Rush vs Yes vs Zappa

"On the 'Rush vs Yes vs Grateful Dead' thread"

I tend to agree with Steven Tyler that

as long as you can get him (Zappa) to stfu he's the fucking best

Unfortunately, Zappa opened his mouth quite often.

it's true but...for me the leap in quality of Zappa at his best vs. these other two at their best is gonna mean Yes & Rush finish 2nd & 3rd again. "Watermelon in Easter Hay," Burnt Weeny Sandwich in its entirety, Zappa's guitar tone generally speaking - what a thing of beauty. I find his condescension & sexism completely insufferable now (though I can't lie, in the 6th grade I thought he was the funniest guy who ever lived) but the music itself is just tremendous.

I can dig Rush and Yes just fine but I don't think either of them have a "Watermelon in Easter Hay."

Pairing the Dead and Zappa makes since in that they are both loved and loathed by many and have just huge discographys and are kind of polar opposites in one band pretty much anything goes and the other nothing goes unless Frank says so.

Zappa. He has more absolutely horrible stuff than either of the others but I think his peaks are higher too.

Lou Reed on Frank Zappa: "He's probably the single most untalented person I've heard in my life. He's a two-bit pretentious academic, and he can't play rock'n'roll, because he's a loser. And that's why he dresses up funny. He's not happy with himself and I think he's right."

he can't play rock'n'roll

When they were doing their R&B and R&B-influenced stuff, THE MOTHERS OF INVENTION were one of the best white R&B bands of the sixties

strong words from the author of "Junior Dad" xp

Dumb quote, but I love the idea of Lou and Frank indirectly snapping at each over the years.

I mean, pretty much that whole quote could be Lou talking about himself in third person.

I actually love that quote, it's one of Lou's meanest takedowns esp. considering that if you're Louis "Butch" Firbanks and you're calling somebody else out for being uncool you must really have bought into your own line hard

xp lol exactly

This is tough because I hate voting against Rush, but I have to go with Zappa on this one. He has far too many albums I love to not vote for him even though he has more than a few unbearable ones.

I feel like I have to vote for Zappa here even though I dislike a fair amount of his music and find his public persona smug & grating in a way that's difficult to separate from the music. Sorry Yes, I did consider you this time.

Also while 'chops-happy rock-as-composition project' is obv accurate in a lot of ways, I feel it's worth noting that Zappa's output has a lot of him jamming over static chords too, often in a kind of tiresome way.
Here I am slagging the act I voted for, ho-hum.

I guess I like the obvious Zappa bits like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HyTP9sP_aI

Also while 'chops-happy rock-as-composition project' is obv accurate in a lot of ways, I feel it's worth noting that Zappa's output has a lot of him jamming over static chords too, often in a kind of tiresome way.

Yep, this is another serious point against Zappa for me. So frustrating, considering how beautiful "Watermelon in Easter Hay" is.

On the other hand, The Grand Wazoo, you know?

strong words from the author of "Junior Dad" xp

― steven fucking tyler (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Sunday, August 5, 2012 10:15 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

junior dad is a beautiful song.

this watermelon song is really pretty.

Zappas come out of the sky and annoy me....

Zappa has lots of great songs, just listen to them and ignore the dross.

i find zappa's worst music so awful and plentiful that it threatens to eclipse the not inconsiderable body of wonderful shit he did along the way

given the results of the last poll, i figure he'll take it in a walk though

i got advice to just stick to the original Mothers of Invention shit and it's served me well

You need the 1974 Roxy Mothers stuff too.

My favourites are the early 70s fusion/jazz-rock records Hot Rats, The Grand Wazoo, and Waka/Jawaka. Also fond of Lumpy Gravy.

This poll is really hard! Zappa had the greatest compositional range but, as noted, is so inconsistent. I voted for Yes in the last poll on the strength of the stretch from The Yes Album through Going for the One. After that point, they're of very little interest to me though. Rush comes closest of the three to being a regular rock band. Despite some dips in the 80s and 90s, they've been pretty consistently reliable and have done some great things.

Hmmmm. Rush were the best at ripping off Zep back in the day (something I think they don't get nearly enough credit for; if you can name a better Canadian Zep wannabe band than early Rush I'd love to hear it). Yes were one of the only prog bands whose ideas about music extended beyond "let's string together a bunch of random unrelated riffs in 7/4 and then throw in a keyboard solo", and deserve credit for that alone. Zappa could not only play the hell out of a Little Richard song, he could flat-out jam (he did some pretty nice stuff with L. Shankar in the late '70s). On the other hand he never wrote anything worth humming in his entire life, which when you have something like 80 albums has to be considered some sort of demerit.

Yes were one of the only prog bands whose ideas about music extended beyond "let's string together a bunch of random unrelated riffs in 7/4 and then throw in a keyboard solo", and deserve credit for that alone.

Not fair to e.g. King Crimson or Soft Machine, to name just a couple. (Besides, Zappa himself was a prog artist.)

On the other hand he never wrote anything worth humming in his entire life,

This is so, so wrong. At least a couple dozen of the original Mothers songs including everything on Ruben and the Jets. Everything on the 1972 jazz records... "Lemme Take You to the Beach" not hummable? Pssshhhh...

Anyway, my vote is FZ, no surprise to anyone who knows me.

I'm guessing that if Frank had only wrote "Black Napkins" he might have got your vote.

This should be Rush vs. Primus vs. Zappa

heh...

Add "How Could I Be Such a Fool?" and "Blessed Relief" to that and how could I resist? (xpost)

One good key to zeroing in on how good a melodist FZ was would be checking out the records by small chamber ensembles playing his work. The Omnibus Wind Ensemble, Ensemble Ambrosius and Le Concert Impromptu all have great sets -- Embrosius play FZ on Baroque instruments, and their album is on Spotify.... http://open.spotify.com/album/40I3p7zHU7waQwZABZoiPr

My most frequently hummed FZ song is Pygmy Twylyte

re zappa: looking over his discography, i'm surprised HOW MUCH of it i used to known (and own - since sold). i kind of would like to hear some of the sounds again, especially the guitar soloing, but just the thought of the songs and the zappaism kind of puts me off.

tho strangely the whole system of nomenclature seems like an accomplishment itself.

still get a kick out of remembering to say 'central scruuutinizer' to myself every few years.

zappa just barely over yes

Heh...Zappa being accused of doing all this juvenile sexist stuff, yet it's Rush and Yes who put all the bare bums on their albumn covers!

Rush & Yes are just fine, but this is an easy decision, really.

Yeah I don't know about that "not hummable" thing. Those three early Mothers records alone should put that to rest. I'm going back through my Zappa discs and realized just how early this guy jumped off the deep end - as brilliant as "Brown Shoes" is otherwise, the song just makes me physically uncomfortable due to those lyrics. Agreed that Zappa really needed to shut up more often, therefore I think Yes is the better choice overall.

I think Zappa has a TON of great melodies, earworms if not outright hummable, from "You Can Take Your Clothes When You Dance" to "King Kong" to "Peaches en Regalia" to "Cheepnis" and beyond.

The song "Absolutely Free" is one of those real crazy earworms that gets in my head for months at a time

also "Oh No" is such a brilliant tune

kinda wondering what the hell happened to this guy in the 70's

Anyone doubting the singability of Zappa tunes needs to give a listen to The Persuasions Sing Zappa too.

1. FZ the impresario (Alice Cooper, Tom Waits, the GTO's, Jeff Simmons lol) and FZ the filmmaker (200 Motels); his own music suffers

2. Injury and enforced downtime; compositional burst with the jazz albums, "RDNZL," "Inca Roads," etc. -- on the road nearly nonstop with one of his greatest bands, playing this stuff until they knew it backwards, forwards and at any tempo

3. Endless grief with Herb Cohen and Warner Brothers

4. Retrenchment, gathering his resources to create Barking Pumpkin and the UMRK

xpost

Zappa up to and including "Hot Rats" is pretty unfuckwithable, after that up to 75-ish is pretty ok...after that it plunges pretty far and fast, at least to me.

