Stereophonic Elucidation in the Western World

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Golden Ego Radio #91

(Released on 25 January 2020)

Los Benders – Lobo Feroz
Lost Acapulco – Aun No Cree en los Zombies
Stereophonic Space Sound Unlimited – Korla Rides Again
Arlo Guthrie – Coming into Los Angeles
The Asylum Choir – Welcome To Hollywood
Loudon Wainwright III – Hollywood Hopeful
The Incredible Staggers – Little Sister
Los Elasticos – Vaquero
Reverberati – Re-Verse
The Bitch Boys – Damascus
Lost Acapulco – Vampiro
The Shockwave! – Penetration from Space
The Guitaraculas – Roswell/Area 51
The Surfaders – Sharkbait
Watang! – Wok Don’t Run
The Guitaraculas – Catch 22
Warren Zevon – Werewolves of London
Warren Zevon – Excitable Boy
Ogden Edsl – Daddy’s Money
Flamin’ Groovies – Kicks
The Shockwave! – She Bop
Bang! Mustang! – Last Train from Sepia City
The Aqua Velvets – Surf Nouveau
Telekrimen – Marea Terror

Plus excerpts from Firesign Theatre radio shows

Sagittarius & Firesign Theatre
24
Feb

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Sagittarius – My World Fell Down
Sagittarius – Hotel Indiscreet

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Gary Usher had been a songwriter since the early 1960s, writing lyrics for some of Brian Wilson’s earliest material. In 1967, while at Columbia Records, he produced Chad & Jeremy and The Firesign Theatre, among others. He’d heard a demo around that time for a song called “My World Fell Down,” recorded by the British pop group The Ivy League.

Usher felt that he could do a cover version of the song himself. He brought in Los Angeles session musicians and friends such as Beach Boys touring alumni Glen Campbell, along with Bruce Johnston and Terry Melcher. He finished the recording by adding a musique concrète bridge. He presented it to Columbia executives under the group name Sagittarius, named after his astrological sign.

The “My World” single reached number 70 in the Billboard Hot 100. When it was revealed to Columbia that a touring group did not exist, Usher started working on an album under the Sagittarius name in conjunction with Curt Boettcher. He utilized him as a songwriter, musician, and producer.

Prior to the release of the album “Present Tense,” another single (“Hotel Indiscreet”) was issued. As was the case with “My World Fell Down”, the bridge featured an unrelated comedy bit by The Firesign Theatre.

Clive Davis disliked the usage of musique concrete in the two singles, so Usher removed these segments from the album versions and placed a few bars of additional music between the first and second verses. Both were mixed in stereo for the album.

Master Wilburn Burchette
15
Feb

Opens The Seven Gates Of Transcendental Consciousness
Ebos Records, 1972
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Dawn Of Awakening
Regeneration
Transformation
Piercing The Psychic Heart
Invoke The Name Of God
Introversion
Realization

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California mail-order mystic Master Wilburn Burchette was first known from his ads, hidden in the back pages of Fate Magazine, Beyond Reality, and Gnostica News. On offer: Burchett’s seven-part, block-printed “Psychic Meditation Course,” designed to teach people how to listen to music. To go along with his lessons, Burchette sold a series of instrumental guitar and electronic records featuring ornate hand-drawn cover designs, complete with listening instructions from the Master himself. Since just his twelfth year, Burchette had been transfixed by the parapsychological, spending as much time reading books on Tibetan mysticism fundamentals as he did practicing guitar, the vibrations of which he used to create tonal pictures and patterns. After time spent teaching classical guitar, Master Wilburn Burchette released seven albums in the seven years spanning 1971 through 1977, before abruptly burning and discarding everything related to his musical explorations.

Writing as Will Loy, Burchette (and his brother Kenneth, as the Burchette Brothers) published Will Loy’s News Bulletin (or Will Loy’s Psychic Prophecy News Bulletin), a monthly periodical, beginning in 1979. It was advertised in such tabloids as the Weekly World News, where it was described as a compendium of information ranging from impending economic, geologic, and climatic catastrophes to the Second Coming, super computers, ancient spaceships, and similar matter.

