FRANK ZAPPA

This is another one of those albums that are so good, but at the same time so bizarre that you can't quite call it a masterpiece. There seem to be flaws in it, but even those flaws could have musical value, and some of them could very well be intentional. This is the type of album that confuses the listener in such a beautiful way.

To someone with conditioned ears, this would be a bad album, plain and simple. Some wouldn't even consider this music. But I think this is the greatest musique concrète piece after Edgard Varèse's works, from whom Zappa was greatly influenced. It's quite reminiscent of Poème électronique, to me, but the difference between that piece and Lumpy Gravy is how the latter is more of a comedic composition, in contrast to the dark, edgy soundscape of Poème électronique.

Frank Zappa's Hot Rats was marketed as a "movie for your ears", but I think this record fits that bill better. If Hot Rats is a relatively conventional film, like, say, a Martin Scorsese picture, Lumpy Gravy is like a film by David Lynch; Inland Empire, for example. In any case, this is one of the most exciting records done by Zappa, and it's one of my most listened-to albums by him. I'm still new to his discography, even though I discovered him over a year ago. I tend to get stuck with individual albums for such a long time because you have to learn to enjoy them. They're complex and completely weird compared to what most listeners are used to.

Among all the weird, avant-garde records I've listened to, Lumpy Gravy takes a special spot, and, even though I cannot tell yet, this might end up being one of my favourite albums by Zappa. It's certainly the most fascinating one I've listened to yet.

Wow. 50 years since this was recorded and committed to the vault, this previously unheard live recording has been released from the Zappa archive. If you know Zappa, this will need little introduction. Suffice to say that Roxy and Elsewhere is ´probably´ may favourite Zappa album. I think the quality of the musicianship and sound (with modern production/editing techniques) on this release tops Roxy.

The band are on the top of their game. Wonderful solos, and Frank nails it yet again with his guitar here. The album is interspersed with chat that makes it so reminiscent of Roxy. Either way it is a most worthy companion to Roxy, and if you love that period of Zappa as I do, this is an immediate favourite. Classic Zappa and a 4.5 for the sheer quality of this release.

Sit back and enjoy this!

'Lumpy Gravy' is a very interesting Zappa album for several reasons. First of all, it is the first album credited to Zappa's name alone, and is a very fascinating example of complex in-studio editing of tapes; then, the 1968 version actually follows an orchestral release that was commissioned to the extravagant leader of the MOI the previous year, a mini-album on which Zappa was not actually allowed to perform due to his contractual obligations to Verve, and a work that had to be re-arranged for similar reasons, leading the avant-garde rock composer to use bits and pieces of it for the reimagined work, the one we know as the '68 version of 'Lumpy Gravy'. Finally, this is a very unnerving and fastidious sound collage concept-record that despite some obvious flaws, carries important characteristics of Zappa's distinctive, dense style, replete with comically cynical snippets of spoken word, and surreal musical passages that touch upon some of his earlier work, yet anticipate several experiments of the near future. The laborious editing of the countless tapes and the fact that an "orchestra" of hired musicians performed the entire work makes it an even more bizarre Zappa album than it already is!

Is this contemporary classical, the work of a genius, or the master tape of a madman? In any case, 'Lumpy Gravy' is a demanding, intense listen that carries the listener throughout numerous shorter pieces of music, orchestral arrangements, spoken word interludes, and blatant musique concrète intrusions. There is a patchiness to the two big pieces, a general discontinuity between all the different elements making up the re-arranged version of the album. And while the dialogues might seem hilarious and wittily sarcastic, there are some seriously good musical motifs, especially on side one, yet not always sitting perfectly well with the hazardous arrangement (or lack thereof) of all the other disparate sonic experiments. As impressive and curious as this album may seem, it is also a fragmented work that lacks the coherence of preceding releases of Zappa, which hinders its listening to an extent - nevertheless, it has to be one of the strangely "essential" avant-garde albums of the late 1960s.

Soon after the release of their debut album in 1966, the Mothers of Invention followed that up with the brilliantly weird and often undecipherable 'Absolutely Free', an early staple of experimental rock that once again displayed the originality of the band and their effortless and satirical approach towards rock music, all while playing some of the most fascinating music to have come out of the late 1960s. Much like 'Freak Out!', the music on here is adventurously avant-garde and offers several completely unorthodox pieces of rock and pop music, with the MOI drawing in influences from all over the place (blues, psychedelia, garage rock, classical and fusion references grace the two sides of the original LP). Besides, this time we have an eight-piece band working itself around, plus a ton of guest musicians, with virtually every single member of this wicked art collective contributing to the bedazzling and disturbingly surreal passages of music and their corresponding sceneries, since the earliest music of Zappa and the Mothers is incredibly vivid and resembling what we could refer to as "a film for listening".

