Re: Don or Frank?

I can't split 'em. Love them both, for very different reasons.

Some of us, as we teened, had older bros and the like; I had to make adventurous purchases. The first title I ever bought that was a challenge, or art record, was Trout Mask. It was confusing. I think was about 13.

(As a parallel thought, I now know it is challenging but not one of his best.) After being stuck on an Oasis title and the new Fall all week, I had a Beefeheart sesh this morning, spurned by the idea that Bat Chain is supposed to have official release in the next month.

I'm a fan of neither's music but think that Frank Zappa is one of the great minds of pop culture.

for the first time in ever,
i can honestly say, 'I VOTED!

i don't need NO FUCKING STICKER.

however, if jim glauner could man/woman the board to issue a few more passwords to the tp fan club prez and her daughte;, the score might actually be alot (a lot?) closer.

signed,
a pagan.



Post Edited (12-04-11 19:03)

There was a time in my life (for about 6-7 years) where I was intensely into Zappa. I've moved on, buy enjoy him from time to time.

Beefheart I like, but he's no Zappa.



Post Edited (12-04-11 22:39)

Had to go with Don. He's responsible for Safe As Milk, the only full album I like between the two of them.

The Captain's music, to me, is fun. Even at its most challenging, I hear a sense of amusement within it all. Zappa, even at his best, always seems to have a smug, above-it-all quality that I never hear in Beefheart. To me, Zappa always seemed to think he was better than his own audience. (Granted, if the Captain had found more success, he might have developed a similar attitude.)

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The Captain's music, to me, is fun. Even at its most challenging, I hear a sense of amusement within it all. Zappa, even at his best, always seems to have a smug, above-it-all quality that I never hear in Beefheart. To me, Zappa always seemed to think he was better than his own audience.

Bingo. Which is why I find it a bit curious that they're always yoked together (apart from the obvious historical connections). The Cap'n seems more intuitive and soulful, and thus a more natural punk progenitor then Zappa's academic exercises and humorless humor.

"Zappa was important to me as an example of everything I didn't want to do. I'm very grateful to him, actually."
- Brian Eno

Tough call, but I went with the Captain by a chin hair.

How is that Fall album, Pagan?

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How is that Fall album

I thought I already reviewed it somewhere on this board but I don't see that post...

...It got bett-ah.
Most new Fall albums wear their face in public; this revealed its visage slower - probably because it's rather dense, in fact, mostly a hard rock outing (liner note from MES, "Brightness does not fit with an ersatz GB"). Rather than setting it aside for others in my to-listen pile it has stayed in rotation, so that says something. It will likely be in at least one category on my year-end list (though at this point that means it will chuck out another title). It's interesting to note that he has now kept the band for three albums (though I believe he's currently touring some of the American guys again).

The last 5 {LP} and how I would rank them/suggest purchases:
Fall Heads Roll [2005]
Imperial Wax Solvent [2008]
Ersatz GB [2011]
Your Future, Our Clutter [2010]
Reformation, Post TLC [2007]

edit:: and surely you're aware of the saying that an average Fall album is still better than fishing at work (or summat)?

NP::
Damned - Grave Disorder
Stones - Some Girls Deluxe
Trash Talk - Awake
Janes Addiction - Escape Artist



Post Edited (12-05-11 23:43)

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I'm also willing to believe that those who remain passionate Zappa fans into their late 20s and onward are simply intellectually or aesthetically stunted.

That's pretty interesting. So are older Zappa fans like older "Star Wars" geeks, video gamers, and the like? Those people who go to sci-fi conventions in costumes? Of course, it may be totally unfair to call those types "intellectually or aesthetically stunted" - I just say that because, like Zappa, I don't "get" that whole scene.



Post Edited (12-06-11 12:38)

I can't say that "hate" is the best word to describe how I feel about Frank Zappa and his music. "Deaf" might be better. However, here is a hateful little citation from The Guinness Book of Poisonous Quotations:

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"Frank Zappa is probably the single most untalented person I've ever heard in my life. He's two-bit, pretentious, academic, and he can't play his way out of anything. He can't play rock 'n' roll because he's a loser. And that's why he dresses so funny. He's not happy with himself, and I think he's right."[/i] - Lou Reed

I voted for Beefheart ... by a blue million miles. Zappa's stuff was never my trough of swill. It's like watching someone dissect a lab rat.

