Frank Zappa: Classic or Dud?

Finished Neil Slaven's FZ biography yesterday – very disappointing. He aggregated just about everything published about the guy, but did absolutely no new interviews with any principal characters from FZ's life. I wonder if Gail's strong-arm tactics were at play. A lot of these people are getting old and dying -- if there's a proper bio of the man to be written, somebody better hurry up.

I think I've mentioned this on some other threads, but I've recently seen a couple really good Zappa documentaries by Tom O'Dell that are worth checking out.

From Straight to Bizarre - a very detailed look at Zappa's labels
http://www.amazon.com/Frank-Zappa-Straight-Bizarre-Unavailable/dp/B00B68PK4G/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1421091642&sr=8-1&keywords=frank+zappa+bizarre

or on youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fX_bnR1SZRM&index=1&list=PL8flSFeCsFvL4TVFypWCptZ6mASDufeI2

Freak Jazz, Movie Madness and Another Mothers - covers the Flo & Eddie years
http://www.amazon.com/Frank-Zappa-Madness-Another-Mothers/dp/B00MA15AIO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1421091592&sr=8-1&keywords=frank+zappa+1969-1973

Was impressed with how in depth these both were and the interesting interviews with former Mothers and other FZ collaborators they managed to get.

more like wank crappa

amirite

http://dangerousminds.net/comments/1967_frank_zappa_linda_ronstadt_radio

Alex Winter is making a documentary: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/frank-zappa-documentary-by-alex-winter-starts-production-20150724

I'm equal parts dubious and hopeful.

...and UMG and the Zappa Family Trust say "hey, let's do this all over again" — http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/frank-zappas-family-plans-massive-new-release-schedule-20150729

A few things to be happy about...
The Roxy Movie
The LA Philharmonic performance of 200 Motels
Ahmet taking over day to day management of the ZFT from Gail

If the Roxy Movie finally comes out I'll be happy. They've been talking about putting it out for seemingly decades now.

RIP Gail Zappa

RIP Gail – you were the best thing that ever happened to Frank, but maybe just a wee bit overprotective of him after his death.

Shame, RIP Gail.

RIP Gail – you were the best thing that ever happened to Frank, but maybe just a wee bit overprotective of him after his death.

I don't know - I think a lot of artists would like to know that someone would be so fierce a guardian of their work after they're gone.

I'm sure they would! That's the main reason my feelings about Gail are so conflicted. No fan of an artist is owed a warts-and-all look into that artist's psyche to try to figure out what made them tick. We'd love to have it, but we don't deserve it just by virtue of our interest. I don't even know if, without Gail's dogged protectiveness, we would have gotten that look at FZ by now, or if Alex Winter's film will give us any insight we don't already have.

I admire the hell out of her while acknowledging my frustration.

feeling your take on that, WmC

hay at least she released Bat Chain Puller!

RIP.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/09/business/media/frank-zappas-house-can-be-yours-for-9-million.html?_r=0

Damn my bad Powerball luck.

Interview with Alex Winter about the doc he's making

http://audio.californiareport.org/archive/R201604291630/a

Schism:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/30/business/media/whats-in-a-name-just-ask-frank-zappas-feuding-heirs.html

jeez, what a miserable bunch

The zapples don't fall far from the tree.

If you'd told me 2 of the kids would be on the inside running the trust and 2 on the outs, peeved, I would have had the groups switched.

Easy to tell who Gail's favourites were.

oh man I bet Frank would've loved to see this

he would've sued all of them

Yeah, even when Gail was alive it sounds like she was just doing Dweezil a favor, and he still had to pay a shitload of licensing. I dunno, I think if you name your kid Dweezil you pretty much owe him whatever he wants.

If you'd told me 2 of the kids would be on the inside running the trust and 2 on the outs, peeved, I would have had the groups switched.

― kills 1.8 percent of household germs (WilliamC), Saturday, April 30, 2016 10:34 AM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yeah no kidding...the split between Dweezil & Ahmet is weirdly depressing to me

Frank is still outsmarting his public from beyond the grave.

There's a Zappacast (available on iTunes) called "remebering Gail Zappa" that discusses what happened before this became public. The good news is that there´s a new release announced for May (Road Tapes 3, a recording from 1970 Flo&Eddie band before they became "Vaudeville"(.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/611vGp3jKDL.jpg

Can someone photoshop this into the shape of a broken heart?

can anyone succinctly explain the gail problem? can't mess with the podcast now and am having trouble finding a straight account of the relevant events since 1993 …she was overzealous in protecting the FZ legacy? if anyone knows of a comprehensive account as such, would be grateful.

All I know is that apparently she had been giving Dweezil, her own son, special dispensation to tour Frank's music, and even then he had to pay. Or as reported in Rolling Stone:

Gail Zappa had previously allowed Dweezil to use the Zappa Plays Zappa in exchange for an "exorbitant fee."

