Let's hear it for another great Italian!

At some point, there just had to be a Zappa screed in the Hole. Now, thanks to Babs, here comes that screamin' sound again! 

Grace Slick, once said of Frank Zappa, “He’s the most intelligent asshole, I’ve ever met”.  Having once met Grace Slick, I can only conclude, it takes one to know one (in a future screed, I’ll do an ‘Airplane’ piece, including my by chance and brief meeting of Grace, and Paul Kantner). [Yes, please!: Ed] That said, I sort of agreed with her. 

  

A working breakfast at the UMRK

Be that as it may, musically I’ve always thought of Frank as an innovator, and a perfectionist.  He showed great respect to his audience, by investing a lot of rigor, time, and money, to ensure that when you saw a Zappa concert you would have an outstanding musical experience.  I myself have seen Frank many times, and not once was disappointed.

 

Another numie for Ronnie's window? 

 

Lyrically, however, his mix of scatological, juvenile, borderline misogynistic, political, and societal humor was where Frank rubbed some people the wrong way.  Many people also think he was anti-Hippie, but in my eye he was a Hippie.  He looked like one, spoke like one, and pretty much acted like one (and therefore passes "The Duck Test").  Okay, he didn’t do so-called illicit drugs, but he loved his, beer, cigarettes and coffee, all of which are technically speaking, are drugs.  One of my favorite Zappa quotes is:

"If you end up with a boring miserable life because you listened to your mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest, or some guy on television telling you how to do your shit, then you deserve it."

The above quote is about as anti-establishment Hippie as it gets.

 

 Insert dog-doo snow cone here

 

Over the years, I’ve come to change my opinion of Frank as a person and lyricist.  From what I can gather, most if not all musicians he worked with fondly remember their time with Frank, and learned much from the experience.  Also, his family still speak very highly of him after all these years despite the fact that he comes off as a terrible father/husband, really speaks volumes. Frank was not what he appeared to be from the outside.  As for Frank’s lyrics, as the old saying goes, “To make an omelette you have to break a few eggs”.  Lyrically, Frank was first and foremost a satirist, and a satirist of a very high order.  Many people claimed to be “offended” by his lyrics, but he was an equal opportunity “offender” in that, no-one or anything went unscathed.  Myself, I find most of his lyrics to be well written and intelligent, while some are not in the best taste and eye roll inducing, but certainly not offensive, but as always, your mileage may vary.

 

 Magic fingers

 

So why this screed, you ask?

The other day, I was looking through my "archive storage facility for music" (and by "archive storage facility for music", I mean a dozen or so very large plastic bins, stored in my wine "cellar", and by "cellar", I mean on the fifth floor of a converted button factory in Manhattan where I live, but I digress), looking for Albert Ayler’s ‘Holy Ghost’ (a 9CD beautifully made boxed set) for a musician friend.  While looking for it, I found ‘Apocrypha (Thirty Years of Frank Zappa)’, a 4-CD bootleg box set from 1994 on Great Dane Records located in Milan, Italy (no really), and though it would fit perfectly into The Good Old Major's Hole.

"Music is the only religion that delivers the goods."

 'Apocrypha (Thirty Years of Frank Zappa)', has luxurious packaging: a book-style box with a faux leather appearance, and contains a large (40-page) color booklet with dozens of pictures and a very long and confusing 1988 interview. Liner notes appear on the far right on every right-hand page, complete with misinformation (the band line-up details are especially abominable: they are not complete, and they falsely state that the Bob Harris from 1971 and the Bob Harris from 1980 were the same person). All of which will be included in the download.

It should be pointed out, some of 'Apocrypha' has been officially released on ‘The Lost Episodes’ and the ‘Mystery Disc’  The duplicated tracks are from the same sources, but in some cases there are significant differences, and often longer. Other times, the official releases have been sped up or down about a half step, and contain overdubs.

If you’re a Zappa fan, you’ll love this set.

[I had this and lost it several years ago - it's great! - so I'll be very keen to answer Babs' question to get the link.]