PROCTOR & BERGMAN
ON 5.1 DVDA AUDIO

PETER BERGMAN: The 1.1 extra person.

PP: Ohhh, it's gotten more crowded in the Studio. Its hot. The mix, we need more ears.

PB: Well we need more mix 'cause we drink more.

PP: It's harder work. And also to retain that kind of distance that you get. It's like being in a movie theater.

PB: Normally we just retain salt and fluids. Now we have to retain material. The thing about 5.1 that's interesting, is that its absolutely tailor made for The Firesign Theatre.

PP: It is.

PB: I don't know for example if I were to buy a 5.1 audio of Cream or The Brandenburg Concerto. If I want to be in the center of the group. Where do you put somebody in the middle of the musical experience. But with the Firesign, it gives us an opportunity to move people and things all around you. It's like a Wonderdome of sound.

PP: But not only that but you know…

PB: Not only that! Don't start with not only that! Yes and!

PP: Yes and not only that but the Firesign Theatre has always been making, what we call, movies for the mind to begin with. We try to be…

PB: Movies in your mind.

PP: Not only that but movies of your mind. You see? And so it's perfect for us to be able to create something that's dramatic that happens to literally move people from left to right and into the phantom center, from whence they never return, by the way. But now we can move them under your skirt and up over the top of your head, through your toupee'.

PB: We moved people out of this very room that we're in, that were living here. It was a low interest family…

PP: But that's another story.

PB: …we moved to a now renovated irrigation ditch.

PP: Right next to the Information Highway.

PB: Al Gore's old Information Highway. And they're happy there.

PP: What do they know?

PB: That's a RICTA smile though.

PP: So.. we're in the iriction business. So the opportunity to create something that will put you in the middle of a tornado, for instance, which we're hoping to do, and move things now around you in a swirl. Remember, we've been in the business for so long, 165 years. We were there before the creation of sound. We did most of our record originally just by performing them.

PB: Like on barbed wire. We were wire recording.

PP: We did the barbed wire recordings but people would get hung up on them.

PB: They were scratchy.

PP: You could only play them once. But now, the opportunity to go back to the old quadraphonic, which we loved so much. We did 2 of our albums in quadraphonic, "I think We're All Bozos On This Bus" and…

PB: "Everything You Know Is Wrong".

PP: That's right. It was in 8-track quadraphonic and so to sit in the studio and actually just be able to move things around in a circle was so much fun.

PB: We used to be able to only move the actual furniture around, you know. But now we can do it as a sound effect. Also, the opportunity on DVDA is that it's an audiophile specialty. So you'll be able to get The Firesign Theatre sampled at extraordinary rates.

PP: Free samples?

PB: So all of the things we used to cover… Now you'll be able to hear all the errors. Hear all the glitches. Hear all the pops. Hear all the crackle.

PP: Isn't that DVD Ahhh? Did I just hear.. Ahhh? What is that?

PB: That's DVD AAH.

PP: Oh, oh, AAH. Yeah, OK.

PB: So we're looking forward to mixing it and then finding out what it's all about. And then we expect that one of us will go out and probably buy one of these sets and set it up so we hear it.

PP: Nobody's given us one. Usually… we've always been in the avant-garde and hired to create things for non-existent systems.

PB: When we first started, people would give us, like, phonograph needles!

PP: Yes, saying, "We're thinking of building a player. Come up with something for a demonstration."

PB: "Think this thing out."

PP: And we did that for the RCA video disc system. We were all given video disc players.

PB: I just threw mine away.

PP: Did you?

PB: Oh sure.

PP: That the one I gave you?

PB: Well now…

PP: I was going to sell that for a lot of money! It was a collector's item.

PB: I knew you were but I gave it to Goodwill. And they're sending it along with Chapstick and Preparation H to Kosovo.

PP: That's good. They could drop it on that woman with breast cancer up in the Antarctic because she's got nothing to do up there.

PB: She's got nothing to watch except herself.

PP: Chemo therapy but anyway, it's true we've always been in the avant-garde. We created the first prototype for the interactive CDI for Stan Kornin. And we created something that sounded a certain way.

PB: It was something that nobody could figure out what to do with.

PP: No, because there was nothing to play it on.

PB: Just like DVDA! There's nothing to play it on!

PP: I think it's DVD and there is a player.

PB: A player.

PP: That's what DVDA means. DVD a player.

PB: And we know who has it but we won't mention his name.

PP: No, we won't. But you can go over and listen to whatever we're doing on that player, if you like.