Frank Zappa: Outrage And Invention - Revision history

Spider of Destiny at 11:29, 25 April 2026

2026-04-25T11:29:28Z

Jason.Kreitzer at 16:04, 14 December 2021

2021-12-14T16:04:02Z

Jason.Kreitzer at 15:38, 29 September 2021

2021-09-29T15:38:31Z

Jason.Kreitzer at 04:52, 22 September 2021

2021-09-22T04:52:11Z

Jason.Kreitzer at 17:35, 21 September 2021

2021-09-21T17:35:50Z

Duncan: Buckley link

2021-08-03T12:14:46Z

Buckley link

Jason.Kreitzer at 02:49, 22 July 2021

2021-07-22T02:49:55Z

Jason.Kreitzer at 01:38, 20 July 2021

2021-07-20T01:38:53Z

Spider of Destiny at 07:32, 31 December 2015

2015-12-31T07:32:50Z

Spider of Destiny at 14:23, 15 September 2011

2011-09-15T14:23:58Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 11:29, 25 April 2026
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	It is, simply, the deeply eclectic fusion of many musics by one of the handful of true giants we've had since rock began. Frank Zappa is indisputably one of the greats, and with him we can end this series on an auspicious high.		It is, simply, the deeply eclectic fusion of many musics by one of the handful of true giants we've had since rock began. Frank Zappa is indisputably one of the greats, and with him we can end this series on an auspicious high.
		+
	[[Category:Articles about Zappa]]		[[Category:Articles about Zappa]]
		+	[[Category:1974]]

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 Zappa also listened to [[Igor Stravinsky|Stravinsky]], and started writing music – without hearing it performed – long before he left high-school at 18. That done, he attended some college courses in harmony and in 1959 finally stopped living with his parents and moved to Los Angeles. Emphatically Los Angeles, rather than San Francisco.
-Zappa got his first thing recorded in 1960 – the soundtrack he wrote for a film called [[The World's Greatest Sinner]]. Characteristically, it involved 52 musicians, and he didn't get any money for it.
+Zappa got his first thing recorded in 1960 – the soundtrack he wrote for a film called [[The World’s Greatest Sinner (The Film)|The World's Greatest Sinner]]. Characteristically, it involved 52 musicians, and he didn't get any money for it.
 It didn't launch Mr Z a single inch toward stardom and he took a job in an advertising agency – further experience much-utilised since.

@@ Line 33: / Line 33: @@
 Zappa also co-wrote 'Break-time', cut by ''The Masters;'' did the arrangement and backing track on Bobby Jameson's '[[Gotta Find My Roogalator]]', the guitar solo on '[[Every Time I See You]]' by the ''Heartbreakers,'' and both guitar and drums on the ''Hollywood Persuaders''' '[[Grunion Run]]'.
-(This and other very detailed info comes from [[Urban Gwerder]]'s excellent fanzine "[[Hot Ratz Times]]", which shoots out sporadically from the unlikely city of Zurich.)
+(This and other very detailed info comes from [[Urban Gwerder]]'s excellent fanzine "[[Hot Raz Times|Hot Ratz Times]]", which shoots out sporadically from the unlikely city of Zurich.)
 In late 1964 Zappa eliminated the last "normal" person in the band, and the Mothers emerged as Zappa, [[Elliot Ingber]] (later in the Fraternity Of Man and later still in [[Captain Beefheart]]'s ''Magic Band'' 1970-72), [[Roy Estrada]] (later in ''Little Feat'' and the Beefheart band), [[Jimmy Carl Black]] (who later formed ''Geronimo Black'' with Mother [[Bunk Gardner]]) and [[Ray Collins]], who later vanished. Zappa's attempts to augment this line-up in 1965 resulted in all these young hopefuls passing through the band: [[Dr. John]], [[Henry Vestine]] (of ''Canned Heat),'' [[Jim Guercio]] (producer for Chicago), [[Van Dyke Parks]], [[Jim Fielder]] (of ''Buffalo Springfield'' and ''[[Blood, Sweat & Tears]]),'' [[Alice Stuart]] and [[Kim Fowley]]. Some of this motley crew appeared, but were later expunged from, an unpleasant film called [[Mondo Hollywood]]; they were also turned down by Columbia Records, with Clive Davis' immortal words "No Commercial Potential!"