And he wrote tons of catchy/memorable tunes.

Anyway, I love/hate Zappa but the music of his I love far outweighs the Rush I love and Yes is so dumb they aren't even a factor.

For the most part '75 is my Zappa cutoff point, too. I like the later 70s Lather stuff, and I find a few tracks on early 80s albums are worth a hearing. Then I get off the bus.

Until we do Rush vs Beatles, I'm always going to be voting Rush.

I like some Zappa, and I like some Yes. But I love most Rush.

Personally I don't get the hatred of Zappa's lyrics. The first thing you have to learn when listening to prog rock is to ignore the lyrics. Maybe it's because Zappa going off about groupies or enema bandits or whatever for ten minutes is harder to ignore than Yes lyrics, which don't make any sense on any kind of a rational level? I always had a harder time ignoring Rush's whole Ayn Rand fetish thing, and as far as revolting groupie lyrics I find myself more put off by some of the stuff Pete Sinfield wrote for King Crimson, maybe because of the attempt at cloaking the same sentiments as "art".

As to his melodies, they're highly musical, and certainly extremely singable, but they're inaccessible on a performance level to someone without musical talent. In other words they're not the kind of songs you would sing in the shower, whereas something like "Roundabout" has bits of it you could hum in the shower. Whereas with Zappa even the songs that when you listen to them sound tuneful and catchy like "Let Me Take You To the Beach" devolve into flat rhythmic exercises when I try to hear them in my head. Maybe related to the way every single version of "Willie the Pimp" I have heard that doesn't have Captain Beefheart singing sounds turgid and lumbering. I don't know, maybe I'd make an exception for something like "You're probably wondering why I'm here", but it's a very small portion of his catalogue. ("Cheepnis" I always get distracted by Tom Fowler's absolutely monster bassline.)

In terms of King Crimson and Soft Machine, I actually like both of those bands much better than I like Yes. I'm speaking mainly about the aspiration sometimes expressed of "prog" being a synthesis of rock instrumentation and classical-level songwriting. In practice this entailed Keith Emerson turning Ginastera into a bunch of squiggly synth noises punctuated by a drum solo. It's a tremendously enjoyable listen, but it's difficult to say it does Ginastera's original work total justice. I can only think of two examples of prog bands who made some serviceable attempt at classical-style thematic development in a rock context- Yes circa "Close to the Edge", and Egg's "Enneagram". That said I'd much rather listen to "Starless" than "Close to the Edge" pretty much any day of the year.

Has anyone here actually heard the piece that "Toccata" was supposed to be an interpretation of? I always wondered what it was like.

I get what you mean w/r/t Zappa's lyrics, but the difference is that Yes never really forced you to pay attention to them the way Zappa does. I agree that in his better moments the lyrics are easy to ignore, but so much of Zappa's catalogue is stuff like "Bobby Brown Goes Down" or "Sy Borg" or "He's So Gay" where the lyrics are clearly the focal point.

And there's almost nothing to pay attention to otherwise. I meant to add that.

Oh man, "Sy Borg." Joe's Garage is really where I decamp the Zappa train. I would assume Ike Willis was okay with those lyrics, or at least okay with the paycheck he was getting, but jeez...

man when I was 12 years old Joe's Garage was so goddamn clever & great & such a big fuck-you to all the squares who're fucking up the world. that is the problem with Zappa's lyrics: they're the kind of stuff that, if you are a 12-year-old reject, seems really profound to you. there is nothing wrong with being an angry kid and being a condescending angry kid is a common, understandable defense mechanism. it is however generally speaking a bad look as a lyricist. Peart does a similar thing, but less often, and plus who the fuck know what that piercing Lee wail is saying half the time? most people learn their lesson with a Rush lyric sheet early on and just tune out the lecturing

It's interesting to watch Zappa's lyrics get uglier and more misanthropic as he got older and suffered real and imagined setbacks and slights.

yeah - like here's Zappa ad-libbing and coming off a little racist in Japan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yWy0iWeltA

like, goddamn, just play some music already dude

man when I was 12 years old Joe's Garage was so goddamn clever & great & such a big fuck-you to all the squares who're fucking up the world. that is the problem with Zappa's lyrics: they're the kind of stuff that, if you are a 12-year-old reject, seems really profound to you. there is nothing wrong with being an angry kid and being a condescending angry kid is a common, understandable defense mechanism. it is however generally speaking a bad look as a lyricist. Peart does a similar thing, but less often, and plus who the fuck know what that piercing Lee wail is saying half the time? most people learn their lesson with a Rush lyric sheet early on and just tune out the lecturing

― steven fucking tyler (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Wednesday, August 8, 2012 6:21 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i mean other than they are both aimed at the adolescent mind, i honestly don't see that much shared by peart and zappa, i mean peart is like ULTRA sincere like ultra ultra and really - despite whatever ayn rand crap -- doesn't have a mean worldview at all IMO...peart also isn't sarcastic at all.

jesus this zappa clip, three minutes of bullshit just to hear some turgid BBQ blues crap

naw, there's a real affinity in their ~philosophies~ - I mean they're both libertarians & that shit informs their stuff. Zappa's a snide annoying dude and Peart generally comes off dreamier but you get the impression both of them think they're a loooooot smarter than the people they're singing to

i dunno i read his book and obv what he's gone through with his losses in his life i really think you seem to want to assume the worst about peart anyway:

This is somewhat random, but you were interested in the writings of Ayn Rand decades ago. Do her words still speak to you?

Oh, no. That was 40 years ago. But it was important to me at the time in a transition of finding myself and having faith that what I believed was worthwhile. I had come up with that moral attitude about music, and then in my late teens I moved to England to seek fame and fortune and all that, and I was kind of stunned by the cynicism and the factory-like atmosphere of the music world over there, and it shook me. I'm thinking, "Am I wrong? Am I stupid and naïve? This is the way that everybody does everything and, had I better get with the program?"

For me, it was an affirmation that it's all right to totally believe in something and live for it and not compromise. It was a simple as that. On that 2112 album, again, I was in my early twenties. I was a kid. Now I call myself a bleeding heart libertarian. Because I do believe in the principles of Libertarianism as an ideal – because I'm an idealist. Paul Theroux's definition of a cynic is a disappointed idealist. So as you go through past your twenties, your idealism is going to be disappointed many many times. And so, I've brought my view and also – I've just realized this – Libertarianism as I understood it was very good and pure and we're all going to be successful and generous to the less fortunate and it was, to me, not dark or cynical. But then I soon saw, of course, the way that it gets twisted by the flaws of humanity. And that's when I evolve now into . . . a bleeding heart Libertarian. That'll do.

Yeah, "Enema Bandit" is one of his worst. Embarrassing just to type the title. 76-80 were such sour years. I imagine every target in his songs had a little Warner Bros. logo for a face. Gays, Jews, any sucker stupid enough to be in love, anybody who dared to have sex... a little date rape tossed around just for lolz. I have to compartmentalize like hell to be such a full-on fan of FZ the composer.

xxp

that is sweet - I did read something abt Peart in recent years that made him seem like a nice enuf dude. I'm just talking about his lyrics, I'm sorry man I will never not be laffing about a song actually leading off with "living on a lighted stage approaches the unreal." but it is nicer at heart than, say, "the illinois enema bandit," which is just hateful

what's really annoying to me is like once I aged out of Zappa, like with most of the stuff I aged out of, I never revisited it until recently. but nowadays I'm listening to the Mothers and loving it, just feel like it's the best most interesting music, and I've become a guy who really likes to hear guitarists stretching out and playing, preferably with really good bands who're doing interesting stuff, and that's Zappa all day, except the second he opens his mouth it's just so awful. "white port and lemon juice" seems ok but I wouldn't be at all surprised if on further inspection it, too, turned out to be some bullshit. upper mississippi otm really, I may find Peart laughable but he's not a dick.

