The Smiley Smile Message Board

Posts: 7


I wanted to add something to the Zappa thread at the ex-board, so here it is; a continuation of that, rather than a new topic.

My recommendation for anyone new to Zappa would be Burnt Weeny Sandwich, an often overlooked and mostly instrumental gem from the end of the original group's output. It has everything, from the two doo-wop retreads that act as the bread for this particular sandwich (they sandwich the "meat" between them, see), through live splices and berserker improv to highly-arranged "orchestral" pieces, all wrapped up in a typically fantastic/repulsive Cal Schenkel sleeve. And for once, the CD works better than the album, letting side one flow into side two, as it should.

Another big favourite of mine (which seems to just go on getting better as the years pass) is Lumpy Gravy, which was pretty much dismissed at the time - "where's the group, where's the tunes? where's the guitar?" - but which showcases his use of the studio-as-instrument as well as anything he ever did. Motorhead's career resumé is a gorgeous bit of audio collage as well as being hilarious.

I have the original "Cruisin' With Ruben and the Jets" 1968 mix from vinyl if anyone's interested. It's a rare find, because he remixed it in '84 (terribly) and hadn't rereleased the original since then.

"Hot Rats" was my starting point for Zappa, and IMHO, the perfect one. It's just interesting enough for the first time listener to hook you in, especially if you just push play and Peaches is your first listen. That's one of Zappa's best hooks, the drum riff leading into Peaches, and that was the curtain rising for Zappa in my mind.

If you like "Willie the Pimp", you might consider getting his other two jazz-fusion albums, "Waka/Jawaka" and "The Grand Wazoo". They're both excellent and sufficiently long. It sounds as if Zappa picked up a copy of Miles Davis' "Bitches Brew" and wanted to do something similar, especially on "Waka/Jawaka".

GREAT ALBUM! Not sure about it as an intro, but I guess it depends on how cool the person you're trying to introduce is...


Another gem. I love Lumpy Gravy--it's among my favorite 25 or 30 albums. "The way I see it, Gary..."

It's all about The Yellow Shark. Damn if that isn't Zappa's finest classical work.

Is that really saying anything?

C'mon guys, the man lost all heart and soul in the early 70's. Songs like Mom And Dad and Take Your Clothes Off When You Dance showed a real caring about the human race and it's possibilities. Then he just stopped caring, and it all became rank and juvenile promotion of masturbation both in the literal sense and musical sense.

I enjoy Frank's material the most between 1966 to 1974, with a few albums scattered between 1975 and 1993, and most of those I listen to just for his guitar work, which was ALWAYS exemplary. If you can listen to Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar and not be moved, well you just don't appreciate the art of the guitar. His classical work I never found much fault with, I enjoy it very much. But his "pop" albums, if you want to call them that, were more obsessed with being rank and disgusting, almost to the extent of self-parody. It was tolerable on Over-nite Sensation and Apostrophe, but after that, it became wearisome, even embarassing.

I'm extremely moved by Hot Rats, let's put it that way.

His most underrated song? Tears Began To Fall. Seriously. Listen to it.

What album is that off of?

And Hot Rats is excellent, though that was in my post above that was apparently inconsequential. :lol: ;D 8)

Tears is on Fillmore East 71, last track.

I forgot to say that I totally agreed with your Rats post earlier.

I LOVE that song! That's a contender for best Zappa tune by a long shot. Shame it's on one of his lesser albums.

WHAT?!
Fillmore East a lesser album? No siree bob, nuttin' with Flo And Eddie is lesser! The reason that the rique humor is hilariously funny there is that Flo And Eddie wrote all of it, though you wouldn't know that by the credits! Bwana Dik, Little House I Used To Live In, Tears, a GREAT Peaches etc. An amazing album, and Just Another Band From LA is, as well.

Just Another Band is great...the main "Billy Was A Mountain..." musical theme is great, and that Flo and Eddie sang it was tremendous.

Agreed on Zappa's failure to live up to his earlier (meaning first decade, or just under) work. I did like his last touring band, but there was no original material to speak of. I like his orchestral music and he was always a good player, but as far as making albums of listenable pop music, nothing he did mattered much to me--at least consistently--after the mid-70s. And really, I don't like anything after Grand Wazoo as much as what came before. The next band, too, I guess, with Roxy, etc.

I prefer Just Another Band From LA, by a long shot.

It's early 70's for me. For some reason, I abhor "Flo and Eddie". I never did understand the obsession Frank had with grossness and some of the drivel that the two Turtles spewed out during that period. My least favorite period by fart.

By fart, huh?  ;)

Dammit. You flat(ulence) out caught me.