We’re Doomed, Part One
27
Jan

We’re Doomed, Part One

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Presenting Cat Simril Ishikawa’s “We’re Doomed, Part One,” featuring excerpts from the “Millennium Trilogy” diary by David Ossman of The Firesign Theatre, as read by fans and fellow Fireheads. These are notes by Ossman on the recording of Give Me Immortality Or Give Me Death!

The Firemail & Chromium Switch Newsletters
9
Jan

I ran two classified ads in Rolling Stone for my Firesign Theatre newsletter. They were in issue #105 (Cooper, 30 March 1972) and #150 (Hefner, 20 December 1973). The zip file contains PDFs of the newsletters, plus my introductory letter to Firesign at Columbia Records. I met them a few months later at the Martian Space Party film premiere in 1972.

Chromium Switch logo, “Filthy Pirate Pub” cartoon (CS #3), and “Jesus Retardo” cartoon (CS #5) by J. Scott Stewart

Firemail & Chromium Switch NewslettersDownload

The Bill McIntyre Interview
7
Jan

Dedicated to Bill McIntyre, longtime Firesign Theatre collaborator who was the producer of the “Dear Friends” radio shows and was behind the board for the “Martian Space Party” broadcast on KPFK (March 1972) that became the core of the “Not Insane” Columbia LP.

This 3-part video was recorded in 2010 on the stage of the Cascade Theatre in Redding, CA with interviewer Phil Fountain.

Bill McIntyre Interview, Part One

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Bill McIntyre Interview, Part Two

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Bill McIntyre Interview, Part Three

A Life In The Day
5
Jan

Radio Free Oz: Final KRLA Show

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This Radio Free Oz show aired on January 14, 1968 from the lobby of the Huntington Hotel Carriage House in Pasadena, where KRLA was then located. This was the final RFO show on the station, and the only one not to originate from the Magic Mushroom in Studio City. Radio Free Oz later moved to KMET, until February 1969.

This aircheck (1:53:06) is from the original three hour broadcast. It also appears in edited form on the DVD/book “Live at the Magic Mushroom.” The television set ‘channel hopping’ theme preceded the “Dwarf” album, and features “Sailor Bill”, “The End of the World”, “Ozzie Knows Father”, “The Evening News”, “The Golden Hind”, “Garbanza”, an “Italian Movie”, and a Ralph Spoilsport Late Late Show – “Babes in Khaki.”