That's a cover of an old doo-wop song by the Four Deuces -- here's the original if you got the Spotify: http://open.spotify.com/track/2DNocU0e1N93twRVwRtBlD

how is "The Illinois Enema Bandit" racist? (not saying it isn't awful in a thousand other ways, but am I not hearing the lyrics correct here?)

not the song, Zappa's intro to the Japanese audience

Yeah, "Enema Bandit" is one of his worst. Embarrassing just to type the title. 76-80 were such sour years. I imagine every target in his songs had a little Warner Bros. logo for a face. Gays, Jews, any sucker stupid enough to be in love, anybody who dared to have sex... a little date rape tossed around just for lolz. I have to compartmentalize like hell to be such a full-on fan of FZ the composer.

― Your sweet bippy is going to hell (WmC), Wednesday, August 8, 2012 4:44 PM (2 hours ago)

i want to say that i dislike zappa's embittered sarcasm, but i'm not sure why i should find it so off-putting when i often enjoy something quite similar in scuzzball punk rockers like mark arm and tom hazelmeyer. perhaps it's the abrasive wackiness of zappa's presentation, running wokka-wokka laps around ween at their worst. perhaps it's that the legitimate pleasures his music offers - compositional and rhythmic complexity, hyperathletic musical brotherhood, and head-spinning textural shifts - don't interest me much.

meanwhile, he has no time for the things i enjoy most. pop melodicism, rock as cathartic release, and direct emotional evocation might help wash the bitterness down, but zappa isn't willing to play those games. he'll stoop to dumb jokes, but rarely to the indulgence of joys too easily had. funny thing is that when i take the time to listen to his early albums, i often do enjoy them (or at least marvel at their prodigiousness), and his live band was amazing well into the 70s, but he ultimately leaves me cold. "tryin' to grow a chin" is pretty badass though. "one more time for the world..."

Contendo otm. Rush is awesome, Yes is awesome. Zappa comes on the stereo and it's time to leave that party.

I can't actually imagine a poll in which I'd vote for Zappa, save "Zappa vs. death by stoning"

"Duke of Prunes" yo

Also, even if you hate Zappa's music, check out the albums he put out:

STS 1051 - Alice Cooper - Pretties for You (1969)
STS 1052 - Judy Henske and Jerry Yester - Farewell Aldebaran (1969)
2-STS 1053 - Captain Beefheart And His Magic Band - Trout Mask Replica (1969)
STS 1054 - Lord Buckley A Most Immaculately Hip Aristocrat (1969)
STS 1056 - Jeff Simmons And Randy Steirling Naked Angels (1969)
STS 1057 - Jeff Simmons Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up (1969)
STS 1058 - Tim Dawe Penrod (1969)
STS 1059 - GTO's Permanent Damage (1969)
STS 1060 - Tim Buckley Blue Afternoon (1969)
STS 1061 - Alice Cooper Easy Action (1969)
STS 1062 - Persuasions Acappella (1970)
STS 1063 - Captain Beefheart And His Magic Band Lick My Decals Off, Baby (1970)
STS 1064 - Tim Buckley Starsailor (1971)
STS 1065 - Alice Cooper Love It to Death (1971)

That "Enema Bandit" clip sums up most of the aspects of Zappa that I hate: a smug, tedious monologue; lame, juvenile humour; a go-nowhere noodly solo.

I get what you mean w/r/t Zappa's lyrics, but the difference is that Yes never really forced you to pay attention to them the way Zappa does. I agree that in his better moments the lyrics are easy to ignore, but so much of Zappa's catalogue is stuff like "Bobby Brown Goes Down" or "Sy Borg" or "He's So Gay" where the lyrics are clearly the focal point.

This + it's not only that Zappa's lyrics can be genuinely unpleasant but they're so obviously trying really hard to be funny and so often fall so wide of the mark for me, at least. Like, did this shit actually seem clever in the 70s?

Peart's interest in Rand has been discussed pretty thoroughly between this thread, the Rush vs Yes vs Dead thread, and the C/D thread. He was into Rand in a fairly naive way. What are emphasized in the lyrics are atheism, independent thought, and creative freedom. Especially with his earnestness, this can seem adolescent but their lyrics are clearly not right-wing political screeds. In fact, they've demanded that right-wing talk radio NOT use their music.

xpost I voted for Yes in the end: they have a significant string of albums I consider great; at their worst, they're boring or saccharine, not outright idiotic or obnoxious.

Also, it looked like Zappa was going to run away with this.

And there's almost nothing to pay attention to otherwise. I meant to add that.

Yeah, OTM with some of those late 70s Zappa tunes. With e.g. Yes lyrics, it's pretty clear that the words are just something for Anderson to hang a melody on. Not the case with something like "Bobby Brown" where the melody is so basic.

Nah Zappa the guy and Zappa the label man is totally OK by me.

Zappa the purveyor of dick jokes in 15/8 is not OK. Zappa the author of "stick it, stick it, stick it, stick it in her poop shoot" is also not OK, catchy though it is. Zappa the composer, who has zero interest in developing any ideas beyond its expository phase: not OK. "We will have 30 seconds of ragtime followed by 45 seconds of free jazz followed by another Suzy Creemcheeze thing." You know, Uncle Meat Zappa, Hot Rats Zappa. Fuck that Zappa. Draconian rehearsal nightmare Zappa is not OK. "I will write something physically impossible for anybody to sing, get Tina to sing it all night until she gets it, while I deliver a first-take half-written thing about dental floss."

Also I don't like that every time somebody starts talking about Zappa at a party, somebody goes "what? you haven't heard {album}?" and loads it up on the Youtube. After about 30 seconds every girl in the room is making that "...awkward!" glace at each other.

I do confess that I like several instrumental tracks, I like "Freak Out" enough to listen to it once a year. I liked "Apostrophe" when I was 10 and thought I was too cool for Weird Al and "Humpty Dance" wouldn't come out 'til the following year. I love Zappa the dude and like that he was drug-free and sober and ambitious, I've spent a lot of time with his music and it is categorically not my thing and I'm a little sad to think there are people out there who'd favour him over Yes, who are often awesome, and Rush, who are always awesome.

it must be said, the lyric is 'ram it, ram it, ram it…', not 'stick it, stick it, stick it…'. maybe he writes good lyrics after all - they can stick!

also what first won my post-adolescent heart over to zappa was the song about raising up the dental floss.

Zappa the composer, who has zero interest in developing any ideas beyond its expository phase: not OK. "We will have 30 seconds of ragtime followed by 45 seconds of free jazz followed by another Suzy Creemcheeze thing." You know, Uncle Meat Zappa, Hot Rats Zappa.

I haven't listened to them in a while, but is there not a fair amount of thematic development in "Uncle Meat," "Dog Breath," maybe "Son of Mr. Green Genes?"

Zappa no hesitation no question.

Also I don't like that every time somebody starts talking about Zappa at a party, somebody goes "what? you haven't heard {album}?" and loads it up on the Youtube.

I was going to be all "lol what parties do you go to??", then I remembered being in composition school. (One of the biggest Zappa fans was a woman, though, actually!)

Zappa the composer, who has zero interest in developing any ideas beyond its expository phase: not OK. "We will have 30 seconds of ragtime followed by 45 seconds of free jazz followed by another Suzy Creemcheeze thing." You know, Uncle Meat Zappa, Hot Rats Zappa.

Zappa certainly has music that fits this description but I don't think that Hot Rats does.

I can only think of two examples of prog bands who made some serviceable attempt at classical-style thematic development in a rock context- Yes circa "Close to the Edge", and Egg's "Enneagram".

This was actually what I was trying to get at in the other thread re the originality/sophistication of "Close to the Edge", especially for its time.