 :D

I agree with Ian, the Flo and Eddie-era stuff was hilarious and right on. "Chunga's Revenge" is incredible, and hell, "200 Motels" is his crowning achievement. Take that, "Uncle Meat," which didn't even get finished and the album is a sprawling mess, take that! (Although of course I love Uncle Meat as well). The obsession is that they sing like motherfargers -- in the Turtles, in Zappa's band, in T. Rex. Those high, clear voices in close harmony? Insanely right-on.

I like the two live albums but for my money "Motels" is the best thing from that era.

And whoever said Zappa failed to live up to the potential of  his first decade: okay, but LATHER. That's a remarkable achievement, even with "Punky's Whips" and "Illinois Enema Bandit" sillying it up. There's some total insanity on that thing, and the sheer SCALE is mammoth. And I'm all about Yellow Shark, too, and Jazz From Hell is up there for me as well!

LATHER is also something posthumous that was based on an earlier project that became "Studio Tan", "Sleep Dirt", and a couple of other things in the mid-70's.

No, Lather was unquestionably an intended large-scale release that was to incorporate those albums. Instead--either by Zappa's own decision or his record company's, depending on whom you choose to believe--it was split up and released as those albums instead. In fact, Zappa himself once played the entire thing while a guest on a radio station in the mid-70s. He said something to the effect of, "okay, everyone, you'll never get to hear this again as it is intended, so hit record on your tape players...I'll give you a minute."

Another thing on why Zappa was fascinated with Flo & Eddie (other than their unquestioned singing ability) -- don't forget that he did have a great sense of humor and irony, even if he buried it beneath d1ck and t1t jokes. So when the guys from the band about whom the Mother once were told "We could make you as big as the Turtles!" he had to see that as a great opportunity for humor...

There's a zappa-penned master tape box in the liner notes, too. Its pretty clear that in a very SIMILAR form, with the linking trax and dialogue, this thing was meant to be a four-album box set. It was RELEASED Posthumously, but not assembled posthumously. And its keen.

Where's the love for Joe's Garage? Surely one of Frank's finest achievements.

I'm also a big fan of Broadway the Hard Way. Granted some of the political humor is dated (or maybe not so much these days!), but it's got some fine new songs (e.g. "Any Kind of Pain") and lots of smokin' playing ("Hot Plate Heaven At The Green Hotel"), plus Sting getting pissed off when Zappa keeps referring to him as "Mr. Sting."

Joe's Garage was one of my first Zappa purchases (amusingly because I was under the mistaken impression that Steve Vai, whom I worshipped at the time as a guitar student in college, was ont he disc). I enjoyed it somewhat at first, finding it funny. But I no longer get into what I find to be a synthetic, trebly, thin sound that Zappa had from the late 70s through the mid-to-late '80s.

Oh wait, 98% of the world had that awful sound.

If not for Tom Waits and a couple of things by Lou Reed, I'd try to wipe the '80s out of everyone's collective memory. I really would.

Guess you enjoyed "Stevie's Spanking" when you discovered it, then. Or was that the end of the worship?  ;)

'fraid that did it for me! To be honest, I still do respect his playing tremendously, and amazed every time I hear or see him (such as in the Dub Room Special Zappa DVD). It's just that I'm not inspired to look or listen as often as I used to be!

Hot damn, I agreed with nearly every word of that post.
There WAS, as much as I hate to admit it, a lot of great music in the 80's, though.

Every once in a while, I come through. Probably the pinot noir talking.

Amen, bro. I HATE that sound. Look to the remixes of "Cruisin' With Ruben and the Jets" and "We're Only In It For The Money" for the worst examples.

And amen to THAT!

I have the "We're Only In It For The Money" with the bass and drums overdubbed by Scott Thunes and Chad Wackerman. Absolutely unlistenable.

The worst part is, the backlash of that retooling was so bad, Zappa turned up his nose at the fans when he finally re-issued the album in it's original form, doing nothing more than the least work possible. At least, that's what I read. That's allegedly why the 1995 Ryko re-issue sounds so terrible in places, Zappa didn't care enough about the original mix to actually do any kind of a restoration job. All of the corrected censorship from the 1984 remix was foregone for the original censored versions.

That's the reason why vinyl is the way to go!

Any love for Sheik Yerbouti?  That is such a great album, and songs like Yo Mama went on to become live staples for him throughout the late 70s and 80s.  Sheik Yerbouti is excellent start to finish.  Is there possibly a better way to make fun of Peter Frampton than when Frank wrote "I Have Been In You"?  The song "Tryin' to Grow a Chin" is without a doubt one of the catchiest rock songs I've ever heard.  And Flakes goes right up there with some of Zappa's finest lyrical achievements:

"I'm a moron and this is my wife. She's frosting a cake with a paper knife.  All what we got here's American made. It's a little bit cheesy but it's nicely displayed.  Well we don't get excited when it crumbles and breaks.  We just get on the phone and call up some flakes.  They rush on over and break it some more, and we are do dumb they're lining up at our door."  Pure genius.

