Zappa - what a tight music arranger

[jancivil]

I think most of us already have the music, instead of just posting a link to a youtube song, it would be more interesting to know why the poster think that track is of special interest, when it comes to the OP.

Well, you stated Zappa was restricted to four on the floor, which makes zero sense, then that launched 'Yes he certainly is uptight', so I guess I was dissuaded to want to talk much.
edit again: But it looks like I was pretty verbose anyway. rp314 didn't say much but he's always been a bit reserved as far I can tell.

Music speaks for itself, I mean I don't read music journalism at all. I wouldn't suppose eg., The Adventures of Greggery Peccary was in common currency here, anyway.

[jancivil]

I've long ago, however, learned to dismiss viewpoints of internet cranks who are too lazy to provide scholarly references.

This dismissal would be more convincing if it didn't come 10 pages after you failed even to acknowledge the words of Nicolas Slonimsky...

I really don't have the time for that, or certainly for a poseur's silly appeals to some 'authority' who happens to have a degree so it makes talking some off-topic crap about 'the groove' seem better. No one should even give a shit at this point, arguing in circles with someone with zero critical apparatus just a-trollin' away has limited entertainment value afaic.

I had an entire doctoral thesis on Zappa's technique on my HD, and in fact I disagreed with certain whole premises of it. It's not the only one I've seen. But guess what, I have my own ideas on it. There are people who get it and people who don't.

[jancivil]

Here's a version of Black Page #2, which almost makes you believe this arcane structure was natural in improvisation



the tune doesn't come in til around 2:48

perfect example of how wrong people are with this 'complexity for complexity's sake' bidness. It's a gorgeous tune.

[jancivil]

explicated here, 'New Age Version' where the 'head' is slowed way down



so lush

[jancivil]

no scholarly research cited, so one is dismissed as internet crank.
Because nothing in school can ever be wrong, and any/everything one learns in actual experience instead of talk which by definition is after-the-fact is to be dismissed.

That's so totally fallacious. And as Herodotus noted, it arrives long after authority was indicated.
Boulez, he didn't write it up in school, all he did was approach FZ and offer to have his group perform something (because it would be good for them to), that's nothing. Boulez, the giant, nah. Kent Nagano, even as his words were quoted on it, that's nothing. Slonimsky, because you never heard of him (and apparently lack curiosity to check it out, since the whole desperate idea is to look like you're right), that's nothing. George Duke, not scholarly at all probably, dismissed. Johnny 'Guitar' Watson, a big part of why FZ gravitated to the electric guitar and later adored Zappa's work, nah, there's no authority here at all. Because the very limit here is somebody has to have written a paper on it, one supposes under the auspices of an academic institution. We should rely on that to grok a 4/4 groove, after all.

[jancivil]

This is thrilling to me and others because it's a thrilling performance.
Dweezil in presenting Frank's music has a number of options available. This is the arrangement for the 1977, early '78 band which is kind of the classic version of City of Tiny Lites.
The keyboardist singing it sounds like Belew although I think he's improved on it a touch. And he's doing Tommy Mars' parts with a slight tweak. He's definitely prettier than Belew, too.

So here, with DZ's efforts we are presented with dealing with a specific arrangement and treatment, specific parts, much like we're dealing with classical music (unlike Z3, above) but we find DZ's guitar solo to be his, even while channeling Frank. And here is one Scheila Gonzalez on tenor and then in a 'trade fours' bit of business with DZ which is unique to the one show (Frank Zappa ethos). And is just thrilling. Joe Travers' propulsive and astute drumming is really something.

[rp314]

Unfortunately this video is not available in our country.

Oh, how I hate when that happens (and it does occasionally happen in the opposite direction by the way ).

In case you didn't already see this from Wikipedia:

The Lost Episodes is a 1996 posthumous album by Frank Zappa which compiles (with the exception of "I Don't Want to Get Drafted") previously unreleased material. Much of the material covered dates from early in his career, and as early as 1958, into the mid-1970s. Zappa had been working on these tracks in the years before his death in 1993.
[…]
"The Grand Wazoo", a spoken word piece recorded in 1969, to which Zappa added a Synclavier track in 1992.

My sense of what connection there might be to the better known work: they both involve the use of sound.

[jancivil]

this is pretty much faithful to the original so it kind of doesn't belong in the alternate renditions thread

[jancivil]

a true gem


FZ wrote this in 1969 for a Jeff Simmons album, but didn't record it himself until 1979.
Arthur Barrow's bass is simply stunning, Vinnie is performing magic, I don't know if it was Warren or Ike with the reggae scratching but it just swings. Everything here is perfection. Ike will tear your heart out here with the vocal.

[jancivil]

She's in love with a boy from the rodeo
who pulls the rope on the chute when they let those suckers go




ZULCH is the auto works
I'm tellin' you, that's where they take all the cars they they hurt
Johnny 'Guitar' Watson vocals on that outchorus

now known as Big Z Auto Works
https://www.mapquest.com/us/california/ ... -288203456

[jancivil]

ok, rocking like nobody's business there and we can move to this



Yeah, I posted another big band covering this, here's FZ's 1988 band
the grandeur

pretty compelling, I'd say

[rp314]

Some more of the posthumous stuff...

[jancivil]

This is in fact an album he was sure to have put out himself. And Amnerika appears first on Thing-Fish.

There is a guitarist named Tory Slusher who has recorded a solo guitar version. I mean all the hocketing is in there, she did it live with some kind of tapping technique. It's on Bandcamp and on Youtube.

I personally don't think there is a better piece of music in the world. Ensemble Modern did it as part of Yellow Shark and it's incredible.

[jancivil]

[rp314]

I personally don't think there is a better piece of music in the world. Ensemble Modern did it as part of Yellow Shark and it's incredible.

"The ensemble is awe-inspiring. It is a rich pageant of texture in color. It's the clarity of his perfect madness, and mastery. Frank governs with Elmore James on his left and Stravinsky on his right. Frank reigns and rules with the strangest tools."

Stravinsky, you say?





Indeed...