These were so fun to do. (And I have color versions, for those who want even more obsessive detail.)

william_ leonard@williamleonard.net · last mo.

shoutout to my fave firesign, 'Don't Crush That Dwarf, Hand Me the Pliers', such a normal and linear comedy album that the author has to draw diagrams like This to explain what the hell's going on:

Brand new in our Bandcamp store: "Caveat Imperator", a previously unheard 67-minute aircheck of Firesign riffing on KPPC in 1969! firesigntheatre.bandcamp.com/album/caveat...

Caveat Imperator: Live on KPPC 1969, by The Firesign Theatre

16 track album

firesigntheatre.bandcamp.com

The Firesign Theatre was “dissenting to just about everything, for the same reason all great satirists do: savage indignation at greed and folly.” —Andrew Katzenstein

‘Not Insane!’ | Andrew Katzenstein

The Firesign Theatre, a comedy group formed in the 1960s, created surreal albums that mixed satire and science fiction, and inspired a generation of misfits.

nybooks.com

warnings were issued, and ignored

Thank you, Andrew Katzenstein

The New York Review of Books@nybooks.com · 4mo ago

Andrew Katzenstein on the generation of comic misfits inspired by Firesign Theatre

I'm not at all shocked to find Kate Culkin's terrific Emerson's Daughters on this list! @klculkin.bsky.social

KLC@klculkin.bsky.social · 5mo ago

I'm shocked and honored to find myself on this list. Thank you @biographersintl.bsky.social @thegraduatecenter.bsky.social @bam-bio-mem.bsky.social #lifewriting biographersinternational.org/news/2026-pl...

Along with @jbraddock.bsky.social and @jordanrbrower.bsky.social ,I'm helping to organize a convergence of sorts for ASAP/17 in Madison, WI, Oct 15-17! @asapartsnow.bsky.social Propose papers here: asap17.exordo.com/login?redire...

@jordanrbrower.bsky.social · 4mo ago

For the 20th anniversary of Henry Jenkins's CONVERGENCE CULTURE, some smart people and I are organizing "Media Convergences Since the Sixties," a seminar at ASAP/17 (Madison, WI, Oct 15-17). Propose papers here. We're looking forward to converging with you! asap17.exordo.com/panels/35/co...

One other goddamned thing Blue Jam and Firesign theatre Are not great comparisons They are way different in humor Firesign theatre is like ween plus shoegaze Blue jam is Francis bacon and Peter greenway backed by coil

Riggsveda@riggsveda.bsky.social · 5mo ago

If you were so unlucky as to have missed growing into adulthood with Firesign Theatre, this is the 2nd-best way to meet them (the 1st being to just listen.) My only bitch is Katzenstein’s insistence that it was boys who loved them. I wasn’t & neither was my best frend www.nybooks.com/articles/202...

@idlerat.bsky.social alert -->

James Goss@gossjam.bsky.social · 5mo ago

🚨 Joe Orton's Up Against it on BBC Sounds alert 🚨 www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

Firesign Theatre David Salzberg Featured in the New York Review of Books April 9 2026 The Electromagnetic History of Everything as Told on Nine Comedy Albums By Jeremy Braddock Philip Proctor David Ossman Peter Bergman Phil Austin

Firesign in NYRB ---->

The Firesign Theatre@firesigntheatre.bsky.social · 5mo ago

Review of Jeremy Braddock's "Firesign" in latest issue of New York Review of Books: www.nybooks.com

Best day: -Browsing for hours to find the album worth spending my meager babysitting fund. -The clerk who got me to buy a Firesign Theater album by acting out his fav bits. -Sliding my fingernail along the plastic wrapper to take out the record. -Reading the cover while listening to the music.

"Happy Chrimble and a Very New Year!" @firesigntheatre.bsky.social

everywhere it's Christmas

the Beatles Christmas records and the Beatles-Firesign connection

open.substack.com

Was reminded the other day that the barely-recognizable processed voices for the pilot and the bombardier in this game were Phil Austin and Phil Proctor of the Firesign Theatre. www.youtube.com/watch?v=dM1E...

B-17 Bomber Intellivision Intellivoice Game Gameplay

YouTube video by The No Swear Gamer

youtube.com

After much research and development I have made an offline version of ChatGPT. Now you can save water and electricity while navel-gazing, and carry one of the world's most powerfully annoying AI chatbots in your pocket.

Found this very late in the game -> an early and great stab at describing @firesigntheatre.bsky.social via the Situationists. Fun to read and not pedantic; fans who listened to the records, read some theory and did their own thing.

