JOE'S MENAGE

You could go to two Zappa concerts in one day, and hear two very different performances (I did that a few times). that what makes every Zappa live recording special. This recording is from a tape that Zappa gave to a fan of his in Denmark, possible as repayment for an insult FZ made of the fan during an interview.

The performance itself is servicable, with no songs that haven't been released before. But a few here stand out to this Zappa freak: there is a playful version of Lonely Little Girl that sounds at first that the band is going to play Ms. Pinky, and a fantastically great rendition of Chunga's Revenge. And of course, the eyebrows in each song give the recordings their own personality.

The recording quality is very good for a master drawn from a cassette tape. And since this was a cassette, the recording is only 45 minutes long. And there is a strange fade out & back in on the last song, Zoot Allures.

I still love it.

Continuing the Joe's series ....

This is yet another album bearing Joe's [INSERT SOMETHING WITTY HERE], and it is yet another '' bad '' album. This product, like the other in the Joe's series is really not polished and feels like a bootleg of some sort. In the case of the previous albums, some tracks were only jams & rehearsals which really made them feel like collectioner's items. This album contains actual songs though, played in their entirety / lengthened in typical zappa style (see Chunga's Revenge, lasting 14 minutes here instead of 6).

The actual performance is OK, nothing really out-of-this-world. At first sight, I had noticed that I liked 4 out of the 8 songs on this CD and didn't care too much about the other 4. They are the 2 first and 2 last songs of the CD, and compromise most of the playtime, whereas the 4 middle tracks are pretty much just filler.

One of the biggest problem here as stated above previously is the quality sound. This is NOT a true live album, it's just not good enough. It's definitely not a cheap bootleg either, but it's definitely not the most pleasing.

Comparing to the previous release #83, One shot deal, there's a noticeable step down in quality. I think this release didn't have to come to because it's just not worth it. Zappa's performances changed so much throughout his career and each night was different, each song had its own flavor. This particular session brings nothing new or interesting and so I deem it as a collector's item only. 2 stars!