The "oh you just haven't heard THIS Zappa album" conversation happens now, happened last week, happens while travelling and meeting strangers, staying with acquaintances etc. The "collage + creamcheeze" quote was obv directed toward Uncle Meat, but Hot Rats too is all exposition, no development. I mean, I don't want to have the "is Zappa's music worthwhile from an academic perspective" i.e. is there development here? It's classist and weird to have that discussion-- and I'm not accusing anybody of *going there* but myself. The reason I brought it up, the lack of development in Hot Rats and Uncle Meat specifically, is b/c those are the two albums that are always being brought up of "proof of genius" when people start complaining about his misogyny and general unfunniness in his songs proper. People always try to have it two or three ways with Zappa. Oh, you don't like the rock music of "Freak Out" (I do!) What about his jazz fusion? Or his orchestral stuff? Or his novelty songs? Like "Valley Girl"? Or his film work? And so on. Oh wait! His live albums? His Synclavier stuff? Did you hear the Boulez concert? Have you heard "Shut up and play your guitar"? The man wrote quickly and inelegantly and never fleshed anything out beyond its brainstorming phase and I think it's interesting that the same people who'll stan forever for Zappa on ILM will dismiss other fastidious white-person music like Dirty Projectors, but yeah, I've spent too many words shitting on Zappa on a thread that's so obviously pro-Zappa. I hope everybody has listened to "Clockwork Angels" it is the best.

ugh Owen it is not "classist" to talk about music from whatever perspective one likes, cut that out plz.

tbf, aero, the only person I accused of being classist was myself. When I think of Zappa as being part of the rock canon, I place him right next to Todd Rundgren, basically, a guy who made a handful of smart rock records before turning into something that is not for me. "Uncle Meat" and "A Wizard, A True Star" respectively, basically.

For me to mention, in passing, that Zappa opted out of developing his material compositionally, is both a reference to the fact that Zappa is highly rated in academic circles, at least, he was when I was in school; mostly the joke-rock of Apostrophe, the jazz fusion of Hot Rats, the collage music of Uncle Meat. I don't actually listen to music with only an ear for "development".

Yeah im voting Zappa here but not in a million years would i put him on at a party. Or really even bring him up in general to strangers.

xp Anyway, you don't think it's classist for a classical music guy to dance ironically to house music and then sniff dismissively about its reliance upon "a steady pulse" and "lack of development" on the walk home? I do. And I don't want to be that guy...

Ha ha, Adam, here I am complaining about Zappa evangelizers but I put on "Duke of Prunes" and it's nice.

Man, I love so many individual players that crossed paths with Zappa but I pretty much hate any time they're all playing together, with him. I guess I appreciate the first Mothers album, or something like "Hot Rats," but so much of the satire is facile and smug and the playing formally impressive but also kind of stiff and lame. Dude sure did like to vamp, too (which is where his influence manifests itself in bands like Phish).

I find Rush's arrangements to be consistently impeccable and downright scary in the amount of stuff they logically stick into a five minute songs. If I didn't love the band already I would vote for them on the basis of economy alone.

And I do this every Rush thread, but what the fuck with bringing up Ayn Rand again? It was just a little window of Peart's lyrics almost 40 years ago (when, for that matter, and as others have pointed out, Rand hadn't totally been discredited/vilified yet). That'd be like ripping on, I don't know, '00s Bowie for his druggy excess and wan flirtation with soul music. Move on.

I've never met any actual hardcore Zappa fans in real life - I'd seen the Onion thing and read anti-Zappa pieces in various places before I'd ever even heard his music so I guess I knew they were A Thing. Anyway I voted for him because he's got more great songs than Yes and Rush combined but he's still the most problematic artist of the three. I mean I like Freak Out! a lot but even the early Mothers can irritate me, just for the way nearly every nice or interesting melodic/harmonic part has to be interrupted by a wacky voice or annoying noise of some description. I love Hot Rats unconditionally and think 'Watermelon in Easter Hay' is beautiful, generally I wish there was more of that and less "Oh no, I've written a pop song, people might think I'm a sellout if I don't put an out-of-tune kazoo on it".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXSSr0cct-k

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVYYuJhdBwU&feature=relmfu

Ugh. But first comment: "Best cut of Stairway to Heaven bar none. Led Zeppelin: you came up with the idea. FZ perfected it."

Different strokes ...

Anyway, you don't think it's classist for a classical music guy to dance ironically to house music and then sniff dismissively about its reliance upon "a steady pulse" and "lack of development" on the walk home? I do. And I don't want to be that guy...

well, I don't believe in ironic dancing, to start with: I have a long and boring rant about that, but the short of it is, if you're dancing, you're dancing, no matter what insecurities cause you to try to cloak your dancing in a field of plausible deniability. I also think that talking about lack of development in any music...is fine! if one's take is "there must be development," then I disagree, but I don't think it's classist to talk about it. finally I think it's more than possible to groove to something and later go "ok, I grooved to that but I have opinions about it please let me share them on this walk home."

Yeah, Owen, "Duke of Prunes" is WONDERFUL. Reminds me a good bit of Eric Satie.

I'm hinting at a larger problem, though, aero, without trying to bring up a day job.

Again, I really don't think that description of collage music applies to Uncle Meat. I know there are a fair number of short tracks but there are also "The Uncle Meat Variations" and "Dog Breath Variations." Which tracks on there might have been developed more?

OK, here goes, I got ten minutes. The tendency of classical musicians, in either the practical performative field or the academic field, to be sniffy and dismissive of pop concerns is a real thing. I know that pop guys suspect that it happens and it does. I'm talking about orchestral performers shrugging and playing dumb while accompanying Antony. I'm talking about classical music critics debating whether or not Jonny Greenwood can be called a composer. I'm talking about the dying branch of ethnomusicological thought that parses world music for its appeal to Western sensitivities, ugh ugh ugh.

And then there's pop music's counter attack. That classical musicians are somehow slumming it, i.e. inauthentic. "Oh she's classically trained? Like I give a shit." When I work as an arranger and I'm dealing constantly with whether or not it sounds like I just put a powdered wig on a punk band, I do not want another "Baby I love you". I say it's a class issue and it isn't, it is an aesthetic issue, but it's the aesthetics of class issues. You feel me?

So yeah, some people here i.e. Sund4r know I went to a composition school, I've been prone to didactic bullshit conversations on ILM about "horizontal composition vs. vertical composition" and have been roundly chastised for it. So when I say, "Lots of people in the academic world like Zappa. Here is my criticism of the albums they love. I apologize if my assessment could be construed as classist," I hope you understand where I'm coming from.

"Oh no, I've written a pop song, people might think I'm a sellout if I don't put an out-of-tune kazoo on it".

This is what really bothers me about Zappa, there's only so many tunes like "Oh No" or "Peaches en Regalia" that are just completely pitch perfect, meanwhile there's so much stuff like "Dog Breath" where it's like, it could totally be a brilliant and perfect thing but Zappa's so intent on letting you know THIS IS A JOKE that he adds a bunch of high pitched screaming and altered vocals and offbeat instrumentation. Freak Out! had a lot of songs that were done semi-straight but clearly weren't, you know? I mean yeah that had kazoos but I have the feeling that if 70's Zappa decided to re-record something like "I Ain't Got No Heart" he would add screaming and a 10-second sound collage and burping noises and completely ruin it. And who knows what he'd do to the lyrics!!

it must be said, the lyric is 'ram it, ram it, ram it…', not 'stick it, stick it, stick it…'. maybe he writes good lyrics after all - they can stick!

Shiek Yerbouti was my first Zappa album and I admit this part made me crack up quite a bit, because, y'know, who does that? Now I appreciate that line because it's one of the few times where Zappa manages to be tasteless and gross in so few words.

"Dog Breath" is one of those Zappa songs ("Duke Of Prunes" is another) with ridiculous lyrics atop a beautiful melody line, but "altered vocals and offbeat instrumentation" is so much part and parcel of his M.O. in this era that I love it regardless. The Residents fall in this camp for me too.

btw, a friend sent me this bass cover of "Peaches..." on facebook recently, it's pretty nifty:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLB4XdkgNCI

"altered vocals and offbeat instrumentation" is so much part and parcel of his M.O. in this era that I love it regardless. The Residents fall in this camp for me too.

in some cases, I can see it, but for me, "Duke" and "Dog Breath" are really different things, maybe because the vocal on "Duke" is actually funny? I mean just the tendency for him to wrap his best stuff in six layers of irony makes his catalogue such a frustrating listen. I mean albums like Shiek Yerbouti contain so much brilliant stuff that it's kind of a shame that my reaction to it is always "shut up SHUT UP shut up SHUT UP!!"

