numberthirty wrote: Wed Mar 15, 2023 6:04 pm Some of you cats are seriously no fun...

Was more underscoring that that was a really good quip than anything else.

But yes, I'm no fun.

DaveA wrote: Wed Mar 15, 2023 7:22 pm

numberthirty wrote: Wed Mar 15, 2023 6:04 pm Some of you cats are seriously no fun...

Was more underscoring that that was a really good quip than anything else.

But yes, I'm no fun.

Same. Fuck that shit.

I read (well, skimmed) all 28 pages of that Zappa thread. I’d forgotten how much yut/Warren tried to browbeat everyone into liking Zappa.

Do ensembles (not counting Dweezil) still perform his music? That seemed to be a serious argument once made in support of his importance. I can’t think of a single instance of it happening, though, but I also wouldn’t be on that particular mailing list.

Eephus described his music as complex, yet not sophisticated, which nailed it.

Complexity in search of a purpose.

I like it.

Exposure to Zappa in my early 20s kindled further interest in better music that inspired him: Stravinsky, Varese, Boulez, Dolphy, Mingus, Beefheart, Howlin Wolf....etc...

Zappa should merely be a stop on the way between rock and more formally complex styles, not a destination.

I'll still listen to most of his output prior to 1975, after that it just gets too slick and satisfied with itself.

Things I like about Zappa's music:
- He knew how to render whatever he was hearing in his head into a performable score and technical recording. Not many pop/rock musicians have such an intimate understanding of music and technology that they can articulate ideas as well as he did.
- His breadth of musical interests and genres and ability to tie them all together. Kind of like Ween, but if the guys in Ween had any interest in music outside of pop/rock before 1960. I enjoy hearing the snippets of everything he stitches together.
- His ability to control his singular vision. He wrote it down himself, edited it himself, did the arrangements, programmed it. Whatever collaboration existed, was there because he allowed it. Sometimes: fuck collaboration. I can't imagine Stravinsky or Shostakovich being any better had they 'collaborated' with performers. I like how he preserved the distinct relationships between composer, arranger, performer, singer, etc....
- Anything Anytime Anyplace For No Reason At All (or AAAFNRAA)' Sure, Why not?
- Conceptual Continuity: Why not have your body of work follow a contiguous arc, while operating under AAAFNRAA?
- The goofy and puerile humor, including humorous musical quotes and nods.

Things I don't like about Zappa's music:
- The fans
- The goofy and puerile humor.
- The often boomer-dad attitudes and blind spots in his thinking
- the slick 'overproduced' 80s sound he brought to everything, even in the 70s (he was a pioneer in that respect).
- Nothing he wrote is as good as the stuff that inspired it.

For every Billy the Mountain, The Black Page, and King Kong, there was a Dinah-Moe Hum, Titties and Beer, and He's So Gay. That sucks. He produced enough dumb garbage to almost cancel out the good. That's not something his contemporaries and predecessors with equal or better abilities can claim.

Wood Goblin wrote: Thu Mar 16, 2023 11:33 am Do ensembles (not counting Dweezil) still perform his music? That seemed to be a serious argument once made in support of his importance. I can’t think of a single instance of it happening, though, but I also wouldn’t be on that particular mailing list.

There are "Zappa fests" all over the world. Milwaukee's is one of (if not) the longest running, I believe this will be it's 25th consecutive year. Ike Willis has performed as part of it for the last 2 years. I also remember hearing that some musicians were doing The Black Page at the conservatory when I was in college.

Thanks—didn’t know that!

Some songs are bangers, I think his guitar playing is distinct and has character, I admire the tenacity and the trying out everything and the huge output and the constantly going at it. Inspiring for the fact that he was largely self-taught.

Will never be a favourite, but he's aight.

Wood Goblin wrote: Thu Mar 16, 2023 11:33 am I read (well, skimmed) all 28 pages of that Zappa thread. I’d forgotten how much yut/Warren tried to browbeat everyone into liking Zappa.

In that thread, yut argues (and argues, and argues) that the song “Big Swifty” “blows Bitches Brew out of the water.”

I just popped “Big Swifty” onto YouTube.

Bitches Brew is still comfortably in the water.

Built a whole life around fingering.