Board 8 > The Frank Zappa Appreciation Topic! Part 10.2

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I listened to YCDTOSA Vol 2 at work the other day. Even better than I remember! Great album/show.
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Oh yeah, YCDTOSA 2 is truly one of the best Zappa albums.
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back!

it was good but not the best dweezil show i've seen. detailed thoughts coming later.
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Hey, I remembered this being an ongoing topic here and thought I'd ask: What are 10 or so essential post-Hot Rats Zappa albums? I never explored much of his work past his '60s output.
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Oh geez. In order of release...

The Grand Wazoo
Over-Nite Sensation
Apostrophe (')
Roxy & Elsewhere
One Size Fits All
Zappa in New York
Sheik Yerbouti
Joe's Garage
You Are What You Is
You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore Vol. 2: The Helsinki Concert
Make a Jazz Noise Here
Lther

That's twelve!

It's pretty much universally agreed upon that those first eight albums are essential. But after Joe's Garage, it gets more subjective, as many Zappa fans would argue that that was "his last masterpiece." You could take out two of those albums and replace them with Jazz from Hell and The Best Band You Never Heard in Your Life but these are just the albums I decided to go with.
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Nice, thanks!
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Lasa's list is excellent. I'll add that Bongo Fury, Philly '76 and You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore Vol. 6 are perfection in my eyes, as well. In fact, Bongo Fury is my favorite album outright - by anyone!
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If I had to keep it super short, I'd say the absolute essentials are Over-Nite Sensation, Apostrophe, Bongo Fury, Chunga's Revenge, and Joe's Garage.
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I wouldn't say Bongo Fury is essential at all tbqh. I like it, but from a Zappa/Captain Beefheart collaboration album, I expect more. I think both of them have made way better albums on their own.

YCDTOSA 6 is my favorite volume after 2, but beside all the excellent stuff on there, there's also a lot of filler. Like, "The Madison Panty-Sniffing Festival" and "Make a Sex Noise" aren't exactly tracks I go back to often >_>

Philly 76 is awesome but it felt weird to put any of the posthumous albums on an "essential albums" list. (Lther doesn't count as Frank did make that album before he died - he just didn't release it.)

Chunga's Revenge is a great choice and I considered putting it on the list, but it was a "kill your darlings" situation. I think the other albums I listed were just a bit more significant to the Zappa canon.
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when are we getting those detailed thoughts on the Dweezil show???

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they're comin'!

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(Overdue) Zappa News:

• New album released on 8/30: Orchestral Favorites 40th Anniversary. It's a 3 CD set.
• New album released on 10/25: Halloween 73. It's a 4 CD set. An album called Halloween 73 Highlights was also released on this date. This album contains selections from the aforementioned album.
• New album released on 12/20: The Hot Rats Sessions. It's a 6 CD set.

Meanwhile, I still haven't listened to Zappa in New York 40th Anniversary Deluxe Edition, so I'm 4 albums behind now >_>;

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Detailed thoughts on the Dweezil show:

