YOU CAN'T DO THAT ON STAGE ANYMORE, VOL. 1

This is the first volume (duh) of Frank Zappa's ambitious six volume, twelve CD collection of live tracks from throughout his career. The goal appears to be to include songs and recording that add to the history or Frank and his sidemen.

Anyone who has been to more than one Zappa concert probably has noticed that the performance of the songs changed frequently. Frank encouraged the droup to add "eyebrows", the little changes, flourishes and improvisations that would make every show unique. And of course, we get plenty of those.

There are a few songs that hadn't been released elsewhere. Ruthie-Ruthie, Babette and Sweet Leilani all fall into this category. Although none of these are spectacular, they are nice to own. This was also the first official release of The Sofa Routine (since included on one of the "Beat The Boots" CDs). While this is the best quality recording of this funny Flo & Eddie era piece, here it is cut way short.

Another good section is a group of songs recorded in 1981 and broadcast on MTV. I have a cassette recorded from my TV (in mono), and it's amazing that this great concert has never been released in full.

The editing is amazing, it flows so well that it's easy to forget that in many of the segues from song to song, the entire band changes (except for Frank).

In my opinion, any Zappa fan should get the whole series.