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 As music, too, Frank Zappa has not always been infallible. But who has? Let's not start niggling away at his work with some sort of cement-scraper. What remains impressive is how much of that work is undemolishably solid, right from the euphoric live version of '[[Happy Together]]', which sounds so deceptively unrehearsed on the [[Fillmore East, June 1971|Mothers Live/Fillmore June 1971]] album, to the virtuoso performances on [[Hot Rats]], and from the delights of the surf-music moments on [[We're Only In It For The Money|We're Only In It For the Money]] to the complex orchestral swamps of the underrated [[Waka/Jawaka]] album of a couple of years back.
-What also becomes clear, if you look down through the great sweep of all those records, is how fine a sponsor of other people's talent Frank Zappa has been. Mothers of Invention have come and gone; very few have been undistinguished. They have included [[Billy Mundi]], [[Arthur Tripp|Arthur Tripp III]] (who became Ed Marimba in Beefheart's Band), [[Lowell George]] (later a founder-member of the fine [[Little Feat]]), and [[Aynsley Dunbar]] – a particularly adventurous choice, considering that he came from the deeply English blues roots of the [[John Mayall|Mayall]] band and [[Jeff Beck]].
+What also becomes clear, if you look down through the great sweep of all those records, is how fine a sponsor of other people's talent Frank Zappa has been. Mothers of Invention have come and gone; very few have been undistinguished. They have included [[Billy Mundi]], [[Arthur Tripp|Arthur Tripp III]] (who became Ed Marimba in Beefheart's Band), [[Lowell George]] (later a founder-member of the fine [[Wikipedia:Little Feat|Little Feat]]), and [[Aynsley Dunbar]] – a particularly adventurous choice, considering that he came from the deeply English blues roots of the [[John Mayall|Mayall]] band and [[Jeff Beck]].
 Most interesting in this respect is the impressive number of musicians from the jazz field that Zappa has utilised and/or popularised. Bringing [[Edgard Varèse]] to some kind of popular fame was by no means Frank Zappa's only exercise in promoting people off the central lines of popular music. In August 1967 a woodwinds-player and pianist joined the Mothers from the ranks of jazz groups complete with a master's degree in music – [[Ian Underwood]]. He remained, contributing heavily to [[Hot Rats]], and was eventually joined in the band by his wife [[Ruth Underwood|Ruth]]; only very recently have they split to do their own thing.

@@ Line 81: / Line 81: @@
 As music, too, Frank Zappa has not always been infallible. But who has? Let's not start niggling away at his work with some sort of cement-scraper. What remains impressive is how much of that work is undemolishably solid, right from the euphoric live version of '[[Happy Together]]', which sounds so deceptively unrehearsed on the [[Fillmore East, June 1971|Mothers Live/Fillmore June 1971]] album, to the virtuoso performances on [[Hot Rats]], and from the delights of the surf-music moments on [[We're Only In It For The Money|We're Only In It For the Money]] to the complex orchestral swamps of the underrated [[Waka/Jawaka]] album of a couple of years back.
-What also becomes clear, if you look down through the great sweep of all those records, is how fine a sponsor of other people's talent Frank Zappa has been. Mothers of Invention have come and gone; very few have been undistinguished. They have included [[Billy Mundi]], [[Arthur Tripp|Arthur Tripp III]] (who became [[Ed Marimba]] in Beefheart's Band), [[Lowell George]] (later a founder-member of the fine [[Little Feat]]), and [[Aynsley Dunbar]] – a particularly adventurous choice, considering that he came from the deeply English blues roots of the [[John Mayall|Mayall]] band and [[Jeff Beck]].
+What also becomes clear, if you look down through the great sweep of all those records, is how fine a sponsor of other people's talent Frank Zappa has been. Mothers of Invention have come and gone; very few have been undistinguished. They have included [[Billy Mundi]], [[Arthur Tripp|Arthur Tripp III]] (who became Ed Marimba in Beefheart's Band), [[Lowell George]] (later a founder-member of the fine [[Little Feat]]), and [[Aynsley Dunbar]] – a particularly adventurous choice, considering that he came from the deeply English blues roots of the [[John Mayall|Mayall]] band and [[Jeff Beck]].
 Most interesting in this respect is the impressive number of musicians from the jazz field that Zappa has utilised and/or popularised. Bringing [[Edgard Varèse]] to some kind of popular fame was by no means Frank Zappa's only exercise in promoting people off the central lines of popular music. In August 1967 a woodwinds-player and pianist joined the Mothers from the ranks of jazz groups complete with a master's degree in music – [[Ian Underwood]]. He remained, contributing heavily to [[Hot Rats]], and was eventually joined in the band by his wife [[Ruth Underwood|Ruth]]; only very recently have they split to do their own thing.