Dont Eat the Yellow Snow Dweezil came out to this song. Surprising way to start the show. I remember from back at the Roxy & Elsewhere show they just started immediately with Penguin in Bondage so I was almost certain they would start this show with Peaches but they didnt. Ive heard a couple of bootlegs of 80 shows in which Frank started with this song so apparently Dweezil was trying to emulate that. Excellent way to start the show obviously, any serious Zappa fan knows this song and its just so feel-good. In those bootlegs, Frank went into the Nanook Rubs It vamp after this song to do the band intros, but Dweezil instead, went into
Peaches en Regalia Nothing to say about this, solid performance of this justly famous Zappa tune.
Willie the Pimp This was fucking awesome. Dweezil probably played the best solo Ive EVER heard him play in this. An epic-length, super intense solo. The approach of the rhythm section was quite different from the approach of the rhythm section in the studio version; they didnt stick as closely to the Willie vamp. Perhaps my only complaint about this was that the keyboardist/guitarist/flautist/percussionist did the vocals. His imitation of Captain Beefheart was passable but not great.
Son of Mr. Green Genes This sounded pretty much like what you would expect this to sound like. Similarly to the studio version, Dweezil played a solo interspersed with composed parts (in the studio version, I always find it difficult to tell which parts of the solo were previously composed and which were improvised, honestly). I love this tune so this was great to hear.
Little Umbrellas Nothing to say about this, just a perfectly faithful version. Really good tune.
The Gumbo Variations As expected, Scheila Gonzalez played a tenor saxophone solo, which was awesome. She did a great Ian Underwood impression, ending the solo with a bunch of Ian-ish, wild free licks. It then immediately went into a Dweezil solo, which I thought was kind of weird. Obviously, there was nobody in the band who was going to play a violin solo, but couldnt Dweezil just have one of the other band members take a solo? Anyway, Dweezils solo was great much longer than the solo Frank played, either in the original version or the remixed Rykodisc version. Again, the rhythm section kind of abandoned the Gumbo vamp during parts of the solo. We then got drum and bass breaks and the ending theme.
It Must Be a Camel Interestingly enough, before they played this tune, Dweezil made quite a big deal about how much he loved it, saying that nothing else composed in the past 50 years has sounded like it and that in 100 years, there will still be nothing that sounds like it. Hes probably right! I do love this tune so I appreciate Dweezil giving it some love. Again, it was an extremely faithful version.
Montana Before this started, Dweezil pointed out that this arrangement was the late 70s version I havent heard such a version, but to my ears it didnt sound any different than the Over-Nite Sensation Montana we all know and love. Anyway, remember how in my writeup for the last show I attended, I pointed out how Dweezil and special guest Richard Hallenbeek did a guitar duel that was sort of short and bad? Well, now it seemed like Dweezil wanted to make up for that guitar duels lameness with this solo. It was nearly as awesome as the Willie solo. Another solo that went on for ages but stayed super intense and interesting throughout. And of course, the song itself is great too.
Teen-age Wind Not much to say about this. I love this song so it was nice to hear. It seemed like at one point, they quoted one of those Mystery Rehearsal Tunes that appear on several bootlegs.
Who Needs the Peace Corps? Before this started, Dweezil pointed out that they were going to play the 1970 instrumental version. Again, I havent heard any of these versions, but it sounded cool. Dweezil played a good solo (yes, apparently this song had a guitar solo at one point!) over a complex vamp.
Im Not Satisfied Nice song choice. This is one of my favorite songs on Freak Out!
My Sharona/Thirteen Yes, the classic The Knack song. I dont come to a Dweezil show to hear this but it was enjoyable enough. In the middle of it, they played a riff from a version of Thirteen that Frank rehearsed in 79 and 80, as can be heard on several bootlegs. (According to FZShows, [a version of] the riff also appears in Tink Walks Amok, but personally I can't hear it when I listen to the track.) Afterwards, Dweezil explained that they played My Sharona because 1) Frank and his bandmates quoted it very frequently throughout the years (true enough), and 2) Frank stuck the My Sharona bassline in one of those rehearsal versions of Thirteen so Dweezil turned this concept upside down and stuck the riff from Thirteen in My Sharona. (Sidenote: Dweezil didn't explain how the whole My Sharona running gag started, but Arthur Barrow used to be in a band with Knack drummer Bruce Gary called Loose Connection and therefore started sneaking My Sharona quotes into Zappa songs [you can hear this in The Blue Light, for instance]. Another fun fact: right when Frank was at Village Recorders recording Joe's Garage, The Knack was recording My Sharona at the very same studio!)
Penis Dimension This was the arrangement of the Wazoo version with the solo section, though it also contained lyrics like the 200 Motels version. It was good. Scheila played a tenor saxophone solo in the solo section.
Bamboozled by Love This was the arrangement of the original slow version, as can be heard on Tinsel Town Rebellion. This was a lowpoint, just because there was NO solo by Dweezil or anyone else. Without the solo section, youre stuck with a rather boring blues song in my opinion (though they did do one of the verses in the fast 88 style, which was cool). At one point, they quoted a Zappa tune I couldnt identify it might have been Tink Walks Amok. Cool aspect, but it wasnt enough to redeem the whole song.
Brown Moses Awesome song choice. One of my favorite songs on Thing-Fish (not that theres many particularly great songs on that album but still >_> ) and they did a great job with it. Very nice to hear those vocal harmonies.
Im a Beautiful Guy This was the start of a string of You Are What You Is numbers (too bad they didn't play Society Pages before this). Great choice, I love this song.
Beauty Knows No Pain Another song I love but this version was kind of lacking the punch of the YAWYI version for some reason. Maybe it was because Dweezils guitar was mixed a bit low, so it didnt have that biting guitar sound Steve Vai added to the YAWYI version.
Charlies Enormous Mouth Yet another song I love (can you tell that I love YAWYI?) but this was also lacking something in comparison with

