Non-Wacky Zappa POX, S&D, etc
― new noise, Monday, 9 January 2017 18:35 (seven years ago) link
xp -- ditto
― aaaaaaaauuuuuuuuu (melting robot) (WilliamC), Monday, 9 January 2017 18:41 (seven years ago) link
the first couple of records tend to get more liked because one gets the sense from them that zappa hadn't entirely given up on humanity at that point
Well, or just people liking the sound of the band at that point and the songwriting.
I'm well into sixties rock and roll and happen to think that Freak Out is a document of one of the most dynamic and brilliant sounding bands around.
― timellison, Monday, 9 January 2017 19:51 (seven years ago) link
must admit that i never got that impression from "go cry on somebody else's shoulder" but to each their own
― increasingly bonkers (rushomancy), Monday, 9 January 2017 20:12 (seven years ago) link
That's clearly one of the songs most reliant on '50s tropes (while a lot of the album is not), but still a nice tune with really good vocals.
― timellison, Monday, 9 January 2017 20:28 (seven years ago) link
Not to hijack this thread. But just read the lyrics to "Brown Shoes Don't Make It" ... supposedly it was about a fashion faux pas of LBJ's and the "dirty old men who run our country." But even still, these lyrics stuck out:
A world of secret hungersPerverting the men who make your lawsEvery desire is hidden awayIn drawer, in a deskBy a Naughahyde chairOn a rug where they walk and droolPast the girls in the officeYou see in the back of the City Hall mindThe dream of a girl about thirteenOff with her clothes and into a bedWhere she tickles his fancy all night longHis wife's attending an orchid showShe squealed for a week to get him to goBut back in the bed his, teenage queenIs rocking and rolling and acting obsceneBaby! Baby!Baby! Baby!And he loves it, he loves it, it curls up his toesShe bites his fat neck and it lights up his noseBut he cannot be fooled, old City Hall FredShe's nasty, she's nasty, she digs it in bedDo it again and do it some moreThat does it, by golly, it's nasty for sureNasty-nasty-nasty, nasty-nasty-nastyOnly thirteen and she knows how to nastyShe's a dirty young mindCorrupted, corrodedWell she's thirteen todayAnd I hear she gets loadedIf she were my daughter I'd...(What would you do, Daddy?)If she were my daughter I'd...(What would you do, Daddy?)If she were my daughter I'd...(What would you do, Daddy?)Smother my daughter in chocolate syrupAnd strap her on again, oh babySmother that girl in chocolate syrupAnd strap her on againShe's a Teenage Baby and she turns me onI'd like to make her do a nasty on the White House lawnGoing to smother that daughter in chocolate syrupAnd boogie till the cows come home
You see in the back of the City Hall mindThe dream of a girl about thirteenOff with her clothes and into a bedWhere she tickles his fancy all night long
His wife's attending an orchid showShe squealed for a week to get him to goBut back in the bed his, teenage queenIs rocking and rolling and acting obscene
Baby! Baby!Baby! Baby!
And he loves it, he loves it, it curls up his toesShe bites his fat neck and it lights up his noseBut he cannot be fooled, old City Hall FredShe's nasty, she's nasty, she digs it in bed
Do it again and do it some moreThat does it, by golly, it's nasty for sureNasty-nasty-nasty, nasty-nasty-nastyOnly thirteen and she knows how to nasty
She's a dirty young mindCorrupted, corrodedWell she's thirteen todayAnd I hear she gets loaded
If she were my daughter I'd...(What would you do, Daddy?)If she were my daughter I'd...(What would you do, Daddy?)If she were my daughter I'd...(What would you do, Daddy?)
Smother my daughter in chocolate syrupAnd strap her on again, oh babySmother that girl in chocolate syrupAnd strap her on again
She's a Teenage Baby and she turns me onI'd like to make her do a nasty on the White House lawnGoing to smother that daughter in chocolate syrupAnd boogie till the cows come home
I also found this on the Absolutely Free site:
I recently began a pen-pal thing with a woman who went to school a couple of years behind Frank, Don, Motorhead and others. Hers is a pretty interesting perspective I thought I would share. As she has not given permission for me to give out her address, I've snipped the headers. (her text follows)It was rumored that the song "She's only 13 and she knows how to nasty" was written about a girl a year younger than me called Patty Keenen who was a dead ringer for Bridget Bardot and looked old enough to buy beer for the boys..Alas poor Patty is no longer with us. And the song "Brown shoes dont make it" was the was it was in our school..brown shoes just weren't cool.