@@ Line 85: / Line 85: @@
 Most interesting in this respect is the impressive number of musicians from the jazz field that Zappa has utilised and/or popularised. Bringing [[Edgard Varèse]] to some kind of popular fame was by no means Frank Zappa's only exercise in promoting people off the central lines of popular music. In August 1967 a woodwinds-player and pianist joined the Mothers from the ranks of jazz groups complete with a master's degree in music – [[Ian Underwood]]. He remained, contributing heavily to [[Hot Rats]], and was eventually joined in the band by his wife [[Ruth Underwood|Ruth]]; only very recently have they split to do their own thing.
-Zappa likewise brought in, via [[Hot Rats]], the jazz pianist [[George Duke]], [[Don "Sugarcane" Harris|Don Sugarcane Harris]] and [[Jean-Luc Ponty]]. And the point that needs emphasising is that not only did Zappa introduce these people to a wider audience – as well as giving recording opportunity and/or outlet, via his labels, to acts as varied as [[Alice Cooper]] and [[Lord Buckley]] – but throughout the varying line-ups, he kept the Mothers to a staggering consistency of concept and performance.
+Zappa likewise brought in, via [[Hot Rats]], the jazz pianist [[George Duke]], [[Don "Sugarcane" Harris|Don Sugarcane Harris]] and [[Jean-Luc Ponty]]. And the point that needs emphasising is that not only did Zappa introduce these people to a wider audience – as well as giving recording opportunity and/or outlet, via his labels, to acts as varied as [[Alice Cooper]] and [[A Most Immaculately Hip Aristocrat|Lord Buckley]] – but throughout the varying line-ups, he kept the Mothers to a staggering consistency of concept and performance.
 It needed a loner of remarkable vision and self-awareness to achieve such collaborative success; that success promises to give us many more years yet of rich, thoughtful and adventurous music. And no doubt that music will continue to contribute to Frank Zappa's overall themes and schemes, building up more pieces and new dimensions within the vast interlocking jigsaw of his output.

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 I don't think it's pressing things too far in fact, to say that Zappa's sure touch with mid-record monologues comes more from hearing Howlin' Wolf do it brilliantly on 'Going Down South' than from hearing Nino & The Ebb-Tides do it so-bad-it-sounds-good.
-It was when Frank Zappa was just in his teens that he came across the music of [[Edgar Varèse]], the man whose beautifully iconoclastic quote decorates many a Zappa album: "The present-day composer refuses to die."
+It was when Frank Zappa was just in his teens that he came across the music of [[Edgard Varèse|Edgar Varèse]], the man whose beautifully iconoclastic quote decorates many a Zappa album: "The present-day composer refuses to die."
 Varese did die, but Zappa has given at least some of his music a bigger audience than it might otherwise have grabbed, having drawn repeatedly on Varese works like '[[Ionisation]]'.

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-[[Frank Zappa]] is the only West Coast musician who emerged in the 1960s without giving free promotion to the California Tourist Board.
+[[Biography|Frank Zappa]] is the only West Coast musician who emerged in the 1960s without giving free promotion to the California Tourist Board.
-He alone came across with a music and a style that did not plug that California sunshine – everyone else from the West Coast used that sunny-groove appeal, whether they were involved in the pre-[[The Beatles|Beatles]] surfing and drag-racing scene, like Jan And Dean, or in the later acid/freak scene (like [[wikipedia:Country Joe McDonald|Country Joe]] & The Fish) or both, like the
+He alone came across with a music and a style that did not plug that California sunshine – everyone else from the West Coast used that sunny-groove appeal, whether they were involved in the pre-[[The Beatles|Beatles]] surfing and drag-racing scene, like Jan And Dean, or in the later acid/freak scene (like [[wikipedia:Country Joe McDonald|Country Joe]] & The Fish) or both, like the [[Wikipedia:The Beach Boys|Beach Boys]].
 Zappa alone took no notice whatever and made music that could have come from New York or Chicago. In other respects though, he was not unlike Brian Wilson: he was a loner, a man with a strong and heady vision of what sounds should be going down; he was into record producing early, and bought himself a studio to operate from; and he was the creative and organisational force behind one of the outstanding bands of our time.