Pick Me, Im Clean Great song choice (though going into this after Any Downers? was kinda weird no Conehead?). Dweezil played a great solo, better than the solo Frank played in the Tinsel Town Rebellion version (probably not as good as the Buffalo solo, though).
Heavenly Bank Account Another lowpoint. I like the lyrics to this song bashing televangelists is nice but I don't care much for the music.
Cletus Awreetus-Awrightus Great song choice. This was a very faithful version of this Grand Wazoo classic. Scheila played a tenor saxophone solo in the solo section.
Twinkle Tits This is an unreleased tune that Frank played in concert one time only in 70, though part of it was eventually released as Another Whole Melodic Section (on Joe's Domage). Also, at one point it quotes The Little House I Used to Live in. Id never actually heard "Twinkle Tits" before, but I was unimpressed by it. (I've read that the one live performance by Frank contained a number of solos, which probably redeems the composed parts, but this version had no solos.)
Carolina Hard-Core Ecstasy Awesome song choice; this is one of my favorite Bongo Fury songs. Dweezil played another great solo.
Duprees Paradise One of those lengthy jam/anything goes tunes in the Zappa repertoire, and unfortunately, as far as versions of such tunes Ive seen Dweezil play go, this was the worst of them. They started with the 73/74 arrangement and then went into the 88 arrangement. Scheila Gonzalez played an amazing tenor saxophone solo over the beautiful Duprees Paradise vamp, just as good as Walt Fowlers trumpet solo in the Make a Jazz Noise Here version. After this, they went into a lengthy routine in which the keyboardist/flautist/guitarist/percussionist pretended he was Johnny Guitar Watson. (I remember Muffin talking about them doing a similar kind of Watson routine in Flakes in the show he saw, though they didnt do that in the show I saw from the same tour.) He did some improvised dialogue with Dweezil about, among other things, pindakaas (Dutch word for peanut butter, Secret Word of the previous two Dweezil shows Ive seen I guess its more of a running gag than a Secret Word at this point). And he sang a song in Watson style (again, his impression was adequate but not great) about the Duprees Paradise club that this number was named after, the formation of The Mothers of Invention, Roy Estrada, and some other things I dont remember. (I went to this show with a friend of mine and she claimed that he was actually singing an existing, non-Zappa song with new lyrics over the Duprees vamp, but she couldnt remember the title. That could be the case, but I didnt recognize it [maybe it was an actual song by Watson?].) Anyway, I thought the whole bit was rather boring and unfunny. When it was finally over, Dweezil ended the tune and the show. Awesome tune choice but this was quite a disappointing version of this classic, honestly. The Johnny Guitar Watson stuff was just a waste of time, and I thought it was a shame that Dweezil didnt play a wrapping it up solo at the end. Scheilas solo was awesome, though.

Encores:
Muffin Man Special guest Richard Hallenbeek came out once again during this song, and he played an awesome guitar duel with Dweezil. Not as good as their duel in Zomby Woof in the Roxy & Elsewhere show, but it more than made up for their pointless noodling in Montana in the previous show I saw.
Im the Slime The arrangement of this version was the closest to the Zappa in New York arrangement. Awesome version. Dweezil played a great and quite lengthy solo. A better solo than any Im the Slime solo Frank ever played? Probably. Also, it was cool when the audience (including me) shouted IM THE SLIME OOZING OUT FROM YOUR TV SET in the appropriate spot.
Tears Began to Fall Great choice, I love this song. When the song was done, they kept vamping on the melody of the chorus and Dweezil did the outros. Thought it was kind of weird to end the concert on this one it didnt exactly make for an arena rock ending! But I guess this is the last song on Fillmore East June 1971, so maybe thats why Dweezil made this decision.

