THE MOTHERS OF INVENTION: FREAK OUT!

Sure, this album is lacking in comparison to many of the ones that would come after it, but that by no means makes this an awful listen. With one of the first double LPs in the life of rock music, Zappa really lays on the irony and sarcasm. Although buried beneath the humor is some rather serious political commentary about the 60s. This Zappa album was one that was always hard for me to understand. Sure, FO is one of his more accessible releases, but some of the pop aspects drove me away from it, as well as several of his other earlier releases. Although the rhythm and blues layered throughout helped keep my interests enough that the problems I had with some of his early material eventually went away or clicked. I can imagine this being fairly revolutionary for 1966. Actually, half of it sounds like 50s R&B mixed with doo-wop and pop and the other half sounds far ahead of its time. "Help I'm a Rock!" is a really enjoyable track as well as my favorite probably, because even though it's fairly repetitive, it builds well and is a great improvisation.

Despite this being a historic album that began a legendary career, I honestly do not think it's a masterpiece in my eyes. It is however a very cleverly-written album, even if it isn't that complex. Some may not think that the amount of humor in this album is too great however, and I can understand why. This also isn't a Zappa album I pull out regularly, despite it being fairly good material, so because of that I'm only giving it 3 stars. This is still an album to check out if you're interested in early Zappa though.

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