Zappa.com

Not so sure, see here:

http://www.lukpac.org/~handmade/patio/misc/why.html


By the way, I don't think there is such a thing as a bad Zappa album.
Just concider the time and work that it took him to put together every one of them.
I don't listen too often to LSO, Francesco or Perfect Stanger but I wouldn't say that they are the worsts.
With Frank, I've learned to pay attention to what is actually on the record and not what I would like to hear.
And I think that it opened my mind.

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I could give you a couple of good reasons for preferring Guitar - mainly because Guitar is all invention, while there's an awful lot of repetition on some of the other live albums.

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We make a special art in an environment hostile to dreamers. Frank Zappa, 1971

The CD version of "Sleep Dirt" gets my vote.

I LOVE the original vinyl version.

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"Voodoo Butter Underpants...
heh, heh... the pants that
nearly broke Tommy Mars' neck."

Probably Thing-Fish

Francesco Zappa. By far.

The following ones don't get spun much either, although I still own them:

Joe's Menage
Thing-Fish
Them or Us
Playground Psychotics

If you think Tinseltown Rebellion is the worst, then there are a lot of Zappa albums you haven't listened to.

Probably Fransesco, but Thing-Fish is a pretty big contender

Depends on the day of the week but here in chrono order

Ruben
Just Another Band (side 2)
Tinsel Town
Utopia
Baby Snakes sndtrk (sounds like shit, love the movie and material)
Them or Us
Thing-Fish (I thought Frank had a brain tumor the first time I heard it)
Franceso (doesn't really count, non FZ)

I Have listened to everything.
'Broadway the Hard Way' and YCDTOSA 3-5 aren't my favourite albums nowadays.

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RZZZZZ!

I'm with you, Fido. TTR is one of the least essential albums Zappa ever did. For the first time in his career he relied heavily on old songs, and it feels too much like those tired old "live albums" every rock megastar used to put out every once in a while. Strange, with all the hours of brilliant live material he had recorded in 1979/80

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We make a special art in an environment hostile to dreamers. Frank Zappa, 1971

I do love the song Fine Girl tho'. I'm convinced it is about a certain breed of Itailian girls only to be found in Brooklyn. Knock out bodies, sexpots, that cook, clean, do maintenance. SERVE their man. Unfortunately, they only have anything to do with the Italians they grew up with.

This has evolved a bit (for the worse for men), but I used to encounter these wimmen often at work, etc.

Gail needs to put this on a dvd: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQJyjMejRv8

I think Fine Girl is about Gail. I also think Tinseltown is Zappa's worst album between 1966 and 1980. Every studio release that came after it is even worse. The 1988 band was the best thing Zappa had done since Joe's Garage.

Fine Girl is a very good song, though.

I like Fine Girl but it IS a very sexist song (intentionally).
Many cultures and ethnicities and can identify with this though.

Gail? NO WAY! Fine Girls don't have a crew of groupies workin' for them.

Sure the type cuts across many cultures but Frank was hanging around Warren and Brooklyn at the time so those girls get my vote.

I have a memory of a big PR push, the song premiering on the radio, think it was WLIR, which reached the NY Metro area.

My first real post so hello everyone.

First instincts would suggest-

Thing Fish
Francesco Zappa

On deeper analysis I really don't like any of the Flo and Eddie period at all apart from bits of Chunga's Revenge and their version of Sofa on YCDTOSA V.1 So it really has to be one of the following:Playground Psychotics 200 Motels, Fillmore East or ABFLA.

Ok it's Playground Psychotics because:
1) Flo and Eddie
2) Yoko Ono (A small eternity with in particular)
3) Endless boring road stuff I just don't care about.

Jazz From Hell is my choice. I've tried listening to it at least 4 or 5 times. The music just rubs me the wrong way. I didn't care for Tinseltown either. Nor am I a fan of Live in New York. I never bought another new Frank Zappa LP or CD after Tinseltown and New York. Then about 2 months ago I purchased Best Band You Never Heard. That one was a good choice. Comments in this site will guide my next purchase.

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A succulent fat one. A mod little flat one. Maybe a hot one, to give me the clap.

