Champagne Lecture

For other versions of this song, see: Call Any Vegetable.

Lyrics

FZ: You know, a lotsa people don't bother about their friends in the ve-ge-ta-ble kingdom. They think: 'What can I say? What can a person who is new to the Midwest say to a vegetable?'
HOWARD: Suss it out, wankers!
FZ: Suss it out, wankers!
MARK & HOWARD: Suss it out, wankers!
JEFF: Suss it out, wankers!
FZ: Suss it out, wankers!
MARK & HOWARD: Suss it out, wankers!
AYNSLEY: Suss it out, wankers ... what's the matter with you?
HOWARD: Aynsley Dunbar!
FZ: And after "Suss it out, wankers" ...
MARK: OK.
FZ: ... you go and get yourself a big bottle of champagne, ...
ALL: Yay!
FZ: ... find yourself a young vegetable victim, ...
ALL: Yay!
FZ: ... take your young vegetable victim ... Step one--now this is very important, you have to do it exactly this way--, bring the band on down behind me, boys, this gets technical! First: You get a Polaroid camera ...
ALL: Yay!
FZ: ... and you make one good jump, from a balcony to another balcony on the seventh floor of the Sheraton Hotel in Jacksonville ...
HOWARD: Aynsley Dunbar, ladies and gentlemen.
FZ: ... When you land on the other balcony with your Polaroid camera, something like this ...
ALL: Heeey!
FZ: ... shoot off one good flashbulb catching. The agent will immediately turn around and say: 'You know, I sure would like to have that photograph.' You walk up to the agent and say: 'Well, huh, funny you should mention it, I have this photograph here and just about time to develop it, yes it turned out great, it shows both of you here, and I'll give you this photograph if you'll give me the munchkin vegetable that you're with in order that I might make a few more pictures.' So you make a quick trade, holding the champagne bottle in abeyance until the rest of the members of your band have jumped over the same balcony ...
ALL: Eeeeeeeeh!
FZ: ... and come in and taken their places around the bed where the munchkin vegetable is laid out, posing: Leg up in the air, leg down, leg to the side. Then, after some deft manipulation of the vital parts of the munchkin vegetable ...
JEFF: Hey, I want some baby to hold my tool and squeeze it!
FZ: ... with one masterful stroke--or maybe you might use several masterful strokes--shake up the magnum of champagne to a foamy froth, holding your thumb over the end of it ...
AYNSLEY: No, no, no! You left the cork in, Frank, you pull the cork out it ... Suss it out, wankers!
HOWARD: They're a hip audience, Frank, they know what's gonna happen next!
FZ: After the band has given you complete attention, and is watching closely for the precise moment of the detonation of the alcoholic beverage into the vital organ, you give a sort of casual glance around the bedroom of the Sheraton, a suave little smile and wink one eye, adjust your bow tie, and just stuff it right in there ...
ALL: Aaaah!
FZ: ... and then you tell 'em how you feel. You whip it right out, take a snort off of it ...
?: How do you feel?
MARK: Aynsley Dunbar!
FZ: No, no, no!

Records On Which This Song Has Appeared

Singles

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Zappa Albums & Side Projects

• Playground Psychotics

Notes About This Song

• This is a variation of the spoken part at the end of Call Any Vegetable (1971 - Los Angeles) (which corresponds to Soft-Sell Conclusion in the 1966 version of the song).

• It is part of the "A Typical Day On The Road, Part 2" documentation on Playground Psychotics.

• From The Real Frank Zappa Book ("The Fabulous Musician", pp. 216-18):

Once upon a time, in a town in northern Florida, a certain Fabulous Musician met three girls in the parking lot of the hotel. He found one of the girls--the blonde--to be the most appealing, and asked her to meet him for recreational deployment after the show. The band was handled by a booking agency, and the agency representative happened to be staying at the same hotel. Somehow, between the sound check and the end of the show, the agent had clamped onto the girl that the Fabulous Musician was interested in. The Fabulous Musician, being a student of human nature, was not disturbed by this usurpation of his 'beloved.' He was, however, certain of several things:

[1] Because the agent was an agent, he wasn't going to fuck the girl all night.
[2] The agent's room was right next door to his room.
[3] The agent's room had an exterior balcony, right next to his exterior balcony.
[4] Since it was summer, there was a high probability that the agent's curtains and sliding glass windows would be open.

He also calculated that, by the time he got back to the hotel, he'd only have to wait a mere few minutes for the agent to accomplish his evil mission. The Fabulous Musician told the other guys in the band (sitting in his room, on the seventh floor) that something 'interesting' was going to happen, and that they should be 'standing by.' Grasping his trusty Polaroid camera, he leaped from his balcony onto the next and, with the click of a shutter and the flash of the flashbulb, produced an instantly 'compromising photograph' of the agent, who opined, "I certainly would like to have that photograph"--to which the Fabulous Musician replied, "I certainly would like to fuck that girl." A trade was made. The agent received the photograph and retired, naked, to the corner of the room, reading The Godfather. The Fabulous Musician called across to the other balcony for the rest to join him. The girl, menstruating vigorously, seemed delighted at the prospect of further gratification. The band seated itself around the bed as if it were an operating theater, and watched in amazement as the Fabulous Musician lifted a bottle of 'complimentary champagne' from a nearby table, placed his thumb over the end, and shook it into a froth, finally plunging it into the crimson tunnel--releasing a torrent of purple spew. The girl achieved what appeared to be an immense orgasm. The Fabulous Musician withdrew the bottle with a flourish, turned to the spectators, said: "Cheers, lads!" and drank the remaining liquid.

CC Clues In This Song

• The "lecture" is yet another tale of a bandmember's encounter with a groupie.