Awesome show, but Id probably rank it third out of the four Dweezil shows Ive seen now. There were just too many songs I dont like all that much (or lackluster versions of songs I do like) to go any higher than that. Also, I missed the chick who did such a great job on Fifty-Fifty during the previous tour apparently she couldn't make it to this concert. I appreciated how much love Dweezil gave to YAWYI, though. It might as well have been called the Hot Rats/YAWYI show. And a guy I talked to after the show told me it was better than the hologram show so uh... there's that.

Also, one final thing I will note is that this was way more like a Frank show (at least the Frank shows from the early seventies on) than the previous Dweezil shows I saw, because Dweezil ran a lot of the songs together in medleys. In other words, I'm a Beautiful Guy went immediately into Beauty Knows No Pain, which immediately went into Charlie's Enormous Mouth, etc. While in the previous shows, there was a cold stop after pretty much every song. So that aspect was cool.

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Oh yeah, forgot to mention that "Twinkle Tits" was an instrumental (if it wasn't obvious from the writeup).

Also forgot to mention that at one point, Frank inserted the "Another Whole Melodic Section" portion into "The Grand Wazoo," as can be heard on Joe's Domage.

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The Lumpy Money Project/Object playlist on the official Frank Zappa YouTube channel has been put on "private" for reasons unclear to me.

Fortunately, I just bought this album!

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Great Dweezil write-up, thanks for sharing. "Brown Moses" going into "I'm a Beautiful Guy" is just beautiful sequencing.

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No prob! Glad someone found it interesting to read ^_^;

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Seeing 2000 Motels - a Zappa coverband - tonight!

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Just looked up Dweezil tour dates. He's coming to Dallas and Austin next month but NOT Houston.

Lame!!!!!

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Mr Lasastryke posted...

I remember from back at the Roxy & Elsewhere show they just started immediately with Penguin in Bondage so I was almost certain they would start this show with Peaches but they didnt.

I was just reading back my writeup for this show and this is actually not true - in fact, they started that show with "The Gumbo Variations." Going by my notes, it seems like that version proceeded exactly like the one at the Hot Rats show, starting with a Scheila tenor saxophone solo and then going straight to a Dweezil solo. Gotta admit I don't remember this at all, so I'm glad I did a writeup for posterity!

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Here are my detailed thoughts on the 2000 Motels show. I don't remember at all in which order they played these songs, so I'm just going by the order in which they first appeared on a Frank album:

