Zappa.com

Did you attend this show at Shepherd's Bush Empire in London?

Dweezil and the band would love to read your reviews.

Please do not post in this thread if you did not attend the show.

Mikey
Zappa.com Webmeister

Thank you Dweezil for keeping Frank's music live!

Wow, this band have matured in 12 months. Jawdropping musicianship combined with an inspired setlist provided the canvas for a masterpiece created live between my ears! The atmosphere during Dog/Meat even silenced the drunken morons behind us.
Scheila switching from vocal to flute in the same breath while playing keyboard with her other hand, and still dancing and having fun was pretty impressive... FZ would have loved her.
So great to hear the Absolutely Free set... never ever imagined I'd hear them performed live so well.
The only negative thing I have to say is that its a great pity Joe is so damn good. If he was an average Joe we could have him replaced and get him back in the vault, but ZPZ would lose out, and I think ZPZ are looking like being the mothers of the 21st century.
Hammersmith is a great live venue, especially compared to the Albert Hall, for us fans... and I suspect for the band too (for next year, hint tint).

Damn glad I've got tickets for Amsterdam tomorrow!

Thanks Dweezil and the band, what a fantastic night.
I can't really put my feelings into words, other than to say that was undoubtedly one of the best gigs I've ever been to.

I'm sure someone with a better memory than me will post a complete set list soon enough, but highlights for me were Dupree's Paradise, Carolina Hardcore Ecstasy (one of those tracks where Frank's guitar solo makes my eyes moisten, I can't be the only one- and it was the same here), Advance Romance, Dumb All Over, G-Spot Tornado (superb, I'd love to get this live version on a CD, hint )and of course, (and surely we were all expecting it) Illinois Enema Bandit - what a great closer.
Any how the hell can Ray White still sing like that?? I live 10 minutes from the Empire (another reason it's a great venue for next year )and as soon as my brother and I got home we put the Lather version on loud (sorry neighbours) -by direct comparison I swear Ray's voice hasn't lost any of it's power or resonance in the intervening 30 years.

Am calculating whether I can get out to Germany to see you again in the next few days...

Please come back next year. Do a couple of nights, stay a while...

Thanks again. Genius.

The present day composer is clearly refusing to die!

An absolutely brilliant show; band as tight as a duck's eyelid. Great sound. We were up by the bar at the back guys, just the best gig we've seen in years!

"The things we do in life echo in eternity"

Great gig!! Black napkins and Zoot allures!!!! fantasic!! They were missing at the albert hall but good to see my fave guitar tunes getting a ZPZ outing.
For me though the evening soured by my brand new zappa plays zappa hat i just had purchased getting pulled of my head by some wanker and thrown into the crowd behind!!!!(yes that poor guy at the front was me!!!)if you got the hat thrown at you or found it on the floor..........well you know what to do.
EVERY FUCKING ZAPPA GIG I GO TOO IM STUCK NEXT TO SOME DRUNKEN IGNORANT MORONS!!!(you know the ones!!! front of stage on the righthand side)
i sometimes wish frank had just stuck to inacessable instrmental stuff, but hey.... then there would no........ illinois enema bandit- RAY WHITE IS A LEGEND!!!

Thanks Dweeze and the Band. What a night, I took my son and his friend needless to say they where blown away and can't wait till the band return.

Highlights, everything!!! Muffin Man awsome.

Dad moment for me when I over heard my son explaining to his friend that he remembers as a young boy me singing Muffin Man song round the house!

What was that song Thai Boy? Briillant and funny.

Brilliant. A huge treat to hear Ray White live - I only saw FZ in '88 and had to make do with Ike, who I went off in a big way after Thingfish. What he did with 'Thai Lady Boy' and the other phrase ('Everything you do in life will echo in eternity'?) was astonishing. Great solo too.

Best thing was the set - excellent choices - San Ber'dino, Dupree's, Brown Shoes, Zoot Allures, Carolina, Pygmy Twilight, Uncle Remus, Dog Meat, G-Spot. Inspired - some of Dad's tours played down to audience, with too much Dinah-Moe, Keep it Greasy, Honey Don't You Want a Man like Me, Bobby Brown etc for the Titties & Beer contingent. Was delighted the songs seem to have been chosen on musical merit. One numbskull at the back shouted 'Play something we know' and I wish I'd shouted 'Play something we don't know'.

Amazing guitar playing. For me, it was just Frank there in the room. Far better than 88 tour - nastier, more raw, more energy, the band clearly enjoying themselves, and only a tiny amount of rehearsed 'humor' with wigs and crap like that.

