Frank Zappa

I won't

But I will say

he's one of the most influential of all time

he's one of the great modern music composers of all time

he's one of the greatest guitarists of all time

he assembled & developed some of the great musicians of all time


A little less of the jazz freakouts & a little less of the penchant for turning live shows into cabarets, & I'd possibly agree with you.


Here's Frank having a little guitar duel with Steve Vai

Beruthiel wrote: »

Joe's Garage, one of my all time favourites.
What a poet. What a wit!

Why does it hurt when I pee?

200motels wrote: »

Would anyone agree with me in saying that Frank Zappa was the greatest rock artist of them all.

No, but he was a marvellous philosopher and an unparalleled anti-establishment ****-stirrer. Good on him!!

dr.bollocko wrote: »

Educate me folks. For I do not understand the cult of the Zappa.

What albums should I start with?

In my humble, his quotes are more enjoyable than his music.
Try these two for starters:

"The computer can't tell you the emotional story. It can give you the exact mathematical design, but what's missing is the eyebrows"

"My best advice to anyone who wants to raise a happy, mentally healthy child is: Keep him or her as far away from a church as you can"

Now I'll scuttle away before I'm Zapp(a)ed for my opening remark!

Sharktopus wrote: »

There are 80 albums up on eircom music - I've decided as a project to listen to an album a day, re-aquaint myself with old ones and get to know new stuff.

If anyone is interested I might post a daily review - just for the hell of it...

Wow, 80 albums in 80 days. Before signing up for that you might want to give yourself a 'cooling- off' period of at least a few weeks or months, sod that, years! However, if you eventually decide to crack open the Jack Daniels and roll up your sleeves, please feel free to give me a 'heads up' so to speak, I fear that I might have to take the aptly coincidental title of one of Jules Verne's novels as an injunction!
By the way, it may 'only' take you 80 days to complete the task, but I fear that within that time you will age far beyond your years, not to mention the 'Rip Van Winkle' effect it could have on your readers.
Good luck with it!

My kids still think that "Don't eat the yellow snow" is a christmas song, its lead to two separate "conversations" with young teachers who didn't realise that the kids didn't actually make the song up.

dr.bollocko wrote: »

Educate me folks. For I do not understand the cult of the Zappa.

What albums should I start with?

Sheik Yerbouti is fun. You can measure a person's psychosexual development by how well they understand the (NSFW) lyrics to Bobby Brown Goes Down. :eek:



But the album that turned me in to fan was ... Lumpy Gravy. Here's part of it:

200motels wrote: »

I have every album he ever recorded and I always say to anyone who's interested in getting to know Zappa to try Apostrophe first after that just pick any and you'll either enjoy or tear your hair out, I'd love to be discovering Zappa all over again.

I always tell people to start at Joes Garage, it's where i started. Can't remember what album i got after that but i got Lost Episopes and Playground Psychotics not long after JG. I loved those albums, not very typical Zappa but very raw and exciting, but they helped me on my journey of been a huge Zappa Fan.

I suppose by rights one should start at the start. Freak Out is very excessable dispite being over 40yrs old. All the early Mothers albums are worth starting with. To some people some of Zappas work is hard to get into and hard to listen to. I think i only have listened to Civilization Phase 3 once.

Another good place to start is the You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore series. Wide range of music covering all eras of Zappas touring bands. Worth starting there and going with what you like best.

But yes Zappa is the greatest Rock artist of all time!

Just an FYI to anyone in the UK.

http://www.dweezilzappaworld.com/events/275-uk-tour-november-2012

Dweezil Zappa Plays Zappa kicks off his UK Tour this Saturday at the Roundhouse. There is also going to be a live stream following the events of the day.

http://www.roundhouse.org.uk/live

DZPZ have only come through Ireland twice (2006 and 2009)since they started touring, but both shows are forever burned into my psyche. I am living in the States now, and will try to make three shows over three days in December. Fargo North Dakota, Minneapolis Minnesota and Madison Wisconsin. 1325 miles over five days.

If have the means, do yourself a favour and try to make one of these UK shows.

Roanmore wrote: »

Both of these were covered in the Classic Albums series, brilliant viewing, well worth getting your hands on it,

It's funny that you should mention the series. I was in San Diego last February to see DZPZ. The morning after the show, I was in a record shop just down from the bay and I came across this DVD.




The second part to the story was while I was looking through their stock of CDs and DVDs, I begin to hear 'wailing' in the background.

I start to follow the noise and I find this man standing in front of the Whitney Houston section (she had died the day before) crying his eyes out and screaming 'noooooooo!!' as 'I wanna dance with somebody' played on the video monitor overhead. He was hugging her CDs and swaying back and forth as if he was trying 'to dance with somebody'.

I was in tears laughing at the poor thing. The people in the record shop eventually had to turn off the video monitors to shut him up.

i want a little ***ish princess
who rattles and hums
and squeaks when she cums

kiss my aura dora
its real angora
would you all like some mora
right here on the floora
and how about you fauna
you wanna

what a legend

Sorry for digging up an old thread, just realising now it's years old!