Word: zappa
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...Blue Oyster Cult, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Frank Zappa, Lou Reed, Arlo Guthrie, they are truly the harbingers of autumn. It matters little whom you choose; the Pilgrims at Plymouth partook indiscriminately of foods both familiar and exotic--maize and corn, turkey and chicken-dogs; it mattered little. Having partaken of the fruits of the earth, having experienced the God-given bounties of the soil, they were renewed. And surely they fancied themselves well-girt against the cruel winter that followed. And they blessed Plymouth, and not surprisingly, they called it Plymouth Rock. Later...
...course, Bowie was always more than merely jarring. To lump him with Alice Cooper, as many do, is a mistake. Despite Cooper's first name and penchant for mascara, his songs were as straight as the midwestern plains from which he came. Cooper's charm, nurtured by Zappa's aesthetic of ugliness, lies elsewhere, perhaps in the psychic territory of a sixth grader...
...past. In addition to Fairport, you'll also get a chance to witness one of the more atypical figures in rock, violinist Jean-Luc Ponty. Though his popular following is quite large in Europe, Ponty remains a critic's musician here, though he is played extensively with Frank Zappa and is close to becoming a full-fledged Mother...
Last month's release of Roxy & Elsewhere, a live Zappa album, makes the same point: Zappa has not yet made a firm commitment either to commercialism and top-40 rock, or to original, honest music that disregards industry and public pressure to record million-selling albums. "Be-Bop Tango" is among the best cuts on the new record because it typifies Zappa music and Zappa humor. If you listen carefully to George Duke's scat singing, you hear strains of Thelonius Monk's "Straight No Chaser" and a Zappa remark about 4/4 time: "It's a pedestrian beat...
...Zappa's next release will be the clue as to whether or not he decides to go strictly commercial. If he has any integrity left, he should stick to his own inherent musical needs, as Charles Ives did at the turn of the century. On several of the Mothers' early albums, Zappa used to quote his idol, Edgar Varese: "The present-day composer refuses to die." I hope Zappa remembers these words...