Zappa.com

like i said earlier when i think unusual i think non-zappa like. Wild Love is VERY ZAPPA LIKE!!

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Agreed it's very Zappa-like, but the topic is ambiguous. I was going for unusual compared to non-Zappa music.

My vote for most un-Zappa-like by Zappa goes to Harder Than Your Husband. The vocals sound Zappa-like on the level that they are voices you know from other material, but short of that you'd have no idea that the person behind that POS was the most brilliant song writer ever. It's every bit as shitty as a real country music song.

HTYH is NOT a POS plus it is very much a parody/mockery song. Shitty? that's exactly what's it's supposed to be.

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Make your checks payable to QUENTIN ROBERT DeNAMELAND, Greatest Living Philostopher Known to Mankind.

I agree that conceptually it's Zappa-like in that it's a parody, but musically it's got zero Zappa-likeness. And lyrically, while slightly Zappa-like in that it's supposed to be funny, those lyrics are not that far out for the genre it's making a mockery of. If that song came on a country station the average country listener would not think twice about it. I can't think of another Zappa song that could disguise itself so easily.

Same here. But for some the context may be much larger, such as in comparison with whatever is 'normal' to them. The OP was rather ambiguous in this regard.

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WTF is this? Can't agree on the definition of 'unusual'? For FZ fans, after hearing most of the catelog, nothing should sound unusual, imo. For nearly everyone else, about half of all of FZ's material should sound unusual. I'm having a hard time coming up with even ONE satisfying answer! I'll stick with Watermelon, but that is unusual only in certain ways. In lots of ways it is very usual, for FZ.

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the best thing about this thread is that there is no wrong answer. just type the song followed by a small summary why you think it's unusual.

the black page

there will never be another composition like it in the history of music.

so many choices, i could go on forever really.

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FYI: What I think I meant by "unusual" in the original post was probably the degree of difference from the rest of the body of work, but feel absolutly free to impose any standard you wish. Lots of interesting tracks and explanations here and I'm really enjoying going back and listening to each one of them.

it's not unusual to be mad with anyone. it's not unusual to be sad with anyone. that's wtf it is! got it??

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Speaking of good ol' Sleepy, although I love the song, Sleeping In A Jar is an unusual and kind of creepy (in a good way) tune.
Love Of My Life is more uncharacteristic than unusual since it's such a sweet, well, LOVE song, something he always said he despised--but probably loved...if it was a 50's Doo-Wop tune.

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Because all of this is very subjective by nature, I wood pick just one song as my personal choice of an unusual Zappa song/composition: Kaiser Rolls. Unusual in a sense that it is the one and only song in Frank's catalogue that I personally can't stand listening to. I hate that song. It gives me headache. The worst song ever written and performed. He was right to never release it himself.

Other than that I think FZ as a whole was never more unusual than in the context of today's world. And that makes his work even more valuable than ever, because it always was sort of a counter-concept to the rest.

Th.

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Amen to that!

That song is so good!

Unusual as in... the not expected from Zappa? Well, is anything really? But I guess the whole CWRATJ was pretty unusual when it was released, and still is, compared with other Zappa-albums, though doowop songs pop up on many of his recordings.