Released September 1975 Producer Steve Gillmor Release date September 1975 | Recorded 1975 | |
Similar TV or Not TV, Forward into the Past, Boom Dot Bust, Fighting Clowns, Dear Friends | ||
What This Country Needs is the second comedy album by the duo Proctor and Bergman of the Firesign Theatre. It was originally released in September 1975 on Columbia Records, and was among the Firesign Theatre's last Columbia albums, along with In the Next World, You're on Your Own and Forward Into The Past. It was recorded from a live performance at The Bottom Line which contained material adapted or re-used from their 1973 studio album TV or Not TV, plus a few new sketches.
Contents
- Proctor and bergman what this country needs
- Title and cover art
- Side one act one
- Side two act two
- Issues and reissues
- References
Proctor and bergman what this country needs
Title and cover art
The title is taken from a song Philip Proctor and Peter Bergman wrote, which parodies Vice President Thomas R. Marshall's famous quote, "What this country needs is a good five-cent cigar". The song says what this country needs is "a good five-cent joke". The album's cover art mimics a cardboard cigar box lid, with a painting of Proctor dressed as a field worker in jean overalls and a straw hat, with Bergman dressed in a suit as the plantation owner. Proctor holds up a wad of cash, while Bergman holds a handful of cigars. The picture provides another joke, as the crop appears to be marijuana (some of which sticks out of Proctor's hip pocket) rather than tobacco.
Side one — act one
- "Turning on Bosco Hern"*
- "Fred and Ford" – a new skit with Fred Flamm (Proctor) interviewing President Gerald Ford (Bergman) during the "Walking and Chewing Gum At the Same Time Marathon"
- "Red Pills on Drugs"*
- "The Roaming Umpire"*
- "Give Up This Day (with R. Reverend "Sport" Trendleberg)"*
Side two — act two
- "What This Country Needs" – a new song performed by Proctor and Bergman
- "Callback" – new; several listeners (Proctor) call a radio talk show host (Bergman)
- "The Man Who Eats Watches" – a new skit featuring German Wacko Krank (Bergman) and a waiter (Proctor), mostly in the Firesign Theatre's usual surrealist vein
- "Dr. Astro" – new; Proctor gives whacky horoscopes
- "Hundred-Dollar Shine" – new; shoe-shine boy (Bergman) charges a business man (Proctor) an outrageous price
* Skits adapted from TV or Not TV
Issues and reissues
This album was originally released on LP:
It has been re-released on CD at least once: