By Deborah Newell Tornelloa.k.a. litbrit
Over in my tiny, eponymously-titled island protectorate, located in the mid-left waters of Blogistan, we have a tradition known as Friday Frank. This regular four-minute (give-or-take) bit entails sharing the genius of the late Frank Zappa with one another and sometimes even dragging new listeners kicking, screaming, and quizzically eyebrow-raising into the fray, never again to look at a snowcone or stack of pancakes in quite the same way. Given that commercial airplay of FZ's music has, to the detriment of independent musical thinking everywhere, long been limited to a few of the humor pieces like Valley Girl and Dancin' Fool, far too many Americans miss out on the staggeringly broad and undeniably wonderful body of work Mr. Zappa left behind when he died of prostate cancer in 1993 at the age of 52.
You can't pigeonhole this sort of genius--neither the music nor the man. Frank Zappa was an Italian-American autodidactic musician, composer, and conductor; he claimed, in his autobiography, The Real Frank Zappa Book, that because he was self-taught and couldn't play absolutely everything, he didn't consider himself a virtuoso. Yet most devotees would argue he was that and more--he's certainly one of one of my all-time favorite guitarists. One of my favorite classical composers too. Politically, FZ was a conservative (yes, you read that correctly--conservative in the true, old-school, fiscal responsibility sense) who regularly encouraged his fans to register to vote and even run for office; in the last years of his life, voter registration booths were a fixture at Zappa concerts. He was also an ardent supporter of First Amendment rights, a man with whom Tipper Gore--wife of then soon-to-be Vice President and avowed FZ fan Al--famously tangled over the issue of labeling music with "offensive lyrics".
Anyway, to my ear, this piece--Alien Orifice--is signature Zappa, combining as it does the shifting time signatures, blasting brass, mellow vibes, and blistering guitar for which Maestro's music was and is beloved, forging a sound that's at once rock, jazz, and pure flowing-from-elsewhere inspiration. Enjoy.
(H/T Farksisten)