@@ Line 36: / Line 36: @@
 (This and other very detailed info comes from [[Urban Gwerder]]'s excellent fanzine "[[Hot Ratz Times]]", which shoots out sporadically from the unlikely city of Zurich.)
-In late 1964 Zappa eliminated the last "normal" person in the band, and the Mothers emerged as Zappa, [[Elliot Ingber]] (later in the Fraternity Of Man and later still in [[Captain Beefheart]]'s ''Magic Band'' 1970-72), [[Roy Estrada]] (later in ''Little Feat'' and the Beefheart band), [[Jimmy Carl Black]] (who later formed ''Geronimo Black'' with Mother [[Bunk Gardner]]) and [[Ray Collins]], who later vanished. Zappa's attempts to augment this line-up in 1965 resulted in all these young hopefuls passing through the band: [[Dr. John]], [[Henry Vestine]] (of ''Canned Heat),'' [[Jim Guercio]] (producer for Chicago), [[Van Dyke Parks]], [[Jim Fielder]] (of ''Buffalo Springfield'' and ''[[Blood Sweat & Tears]]),'' [[Alice Stuart]] and [[Kim Fowley]]. Some of this motley crew appeared, but were later expunged from, an unpleasant film called [[Mondo Hollywood]]; they were also turned down by Columbia Records, with Clive Davis' immortal words "No Commercial Potential!"
+In late 1964 Zappa eliminated the last "normal" person in the band, and the Mothers emerged as Zappa, [[Elliot Ingber]] (later in the Fraternity Of Man and later still in [[Captain Beefheart]]'s ''Magic Band'' 1970-72), [[Roy Estrada]] (later in ''Little Feat'' and the Beefheart band), [[Jimmy Carl Black]] (who later formed ''Geronimo Black'' with Mother [[Bunk Gardner]]) and [[Ray Collins]], who later vanished. Zappa's attempts to augment this line-up in 1965 resulted in all these young hopefuls passing through the band: [[Dr. John]], [[Henry Vestine]] (of ''Canned Heat),'' [[Jim Guercio]] (producer for Chicago), [[Van Dyke Parks]], [[Jim Fielder]] (of ''Buffalo Springfield'' and ''[[Blood, Sweat & Tears]]),'' [[Alice Stuart]] and [[Kim Fowley]]. Some of this motley crew appeared, but were later expunged from, an unpleasant film called [[Mondo Hollywood]]; they were also turned down by Columbia Records, with Clive Davis' immortal words "No Commercial Potential!"
 [[The Mothers]], as they spelt it by this time, were signed eventually to Verve/MGM, and a double-album, [[Freak Out!]], was recorded early in 1966 and issued that summer. That's when the music went out of the window. What had impact for the public and for the media was the hairiness, the freakiness, the ugliness, the vulgarity of the band. They looked and sounded gruesome.

@@ Line 8: / Line 8: @@
 He alone came across with a music and a style that did not plug that California sunshine – everyone else from the West Coast used that sunny-groove appeal, whether they were involved in the pre-[[The Beatles|Beatles]] surfing and drag-racing scene, like Jan And Dean, or in the later acid/freak scene (like [[wikipedia:Country Joe McDonald|Country Joe]] & The Fish) or both, like the
-[[wikipedia:The Beach Boys|Beach Boys]].
+[[The Beach Boys|Beach Boys]].
 Zappa alone took no notice whatever and made music that could have come from New York or Chicago. In other respects though, he was not unlike Brian Wilson: he was a loner, a man with a strong and heady vision of what sounds should be going down; he was into record producing early, and bought himself a studio to operate from; and he was the creative and organisational force behind one of the outstanding bands of our time.