Also notes:

In the wake of matriarch and longtime estate executrix Gail Zappa's death in October, son Ahmet Zappa was tasked with handling the day-to-day operations of his father's estate with help from youngest daughter Diva Zappa. Dweezil and Moon Unit Zappa are not trustees, but remain equal beneficiaries of their father's estate with their other two siblings.

So for whatever reason, Dweezil and Moon Unit make money from Zappa but are not trustees, and the other two are, and all four - or both pairs - are at odds.

Also, other long time tribute bands like project/object and the grandmothers were pretty much put out business by the Zappa family.

http://zappacast.podomatic.com/

I think a great way to keep Frank Zappa's legacy alive to to stop people from playing his music live (since he never gave a shot about live performance, anyway) and to put all your efforts into reissuing the back catalog for the 30th time.

since he never gave a shot about live performance, anyway

A shit or a shot? Either way, I'm not sure that's true.

It was an autocorrected joke. Zappa repeatedly more or less dismissed his records as snapshots, and promoted live music as where it was at. So it's ironic that his estate is so stuffy about letting people play his music. It would be like the Dead limiting live performances.

Yeah there's definitely something very sad about it. I've seen ZPZ and they are definitely not a cash-in, they clearly try very hard to get things right and I always thought Dweezil was doing his old man proud.

can anyone succinctly explain the gail problem? can't mess with the podcast now and am having trouble finding a straight account of the relevant events since 1993 …she was overzealous in protecting the FZ legacy? if anyone knows of a comprehensive account as such, would be grateful.

Gail ran the whole ZFT until Ahmet took over. Gail supported ZPZ but at one point Dweezil and her fell out with each other. Frank told Gail to sell the back catalog, but she decided not to and protect the whole image of FZ and everything that came with it. This is discussed extensively in the podcast about Gail (again).

I put my hopes on Alex Winter. He understands that the vault needs to be catalogued and conserved. Joe Travers can´t do everything by himself.

Ahmet's side of things in the wake of the NYT story:

https://www.facebook.com/notes/ahmet-zappa/an-open-letter-to-my-brother/10153667213097309

That $1 a year thing sounds fishy. If it sounds too good to be true ...

My guess is that yeah, it is $1 a year, but that a big percentage of tour profit gets rolled back in to the trust. So Dweezil can play Zappa for $1, but he may indeed be losing hundreds of thousands in profits going back to the trust. Which does sound a little greedy on Dweezil's part, but I guess the only way to know would be to see the breakdown of his costs.

My take: I saw these two bros a couple of times together, playing their own material. It was brilliant and a lot of fun. Saw the ZPZ tour and thought it was pretty boring. Dweezil and Frank have totally different guitar styles and I'd rather see Dweezil shredding his ultra-heavy Spinal Tap stylings than hammering out Baby Snakes etc for three hours. They should wise up and forget about the $$$, which I doubt they need.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cv3sAFe1FCM

yeah, basically the idea is that the profits from any performance using Zappa's name and songs gets shared with the family, which would make sense if they were all going out there and doing this, but it's really only Dweezil, so I can see why it pisses him off.

i kinda don't get this story. the $1 thing seems entirely reasonable. it is common with legal proceedings, titles, contracts, etc. to involve such a fee. if you buy a used car you may pay this fee to buy the title.

it makes sense that they would want all the money to stay in the family. it is Frank's songs after all. i assume Frank set that up?

so it sounds like Dweezil just doesn't want to share the money w his family? or could it be more complex than that, maybe a legal attempt to restructure the family estate?

yeah, basically the idea is that the profits from any performance using Zappa's name and songs gets shared with the family, which would make sense if they were all going out there and doing this, but it's really only Dweezil, so I can see why it pisses him off.

― Check Yr Scrobbles (Moodles), Wednesday, May 4, 2016 7:24 PM (24 minutes ago)

OTM. He's doing the heavy lifting and taking on a lot of touring expenses and the other 3 kids get to sit back and be handed free money.

adminning the business end of things even on a rinky-dink operation ilke the joan crawford loves chachi band is a goddamn 8 hour a day job minimum and nobody comes up to the biz end ppl at the end of their shift and says "you kicked ass today." adminning the zappa operations is, I am 100% sure, a fucking lot of work and a shitload less glamorous than touring.

OTM. He's doing the heavy lifting and taking on a lot of touring expenses and the other 3 kids get to sit back and be handed free money.

― contains less than 2 percent of the following (WilliamC), Wednesday, May 4, 2016 8:52 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

only if he plays THESE SPECIFIC SONGS. he has the option to play his own music and keep all the money.

he has the option to play his own music and keep all the money.

All the money from the eight people interested in hearing "Blonde Hair, Brown Nose" and "Bang Your Groove Thang"?

And there it is.