That "Peaches..." cover is quite nifty.

That's a good cover, thanks! xp

For the "Duke of Prunes" fans who haven't heard its original incarnation, here are the two pieces from Run Home Slow on Mystery Disc 1. "Duke" starts at 1:24.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sviQhh5NgRs

I find Rush's arrangements to be consistently impeccable and downright scary in the amount of stuff they logically stick into a five minute songs. If I didn't love the band already I would vote for them on the basis of economy alone.

And I do this every Rush thread, but what the fuck with bringing up Ayn Rand again?

free markets are efficient markets, it's only logical

relevant Spotify Playlist

Zappa as Composer (basically zappa's stuff isn't on Spotify so this is various ensembles doing his works, pretty cool stuff)

http://open.spotify.com/user/ulyssestone/playlist/5TbtE6C4mnpoMQGI7BvP9m

Quite a few full-length Zappa bootlegs are on youtube since I last checked. 1973 Arlington TX, with Jean-Luc Ponty, is really good so far.

dying branch of ethnomusicological thought that parses world music for its appeal to Western sensitivities

I'm not sure that this is not entirely a strawman, by the way. I don't know as that this accusation applies to any of the normally considered pioneers of the field - Nettl, Hood, Charles Seeger, or others.

I'm not j'accuse-ing ethnomusicology as a whole and certainly not the people you mentioned! I can think of two specific examples off the top of my head (a composer who brings Greek traditional music to the concert hall by removing all context of its original presentation and scores it for orchestra; a transcription of Mongolian throat singing into Western notation) but, like the other instances I mentioned, they are not indicative of any community as a whole, and for every example of classical snobbery there are ten examples where it is not the case. Not looking for a strawman, just trying to explain the root of my frustration with Zappa's tacit acceptance into the classical canon over, say, hundreds of other more worthy pure pop/world/electronic musicians who've never learned to write score.

"Dog Breath" is one of those Zappa songs ("Duke Of Prunes" is another) with ridiculous lyrics atop a beautiful melody line, but "altered vocals and offbeat instrumentation" is so much part and parcel of his M.O. in this era that I love it regardless. The Residents fall in this camp for me too.

I think I find The Residents more palatable in that respect because they go full-on weird - similarly I actually really enjoy Lumpy Gravy for what it is. One moment that particularly bugs me occurs in 'Camarillo Brillo' - which is an excellent pop-rock song, even taking into account the lyrics - but just that one bit where he sings "She was breeding a DWARF" completely sets my teeth on edge.

Yeah I mean basically we're talking the difference between The Room and Snakes on a Plane here (Zappa is Snakes on a Plane, if you didn't get that)

Haha yeah, the inflection on that dwarf line (I always think of it as Frank's top 40 AM radio dj voice, or game show host.) I used to love it and imitate it as an adolescent; now, not so much. (xpost)

If by the Residents you mean the Shaggs. I have different problems with the Residents. Okay, this analogy is falling apart.

The simple explanation for all this is that Frank hated pretty much everyone who wasn't himself. I mean that may not be true but it explains so much, including why he maybe didn't think his audience was worthy of the "real" Frank?

Records like Hot Rats and Burnt Weeny Sandwich are also really appealing because they're such lush analog recordings. Sound great on vinyl. (Never had Uncle Meat on vinyl.)

Also quite like some of the cover art from that period.

so zappa's gonna take this one, right? tons of knowledgeable fans itt, and a zappa win would square with the results in the previous poll. ILM = people who like the greatful dead, phish and frank zappa. who knew?

grateful?

yeah that

Zappa just has such a vast (if erratic) catalog. From hearing We're Only In it... as an impressionable kid, to checking Uncle Meat out of my local library, to attending rep theater showings of 200 Motels, he's a huge part of my upbringing. Even though I don't listen to him often anymore, these occasional Zappa threads prompt me to scour youtube for stuff I haven't heard, and I generally end up entertained. Search Petit Wazoo shows, and I liked that Texas '73 show I listened to today a lot; lots of jazz, few vocals, little smarm.

also relevant:

http://www.musicdirect.com/p-96346-mothers-of-invention-frank-zappa-the-original-mothers-of-invention-lmtd-ed-import-lp.aspx

I hope everybody has listened to "Clockwork Angels" it is the best.

Gave it another good listen after I saw your post. I wondered if maybe I should have voted for Rush.

It's interesting to compare something like "YYZ" to some of the things on Hot Rats. I could see a case for it being the tighter composition.

my frustration with Zappa's tacit acceptance into the classical canon over, say, hundreds of other more worthy pure pop/world/electronic musicians who've never learned to write score.

But isn't the point that he did write scores? When e.g. SUNY Buffalo offers 'master composer' classes on Zappa (alongside Ives or Ligeti), they're not necessarily saying that he's better than Hendrix or ODB or an Inuit vocal game (or Yes, for that matter). They're saying that he was a composer in the same way that Stravinsky or Ligeti were composers: he wrote and orchestrated music on paper using the language of Western notation. As such, it makes sense to include him in that category (and then evaluate whether or not he was a 'master').

(That said, Richard D James and Tom Jenkinson were also considered contemporary composers by people in my grad programme. I originally included James in my list of composers to study closely for my comps but I ended up dropping him.)

^^^ This is otm. He was a composer first and foremost, and deliberately worked in the rock milieu and arranged for rock band because the wages there weren't starvation-level. xpost

I will never not be laffing about a song actually leading off with "living on a lighted stage approaches the unreal."

Afaict, you're way more of a lyrics-oriented listener than I am so I'm interested in hearing your side of this. I can totally see why the lyrics to "Limelight" aren't great poetry. They're slightly clumsy but I don't think they're that much worse than e.g. Bono or Sting lyrics in this regard. Importantly, though, I think they actually still deal with their subject in an intelligent and thoughtful way, at least compared to most rock songs about being a rock star: "Cast in this unlikely role/Ill-equipped to act/With insufficient tact/One must put up barriers/to keep oneself intact" is actually pretty self-aware despite the weak "tact/intact" rhyme imo, neither sentimental (like "Wanted Dead or Alive") nor bombastic (like The Wall). That's a quality I also appreciate in some of Ian Curtis's lyrics, which could also get clumsy at times.

Also worth noting that "Limelight" lyrics preceded Rush's mainstream crossover.

get on with the fascination imo

have a soft spot for all of these guys

-first time i tried mushrooms was the first time i heard the Mothers (and VU)
-three of us would drive around in high school listening to music and one guy was a big Rush/Yes fan (I was a new wave guy and the other friend was a Dylan freak) so I heard Bytor and the Snow Dog and laughed and laughed at the title. we would share the tape deck so no one was subjected to one band for long. i eventually started liking everything that was played. i like Rush and Yes about evenly, but Working Man really rocked in a Trans Am environment

when i was in fifth grade i went via bus to georgia for a nerd olympics-type thing. wedged between the seats i found a homemade c60 cassette tape that someone had written the stylized R U S H on.

it was taped off some late night radio show doing deep cuts -- the first song was the trees and the second was working man. <3

lol i taped PAT BENETAR off the King Biscuit Flower Hour. like literally stuck a tiny microphone in front of the stereo speaker. god i loved her

that cassette is probably still somewhere in my dad's house, but i no longer have anything to play it on

Nerd Olympics? Are you saying Odyssey of the Mind?

