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Thread: Zappa

  1. #1
    Forum Member OldStrummer's Avatar
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    Zappa

    I spent an enjoyable 2+ hours yesterday watching the documentary movie Zappa on Hulu yesterday. One of the most successful KickStarter campaigns, this movie raised some $1,200,000 in 30 days by 8,000 donors. It was just released November, 2020.

    A reviewer on IMDB said it best:

    Frank Zappa's music polarized people. I never encountered a serious listener who did not either love it or hate it. Casual listeners could be meh but not anyone who invested time to listen. Mr. Zappa was much less than the purported rock star, a label he would not care for and much more one of the greatest composers of the twentieth century. He created and worked for his own enjoyment and if others liked it , great and if they didn't that was ok with him.

    He railed against stupidity and the compromise of freedom. While clearly a challenging taskmaster, he never seemed so happy as when conducting the ensemble near the end of his life.
    The movie clearly shows that Zappa was a composer. Much like Salvador Dalí, his commercial efforts were the means to fund his artistic efforts. His archives, which I did not know he kept, are a veritable museum of the life and works of Frank Zappa.


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    Forum Member DanTheBluesMan's Avatar
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    Re: Zappa

    I got that copy of GP. Frank was a relentless pursuer of truth in media. He recorded hundreds and thousands of hours of videotapes to catch the media in its attempts to newspeak. I wonder what became of those?

    I'm not a casual listener of FZ but I have a great deal of respect for him. Somewhere I have a triple vinyl copy of the "Shut Up and Play Yer Guitar" series.
    "Live and learn and flip the burns"

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    Forum Member ch willie's Avatar
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    Re: Zappa

    I'm a big fan of Zappa and go through stages of listening to him. One of my favorite live albums is "The Best Band You Never Heard in Your Life". There is some serious playing by a great band. Serious players, and as silly as some of Zappa's songs might seem, he could also write very pointed satire. He blasts Jimmy Swaggart's hypocrisy in a rewrite of "Lonesome Cowboy Burt". It still makes me laugh out loud--y'all remember the incident with the prostitute in Nashville.

    My fave Zappa album is "Joe's Garage." The humor is ripe, and so is the playing and the concept.

    The first time I ever smoked a left handed herbal jazz cigarette, my bros and I listened to "Over-Nite Sensation" with "Camarillo Brillo". I remember everyone laughing hard at Zappa's "Dinah Moe Humm". "more a on the floor a". lol.
    If we'd known we were going to be the Beatles, we'd have tried harder.--George Harrison

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    Forum Member OldStrummer's Avatar
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    Re: Zappa

    I might come across as a Frank Zappa fan boi, but I'm not. I saw him in concert five times over the years, and have vivid memories of them. The movie showed aspects of his life that I never knew, and some that it confirmed. Among those was that first and foremost, Zappa was a composer. I knew this because I recall reading a German magazine on the train between Munich and Vienna where there were photographs of his compositions. That he was insistent that his music be performed perfectly is no secret.

    The movie shows him, pen in hand poring over composition paper, writing his music; no instrument in hand, just putting the music in his head on paper.

    I mentioned that I'm a fan of Salvador Dalí. I am a patron of the Salvador Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida. I recognize in Zappa that same sense of artistic integrity coupled with the recognition of needing patronage to pursue his art. So, Zappa was to many a loon and a buffoon, but he was not. The movie shows that he was a serious man dedicated to his art. The great mistake was to overlook him.

    This clip from the Steve Allen Show in 1963 shows a 22 year-old Zappa playing a bicycle. What I like best about this clip is how Steve Allen starts out like he's going to have a lot of fun with this chump, and winds up with a high regard for him at the end.


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    Forum Member S. Cane's Avatar
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    Re: Zappa

    I confess that I tried hard to like Zappa but never really did. Maybe I should listen to his albums again...

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    Forum Member OldStrummer's Avatar
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    Re: Zappa

    Quote Originally Posted by Sérgio View Post
    I confess that I tried hard to like Zappa but never really did. Maybe I should listen to his albums again...
    Don't.

    At least not until you've at least watched this movie. I confess that like so many contemporaries of his, I lost track of his work as we both grew older. The movie shows some of his later works, that were performed by orchestras and "serious" ensembles. On a review of
    Orchestral Favorites 40th Anniversary (a posthumous release) one reviewer wrote,

    How frustrating must it be to hear fully formed orchestral compositions in your head and spend all the time and effort to turn it into dots on paper only to never hear it performed? Sometimes you have to take matters into your own hands and make it happen. Frank did just that and while the results may not have met his extremely high standards, the rest of us mortal folks sure do enjoy it. Glorious high brow music mixed with equally glorious low brow humor. Things became a bit more polished when The Yellow Shark patrolled these waters, but this is a giddy roller coaster ride of fun.

    Earlier today during lunch, I watched a YouTube video of professional drummer Shawn Crowder analyzing, dissecting, discussing and playing Zappa's Black Page #1, considered by many to be "the impossible song." I found it quite enlightening. And like so many other things when looked at more closely, very revealing.


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    Forum Member OldStrummer's Avatar
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    Re: Zappa

    This is a short clip (a trailer for the movie, perhaps) featuring Ruth Underwood playing The Black Page on piano. Underwood a classically trained virtuoso musician, played with Zappa's band from 1972 to 1977. She married Ian Underwood (they divorced in 1986), who also played with Zappa.

    I find this clip melancholy and memorable. At the heart of it all is the music of Zappa. It's quite a piece.


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    Forum Member ch willie's Avatar
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    Re: Zappa

    Steve Allen--a talk show host who actually had talent and was quick witted. I loved that clip. Zappa was a composer first, very influenced by the dissonance of Varčse. Probably Stockhausen too. I haven't watched the documentary yet. I read two books by Zappa a couple of decades ago. I might watch the doc today.
    If we'd known we were going to be the Beatles, we'd have tried harder.--George Harrison

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