It was rumored that the song "She's only 13 and she knows how to nasty" was written about a girl a year younger than me called Patty Keenen who was a dead ringer for Bridget Bardot and looked old enough to buy beer for the boys..Alas poor Patty is no longer with us. And the song "Brown shoes dont make it" was the was it was in our school..brown shoes just weren't cool.
http://www.arf.ru/Notes/Afree/bshoes.html
In the wake of what we now know about the 60s free love scene in rock (hello Kim Fowley), lyrics like these make me super uncomfortable. They don't feel like satire -- or just satire anyway. They're just a bit too enthusiastic and detailed.
Maybe it's just looking at things like this without the benefit of contemporaneous eyes. Zappa really did have a distinctive voice musically that I still enjoy from time to time. But between his reported *love* of groupies, pretty much everything he wrote about women and the aggressive tone to his lyrics in general, I have a hard time with pretty much any of his vocal stuff, much less songs that veer into social commentary.
― Naive Teen Idol, Tuesday, 28 February 2017 19:52 (seven years ago) link
Hot Rats is honestly so so good, I looked this thread up to say. esp. Green Genes > Little Umbrellas, what a lovely stretch of music, so distinct, off in its own world
(I think the general nastiness of Zappa's outlook on the world as understood through his lyrics is something we've covered on this thread, and I concur that there's some deeply ugly shit in there)
― though the tempest rages, (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Monday, 6 March 2017 01:57 (seven years ago) link
Deeply love Hot Rats
― illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Monday, 6 March 2017 08:54 (seven years ago) link
I tend to cut off around '74 when he was still doing the Gamelan sounding stuff and hadn't gone totally into the really creepy scatological stuff . Also don't pay much attention to the '71 stuff.
BUt Mothers were pretty great in the 60s and the instrumental stuff around Gran Wazoo/Waka Jawaka is pretty good too.
― Stevolende, Monday, 6 March 2017 10:07 (seven years ago) link
the Boy Wonder sessions w Burt Ward are awesome. i love "Teenage Bill of Rights".
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Friday, 14 July 2017 22:54 (six years ago) link
i love "jazz fart."
― Western® with Bacon Flavor, Saturday, 15 July 2017 05:48 (six years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03F4nmPow9M
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Saturday, 15 July 2017 13:10 (six years ago) link
Freak Out! up to Uncle Meat = Classic.Hot Rats = Classic.Burnt Weeny Sandwich up to Just Another Band from L.A. = Some fans like this period, but it's not for me.Waka/Jawaka and The Grand Wazoo = Excellent for fans of Frank the "composer"Over-Nite Sensation and Apostrophe (') = Classic musically, but the rot starts to set in lyrically during this period IMO.
From 1975 to 1981, I enjoy the occasional track but find the albums quite patchy (particularly the albums that resulted from Lather being split up into various releases) and find the lyrics hit new levels of puerile in places, particularly on Sheik Yerbouti and Joe's Garage, then around 1983 I fall off entirely.
― more Allegro-like (Turrican), Saturday, 16 September 2017 20:46 (six years ago) link
Just heard some instrumental Synclavier track and it sucked. Night School? something like that.
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 16 September 2017 21:23 (six years ago) link
Yeah, from Jazz from Hell. for the longest time famous mostly for being the only instrumental album with a Parental Advisory sticker on it.
