttons was live on WBAI on their 1970 east coast tour. Om, Om, range. The Fresh Chef. Sea Biscuit. Kooky. Tea. Randy Newman. Dwarf. War against the cows. Indians are so smart.

Orson, or moon - “This collage was inspired by a November, 2016 Firesign chat interview with Phil Proctor who talked about working with Orson in the move A Safe Place. I have a 4-cassette collection of interviews with Orson by Peter Bogdonovich,  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ This_is_Orson_Welles that has just proved useful for something other than gathering dust.  The Welles biopic Magician http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=Magician%2c+Orson+Welles&view=detail&mid=3A2EBF1E459FA0477F963A2EBF1E459FA0477F96&FORM=VIRE
was also useful. I had used a scene from the War of the Worlds broadcast in my play Red Shift http://www.seemreal.com/ with Orson Ossman as young Welles and his father David as how old Welles tried to sound as an actor. Thanks, Orsons. ”

Peter Bergman Meets Hello Kitty - The latest collage comes from CBC Idea programme called The Complexity of Cuteness, https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-23-ideas/clip/15810357-the-complexity-cuteness?subscribe=true. We start out this collage, as we have many others, with The Beatles: George Harrison complaining about taxes. I remember when the Beatles were considered cute, at least in comparison with The Rolling Stones. Do we need more cuteness now as we're being ravaged by a pandemic?  Peter Bergman had his fill of cuteness while driving down the California coast and stopping to look at some elephant seals, along with a Hello Kitty bus of teen aged Japanese girls, far more interested in their phones than in the seals. As Konrad Lorenz pointed out, cuteness has evolutionary benefits for us. A Dear Friends bit about cute animals. 2020 was a year for the Devilmaster. A game of dentists. Japan takes cuteness seriously. Several scholars of Japanese cuteness make up most the this Ideas programme. Follow in your books and repeat after me as we learn our next word in Japanese: Kawai-i. Violent Juvenile Freaks are not cute. Phil Proctor reads Loren Eiseley.  If the youth in Japan couldn't change Japanese government policy, they could at least sink into the apolitical world of Cuteness. One of the first Firesign bits, International Youth on Parade goes in the opposite direction from cute. A refuge from adulthood. Smoky the Bear, the Zen mascot. The land of Zen has gone in a very direction in terms of mascots. Young Guy in Radio Prison. John Oliver in mascot-land. Pork. We can take on a couple of Hello Kitty toasters, or something. Pete is flabbergasted. Assorted buses. The cult of Kitty, lonely for the devil. Hello, anti-racism. Don't fret, get a pet. Austin enjoys Pokemon very much. Small things can have power. More comfort, please!

Peter, Paul & Lenny - I got the idea for this collage when Paul Kantner died recently. Paul Krassner has stories about being mistaken for Kantner on his albums, including a hilarious piece by "Homer Simpson." Peter Bergman talking about Lenny Bruce on the original KPFK Radio Free Oz went well with pieces by Lenny and Krassner, along with some tunes.

Phil, Phil & Associates - Phil, Phil and Associates was inspired by the Jackson Browne tune Lawyers in Love. It is combined with the intro to Lawyer's Hospital, a clip from the film The Sputnik Moment, the Samantha Bee-Masha Gessen bit I used in my Trump collage, a bit from my play Neal Amid starring Phil and Melinda and The Firesigns discussing Donald Duck and Associates from the Dear Friends episode All We Have to Fear is me from 12/12/70.

Phil, Phil and Philip K. Dick (part 1) - Either Philip K Dick is the most Firesonian of writers or the Firesigns are the most Philip K Dickian of comedians or both. How can you be in 2 places at once when you're not real at all, is a question that interested them all. The BBC series Arena did  a show about PKD which provides the material for the following collage. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cK2MPgAHRk
There will be more.

