Thank you Peter Bergman/Radio Free Oz.com

 
Dangerous Minds pal Taylor Jessen, the fabulously meticulous archivist for the Firesign Theatre is in the process of putting together the ULTIMATE collection of rare Firesign Theatre radio shows for a limited edition release via www.firesigntheatre.com. I’ve been raving about these programs (all recorded between 1968-72) on this blog for months and now you can hear them yourself, every Tuesday on WFMU radio at 7:00 pm in the New York area over the airwaves and streaming over the Internet on WFMU.org.

Below Taylor writes of what it was like trying to track down the audio cues used by the FST in an online essay on WFMU’s popular blog, with 30 mp3 files and a contest to win Firesign Theatre photographs signed by all four members:

For ten years or so, the Firesign Theatre has been engaging me in a friendly round of “Stump the Archivist.”

Between 1970-1972, Firesign did about seventy hours of original radio broadcasts. The shows were mostly an excuse for them to riff, but they also played a lot of music breaks, sound effects, incidental music, and total dada noise foofaraw. During those original broadcasts of The Firesign Theatre Radio Hour Hour, Dear Friends, and Let’s Eat, they put the needle on the record about 1000 times, and one of the most fun aspects of restoring all those airchecks (soon to be reissued, yes the whole schmear, in remastered digital audio with an accompanying 108-page comic-book-size color fan guide featuring complete show rundowns, an historical essay, new interviews with the 4or5 guys and their engineer & producer, never-published photos, collages, found objects, scripts, and good God make it stop, it’s just too awesome. Please check regularly here and at http://www.firesigntheatre.com for an official announcement; we’re only making 500 copies and they’ll never be sold in stores) – one of the most fun aspects, I say, of all this obsessive archival work was identifying those 1000 needle-drops.

To play along and try to identify these music cues—-some are easy: Beatles, Stones, Dylan, but others are pretty darn obscure—visit Firesign Theatre is Playing At My House (WFMU’s Beware of the Blog). You only have to be able to identify ONE of the musical mysteries to win!

Below, my recent interview with the Phil Proctor about the vintage Firesign Theatre radio shows being aired on WFMU:
 

 
Firesign Theatre on Dangerous Minds

Beginning June 15, vintage Firesign Theatre radio shows, dating from 1970-72 will be rebroadcast for the first time since their original air dates on WFMU radio. This is comparable to being a James Joyce fanatic and finding not just one notebook where he’s working out the themes that would become fully developed in Ulysses and Finnegans Wake, but an entire crate of ‘em. Some of the most mind-bending, thought-provoking and hilarious material of their career and unheard for the past 40 years. A counter cultural treasure of the highest order. Firesign Theatre LIVE in Portland and Eugene, Oregon this weekend!

 
Dangerous Minds pal, Peter Bergman is back on the radio! The Firesign Theatre funnyman has resurrected the Radio Free Oz moniker of his legendary KPFK radio show of the mid-1960s and is trying something new for 2010.

Broadcasting from his new homebase in Whidbey Island, WA, Bergman’s new incarnation of Radio Free Oz continues on with his unique take on freeform radio and features cameo appearances from his comrades in the Firesign Theatre (I even make an appearance in one of them). Currently a weekly program going out live on Sunday nights, Radio Free Oz will soon be on five nights a week.

The highlight for me are the segments about weirdo evangelist Tony Alamo by Philip Proctor in each show. I laughed so hard I cried. Co-hosted by David Ossman.

And speaking of Radio Free Oz, Proctor and Bergman, I found this unusual—and really interesting—piece on YouTube today and it features Peter Bergman and Philip Proctor reading from William Burroughs. Peter reads “Death Dwarf in the Street” on the old Radio Free Oz show in the ‘60s and Phil reads “The Saragossa Cafe” in a more recent recording. An excerpt from Nova Express, a film by Andre Perkowski.
 

 
Get tickets at www.firesigntheatre.com. And you can listen to an NPR interview with David Ossman and Philip Austin here.

For the first time in a very long time, an interview with Philip Austin, Peter Bergman, David Ossman and Philip Proctor, the legendary Firesign Theater. (Jan 8 & 9, 2010 shows in Whidbey Island, Washington, see www.firesigntheatre.com for more information)
 

 
Word of mouth “buzz” should prove strong for reunited comedy icons The Firesign Theatre’s four evening run at the Barnsdall Gallery Theater after Wednesday’s well-received opening night. Performing some of their “greatest hits” including the complete librettos for fan favorites “Don’t Crush That Dwarf Hand Me the Pliers” and their debut record 1968’s “Waiting for the Electrician or Someone Like Him,” the troupe were in fine form, winning two standing ovations from the wildly enthusiastic audience. The second act consisted of scenes from “Anythynge You Want To: Shakespeare’s Lost Comedie” which the group has been working on and retooling for several decades and an appearance by their most popular character, Nick Danger, “America’s Only Detective.”