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 16 September 2017 21:24 (six years ago) link
I don't like much of the synclavier stuff -- I don't know whether FZ had a limited timbral palette available to him or chose those crappy sounds, but often there were interesting compositions buried in there. Here is a terrific version of "Night School" played by humans (Ensemble Ambrosius) --
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbXl_zSArpo
― WilliamC, Saturday, 16 September 2017 22:24 (six years ago) link
while i'm kind of glad he died when he did because he was enough of a misanthropic asshole at 52, i do wonder if his compositions might not have started sounding better if he had the chance to abandon the synclavier. or if he just would've started doing crappy midi. who knows.
i was listening to this tune that circulates as a frank zappa synclavier outtake called lakshi's delight. it doesn't sound anything like zappa, but it really highlights for me zappa's deficiencies as a composer. whoever wrote this piece has a better grasp of compositional technique than zappa, who was proud of only having one semester of formal training, did. listen e.g. to the baroque ending flourish, which isn't something zappa could ever have done. whoever composed this piece is also better able to integrate non-western musical technique than zappa ever could. worth comparing to a piece like "navanax", which is just a 100 second flurry of dissonant notes in improbable time signatures. i'm sure it's compositionally very sophisticated, but is it good?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66PxJWforEM
― bob lefse (rushomancy), Saturday, 16 September 2017 23:10 (six years ago) link
Jazz From Hell isn't great, but I think there's lots of solid tracks on Civilization Phase III
― Moodles, Sunday, 17 September 2017 00:57 (six years ago) link
Pretty much agree with Turrican. However, I would add weasels ripped my flesh as well
― Week of Wonders (Ross), Sunday, 17 September 2017 01:02 (six years ago) link
also missing from his list: One Size Fits All and Roxy and Elsewhere, both classic IMO
― Moodles, Sunday, 17 September 2017 01:05 (six years ago) link
Ooh good ones Moodles. Yeah cosign
― Week of Wonders (Ross), Sunday, 17 September 2017 01:09 (six years ago) link
"andy" is such a great song. he could do some great todd rundgren-style prog when the fancy struck him.
ts: "andy" vs. "zen archer"
― bob lefse (rushomancy), Sunday, 17 September 2017 01:49 (six years ago) link
also missing from his list: One Size Fits All and Roxy and Elsewhere, both classic IMO― Moodles, Sunday, September 17, 2017 1:05 AM (six hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― Moodles, Sunday, September 17, 2017 1:05 AM (six hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
Ah yeah, One Size Fits All is great. His last truly great one, IMO.
― more Allegro-like (Turrican), Sunday, 17 September 2017 07:53 (six years ago) link
Dunno, after Hot Rats it just ain't for me. Shame because half of what comes before is pretty classic
― licorice oratorio (baaderonixx), Sunday, 17 September 2017 08:51 (six years ago) link
That "Lakshi's Delight" is really nice.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Monday, 18 September 2017 14:47 (six years ago) link
For me Sheik Yerbouti is where things went so irredeemably wrong that I basically gave up on any future releases.
― "Celebration" encourages the listener to celebrate good times. (Dan Peterson), Monday, 18 September 2017 14:49 (six years ago) link
that was the first Zappa I ever bought. it's pretty amazing to hear so much about what a genius Zappa is and how he's unparalleled as a composer etc. etc. and then actually buy one of his albums and have it contain a song like "Broken Hearts Are For Assholes". made me laugh at least. not sure how much of the album I could stomach now. though I'm pretty sure "Flakes" is still a great tune.
― frogbs, Monday, 18 September 2017 15:05 (six years ago) link
Also City of Tiny Lites and several others, it's pretty well split between great and terrible tracks.
― Moodles, Monday, 18 September 2017 16:03 (six years ago) link
Dylan impression on Flakes worth price of admission alone
― licorice oratorio (baaderonixx), Monday, 18 September 2017 16:50 (six years ago) link
biggest problem with sheik yerbouti is that he cut as much adrian belew from the songs as he could when belew left to tour with bowie. belew was the star of that band, and there's _lots_ of badass playing from him that was left on the cutting room floor because of personal animosity.
― bob lefse (rushomancy), Monday, 18 September 2017 17:05 (six years ago) link
In the interest of fairness, I just relistened to "Flakes" and "Tiny Lights" for the first time in many years. I think you guys want something different from a Zappa record than I do.
"Yo Mamma" is the only song I remember liking; hot guitar solo, but even that one has really cheesy synths.