Tinseltown certainly merits consideration. That album and Live in New York convinced me to stop buying any new releases for a very long time. Despite the fact that I own darn near everything released before then. After 20 years I decided to buy a few Zappa CD's, including Jazz from Hell. Jazz from Hell gets my vote hands down. Happily though, I decided to buy Best Band You Never Heard. Now that's more like it! I'm a big fan again. Still. Whatever.

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A succulent fat one. A mod little flat one. Maybe a hot one, to give me the clap.

Francesco, because there is nothing to recommend it. Any other Zappa album has at least something about it I like...

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If we're dumb . . .
Then God is dumb . . .
(An' maybe even a little bit ugly on the side)

The first recording of a nearly forgotten composer! Of course I love it, even if it has entire scales running.

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Join the PackardGoose forum! Send me a PM!

Oh well Bonny, sorry.

The Perfect Stranger is great and I love to listen to the LSO vols I and II, which are nicely packaged on a 2-CD set (as opposed to the LPs I bought separately back when they came out).

I do think that Frank's '80s output is generally more spotty than either of the previous two decades. For example FZ Meets the Mothers of Prevention has Alien Orifice, a great track, and then Yo Cats, which epitomizes a weird singing style that appears on some tunes on Man From Utopia also, and it is just grating.

I also understand why Thing-Fish bothers some people, bits like Briefcase Boogie aren't funny after a listen or two.

But I LOVE the Synclavier work and, except for Valley Girl, all of SATLTSADW.

He was prolific, as usual, in the '80s, but the work was all over the map.

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If we're dumb . . .
Then God is dumb . . .
(An' maybe even a little bit ugly on the side)

[quote="Dark Clothes']Broadway the Hard Way' and YCDTOSA 3-5 aren't my favourite albums nowadays.[/quote]
I'm with you, Fido. TTR is one of the least essential albums Zappa ever did. For the first time in his career he relied heavily on old songs, and it feels too much like those tired old "live albums" every rock megastar used to put out every once in a while. Strange, with all the hours of brilliant live material he had recorded in 1979/80 [/quote]

Yeah i heard a early 80's dutch bootleg that was far superior to Tinseltown Rebellion, even by then he could still cut it live.

That said i bought it on vinyl not long ago and i admit it does have its moments.

Any of the strictly Syn-clavier realizations....

Not into them, at all!

For me, the perspective of being there when FZ was alive and waiting for the next release is totally different to having his whole repertoire available with no more new releases (I mean from him as a living composer). I was disappointed when Zoot Allures first came out (as a whole - but the tracks Black Napkins and Zoot Allures were monster right from the off). I like the album now, although it's not near the top of my list.

In contrast, Studio Tan, Sleep Dirt and Orchestral Favorites blew me totally away.

The other thing that disappointed me about FZ at the time is that the period from Man From Utopia through Yellow Shark inclusive has about 28 new releases with only 8 of them being fully new albums in terms of compositional content. That's not how I feel about it now. I have all the official releases and listen to them all. I'm not going to get the new FZ composition buzz ever again so I approach the material from a different angle now.

Strokes for folks, but Tinsel Town Rebellion is a very good album. I was very happy when the new remaster appeared.

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The way I see it Barry, this should be a very dynamite show.

My vote goes to Playgroung Psychotics. Even though I am a great admirer of his innovative approaches and sociological pieces, I can't really get through this one easy. Plus, and I know stones gonna rain after I say that, I am not a big fan of Billy the Mountain...

I now own the original Ruben LP and this album grew considerably with me!

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The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true Art and Science. - Albert Einstein

The problem with BTM and any of the Flo and Eddie routines is that part of their allure is the jokes, and after you heard them once or twice, they are not particularly funny anymore - that is why I like the BTM on CH because there is a lengthy musical interlude stuffed in the middle.

I also agree that, when they first came out, like any new album by an artist you enjoyed, some songs, you just didn't warm up to them.

I will tell you that I was really displeased when the vocals were added to those Hunchentoot somgs - Lisa Popeil does nothing for me except I like that Lisa's Love Story on YCDTOSA.

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If we're dumb . . .
Then God is dumb . . .
(An' maybe even a little bit ugly on the side)