[UA] Reading and Listening

[Ian Young]

Hello again,

While I'm not such a big fan of foisting my personal tastes off on
others, I think I have a couple of worthwhile references for potential
UA players...

READING

The Illuminatus! Trilogy
- by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson
Zoinks!  Socially and politically dated, this is still one of the
wildest occult/conspiracy freakshow books I've ever read.  Don't expect
subtlety here.  Clued-In cabals, clueless dupes, and ancient evils duke
it out for supremacy on the Eve of Destruction.  The books feature a
UA-inspiring blend of street-level, global-level, and cosmic-level story
telling, and a prominent focus on The Naked Goddess herself (well, a
*strong* parallel thereof).  Far from everyone's cup of tea, there are
still far worse things you could do to yourself.

LISTENING

The Firesign Theatre
Just about anything you can get your hands on by these guys will give
you hours upon hours of absurdist inspiration for any UA game.  Sharply
critical of any popular, post-modern freakdom (especially the new-age
movement), the Firesign Theatre's albums are "radio theater" styled
satires of the human condition.  More and more of their work is being
released on CD, including their most recent "Give Me Immortality Or Give
Me Death!", though "Everything You Know Is Wrong" is still lamentably
missing in action.

Negativland
Again, anything by these three-eyed freaks of nature will give you fuel
for your UA-furnace.  These albums are social satires as well, but not
in theatrical format -- they're more musical/ambient/spoken-word
montages that tell some awfully bizarre (and often factual) tales of
modern life.  A real jewel of the lot is "Helter Stupid" which may
provide you with more insight into psychopathic murder and news-media
mis-information than you ever wanted to know (it's also absolutely
priceless for it's disco version of their song "Christianity is
Stupid").

MULTIMEDIA

The Residents
Okay, okay -- this is another group rather than a specific title, but
you can't peg these people down to a specific album or CD-ROM.  They're
a group of anonymous artists of all varieties who create some
delightfully strange musical albums.  However, I recommend their
multimedia CD-ROMs as inspiration for the strange, pale underbelly of
society common to UA.  "Freak Show", "Bad Day On The Midway" and
"Gingerbread Man" are all character studies in the grotesque and the
obsessed.  They're getting hard to find, though, so keep your eyes
peeled.


Enough of me.  Carry on.

Gone again,
Ian