― "Celebration" encourages the listener to celebrate good times. (Dan Peterson), Monday, 18 September 2017 17:11 (six years ago) link
none of it sounds like 60s MOI, if that's what you mean
― Moodles, Monday, 18 September 2017 17:40 (six years ago) link
I love both the idea and execution behind "Rubber Shirt," I love the bit of Sinister Footwear that wound up in "Wild Love," I like the guitar jams and "City of Tiny Lites" and the Dylan impersonation a lot, and most of the album is forgettable or outright gross. SY was my 1st FZ album (bought in '79 when it came out) followed a few weeks later by Uncle Meat -- it was interesting connecting the dots between the two.
― WilliamC, Monday, 18 September 2017 18:24 (six years ago) link
I guess I'm alone in hating the Mothers albums.
― grawlix (unperson), Monday, 18 September 2017 18:43 (six years ago) link
lol I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who hate any given Zappa album
― frogbs, Monday, 18 September 2017 18:59 (six years ago) link
I dig jazz from hell, it sure ain't for everyone
― brimstead, Monday, 18 September 2017 22:45 (six years ago) link
eat that question doc is worth a look
― Week of Wonders (Ross), Monday, 18 September 2017 22:56 (six years ago) link
zappa was my number 1 since adolescence. I've been obsessed most of my life, but the recent barrage of docs/interview footage combined with some amount of getting older and the evolution of our collective societal notions has really soured me on him as a man and consequently put me off of a lot of his music. the guy had absolutely no respect for women to the point where he was downright abusive. his political satire does actually get fucking racist at times. id much rather listen to later beefheart record now a days. that dude humbled out. zappa didnt.
― Shart Dressed Man (kurt schwitterz), Monday, 18 September 2017 23:26 (six years ago) link
i kind of moved on myself. i became less impressed with him as a composer once i actually started listening to other modern composers. and goddamn there is no excuse whatsoever for "the illinois enema bandit". what a vile hunk of misogynist trash. he's got some good stuff, but his awful stuff is _really_ bad.
― bob lefse (rushomancy), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 00:48 (six years ago) link
kurt OTM
Zappa was absolutely against censorship and being censored by the state but he was always off the money post We're Only in it for Money because that was the last time he was in touch with anyone
― Week of Wonders (Ross), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 00:53 (six years ago) link
zappa was out of touch, Carlos had the market on progressive synth music covered in the 80s and he was doing some corny ass shit
― Week of Wonders (Ross), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 00:54 (six years ago) link
The posthumous release "Hammersmith Odeon" has 3 cd´s from that tour. Unfortunately without a version of "Wild Love". I liked the Capitol version of "Lumpy Gravy" (without the vocal parts and heavy razorblade editing) better than the official release. The Capitol version is on disc 1 of "Lumpy Money".
So I read Belew did the liner notes of a yet-to-be-released box of Zappa tour recordings, I think from '77.
Writing for orchestras, somehow I tend to see Zappa as a more melodic version of Boulez. "Yellow Shark" is a late masterpiece. I like it better than his Synclavier-music.
― EvR, Tuesday, 19 September 2017 15:00 (six years ago) link
This is intriguing. Don't think I've ever heard Belew fully unleashed with Zappa.
― Moodles, Tuesday, 19 September 2017 16:25 (six years ago) link
jesus this kicks so much ass
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBbH6EsNBAQ
― Shart Dressed Man (kurt schwitterz), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 16:56 (six years ago) link
Some epic keyboard grooves from Tommy Mars on this one
― Moodles, Tuesday, 19 September 2017 17:05 (six years ago) link
ok Zappa is a very strange choice for this
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/frank-zappa-hologram-to-perform-with-steve-vai-others-w504727
― frogbs, Friday, 22 September 2017 18:58 (six years ago) link
why is he a strange choice? the zappa cult has pretty much proven it will eat up anything plus guitar mag dorks are the biggest marks in music (throwing vai into the equation)
― Universal LULU Nation (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 22 September 2017 19:00 (six years ago) link
plus holo zappa can't throw them dirty looks when they fuck up
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Friday, 22 September 2017 19:06 (six years ago) link
Zappa's shows tended to be improv and banter heavy. like what are they gonna do here.
― frogbs, Friday, 22 September 2017 19:08 (six years ago) link
collect the dough put it in the bank
― Universal LULU Nation (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 22 September 2017 19:18 (six years ago) link