Brownie were we accidentally separated at birth? R U MY TWIN!?

around the same time my dad's colleague made me a mix of fz -- mostly apostrophe/overnight sensation/live stuff iirc. i recall liking 'the torture never stops' but man the vamping did go on

later on in high school i was visiting a college in ny state and couldn't sleep so i put on my walkman and whatever station was there played 'and you and i' and that was pretty sweet

xxp it was called academic games

we are twins viceroy

i never knew, and still don't, whether FZ was serious or what. i read his autobiography and loved it but i was a serious guy back then when it came to pop music and i guess i just don't know

When e.g. SUNY Buffalo offers 'master composer' classes on Zappa (alongside Ives or Ligeti), they're not necessarily saying that he's better than Hendrix or ODB or an Inuit vocal game (or Yes, for that matter). They're saying that he was a composer in the same way that Stravinsky or Ligeti were composers: he wrote and orchestrated music on paper using the language of Western notation. As such, it makes sense to include him in that category (and then evaluate whether or not he was a 'master').

Sure, sure, but what about all the other more talented composers that weren't taught? I mean, this is partly "smh at my school" but no course on Weill, Gershwin, Moondog, Beefheart, Parks, Faust, Bacharach, Scott Walker, Hazelwood, christ, I think more could be learned from Barry Manilow than Zappa as a score composer, and I'm staying pop, like film composers... essentially it's a taste issue here, I guess, b/c I think score composers could learn a fuck of a lot from Nelson Riddle, while meanwhile, you could substitute an entire course on Zappa with a lecture on the theme from "The Simpsons"

hate all these bands, but Yes has a couple songs I find mildly entertaining and their members were in other things that I like a lot (Tomorrow, Plastic Ono Band) so uh them I guess

xp

well, it's partly that by making room for zappa, the academy bows to boomer tastes, right? rock, funk & soul, pop music, rebellious iconoclasm, freaky subversion, etc. the others you mentioned wouldn't accomplish that so well, with the exception of beefheart.

I'd question how much Zappa is taught in undergrad music history or composition classes, honestly.

also zappa brought freedom to czechoslovakia iirc

(or theory classes)

xp

There's a lot not to like about Zappa, but in practice it doesn't bother me because I just don't pay any attention to it and only listen to the good stuff (original mothers + lumpy gravy & hot rats).

But wow, Owen's specific dislikes of Zappa couldn't be more diametrically opposed to mine.

Nah Zappa the guy and Zappa the label man is totally OK by me.

That's interesting because as much as I like his early music I think it would be pretty hard to deny that the guy was a huge asshole. And "zappa the guy" is mostly what people object to re: his dumb sense of humor, lyrics, etc.

You know, Uncle Meat Zappa, Hot Rats Zappa. Fuck that Zappa.

wtf, those are two of his best albums

I love Zappa the dude and like that he was drug-free and sober and ambitious,

that's the most insufferable thing about zappa! thankfully he surrounded himself with other musicians that weren't like that.

I've spent a lot of time with his music and it is categorically not my thing and I'm a little sad to think there are people out there who'd favour him over Yes, who are often awesome, and Rush, who are always awesome.

lol, so backwards. Zappa made a decent chunk of great music before '70. Yes had brief moments of brilliance but man, talk about lack of development! I rarely feel like sitting through an entire Yes album to hear those few cool parts. I guess my brain is more suited to Zappa's ADD approach. and LOL @ Rush.

When I think of Zappa as being part of the rock canon, I place him right next to Todd Rundgren, basically, a guy who made a handful of smart rock records before turning into something that is not for me. "Uncle Meat" and "A Wizard, A True Star" respectively, basically.

So basically you don't like anything that's awesome?

xp to contendo: That is a hugely interesting point and I never thought of that. I guess he is the best example of "whoa! the 60s!"

@ timellison As I said, I can only reference my mercifully short academic career.

@ wk Cool, we're different people!

I'd question how much Zappa is taught in undergrad music history or composition classes, honestly.

― timellison, Thursday, August 9, 2012 6:23 PM (19 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

CSCL 2032: Dude You Just Haven't Heard The Right Albums: Navigating Zappa

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YIjte73IPg

I've heard of this stereotype of "Zappa fans", but I never experienced that vibe where I went to school. Where I went to school it was Dream Theater fans. Course that might be down to engineering major vs. musicology major culture.

So like maybe the stereotype breakdown goes like this:
Rush fans = dudes who thought they were smart but weren't, really
Zappa fans = dudes who thought they were smart, and were, but were still insufferable condescending assholes
Yes fans = spaced out hippies with a fondness for bass solos

If we're going by these stereotypes, I gotta go with #3, as long as they don't try and sell me any crystals. Or candles shaped like crystals. That said I haven't known a whole lot of meathead Rush fans, or condescending Zappa fans, or well really any Yes fans.

rush is different though because there are casual rush fans that just like tom sawyer, limelight, and some scattered radio staples. i'm not sure there are casual yes fans outside of ppl that like owner of a lonely heart as an 80s single.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5agCr45Ev4&feature=related

On the "Dude you just haven't heard" tip, there's some great stuff on Lumpy Money like the original 22 minute long edit of Lumpy Gravy with no talking, another assembly of similar stuff called "How Did That Get In Here" and instrumental versions of some of the WOIIFTM songs at their original tempos which were kind of a revelation to me. All essential listening for nerds who like '60s Hollywood recording studio behind-the-scenes geekery and instrumentals of Wrecking Crew tracks.

Yeah, with respect, Ówen, I'm just not sure that Zappa has the pride of place in music academia that you're claiming, especially over some of the other composers you mention. We can agree that the Norton Anthology of Western Music is about as 'canon' as it gets? These are the contents of its volume on the 20th century: http://books.wwnorton.com/books/detail-contents.aspx?ID=13437

Note the presence of Joplin, Gershwin, Bessie Smith, King Oliver/Louis Armstrong, Ellington (also on my list of composers for my comps - as was Ornette btw), W. G. Still, and the absence of Zappa. (I never thought Weill was excluded from the canon at all btw.)

The Royal Conservatory History overview course covers Bernstein but certainly not Zappa, at least back when I took it. I don't think Zappa is stressed that heavily in Burkholder/Palisca/Grout (the overwhelmingly dominant history text)? My undergrad courses did cover Gershwin but not Zappa. I only really came across that at UB where there was an elective 'master composer' course which would be about Ives one year, Ligeti one year, Zappa one year, ...

I can say that I've never taught or felt obliged to teach about Zappa (although I do sometimes use Rush's "YYZ" as an example of the Locrian mode in 20th century theory classes!).

xposts

that you're claiming

Maybe "suggesting" is a better word than "claiming" here.

I do sometimes use Rush's "YYZ" as an example of the Locrian mode in 20th century theory classes!

i don't even know what that means, but <3

I feel like Yes wanted to integrate classical music into rock and they actually knew what they were doing and did it in a pretty successful way. While Zappa wanted to be Varese but actually ended up sounding more like Les Baxter or Henry Mancini. And Yes seems to have taken themselves extremely seriously. Zappa maybe took himself even more seriously while working really hard to pretend like he didn't, which is pretty obnoxious. But those kind of embarrassing failures sometimes led to more interesting music.

I feel confident in asserting, just from what I've gathered from friends, that going to music school can make you hate the shit outta some music school dudes. I would further guess that a lot of music school dudes who don't seem to hate other music school dudes...are Zappa fans, and vocal about it.

in my limited experience w/music school dudes, who I totally do not hate but they do have their own distinct vibe, they also think John Williams is the fucking business.

There is something to say about that, it's rare to hear a Zappa album and just not have a reaction to it, which puts them ahead of stuff like Tales from Topographic Oceans

That said, Zappa rarely reached the heights that Yes did. I mean the great thing about the good Yes albums is that they're just satisfying from beginning to end and there's so much you can focus on, while the best moments in the Zappa catalogue rarely last more than two minutes or so

The biggest music school nerd I knew in HS (ended up going to Berklee) played in a Yes cover band!

wanted to be Varese but actually ended up sounding more like Les Baxter

This is an unnecessary zing. Are you sure he "wanted to be Varese?" Because he sure seemed to devote his life to other things.

And even if you're talking about "Uncle Meat," it's only "Les Baxter" by default because it's melodic (and not even Les Baxter-style melodic).