More from The Calendar: The Firesign Theatre returns to its Los Angeles roots

Here’s an extraordinary performance of the Nick Danger adventure Frame Me Pretty from an 1981 episode of Evening at the Improv:
 

The Firesign Theatre’s “Forward Into the Past”
Where: Barnsdall Gallery Theatre, 4800 Hollywood Blvd., L.A.
When: 8 p.m. Oct 14 to 17
http://www.firesigntheatre.com

Cross posting this item from Brand X

 
I have a short article in the Calendar section of today’s Los Angeles Times. It was clear to me when I read what my editor there, Dean Kuipers, added to my original draft that he, too, was a big Firesign Theater fan:

The Library of Congress called the Firesign Theatre “the Beatles of Comedy” when its 1970 album “Don’t Crush That Dwarf, Hand Me the Pliers” was selected for the National Recording Registry.

An apt comparison, considering that, along with contemporaries Monty Python in Britain, the searing and psychedelic satirical troupe helped invent a literary brand of album comedy that lodged itself in the culture of college students across the country. The group paved the way for later arrivals such as Cheech & Chong, “Saturday Night Live” and Second City.

Celebrating the 40th anniversary of one of its most popular characters, detective Nick Danger, Third Eye, the four-man troupe makes a rare local appearance next week, performing Oct. 14 to 17 at the Barnsdall Gallery Theatre with a new show, “Forward Into the Past.”

Read the entire article at the Los Angeles Times

Tickets on sale for the Firesign Theatre show in Los Angeles next week here

Wonderwall is an unusual and beautiful psychedelic Sixties period piece that sees a scientist (Jack MacGowran) becoming obsessed by a gorgeous model who lives next door to him.

Wonderwall is probably the ultimate “swinging London” film and what a pedigree it has. The film stars the lovely Jane Birkin and featured Anita Pallenberg and Dutch design collective The Fool (who art directed the film and were well-know for their work with the Beatles) in cameo roles. The soundtrack was by George Harrison and featured Ringo Starr, Eric Clapton, some top classical Indian players in Bombay and an uncredited banjo performance by Monkee Peter Tork. There is one song called Ski-Ing that features one of the single most ferocious guitar riffs that Eric Clapton ever laid down and most of his biggest fans have never even heard it.

Made in 1968 by first time director Joe Massot (who would later direct the Led Zeppelin concert film The Song Remains the Same and work on the psychedelic western Zachariah with the Firesign Theatre), Wonderwall was released on DVD in an elaborate package by Rhino in 2004 that now goes for top dollar to collectors.

The stills and animated gifs here were nicked from the fantastic blog of Martin Klasch. Over and over again, I find myself using Google Images and landing on his site, which is a visual treasure trove. He’s got a great eye. Check it out.

(Part I) In which P&B announce the upcoming Firesign shows in LA (buy tickets here), Richard reveals himself to be a “baby of the Firesign Theatre” (it’s true!),  Phil tells how the Firesign Theatre were the original computer hackers and we discover why Surrealism makes you smarter. As Peter says near the end, “You either never heard of us, or you have us memorized.” I fall into the latter camp and this one is for all my fellow Bozos on this Bus. I have done hundreds of interviews in my career and this one is in my top five favorites. Hopefully, schedules permitting, I’ll be speaking to all four Firesign Theatre members next month. Stayed tuned for Part II next week. (You can listen to David Ossman and Phil Austin on Air America recently here)

In that case, so must growing up reading William Burroughs, the Illuminatus trilogy, conspiracy theory books, dropping acid and listening to Firesign Theatre records!

From Science Digest:

Reading a book by Franz Kafka ?��Ǩ���?��Ǩ��� or watching a film by director David Lynch ?��Ǩ���?��Ǩ��� could make you smarter.

According to research by psychologists at UC Santa Barbara and the University of British Columbia, exposure to the surrealism in, say, Kafka’s “The Country Doctor” or Lynch’s “Blue Velvet” enhances the cognitive mechanisms that oversee implicit learning functions. The researchers’ findings appear in an article published in the September issue of the journal Psychological Science.

“The idea is that when you’re exposed to a meaning threat ?��Ǩ���?��Ǩ��� something that fundamentally does not make sense ?��Ǩ���?��Ǩ��� your brain is going to respond by looking for some other kind of structure within your environment,” said Travis Proulx, a postdoctoral researcher at UCSB and co-author of the article. “And, it turns out, that structure can be completely unrelated to the meaning threat.”

Reading Kafka Improves Learning, Suggests Psychology Study

And speaking of the Firesign Theatre, tickets are on sale now for their upcoming Los Angeles shows!

Thanks Kevin!