Herein, many of the shorter pieces actually make up for longer suites, led by a certain musical motif around which the rest of the compositions are developed, which in many regards works as the anticipation of the progressive rock style and what the bands associated with it would go on to experiment with later on. Not an easy album to dissect or digest, similarly to the debut, 'Absolutely Free' still has some really fine pieces like the great suites 'The Duke of Prunes' and 'Call Any Vegetables' on side one, with a strong display of Zappa's improvisational style of play, and the garage-prog collage of sounds found on side two ('Brown Shoes Don't Make It') with all of its quirky accompanying shorter tracks. The strengths of this album overshadow its downsides for sure, which is very likely why this release is well-respected and seen as a significant part of the classic MOI catalogue, and despite its obvious but cheerfully chaotic and patchy flaws, 'Absolutely Free' indicates a desire for rebellion as well as a vision of ominous quirkiness that we just cannot ignore.

A revolutionary rock album for 1966, without a doubt, 'Freak Out!' is the debut studio album of The Mothers of Invention, a Frank Zappa-led quintet that completely shackled the idea of a rock band, and the extent to which the standard blues format might be experimented with. Released precisely a week after 'Blonde on Blonde', it is quite likely that this is the first debut double album to be released by a rock band, a work so unhinged and far-reaching that it crosses genres with ease, drawing in influences from psychedelic rock, blues, doo-wop, experimental music, and R&B, to create a vivid satire of American culture that would go on to influence the entire progressive scene as well as provide a fascinating new idea of an artistic take on the rock genre, limited strongly (yet not exclusively) by the artist's creativity.

You can call it challenging and entertaining, and whatever this album may be, the four sides of this LP assault the listener with the vicious and humorous patchwork of sounds, effects, vocal trips, and occasional use of some ridiculous instruments, at least for what concerns our idea of rock music. Vehemently experimental, 'Freak Out!' is interestingly enough a concept album, too, wherein each song depicts a particular scene, it inhibits an idea and explores it so that the whole of the work is tied together by the vision of its creator. There are absolutely bizarre arrangements, some wackily constructed pieces made up of different movements, catchy and quirky pop-sided blues numbers, and kazoo-laden jams; in a word, a tiny bit of everything. A world of its own, this debut album already anticipates a lot of the musical vocabulary that would become synonymous with Zappa's name, and the most daring part of it has to be the blatant experimentation and anecdotal musical parodies, as heard on some of the classics like 'Hungry Freaks, Daddy', 'Motherly Love', 'Any Way the Wind Blows', 'Trouble Every Day', the 'Help I'm a Rock' absurd suite in three movements, or the closing side-long and provocative collage of sounds and tapes, the 12-minute-long 'The Return of the Son of Monster Magnet', perhaps the essential antidote to all the Bob-Dylans out there. A massive album that introduced a new sensitivity in rock, it showed a comical manner and an avant-garde approach that transcends genre, and eventually, would influence a whole bunch of later movements and styles.

This is an interesting live release for Zappa fanatics largely because we've not heard so much from this particular lineup of Zappa, Terry Bozzio, Napoleon Murphy Brock, Roy Estrada, Andre Lewis, and Norma Jean Bell. It's a touring group that Zappa formed in late 1975, after the dissolution of the mid-1970s version of the Mothers of Invention and the Orchestral Favorites experiments, and which lasted just long enough to contribute a little to Zoot Allures before being mostly dissolved, with Zappa retaining Bozzio and then recruiting Eddie Jobson and Patrick O'Hearn as the core of his next lineup.

This missing link between the One Size All and Zoot Allures eras finds Zappa shifting to a more muscular sound with more traditional rock instrumentation (farewell, Ruth Underwood and her galaxy of percussion instruments) and making the most of that sort of setup. We get updates on old songs, and we get some new material like Black Napkins, Zoot Alures, and the Illinois Enema Bandit, the latter being one of Zappa's more misjudged lyrics (is it really funny to laugh at sexual assault?). Chunga's Revenge gets a long and pretty decent workout, at that. In the end, this might not be one of Zappa's more essential live albums, but it's worth it if you're interested in this lineup, since the closest other live release I'm aware of featuring it is FZ:OZ, and Norma Bell isn't on that (a shame, because her sax contributions here are on point).

I'd like to take the time to reminisce a little bit about Zappa, as I believe this is my final review of his music. It's been a ride! And "Dance Me This" is such a meaningful title for his final release. He finished this album in 1993, the year of his passing, and did it all pretty much on the synclavier. This is of course an archival recording, not being released until 2015. Who needs musicians when you have an electronic device that is like an electronic workstation for creating music. A digital synthesizer with a digital sampling system included.

I first heard of the synclavier when reviewing Zappa's 1984 album "The Perfect Stranger". Four of the tracks on that one were done by Frank on his synclavier, which he called "The Barking Pumpkin Digital Gratification Consort". The other three songs on it were done by a real mini orchestra with a conductor. That album was on the Classical music charts for almost a year. And hey, you could use the synclavier at home in your underwear if you wanted. In fact Frank says that album was recorded in the "The Utility Muffin Research Kitchen".