Trailing Clouds of Glory

vernacular Firesign Theatre scholarship of 1974

open.substack.com

Thanks, @bartona104.bsky.social for inviting me onto her great Continuous Wave newsletter. This week's installment features an excerpt from the radio/How Can You Be in Two Places at Once chapter of Firesign (with color photos). @firesigntheatre.bsky.social @ucpress.bsky.social

Julia Barton@bartona104.bsky.social · 9mo ago

Find out how @firesigntheatre.bsky.social are the missing link between radio's creative past and present, thanks to this fantastic guest post by @jbraddock.bsky.social continuous-wave.beehiiv.com/p/stoners-ke...

includes discussion of Sonic Youth's Martin Mull cover:

history of the rock-comedy 7", part two

comedy and airplay in the 1970s — the game Cheech & Chong won (and then got tired of winning)

open.substack.com

Yes, ripped from the maw of the historical void—or more specifically from an open reel tape marked simply "Claypool"!We've uploaded WAV and MP3 files to the Internet Archive where they'll be saved for posterity and free to all comers. Now FINALLY this great art by @mahendra.bsky.social can pay off

Beginning of my reckoning with Cheech and Chong (but not only them). C&C's records always sounded great, and there was a reason for that. @firesigntheatre.bsky.social @sidfudd.bsky.social

history of the rock-comedy 7", part one

comedy and radio airplay in the 1970s — the game Cheech & Chong won

jeremybraddock.substack.com

One from the vaults: Lost NBC Pilot "WAP! V.1.0" (2000), featuring Scott Adsit, @blainecapatch.bsky.social, @gregproops.bsky.social, @philproctor.bsky.social and @mariabamford.bsky.social youtu.be/9sDz3AT0mtY

WAP! V.1.0 unsold pilot, Messina Baker Productions

YouTube video by Firesign Theatre

youtu.be

Final ep of an 8-part series on radio sources for the Firesign Theatre's *How Can You Be in Two Places at Once When You're Not Anywhere at All.*. This last installment felt eerily up-to-the minute. @firesigntheatre.bsky.social [Links to all 8 episodes at the bottom of the post]

Firesign sources #8 / FDR Pearl Harbor address

radio sources for the Firesign Theatre's *How Can You Be in Two Places at Once When You're Not Anywhere at All*

jeremybraddock.substack.com

I mentioned a while ago that I was obsessed with the Firesign Theatre's comedy LPs as a teen. I just got a copy of Jeremy Braddock's Firesign, which deconstructs the technical and cultural composition of these albums. Talk about a treasure trove!

"Eggs to Market: The Story of Automated Egg Processing" (1964, Film Associates of California), featuring uncredited narration by our own David Ossman (who says "I think I did a half dozen voiceovers for these guys"): www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzRH...

Eggs To Market (1964)

YouTube video by A/V Geeks 16mm Films

youtube.com

part two of my trip into Ginsberg, audiotape, war, rock, &c.

Allen Ginsberg's 1965

In my last post (see above), I was writing about Allen Ginsberg’s audiotape experiments, which he began in late 1965 and produced one of his greatest poems the following year, “Wichita Vortex Sutra.” ...

open.substack.com

The @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social had a long piece about Jeremy Braddock's book about the @firesigntheatre.bsky.social. Now available through @ucpress.bsky.social. Link in replies. We also released Firesign's double #LP for Dope Humor of the Seventies (scroll for image), available on our site now.

There’s a Seeker Born Every Minute | Los Angeles Review of Books

Colin Marshall reviews Jeremy Braddock’s “Firesign: The Electromagnetic History of Everything as Told on Nine Comedy Albums.”

tinyurl.com

I wrote about the audiotape Allen Ginsberg used to compose his great Vietnam-War-and-media poem "Wichita Vortex Sutra" @firesigntheatre.bsky.social

Ginsberg goes electric }}}}{

poetry and audiotape in the year of revolver and blonde on blonde

jeremybraddock.substack.com

MEDIA OBJECTS episode 6 // Artificial Intelligence, as reality // with Steve Jackson, Mendi and Keith Obadike, Chris Csikszentmihalyi, and The World According to Sound @mendiandkeith.bsky.social

Media Objects 06: Artificial Intelligence, Vol. 2

In the previous episode, we heard how so-called artificial intelligence is being sold to the public as a revolutionary, inevitable technology that is going to completely transform society. This claim

soundcloud.com

MEDIA OBJECTS episode 5 // Artificial Intelligence, as metaphor // with Gili Vidan, Chris Csikszentmihalyi, and The World According to Sound

Media Objects 05: Artificial Intelligence, Vol. 1

With today’s so-called generative artificial intelligence, we’re being told that we have finally arrived. We’re now beginning to build true “thinking machines,” machines that will do everything a huma

soundcloud.com

MEDIA OBJECTS episode 4 // Typewriters // with Philly Typewriter and The World According to Sound

Media Objects 04: Typewriters

Text written with a typewriter is not the same as text written by hand, composed on a computer, sent in a text message, or generated by artificial intelligence. Like all media, the typewriter does not

soundcloud.com