It wasn't even meant as a zing. I love the '60s soundtracky style of early zappa.

sund4r thank you for bringing up Norton Anthology! Check the 3rd edition (1996) and you'll see the source of my frustration. (Looking online for a more comprehensive list of the studied works; I only have the scorebook on hand.)

For Locrian mode in pop music, here's a tip: Björk "Army of Me". (She adjusts the scale in the chorus, the bass is Locrian)

Ffff now I just want to ask Owen and Sund4r what the academics think of ol' Ennio Morricone. IMO his original soundtracks are way better than orchetral renditions because the instrumentation in his filmworks include shit like sirens and vocal shouts and gunshots and stuff that AFAIK is not part of classical symphony orchestra. Probably gonna take this to a different thread...

xp I was off-base re: Gershwin, my bad. He's always been on syllabus.

xp

I mean it seems to me like he devoted much of his life to being seen as a "serious composer." But for me his greatest non-pop-song pieces sound like amazing B movie soundtracks, rather than the "guy playing pseudo-bach on a synth" sound of a lot of english prog (not specifically a Yes dig).

@ Viceroy, Sund4r's a better source, but my comp teacher loved Morricone and once turned a lecture on Barber songs (how to set the English language) into a digression about how great was the soundtrack to "The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly"

For Locrian mode in pop music, here's a tip: Björk "Army of Me". (She adjusts the scale in the chorus, the bass is Locrian)

Thanks for this tip! I'll check that out when I get home.

I'm unfamiliar with the 3rd edition of NAWM tbh.

xp That's awesome!

Perhaps ill-advisedly, I stayed away from film music or virtually any sort of marketable compositional music in my studies, so can't say too much about Morricone, sorry. I mean, I wouldn't say he's part of the essential-everyone-studies-it canon.

music school dudes otm re: John Williams

This is an unnecessary zing.

it's been a while since I said "new board description," but...

OK, back to the task at hand:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WN4wIpDABUU

Btw whoever mentioned music school and Dream Theater earlier: this definitely fits in with Rush. I remember my little bro trying to get into music school and having these crazy drum maps of Neal Peart's set.

Dream Theater is def a thing for music students, not academics, although we'll likely see this shift in 15-20 years.

At the last place where I taught, one percussion major did a regular graduating recital, then gave a second additional graduating recital that was all arrangements of Dream Theater and Symphony X songs for synth-marimba with accompanying rock band.

http://andrewolson.com/Neil_Peart/snakesarrows/tour/images/img10.jpg

haha though peart's got nothing on terry bozzio

re: the above clip, I love that there was a time where you could say "Sure, Geddy sings high on their records; but have you heard him live?!"

Sometimes I feel like I don't give Rush a fair chance, but then I watch a video like that and I can't stop laughing.

dear Neil Peart that is too many drums. sincerely, a guy who listens to Nile, for Christ's sake

http://www.steevi.com/Resources/bozzio.jpg

dear Neil Peart, that is a nice little cocktail kit you got there? are you in jazz combo?

this is kind of awesome

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hxe-SWxDEcw

GUITAR CENTER DRUM-OFF

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR3KWRDK3_U&feature=related

of course RAVI DRUMS chose the road less travelled

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kw_Bd-13YCk&feature=related

so into that terry bozzio clip but I'm pretty sure that playing it with my wife in the room mean my marriage is over

chick man, they don't get it

Rush fans = dudes who thought they were smart but weren't, really

#1 rush fan right here

god damn at that Rush "Anthem" clip

OMG 8 bass drums:
http://terrybozzio.com/kit-setup/

Who the fuck needs 26 toms??

Tom Tom Club?

sund4r I think bozzios tom are tuned to scales

Ah. OK, he mentions that in the clip you posted.

Lol I like how I said that as if the fact that they are tuned to scales somehow makes it less ridiculous

they have that already it's called a piano

it occurs to me that perhaps a lot of zappa fans are happily willing or easily able to separate performance from composition, and relate primarily to zappa as a composer and in an intellectual sense. i find it difficult to do that. when i listen to music, i'm in it for immediate sensual and emotional rewards; the intellectual appreciation of construction comes later and means less.

since it was brought up itt, "peaches en regalia" is a perfect illustration of this. the cello performance/arrangement that dan peterson posted is gorgeous. the sound of the instrument itself is a big part of that. the timbre and tone alone are immediately appealing. the performance is accomplished but not flashy, and it makes visceral, musical "sense" of the relationship between the instrument's natural sound palette and the piece's progress.

the zappa performance on hot rats, however, is just ghastly. horrible sounds thrown together with no seeming attention to timbral/tonal relation, all glopped over with useless ornamentation, and performed with a grating sort of would-be-fluid stiffness. the underlying composition is quite lovely, as it turns out, but zappa doesn't give you much reason to stick around and figure that out.

god, i really wish i could go back and edit my posts. "relate primarily to zappa as a composer" wtf?

i suppose it's also possible that some people simply don't care that much about conventionally "pleasant" sounds & arrangements, or (and i shudder to think) actually prefer the grotesque candyland chaos zappa serves up. it's certainly colorful, and i can see how it might appeal to those with a pronounced fondness for other sorts of action-packed musical zaniness: john zorn, mr bungle, les claypool, residents, etc.

the rabbit hole of chops dudes this thread has taken me down is a place I always, always love gong. Thank you, thread, for getting me to the point of watching 10-minute Steve Lukather videos from 1994.

i want to say that i dislike zappa's embittered sarcasm, but i'm not sure why i should find it so off-putting when i often enjoy something quite similar in scuzzball punk rockers like mark arm and tom hazelmeyer.

Something interesting: Songs About Fucking is arguably as or more sexist/tasteless/unpleasant as some of Zappa's shit. Yet several people have praised it on the 1987 thread and no one has complained about it, whereas not even the biggest fans here have shown much willingness to get behind stuff like "Illinois Enema Bandit", "Titties and Beer", "Sy Borg", "Bobby Brown", etc. I don't love that Big Black album but I do like it. Ditto with a lot of hip-hop. So I think it really is an aesthetic issue in Zappa's case, not a moral one: the obnoxious lyrics on the offending songs are foregrounded so heavily and sit there, sometimes with less to appreciate musically otherwise, and also just that, unlike e.g. ODB lyrics, they're so weak as comedy, with little wit or comic timing. (I guess this is similar to something I already said upthread but I was considering it again with these comparisons.)

actually prefer the grotesque candyland chaos zappa serves up. it's certainly colorful, and i can see how it might appeal to those with a pronounced fondness for other sorts of action-packed musical zaniness: john zorn, mr bungle, les claypool, residents, etc.

I haven't listened to the cello version yet but yes, this is a big part of the appeal of Zappa's instrumental music. "Grotesque candyland chaos" is a great description btw!

I could do without the more squacky moments in "Peaches", but as a whole that arrangement kills

Putting my last two ideas together, I guess one reason Zappa is frustrating is that the music itself can be delightfully humorous, his lyrics and delivery much less so.

zaniness

^

I guess one reason Zappa is frustrating is that the music itself can be delightfully humorous, his lyrics and delivery much less so.

I don't know if I really want to drag the unholy Seth MacFarlane into this, but Zappa's catalogue as a whole is kind of like laughing your ass off at a really funny and clever joke on Family Guy that hits on every level, then getting pissed that the rest of the show settles for so much less.