So on this final release it's all synclavier music, no musicians except for the addition of a brief guitar solo from Zappa that was overdubbed, and the use of vocals he recorded from the Tulvan Throat Singer from Siberia who happened to pay him a visit when doing a US tour. He promptly had them in the studio recording some of their vocals and using it here.

Memories? Not a lot. As far as Zappa's music goes "Hot Rats" stands alone in my opinion. I'm not sure when I first heard of Frank or his music but I do remember one Christmas my cousin Tim who would have been about 18, put on "Titties & Beer". I still remember the nervous laughter from my dad and uncles. Bold move Tim when pretty much that whole side of the family were church goers. I remember hanging out with this attractive Italian girl who played me her Zappa records.

But it would be much later in life before I would actually buy his music. I remember the business I had, and of course I played my music no matter what it was. And getting many interesting comments over the years. Not all positive believe me. This lady comes in while Zappa is playing. She turns her head, like she's listening intently to it. And comments about the incredible arrangements. "Who is this?" she asked. "Frank Zappa" I replied with a smile. I could tell by her non-reaction that she had no idea who he was.

This album is quite experimental with half of it being taken up with the "Wolf Harbour" suite which is divided into five sections. My favourite track is "Rykoniki" because it reminds me of UNIVERS ZERO. "Piano" is pretty good with that classical piano, but again it's all done on the synclavier. A good album but far short of 4 stars in my world. Check out "The Perfect Stranger" if you can. I found "Yellow Shark" to be disappointing as well.

From the now legendary drum fill that opens "Peaches in Regalia" to the last crazy notes of "The Gumbo Variations" this album is a true tour de force of the genius from Baltimore.

I think that a great merit of this album is to leave aside the uncomfortable comedy and social satire with which he filled his previous albums to launch a serious work (if you can call anything Zappa has ever done that).

And it is that this album proved once and for all that Zappa was a great composer of sera music, jazz, rock, blues and avant (in case there were any doubts about it) while in the aspect of execution he made it clear that he was a guitar virtuoso with a unique language that to this day is confused just by listening to a few notes of his glorious guitar.

An album that many mark as the best initiation into the world of Frank and all his conceptual continuity... I'm not sure about this, but I'm sure that Hot Rats is an absolute masterpiece!

There's one thing you can say for sure about Zappa: the dude was a keen early adopter when it came to new technology. At its best, this yielded groundbreaking, incredible results in the studio, as on Hot Rats; failing that, it at least made him seem prophetic from time to time, like late in life when he speculated about novel systems of music distribution, essentially considering the creation of online streaming a while before the technology was really there to implement the idea.

Then there's Jazz From Hell, an experiment in making most of an album (bar for St. Etienne, a live track) using just his trusty Synclavier. This is an electronic instrument whose sound has dated poorly, but which may have some nostalgic associations for some, especially those who love videogame soundtracks of a certan era - don't think NES-style beeps and boops, think of the sort of output you'd have got on a nice Roland soundcard from a game which really explored the possibilities of that equipment (a Sierra graphical adventure, perhaps).

Freed of the need to work with other musicians, Zappa unleashes complex material which would be difficult to achieve in real life - indeed, he thought some of this was genuinely unplayable by human hands, though eventually sufficiently talented performers proved otherwise. It's an interesting technology demo for sure, but it's not really more than that; Zappa is pushing one-man digital composition to its limits here, and whenever you push technology beyond its limits you risk creating something which ages worse because it exposes all of the limitations of the equipment you are working with.

A solid attempt, but the passage of time has seen other hands find a more nuanced and less gung-ho "all complexity all the time" approach to composing on this sort of legacy electronics yield works that have largely eclipsed Zappa's early efforts here, such as on the chiptune scene. Zappa gets credit for blazing the trail, but others have walked it with more confidence and better results.

The triple LP Shut Up N' Play Yer Guitar set proved there was an appetite for people to just listen to Frank Zappa's guitar solos shorn of context; Guitar, its sequel, proves that you can't just fill two CDs with this stuff, throw it out there, and call it a day and expect to produce something as interesting as that set was. For one thing, thanks to the triple LP format Shut Up N' Play Yer Guitar could at least be absorbed in digestible chunks; here Zappa pretty much fills two CDs of material and throws you in at the deep end.

For another, Zappa had already mined his archives fairly thoroughly to put Shut Up together in the first place; the selections on that hail from 1972 to 1980, the selections here come from 1979 to 1984. That's a tighter period of time - the start of which had already been raided for Shut Up's purposes, the latter end of which doesn't represent one of Zappa's more beloved live bands (or at least, not so beloved by me). A shorter time period means less musical variation and development over the course of the set - and by the end of the 1980s Zappa's guitar technique had matured to the point where it just didn't develop that much from year to year.

A lot of this ends up running together to my ears in a rather unmemorable fashion; the only times it really makes me sit up and pay attention is when I recognise the backing song Zappa's playing his improvisation over, or when he starts quoting someone else's material. And when the least interesting thing about a collection of improvisations is the most imporovisational and original parts, that's not a great sign.