CBS Radio Workshop, Part Two
27
Oct

Another Point of View or Hamlet Revisited (6/22/1956)
Original script: Ben Wright and William Conrad
An analysis of Shakespeare’s Hamlet argues that he is the true villain of the play. Featuring Ben Wright, William Conrad, John McIntire.
The Billion Dollar Failure of Figger Fallup (8/24/1956)
Original radio play: Henry E. Fritsch
A polling firm is hired by the Devil to conduct research to predict how many new sinners Hell is likely to be receiving over the next twenty years. Featuring Joseph Julian, Robert Dryden, Elaine Rost.
A Pride Of Carrots or Venus Well Served (9/14/1956)
Author: Robert Nathan
A pair of astronauts arrives on Venus only to discover that it is populated by a host of bizarre life forms, including sentient vegetables. The radio play was later turned into a short story, ‘A Pride of Carrots’, first published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, in December 1959. Featuring Robert Nathan (narrator), Elaine Burke, Ted Bliss, Daws Butler, June Foray, Alan Reed, Bill Thompson.
Report on the Weans (11/11/1956)
Author: Robert Nathan
Archaeologists in the year 7956 explore the abandoned ruins of the long-dead civilization of North America, and attempt to decipher the meanings of its strange artifacts. Based on a short story, ‘Digging the Weans’, first published in Harper’s Magazine, in November 1956; together with another story, ‘A Further Report on the Weans’, this was later expanded into a book, The Weans, in 1960. Featuring Hans Conried, Edgar Barrier, Byron Kane, Jay Novello, June Foray.
The Crazy Life (1/27/1957)
Author: David Karp                     
This is about a funny man, who isn’t really, and his wife who doesn’t love him, but really does. A story of a man who lives by laughter told in part by the woman who married him and who shares the crazy life. Featuring Henry Morgan, Elspeth Eric, Bryna Raeburn, Luis Van Rooten.
The Space Merchants, Part One (2/17/1957)
Authors: Frederik Pohl and Cyril M. Kornbluth
In a future dominated and controlled by advertising agencies, an executive in one of these firms is assigned the campaign to persuade people to move to Venus, despite its extremely harsh, hostile environment. Based on a novel of the same name first published in 1953 (adapted from a serial published in Galaxy Science Fiction magazine, as ‘Gravy Planet’, in 1952). Featuring Staats Cottsworth, Ralph Bell, Virginia Kaye, Ian Martin, Robert Readick, Ralph Camargo, Robert Dryden.
The Space Merchants, Part Two (2/24/1957)
Ballad of the Iron Horse (3/3/1957)
Author: Charles B. Smith
A story told in verse about a railroad locomotive and its experiences during the Civil War and the westward expansion. Featuring William Conrad (narrator), Daws Butler, Jack Moyles, Dick Crenna, Joe diSantis, Jack Kruschen.
Heaven Is in the Sky (5/19/1957)
Original script: Jules Menklen
A documentary examining a mid-air collision between two planes over California air space that scattered debris over Pacoima Junior High School, causing death and destruction. Featuring Frank Goss.
I Have Three Heads (5/26/1957)
Original script: Mort Goldberg
A pair of tape recorders discuss the techniques of recording and editing for radio. Featuring Jackson Beck, Ian Martin, Bill Quinn, Ralph Bell.
Sweet Cherries in Charleston (8/25/1957)
Original radio play: Richard Durham
After gaining his freedom, a slave in antebellum South Carolina attempts to inspire his fellow slaves to follow him in seeking liberty. Featuring Parley Baer, Roy Glenn, Ed Marr, Paul Frees, Harry Bartell.

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The CBS Radio Workshop was an experimental dramatic radio anthology series that aired on CBS from January 27, 1956, until September 22, 1957. Subtitled “radio’s distinguished series to man’s imagination,” it was a revival of several earlier series on CBS — Columbia Experimental Laboratory (1931), Columbia Experimental Dramatic Laboratory (1932) and Columbia Workshop (1936-1943, 1946-47). Some of the same writers and directors employed on the earlier series were involved in the 1950s revival. The CBS Radio Workshop was one of American network radio’s last attempts to hold on to, and perhaps recapture, some of the demographics they had lost to television in the post-World War II era.

CBS Radio Workshop, Part One
20
Oct

Brave New World, Part One (1/27/1956)
Author: Aldous Huxley
Six hundred years in the future, society is tightly controlled via a rigid caste system and genetic engineering, with citizens kept passive and obedient by recreational drugs and promiscuous sex. Based on a novel of the same name, first published in 1932. Featuring Joseph Kearns, William Conrad, Lurene Tuttle.
Brave New World, Part Two (2/3/1956)
Storm (2/10/1956)
Author: George R. Stewart
A violent storm, called Maria, hits the west coast of America. Based on a novel first published in 1941. Featuring William Conrad (narrator).
Season of Disbelief and Hail and Farewell (2/17/1956)
Author: Ray Bradbury
Season of Disbelief — An elderly woman tries to persuade a pair of disbelieving children that she, too, was once young. Based on a short story first published in Collier’s magazine, on 25 November 1950; and later as a chapter in Ray Bradbury’s Dandelion Wine, in 1957. Featuring Ray Bradbury (narrator), John Dehner, Virginia Gregg.