Phil, Phil and Philip K. Dick (part 2) - At the end of his life, Philip K Dick momentarily set aside a life of self-pity to write a story about his love for Linda Ronstadt. It seems unlikely she ever read it, or Phil heard this song. Where-as Part One was largely from the BBC Arena show about PKD, the stories in Part 2 are from various sources on-line. The first is from one called The Penultimate Truth which delves deeply into Phil's past: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUo1OlnOH-A&t=14s  Uncle Underground is from the Firesign's Hour Hour radio series. Harold Hiphugger and Ray Hamburgere say goodbye. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau appologizes. Chris Taylor provides the science news. Phil's ROTC woes are related in a long interview with Charles Platt from 1979  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7C7Y8WEIsBU . Phil A and Pete relive their Army Days on Hour Hour and Dwarf. The discussion about the I Ching is from a PKD 1977 interview on the KPFK SF show Hour 25 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFhsDUAZ6Co.  A few relavent Firesign bits.Eat or Be Eaten meets Nick, tries a sugar cube.  Phil P speaks Latin in Power. Mr.Foster Freeze reads UBIK. David and Tiny Ossman are also interviewed taking calls on Hour 25 in 1973. PKD can't decide whether to eat Chinese food or not. The last of the beans. Proctor and Ossman at the Library of Congress, Sept. 2017. Which reel? Neal Young plays Rockin in the Free World on SNL from 1989.

Prescription: Poetry - Like the Firesign Theatre, the poet Chris Lawson wants you to know more than you do now. Soon, heavy industry will make it possible for all the people to have everything it desires in a free market place.  The best of all alternatives, even for conservatives. Medical school for a few weeks. Live from the Senate bar. Not a gateway. I just couldn't seem to get off the stuff. Though stoned as hell, no way to tell. Hi friends here in the city of Emphysema. Bob Snork Motors, from Lawyer's Hospital. Supernark Finlater has a change of mind. All tastes and kilos. Propaganda war. Dr Whiplash. Canapa Seeds. Healthful Gruel. The Grass Roots Gourmet, from All Things Firesign. The US Coalition, Pot's Greatest Opposition. Air Force Generals Only. Balliol Brothers. The Free Mexican Air Force. Ben Franklin, Hero or Hop-head? Medical Evidence. A tale from Proctor's Autobiography, Where's My Fortune Cookie? plus a clip from Roller Maidens. Badly burned. The Pills Brothers. A Pot-shaped hole. Let's get into holes. Saving Planet Earth. A black hole guest stars in How Time Flys. The lumberjack song. Valhalla Thunderbolt Gasoline.

Rainy Day Firesign - Dylan celebrates his 75th birthday. Don't bogart that joint, Bob.

Satire (1) Gulliver travels to Firesign Land - Part one of my two-part collage series about satire was inspired by, and steals copiously from a CBC Ideas programme: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/a-modest-proposal-about-satire-1.4718112 Just what is satire anyway, and is it less effective today than it was in Jonathan Swift's time? Or was it ever effective? Is satire being Trumped today? David Ossman reads his poem about Donald the Garden Gnome on the KBOO series Talking Over Each Other. Phil Austin goes off to invade Poland. The viciousness of satire bites through in Firesign's Rat in a Box commercial. This part of the series  is mostly about Gulliver's Travels, with dialogue from the 1996 miniseries: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulliver%27s_Travels_(miniseries)  Which end of a hard boiled egg should be cracked first? The side closest to the aliens. Mark Time and Gulliver make good use of urine. Scaled Down Danger finds Nick Danger in Brobdingag. The Houyhnhnms meet Mr Ed, while Ozzie Knows Father. Horses never get sick, and never need Dr. Whiplash. Lies are unknown to the horses, unlike the current American president. Horse pie or horse and eggs? Yahoos are in Ohio too. The queen of the Brobdingagians dismisses England as a land of vermin. Laura Nyro offers hope.

Satire (2) Romans, Arabs and Yankees - Back to the Ideas programme history of satire to visit Horace and Juvenal, while Proctor and Bregman act out the declining fall of the Roaming Umperor. We learn about a millenium of satire in Arabic. The Fools in Space love Islam. The Qu'ran, re-organized. A little brown froggy body aquiver. Sinclair Lewis wins a prize. The Straight Babbits. Deacon E.L. Gantry. GB Shaw responsible for all problems he creates. Armando Ianucci on Trump. Press hounds nipping at Hemlock's heels. US Plus dot News. Nothing can bring Weird Al shame. Football? Baseball? Boxing? All out warfare on the field. Peter Cooks admires the subversive satire of Weimar. Jokes aren't votes. Springtime for Mel Brooks.