Something interesting: Songs About Fucking is arguably as or more sexist/tasteless/unpleasant as some of Zappa's shit. Yet several people have praised it on the 1987 thread and no one has complained about it, whereas not even the biggest fans here have shown much willingness to get behind stuff like "Illinois Enema Bandit", "Titties and Beer", "Sy Borg", "Bobby Brown", etc. I don't love that Big Black album but I do like it. Ditto with a lot of hip-hop. So I think it really is an aesthetic issue in Zappa's case, not a moral one: the obnoxious lyrics on the offending songs are foregrounded so heavily and sit there, sometimes with less to appreciate musically otherwise, and also just that, unlike e.g. ODB lyrics, they're so weak as comedy, with little wit or comic timing. (I guess this is similar to something I already said upthread but I was considering it again with these comparisons.)

fwiw one reason I've always been lukewarm on Big Black is the casual sexism trying to hide behind a general-misanthropy mask (I think Albini grew out of that & consider Shellac a much better band). Re: hip-hop, generally speaking with hip-hop I think you either make your peace with sexism to enjoy the music or you check out; I've mainly done the latter, which is exactly what I do with pretty much all vocal Zappa: I tune out right around "Apostrophe" and only come back for the instrumentals ("Watermelon in Easter Hay" is so unbelievable...what the hell is it doing in the same corpus as "Catholic Girls"?)

The problem with vocal Zappa is that like 95% of his vocal melodies are exactly the same as the melody of the song; even his *good* vocal stuff wouldn't lose much if the they were removed altogether.

i suppose it's also possible that some people simply don't care that much about conventionally "pleasant" sounds & arrangements, or (and i shudder to think) actually prefer the grotesque candyland chaos zappa serves up. it's certainly colorful, and i can see how it might appeal to those with a pronounced fondness for other sorts of action-packed musical zaniness: john zorn, mr bungle, les claypool, residents, etc.

Yeah I love early Zappa for the sonics and arrangements (as well as the melodies), and particularly the cheesy, plastic, TV show theme quality of some of his stuff. I don't like any of those other artists you mentioned though. I don't normally go for zany but in Zappa's best stuff there's a darkness that undercuts the zaniness.

BTW, I had no idea until last night that both Roy Estrada and Napoleon Murphy Brock were convicted sex offenders!

well, that complicates the moral-vs-aesthetic thing a little

Something interesting: Songs About Fucking is arguably as or more sexist/tasteless/unpleasant as some of Zappa's shit. Yet several people have praised it on the 1987 thread and no one has complained about it, whereas not even the biggest fans here have shown much willingness to get behind stuff like "Illinois Enema Bandit", "Titties and Beer", "Sy Borg", "Bobby Brown", etc.

this doesn't address the moral component of that argument, but negativity in punk rock sort of "works" on a musical level because punk rock, like a lot of heavy metal, is driven by a kind of violent ecstasy. i was listening to "anarchy in the UK" the other day, and forgive me if this is an obvious point, but it occurred to me that the song has absolutely no political dimension. when johnny rotten sings about wanting to be anarchy, he's talking about the feeling of screaming into an amplified microphone with a band exploding into ecstatic, mile-a-minute chaos around you. what he's really saying is, "i want to be this sound, this moment." it's the same feeling iggy pop addresses in "raw power".

that situation, the situation of the punk singer, turns venom into a positive musical virtue. when the violence of the subject matter matches and conjures a violence in the vocal performance, it enables a transcendent release that turns mere violence into an ecstatic sort of joy. that can't really happen in zappa's musical universe. his venom can't find any kind of emotionally expressive release, so it just sits there festering.

oh man the Greasy Love Songs reissue just came in the mail (Cruising With Ruben & the Jets + extras) - utterly gorgeous package, really A+ production job. Little wallet-size card of what looks to be Zappa's high school graduation photo, bright mylar panels, big booklet with liner notes by Cheech Marin.

Totally bitching piece of product and it sounds SO GOOD.

Ruben has three dogs: Benny, Baby and Martha.

"Bobby Brown" is pretty funny. It is satire. Including a rape joke is not the best idea but the song is a comment on the sort of person that would think a rape joke is funny, how little respect this person has for anybody other than himself. Even as he ascends into sexual deviance and is being used and abuse his thoughts are "Oh God oh God I'm so fantastic". Completely self-obsessed. The shiny teeth and fast car are status symbols to him as much as who he effed and how cool and cutting edge his sexual life is. It's about a villain who is getting his due but not even realizing it because he's so obsessed with his own greatness. The irony in the lyrics is mimicked by the simple, catchy, confident melody and late 70's soft-rock pr0n arrangement.

Bobby Brown is Daniel Tosh.

I think we all get that, Adam. I think it's cheap and heavy-handed, like Sublime's "Date Rape" but even more ott.

yeah, and equating homosexuality and kink with deviance and being a "sexual spastic" is p fucking lame. i mean, sure, it's a supposed to be a satire of a self-obsessed type, but the hinge of zappa's "satire" = "lol, u r a gay fag."

OTM

Also pretty disturbing that the bg vocalist on that album is a convicted rapist

Wait, is that true about Napoleon Brock Murphy? (I see it on Roy Estrada's Wiki, which is pretty creepy.)

Whoa: http://mugshots.com/US-Counties/California/Santa-Clara-County-CA/Napoleon-Murphy-Brock.4542761.html

yeah, I don't see a date on Brock's conviction although the mugshot looks fairly recent right? But Estrada has 3 convictions for child sexual assault dating back to '77!

yeah Estrada was a real piece of work evidently

25 years without parole. I had not heard about Estrada; saw him not too many years ago with The Grandmothers.

Ugh, didn't know that about Estrada. Yick. That poor kid.

I'm really upset to hear about these guys. It's a real shock, especially NMB, who comes across as a fairly likable person. Ugh. This is going to ruin a lot of my favorite songs.

This gives me mixed feelings about zappa himself. On the one hand I always thought he was an asshole for dumping the original mothers, but maybe he had good reasons after all. But on the other hand maybe it wasn't a coincidence that he attracted certain types of people. And given his later lyrics and everything I wonder how much he was complicit in that sort of thing. I always kind of liked the creepy "freak scene" dark side of the Mothers but for some reason I didn't suspect that it actually got THAT creepy.

It certainly puts the lyrics to "Magdalena" in an even more uncomfortable light.

Jesus, I didn't know that song!

Listening to this, with a bit of a beer buzz going, I'm struck by one of the things that makes me uncomfortable about Zappa, that I'm realizing after this discussion. He was clearly a very intelligent man who was very serious about the craft of his music, to the point of obsessiveness. It doesn't make sense that he'd just ad-lib some dumb shit for shock value like the Day-Glo Abortions or someone. When that shit is in there, it seems like it had to mean something to him or something.

It's weird because I've always chosen to listen to zappa's satirical anti-hippy lyrics in a naive way and just take them at face value. Like Absolutely Free is a genuinely great psychedelic song IMO. I don't care if he meant it as a joke or not. But the same seems to be true with some of the creepy sexual lyrics. Was the supposed satire just a cover for him to sing about what genuinely interested him? A lot of his lyrics are full of contradictions, and are clearly ironic in one line and then seemingly genuine in another. I've always thought he seemed like an incredibly insecure dude who tried to mask his insecurities with all of the "jokes."

I'd suppose it is largely context. Big Black goes there it's kind of a horror or true crime movie, you expect it to be there. I suppose Illinois Enema Bandit seems somehow sleazier as it is being played for laughs out of a mid tempo blues that wouldn't sound out of bounds musically on a Doobie Brothers record. And maybe it is that cultural divide where people could just dig the music and not really realize what it is somewhat about is why Bobby Brown was a chart hit in parts of Europe.

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so basically X is going to win any 'X v rush v yes' poll

countdown to some very angry prog fans

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/6e/XLosAngeles.jpg/220px-XLosAngeles.jpg

I'd vote for X in an "X vs Rush vs Yes" poll, even though I quite like Rush. Doe & Cervenka are tops in my book.

was going to move to northern michigan and name my Yes cover band Starship Yooper

late lol @ "Starship Yooper", that song will never be the same to me again

anyway just wanted to chime in and say I listened to "Magdalena" and EWWWWWWWWWWWWWwwwwwwwww, I kind of agree that there's a part of Zappa that must have internalized this stuff to some degree. "Brown Shoes" mostly gets a pass because of what a classic it is but lately that one's made me really uncomfortable too.

Interesting how this poll came back in exactly reverse order of awesomeness.

yes is always the most awesome band in any list of awesome bands