Lets Make the Water Turn Black A faithful version of this Were Only in It for the Money classic.
Peaches en Regalia Always nice to hear this classic, of course. This arrangement sounded like the Peaches III version, though it lacked the extended Lets hear it for another great Italian ending. (Ive still never heard the Peaches II version, BTW, assuming it even exists)
Tell Me You Love Me They did the original Chungas Revenge version. Awesome song.
Sharleena They did the 80s version of this classic (as can be heard on Them or Us and YCDTOSA Vol. 3), but with one noticeable difference: it started off with the keyboard player playing a quite lengthy solo over the opening chords of the song. Very nice addition; it was an amazing solo. It then proceeded as normal, with the guitarist playing a great guitar solo in the proper solo section.
Magic Fingers I actually arrived late at the show so I missed the first few songs I only heard them play the end of this in the lobby -_- From what I could tell it sounded great, though! They did the original 200 Motels version (which means that I probably missed a guitar solo, dammit).
Uncle Remus Great to hear. Faithful version of this Apostrophe () classic. I think the guitarist just played Frank's solo from the original version in the solo section, rather than improvising a solo of his own, but I'm not sure.
Penguin in Bondage Good song. Note that they played the full version of the song the Roxy & Elsewhere version omits a section. Good guitar solo by the guitarist.
Village of the Sun Great song. They played the Chicago 78 version, with the solo section. The keyboard player played a great, very long solo in the solo section. The vamp during the solo wasnt as pronounced as the one in the Chicago 78 version, but the chord progression was the same. They played the last part of the song again after the solo section (from the It take the paint off your car section on) this didn't happen in the Chicago 78 version.
Carolina Hard-Core Ecstasy One of my favorite songs on Bongo Fury, as I pointed out in the writeup of the Dweezil show in this topic. The guitarists guitar solo was OK for what it was, but quite short.
Ms. Pinky Good song choice.
Flakes Great song choice and they did an awesome job at it. I thought this version was legitimately better than the one Dweezil did at the Roxy & Elsewhere show!
Broken Hearts Are for Assholes Probably the one bad song choice in the show. I dont like this one much.
City of Tiny Lites Great song. Surprisingly, Dweezil never played this one in one of the four shows by him Ive seen now, even though it was a concert favorite of Frank (I looked it up and he played it a whopping 327 times!). It was a faithful rendition of the Sheik Yerbouti version, with the guitarist playing a short guitar solo in the solo section (like Frank did in the SY version). They played a random chord to end the song, which didn't happen in the SY version.
Catholic Girls Great song choice.
Crew Slut Awesome song choice but the solo section was disappointing; all it contained was a short pedal steel guitar solo by the bass player. A far cry from the jam we know and love from the Joes Garage version.
Bamboozled by Love They played the fast 88 version of this song, though they didnt play the Owner of a Lonely Heart vamp in the solo section instead, they played a one chord vamp. The guitarists guitar solo in the solo section was rather short and lackluster, unfortunately.
Society Pages Great song choice.
I Dont Wanna Get Drafted Great song choice.

Good show. The keyboardist and the guitarist were both awesome (though the solos by the latter were hit-or-miss, as I described in my writeup, though most of them did hit). Vocally, the band was also more than competent, with three vocalists (two male and one female) doing a good job. The one weak link in this band was the dummer, though. He was fine, I guess, but he honestly wasnt any better than Jimmy Carl Black >_> This was especially evident during the solos. I think 2000 Motels could be a really great Zappa coverband with a better dummer, but for now Ill describe them as merely good.

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Just paid 18 for a secondhand LP of The Man from Utopia >_>

It's better than nothing, I guess. Now, let's hope it isn't all scratched up...

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challenge: help me think of zappa songs (instrumentals) that are innocuous enough that my fiance will allow them to be played during our wedding

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Twenty Small Cigars
Sofa No. 1

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Aww yeah Zappa in New York GET.

Took me long enough to buy the album featuring my favorite Zappa band of all time!!


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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxOirev4Nqk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugMep20elgQ

If you're wondering what to do next in these times of quarantine, I highly recommend checking out these two awesome interviews! The first features Vinnie Colaiuta and the second features Art Tripp. Both great drummers who contributed a ton to Zappa music!

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Random awesome non-zappa guitar solo time

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SFNW5F8K9Y

Prince starts around 3:30. Epic!

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Nice.

Guitar solo-wise, Prince was influenced by Hendrix and Hendrix, in turn, was influenced by Zappa, so this counts as Prince being influenced by Zappa by proxy, right? >.>

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Pretty funny how when Zoot Allures came out, it was quite a big deal how Zappa played almost all of the instruments himself and produced the album.

Prince probably saw that and was like "yo, I'm gonna play all the instruments and be the producer on my debut album."

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John Fogerty (another favorite of mine!) did a lot of that too when he went solo.

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R.I.P. Little Richard

"WOWIE ZOWIE is carefully designed to suck the 12 year old listener into our camp. I like the piano and xylophone accompaniment on the second chorus. It is cheerful. It is harmless. Wooly Bully. Little Richard says he likes it." - FZ in the Freak Out! liner notes

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRA5ai3ooHI

Interview with Steve Vai. Another great interview!

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Next in our "good non-FZ guitar solos" series, this came on the blues XM station while I was recently driving around with the fiance

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmsUkutNnI0

(solo starts at about 3:38)

She even commented that it was a great solo!

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Zappa News: A new album was released on 6/26: The Mothers 1970. It's a 4CD box set.

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