Scratched Up Firesign - On tonight's Firesign Chat, we present 2 plays by Lili Dubois, of Scratched Up Radio on Community Radio Station KKRN in Round Mountain, California. The first play is called News From A Satellite.  It's mixed with Firesign's Ersatz Brothers Coffee, Gook flu, Linda Ronstadt singing Poor Poor Pitiful Me, Firesign's Oh Heavenly Grid from 2 Places, Peter Bergman heads to New Zealand from Fools in Space, Gilbert Skink from Roller Maidens, Organ LeRoy, and Sailor Bill from the Magic Mushroom play A Life in the Day,  The 2nd play is called Adventures in Cooking. David Ossman reads the lyrics to his song A Sweet Tomato Named Mary.  The Fresh Chef from the Firesign radio series, Hour Hour; the Chemical Corn Exchange Bank from Dear Friends; the primitive mudmen of New Guinea, Get Trucked from The Bride of Firesign, Nick Danger, Proctor and Bergman's Lemon Car, the cold hook from Giant Rat, Mark Time from Dear Friends,  the mayor from Boom Dot Bust, the Sasquatch Symposium from my play Big Time and then the end credits from Scratched Up Radio Theatre and Gas Music From Jupiter from Everything You Know is Wrong.  After that, Chef Entree from Proctor and Bergman's Give Us a Break and Carrots from the Firesign's 1997 April Fools radio spots and finally, Exorcism in Your Daily Life, the first play from the brand new Firesign Theatre disc Live at the Magic Mushroom. We'll be playing all the Mushroom shows in order on Firesign Chat.

Sex, Drugs and Charlie Chance - The song Magical Mystery Tour (as opposed to the album) along with the mysteries of sex and drugs and the great detective Charlie Chance from the earliest Firesign days.

Sex, Drugs and Charlie Chance (edited)
A Charlie Chance Mystery - This is an abbreviated version of a previous collage called Sex, Drugs and Charlie Chance.  This one I'm just calling A Charlie Chance Mystery (originally The Poisoned Puff), blending in the Beatles tune A Magical Mystery Tour with assorted Firesign bits. Beginning with Bergman's First Law of Radio, from David Ossman's Radio, Any Questions? Then we start hearing The Beatles. Austin's Tales of the Old Detective: X is for Xmas. Electrician, Dwarf, Time Capsules, Nick Danger, A Child's Garden of Grass, How Time Flies, a radio interview with the Firesigns when they were promoting Immortality, Free Mexican Airforce, Fools in Space, By the Light of the Silvery, and finally, The Poisoned Puff, a Charlie Chance Mystery.

Sgt. Pep Pills (1) - My most ambitious collage project. Sgt Pepper came out as the Firesign Theatre were writing their first album Electrician and greatly influenced its production values.

Sgt. Pep Pills (2) - The 2nd half of Sgt. Pepper plus Firesign interventions and a story of Switzerland intercut with random clips from the US Armed Forces Network in Tokyo, 1977.

Smothersign Theatre - After Tommy Smothers died recently, I began watching clips of the brothers on You Tube. A lot of them seemed confluent with the Firesign Theatre, thus, this collage. We begin with the smothered Wagon Wheel, Austin as James Stewart, Proctor's End of the Girl restaurant, Dwarf, I talk to the trees, Microorganism State Park. Dance, Boatman, Dance. Mutt and Smut x 2. A song about the railroad. 2 Places. Putin/Pumas. Temporarily Humboldt County. A flower child. Carnation Instant Breakfast. Oh Yoko. George Harrison. John Lennon heckles the Smothers. Bob Einstein. The Smothers reminisce. Phil Proctor's autobiography. Phil Ochs' song A Draft Dodger Rag. Roller Maidens. Proctor escapes the draft. Bergman's favourite review.

Smothersign Theatre 1
Smothersign Theatre 2

Stan Freberg's America (Side B) - Harry Shearer's novel is called Not Enough Indians and that's a good title for Side B of Stan Freberg's USA. Well, according to Ossman and Proctor, in another universe, Harry was a part of the Firesign Theatre so they lend a hand to make Side B a bit more entertaining. Washington can't make up his mind and Ben Franklin demonstrates why he was the only president of the United Snakes who was never president of the United Snakes.