I think Zappa put out plenty of great material in his later years, then again, perhaps I'm biased considering my first Zappa album was "Ship Arriving Too Late to Save a Drowning Witch".  :D

Not really.

It should be called Suck Yerbouti because that album really, really sucks.

Yep.

Where's all the LOVE for Absolutely Free? That's only Zappa's second finest album, after Freak Out.

I love Absolutely Free. I don't think it's his second best, but it's really good. The original Brown Shoes Don't Make it alone makes it worth it

At least no one here has mentioned Jazz From Hell. That makes me shudder.

I hate Jazz From Hell the worst of any of his stuff, which is saying something. I love Absolutely Free. Not in my Top 5, though.

Death to the Synclavier!

Someone did earlier. I forget who.

I actually enjoy Jazz From Hell quite a bit.  It's unusual, yes.  But it's pretty good for what it is in my opinion.  Certainly not everyone's cup of tea to be sure, but it won a grammy for a reason.  Plus, Jazz From Hell is the only instrumental album to ever get a parental advisory label put on it.  It was over one song title (G-Spot Tornado).  Unbelievable.  I spin it as often as any other Zappa record.

Oh, and Absolutely Free is the $h1t.  I love that album.  Cruising With Ruben and the Jets is another one of my favorites.  What mix I listen to (original vinyl or the 1984 CD remix) doesn't really matter to me however.  There are things about the CD remix that I like but the more I listen to the original vinyl mix, the more I like it.  It's far more raw.

To tell you the truth, I think that Freak Out! through Weasels Ripped My Flesh was his longest consecutive streak of putting out albums that rate 8 and higher on a scale of 1-10.  Hell, I place Uncle Meat in my top 5 favorite rock albums of all time.  He certainly had his moments after that period though.  I'll defend Sheik Yerbouti, Ship Arriving Too Late, Jazz From Hell and Yellow Shark until the day I die.

That was me. I fracking love Jazz From Hell. In fact, I fracking love ALL his synclavier stuff, including "Civilization Part III." I think its some of the most interesting instrumental stuff he ever did. I remember getting Jazz from Hell the Christmas it came out, being totally mystified by it, and then playing it constantly for like three months. I came away from it adoring the hell out of it. Its complex, insanely speed-demon-y, and has some really intriguing melodies and arrangements.

Sure, its "cold," but for Frank at the time, that was kinda the point.

Analogdemon, I'm not with ya on Shiek or Ship Arriving, but Jazz from Hell and Yellow Shark? Resounding YES. Yellow Shark particularly -- FANTASTIC album.

I *kinda* liked "Them Or Us" too.

Oh yeah, and I really liked the "LSO" record in High School but apparently, according to his bio, the "horns got drunk" story in the liners is totally apocryphal and symptomatic of his irritating perfectionism.

I like this album, too. Very much, in fact.

Right on -- that's multiple people with taste that like the synclavier stuff. Vindication!

I think it is just a completely different experience. There is definitley a mentality I think we are all guilty of that includes expecting something you know and like from someone, so when the next Zappa album you buy doesn't sound like We're Only..., but instead like Hot Rats, you're pissed. Or instead of Hot Rats, like Sheik Yerbouti, or Jazz From Hell, or Thing-Fish.

To me, there is definitely a lot of Zappa's material I dislike, but there is a lot I like, too. I've tried hard with him -- harder than with anyone else, purely out of necessity -- to try and put Zappa out of my mind and listen to each piece of music as if it were to me a new artist's work. That way it becomes more difficult to remember that I personally wish he had done a dozen more albums in the late 60s/early 70s vein.

I love Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar. It's one of my favorite Zappa albums. One of my favorite guitar albums.

Does that have "Watermelon in Easter Hay" on it? Cause that song is absolutely stunning -- a gorgeous lil' knockout.

That's on the Guitar album. That's also a great one.

"Watermelon" is on Joe's Garage. A masterpiece.

I love the synclavier stuff. For me, it's as much part of "electronic music" as his own catalogue. If you listen to some Stockhausen (recommended: Hymnen, especially the brain-melting Fourth Region), Subotnick's Silver Apples of the Moon, Terry Riley's Rainbow in Curved Air, and then Zappa's Civilisation, you can hear a whole universe of music that's not at all cold or sterile or trying-to-sound-like-something-else. I agree that Jazz From Hell, when heard as part of his conceptual Big Note, can sound out of place. I think it's a real shame he never got the chance to extend his synclavier work - he was really just starting out.

Dogbreath (variations):

What you said, exactly!!