That Lou Reed quote proves the old axiom that even a stopped clock tells the right time twice a day.

I've tried Captain Beefheart numerous times - bought Trout Mask Replica twice over the years - and while I can appreciate what he's doing and why he's important, it's not music I've ever listened to for pleasure.

I used to own several Zappa records, but, again, I always appreciated them more than I enjoyed them. Hot Rats is the only record I ever listened to more than a couple of times.

Ironically, though, when it comes to music influenced by either artist, I tend to listen to the Beefheart followers instead of the Zappa ones.

frank zappa was a pretensious asshole with a great sense of humour.
lou reed was a pretensious asshole without a great sense of humour.

like em both though

It's been haunting me for years because I just can't find any reference (Google doesn't help), but I swear I read an interview with Zappa once that made it all come clear. Paraphrasing, he said something like "I know my audience. My audience is smart Jewish males between the ages of 14 and 20. If what I do appeals to that audience, the work and I are successful. If you are not in that demographic I basically couldn't give a shit what you think of my work, because it's not meant for you."

I'm not Jewish, but otherwise I was square in his demographic when I was a Zappa fan, and I was a big one. When I grew out of it, my fanhood diminished. I'm perfectly willing to believe that his later work, which doesn't move me from what I've heard of it, is just as good as anything he did that I liked earlier - it's just no longer for me. I'm also willing to believe that those who remain passionate Zappa fans into their late 20s and onward are simply intellectually or aesthetically stunted. He didn't care, so why should I?

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> So are older Zappa fans like older "Star Wars" geeks, video gamers, and the like? Those people who go to sci-fi conventions in costumes?

Seems an apt comparison to me.

Quote2:
> Just as an exercise ... would anyone care to list a few "Zappa-influenced" artistes? Does Mr. Bungle fall into this category?

A couple of the later Godley-Creme albums are pretty Zappa soaked. They even namecheck him ("I was getting into Zappa while you were getting into Zen")

Quote2:
> Just as an exercise ... would anyone care to list a few "Zappa-influenced" artistes? Does Mr. Bungle fall into this category?

Steve Vai
Warren Cuccurrulo
George Duke
Chad Wackerman
Adrian Belew
Terry Bozzio
Jean Luc Ponty
Mike Kenneally
Dweezil Zappa (duh)

I don't care what anyone says. Zappa was an AMAZING musician. I don't go for a lot of the low-brow humor stuff, but that was just a fraction of his recorded output. His music was so diverse that if you don't dig Joe's Garage, you just move on to Hot Rats which is in another universe entirely.

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Just as an exercise ... would anyone care to list a few "Zappa-influenced" artistes?

Any bar band that's ever played "Smoke on the Water."

breno wrote:

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>>Just as an exercise ... would anyone care to list a few
>>"Zappa-influenced" artistes?

> Any bar band that's ever played "Smoke on the Water."

Man, that's oblique.

I almost said Modern English and the Plimsouls, who got huge bumps from being included on the Valley Girl soundtrack. And Nicholas Cage, who got his big break starring in the movie.

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I've tried Captain Beefheart numerous times - bought Trout Mask Replica twice over the years - and while I can appreciate what he's doing and why he's important, it's not music I've ever listened to for pleasure.

Trout Mask Replica ... twice? Why twice? I mean, was it that bad the first time 'round? If the stove top is hot, why go back?

That' seems like a bad place to start with the good Captain. I'd start people at the beginning with Safe As Milk and caution them that it's only gonna get weirder. Safe As Milk has actual songs. Songs you could sing during your morning commute.

...

Can you imagine pulling up at a stop light with the windows rolled down and looking over into the next car to see some freaks singing along to "Neon Meate Dream Of An Octafish?"


"Squirmin' serum 'n semen 'n syrup 'n semen 'n serum!"

...
...

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Ironically, though, when it comes to music influenced by either artist, I tend to listen to the Beefheart followers instead of the Zappa ones.

Just as an exercise ... would anyone care to list a few "Zappa-influenced" artistes? Does Mr. Bungle fall into this category?

"Trout Mask Replica ... twice? Why twice? I mean, was it that bad the first time 'round? If the stove top is hot, why go back?"