Standing Rock Freberg - My last collage featured Ken Kesey talking about casinos on Indian reservations so I wanted to continue with that theme. It was suggested I do a collage based on the Standing Rock Sioux situation. It seemed like something the Firesign would have been involved with in their 60s Indian period. Stan Freberg presents the United States of America is both Firesonian and relavent to what's happening in North Dakota today. The voices from Standing Rock are from the short film Mni Wiconi https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FDuqYld8C8 and the CBC radio programme Unreserved http://www.cbc.ca/radio/unreserved/something-extraordinary-is-happening-at-standing-rock-1.3850506.

Suzuke And Half A Key - Listening to Tom Power interview Canadian scientist and broadcaster David Suzuki on the CBC radio show Q recently, I realized Suzuki would be a perfect person to match with Firesign https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-50-q/clip/15893054-at-85-david-suzuki-isnt-slowing-hes. His peeing in nature story could be an out take from Bozos. Sprinkled into the interview are Relent from Bride of Firesign, sand dollars from Bozos, Bergman's Ecolition from Dear Friends, Back from the Shadows, Bear Whiz Beer, Sleep from Dear Friends, George Tirebiter from Dwarf, a Canadian accent from Giant Rat, FDR from Nick Danger, the mayor's speech from Boom Dot Bust, Principal Poop's speech from Dwarf, Indian school from Humboldt County, keys from Nick Danger, dick tales from Bride, skydiving from Immortality, oysterettes from Bozos, the Everything You Know is Wrong Expo, a man writes a book about ecology from TV or Not TV, a pickle from Nick Danger, elder wisdom from Humboldt County and Peter Bergman's final words.

Talking Over Glen Gould - "A recent Ideas programme celebrating a series about the north Glen did for Ideas half a century ago inspired this collage, considering how much the Firesigns loved talking over each other, as Glen did in his Ideas show: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/revisiting-glenn-gould-s-revolutionary-radio-documentary-the-idea-of-north-1.4460709
We can see it in the opening bit Echo Poem from their Dear Friends disc. Some northerners talk over each other from the Gould piece, The Idea of North. Bob and Doug take off. Ossman's poetic dialogue with a tape recorder. More northerners. More poetry. Lists from A Shadow Moves Upon a Land and Bozos. Firesign's Talking Over Each Other. A Not Insane opening. Ossman wants you to use more than one part of your brain. Gould explained. Simon and Garfunkle sing the news. Zappa as lounge singer. The Airplane at play. Yet more northerners. Are the Firesigns funny?"

The Galloping Che - Eternal thanks to my Facebook friends for turning me on to good stuff. I had long wanted to make a collage mixing Firesign with Billy Bragg's song Waiting for the Great Leap Forward, which I saw him perform on the Letterman show https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M9DC2DFtGs Maybe the best political song I've ever heard and that's saying a lot. A Facebook post alerted me to Keith Richards talking about Street Fighting Man. The interview with Che Guevara's brother was on a recent CBC radio program called Day 6 which is here: http://www.cbc.ca/listen/shows/day-6/segment/13983494 The Firesign always wanted to ignite a cultural revolution. Were they more successful than Che?

The Ratsign Theatre - Two more Ideas programmes inspired this collage: https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-23-ideas/clip/15805236-rats-haunting-humanitys-footsteps-part-one and https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-23-ideas/clip/15805483-rats-facing-our-fears-part-two.

Go rat about in the cupboard. Rats have invaded Firesign world. A plague of rodents. Billy Graham killed his own rats. People become rat and  crows. The smog has its own alchemy. Macbeth meets Firesign. Cannibals and animals in Cirque Internationale. Your friend, the rat; a DVD extra from Ratatouille. Isn't he a good sport. The symbol of firmness symbolizes heaven. Get back, Dr. Whiplash. Various boxes. Oh brothers rats! Catherwood on all fours. What would a rat do? We are so much better because of them. Corrigan studies rats. The Jerry Ford rat shoot. These are my sewers. Remy and his dad. Rats clean sewers. Rats get a new image. Vancouver Professor Bruce Alexander creates Rat Park. Rats are the secret of power. Happy New Year, little rat.