Hail and Farewell — A twelve-year-old boy is forced to move from town to town every few years, finding new ‘parents’ each time, because he appears never to age. Based on a short story first published in Today, on 29 March 1953; and later in Ray Bradbury’s short-story collection The Golden Apples of the Sun, in 1953. Featuring Ray Bradbury (narrator), John Dehner, Virginia Gregg.
The Voice Of The City (3/2/1956)
Original script: Norman Katkov
A series of snapshots of life in New York city. Featuring Clifton Fadiman (narrator).
Cops and Robbers (3/16/1956)
Original script: Stanley Niss
Real-life former detectives solve a fictional crime. Featuring Larry Haines, Ken Lynch, Elspeth Eric, John Sylvester.
Speaking of Cinderella (If the Shoe Fits) (4/6/1956)
Original radio play: Ed Vertier and Don Clark
The classic story of Cinderella told in two ways: the traditional version and an updated modern one. Featuring Vincent Price, Lurene Tuttle, Harry Bartell, Jeanne Bates, Vic Perrin, Jack Kruschen, Jeanette Nolan, Virginia Gregg, Peter Leeds.
Jacob’s Hands (4/13/1956)
Authors: Aldous Huxley and Christopher Isherwood
When a farm worker’s mysterious power of healing, which allows him to cure both animals and people just with his hands, is revealed to the world, he soon discovers that his gift may also be a curse. Based on an unproduced film treatment from the 1930s, later published as Jacob’s Hands: A Fable, in 1998. Featuring Raymond Massey, Herb Butterfield, Helen Kleeb, Vic Perrin, Lawrence Dobkin, Christopher Isherwood, Janet Stewart.
The Record Collectors (4/27/1956)
Original script: William Woodson, Lou Houston and Larry Thor
A pair of record collectors is interviewed about their collections, with their preference for older, ‘classical’ popular music causing them to be caustically dismissive of more modern recordings. Featuring Howard McNear, Margaret Whiting, Margaret Young, Lyn Murray, John Dehner.
The Enormous Radio (5/11/1956)
Author: John Cheever
A couple purchases a new radio, but after discovering that it is picking up conversations from nearby apartments, the wife finds it impossible to resist listening in on their neighbours’ lives. Based on a short story first published in The New Yorker magazine, on 17 May 1947; and later in John Cheever’s short-story collection The Enormous Radio and Other Stories, in 1953. Featuring William Conrad (narrator), Helen Kleeb, Charlotte Lawrence, Hans Conried, Virginia Gregg, Irene Tedrow, Eve McVey, George Walsh.
The Little Prince (5/25/1956)
Author: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
An aviator who has crashed in the desert encounters an alien boy whom he calls the Little Prince, who has arrived on Earth from his home ‘planet’ of asteroid B-612. Based on a novella first published in 1943. Featuring Raymond Burr, Richard Beals, Joseph Kearns, Ben Wright.

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The CBS Radio Workshop was an experimental dramatic radio anthology series that aired on CBS from January 27, 1956, until September 22, 1957. Subtitled “radio’s distinguished series to man’s imagination,” it was a revival of several earlier series on CBS — Columbia Experimental Laboratory (1931), Columbia Experimental Dramatic Laboratory (1932) and Columbia Workshop (1936-1943, 1946-47). Some of the same writers and directors employed on the earlier series were involved in the 1950s revival. The CBS Radio Workshop was one of American network radio’s last attempts to hold on to, and perhaps recapture, some of the demographics they had lost to television in the post-World War II era.

Firesign Theatre – KPFK Pledge Drives
28
Sep

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KPFK Pledge Drive Segment
KPFK Dog Giveaway
KPFK “If You Care Too”
KPFK Millenium Rose Parade

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Airchecks from L. A. station KPFK, featuring the Firesign Theatre on 1970-71 radio spots and pledge drives, plus an excerpt from their coverage of the 2000 Rose Parade.

Firesign Theatre at the L.O.C.
21
Sep

An Evening with David Ossman and Philip Proctor of the Firesign Theatre
Philip Proctor and David Ossman of the Firesign Theatre perform a new sketch titled, “The History of the Art of Radio, Revised,” in the Library of Congress Coolidge Auditorium, September 28, 2017. Photo by Shawn Miller.