It was about 10 years apart. My tastes had broadened and evolved a lot since the first time I gave it a shot. I thought I might appreciate it more the second time around, especially since I'd acquired an appreciation of free jazz by that time, and I've always kinda thought (rightly or wrongly) that TMR was the Captain treating the blues as free jazz.

I've listened to a few other Beefheart records, which I acquired after the first go-'round with TMR - Shiny Beast, Doc at the Radar Station, Ice Cream For Crow. I need to go back and revisit those, especially the last two.

I picked up a used copy of the early 90s edition of Doc this weekend, and listened to it this morning. You know, I think I finally get it. It doesn't sound nearly as radical to me now as it did back in the late 80s/early 90s when I first listened to it, but it still sounds unique. Now I need to get Crow.

Lester Bangs called Zappa "a moronic cretin that kids actually call 'genius' and 'musician' instead of 'wretched rip-off artist' ... walking human offal, if any such substance ever existed."

i googled frank zappa n lou reed together and i am reading about everything posted for hours.
so many differences in opinions and so many things that are contradictory.

Lester Bangs was many things; brilliant, obnoxious, semenal, incendiary, irreverent, thoughtful, visionary, whacked...

but on this topic and that quote, he was just plain wrong.

my humble opinion...



[buddylove.us]

Each of my questions answered.
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I need to go back and revisit those, especially the last two.

Agreed, fwiw. Start there.
The style he was going after on TMR peaked on the more listenable Lick My Decals but it's TMR that has received the patina-badge of "Classic". The timing, the cover art, the fact it charted in the UK and the Foghat* syndrome.

I rank thusly:
Doc
Ice Cream
Milk
Decals

I used to listen to Frank some but more as a curiosity. Was familiar with 5 or 6 titles. I knew guys in college who ate it up. I think Frank's demographic comment had as much to do with the peak age of record-buying regardless. I can't fully remember exactly why it turned me off but there was a Dead boot where Frank tells 10,000 tripping, grinning, happy concert-goers, "Now I'm going to fuck with you". It fit the descriptions given above re smugness and unapproachability. He wasn't invited back.


*(Double w/gatefold)

I would never hate on Frank, though.
He didn't just report to congress, he stood up to the man in a way loaded with a meaning that's easily forgotten due to changing times. The man that really was The Man. It wouldn't mean as much today but that's only, in part, because he did so. Today musicians can be linked to politics without culture-shock reckoning. Frank went to bat.

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i googled frank zappa n lou reed together and i am reading about everything posted for hours.
so many differences in opinions and so many things that are contradictory.

And yet Lou inducted Zappa into the R&R HoF. I actually did a web search last year trying to figure out how the hell that happened, and couldnt' come up with anything. Frank had no surviving friends?

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Can you imagine pulling up at a stop light with the windows rolled down and looking over into the next car to see some freaks singing along to "Neon Meate Dream Of An Octafish?"

When I give my daughter a bath and she plays with her toy octopus, I've been known to "sing" that very song in my imitation Beefheartian growl. But she's a toddler, she's not scared. Yet.

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I would never hate on Frank, though. He didn't just report to congress, he stood up to the man

+1

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I rank thusly:
Doc
Ice Cream
Milk
Decals

I'd put Shiny Beast at number two on that list, but otherwise agree with the rankings. And I may just be overly fond of Shiny Beast because it was my introduction to the Captain. I'd heard his name many times, but never actually heard him until I was a senior in high school and a friend found a 99 cent 8-track of Shiny Beast and took a flyer on it, and we then spent the next two weeks driving around singing "Floppy Boot Stomp," "Tropical Hot Dog Night" and "When I See Mommy I Feel Like a Mummy" nonstop.

Yeah maybe the history of Shiny makes me rank it lower, c/w the availability of the boot. We'll see - if/when g.Zappa gets the new release out.

edit::I wish I had an idea what these words mean:
8-track of Shiny Beast and took a flyer on it
On second thought I'll just appreciate the nice poetry of it. I'll put that in my lyrics fragments file, TYVM. In the meantime can you haiku it up?



Post Edited (12-08-11 00:38)

I give Zappa points for the distinctive facial hair alone.

> I give Zappa points for the distinctive facial hair alone.

Really? My high school had a creepy custodian with the exact same whiskers. Come to think of it, that may have turned me off to Zappa, back in those days.