As was typical with Firesign Theatre albums, In the Next World You're On Your Own features several story lines which compete for the spotlight throughout the album. This time out, there's a police drama, a game show, the overthrow of the U.S. by the native Americans, an awards ceremony, and a baseball game between the birds and the insects. Even if it's a bit hard to follow what's going on, there are still some great moments: for one, you can hear the members of the troupe hollering out old catch lines as catcalls during a section where George Tirebiter is reading out a list of nominees at the awards show -- and this follows a pretty nasty but funny Woody Allen impersonation. Even though the album is dense and well-written, much like their classic earlier material, it's still lacking a certain zip. It's not surprising, really -- the album came after a long string of solo albums from the various members, and the entirety of this one was written by the duo of Phil Austin and David Ossman; Phil Proctor and Peter Bergman were pretty much brought in at the last minute to fill out the voice-talent lineup. It's pretty safe to say that the group wasn't cohering particularly well at this point, and the record label knew it, because after the release of this one, Firesign Theatre found themselves without a recording contract for the first time since their debut. [Note: laugh.com reissued In the Next World You're on Your Own on CD in 2002.]