Dweezil seemed to enjoy himself, smiling throughout. Well done for finding a way of playing the classics without resorting to the 1980s band's ubiquitous cod-reggae rhythm tracks.

I could never imagine I'd say this, but providing the set list evolves - and all the cheesy over-played stuff remains offside - I'll definitely come back again next year. Bring Nappy along with you, and I can die a happy man.

great show,superbly played Frank would be proud. Loved the set so much talent on one stage how about 2/3 nights next year

Great gig!

Haven't stopped humming Carolina Hardcore since!

Ray White - Superb! thank you!



Everyone who ever goes to a gig finds themselves next to or near some drunken ignorant morons - it's living proof that the most abundant element in the universe is stupidity - as Frank once put it.

Can't wait to see y'all again - make it soon and maybe more dates - dare I say it - outside London?

Just want to say a HUGE thank you to Dweezil and the band!! Crikey - you guys can shred on the gee-tars!!! I wasn't 100% familiar with all the songs played - but - I came away from the show blown away.

Fantastic musicianship and everyone looked like they had a great time. I love to see performers enjoying themselves at a gig - it adds a lot to the experience. One of my favorite things was the "play along w/ Frank" video - awesome to see.

Also delighted to see Ray on stage - he sounded great. Lots of power in his delivery - and it looks like he had some fun too The last time I saw Ray was when he was playing w/ KVHW in the states (loved it all!).

The setlist looks similar to the 26-Sep gig in Tilburg.

Thank you again - I really enjoyed the show and my guess is that by the looks on the faces around me, everyone else did too. The dude leaning over the front balcony was certainly digging it too!

Fantastic show, choice of material was suberb indeed!

I suspect that this is the UK's fault and not ZPZ's fault. Usually, it is venues that book bands, not the other way around. I mean, there's managers and promoters and whatnot in there but I believe that the relationship is in that direction.

Call me a curmudgeon, but the real live music scene in this country is pretty poor. There's not enough promotion / interest for venues to take risks on stuff that is not seen as being very commercial. Continental Europe is so much better in this respect. Culture is encouraged and embraced. Holland has 1/4 of our population but 2x the ZPZ gigs. That's a factor of 8!

With the audience response in London on Tuesday night though (multiple standing ovations) and similar in Manchester last year, maybe next time round there's more chance for Birmingam, Glasgow, Cardiff, etc...

An awesome, jaw-dropping, thoroughly invigorating show which I am so happy to have been able to attend. I feel sorry for the people further away from The Big Smoke who missed out.

When Ray White came on and launched into "City Of Tiny Lights", I was in instant heaven. We also had "Dog Breath" and "G-Spot Tornado". Can it get any better? Dweezil is dead on the right tracks here trying to bring THE MUSIC to a wider audience.

Bravo!!

What a mind-blowing-and-heart-stopping-experience it was. The intensity of the gig was amazing, except for the short noise improvisation which started the whole extravaganza. I think the first time I was able to inhale after the show had started, was when busting in to the laughter with the "Thai Lady-Boy" improvisation. Rest of the show continued with the same flow.

The solo's in Dupree's Paradise were veeery hoooot and everybody on the stage seemed to be in flames (honorary mention for Aaron).

Frank came to the stage on film on exactly right moment's and I am still amazed how well the video footage and band played together. It didn't feel a bit akward as I felt before the show.

Black Napkins, Willie the Pimp, Wind up, What's new in Baltimore, Dumb all over, Zoot Allures, Suzy, America Drinks, Brown Shoes, Muffin Man, Joe's Garage, G-Spot, Caroline, DogMeat, AAAARGGG the set list was awsome, all brave choices in favour of the music. I am not a big fan of Illinois Enema Bandit, but Billy's introduction got me to the mood for even that particular piece of American History.

Dweezil played extremely elegantly and Ray is/was/and always will be THE voice of the universe.

Sheperds Bush Empire was a great venue for the show and the sounds were amazingly clear i.e. thumbs up also for the sound guys.

Travelling from Finland "just" for the show in London made my ecological footprint a little bit bigger, but for this reason it was worth it.

Music is the best! Thank you Dweezil for keeping Frank's music alive.

ps. Danny H., next time you can't leave Helsinki outside of this tour, I took your words as a promise!

I wasn't sure what to expect from this show. Before last years show I'd been keeping a very close eye on the tour so by the time I got to the show I felt like I knew exactly what was going to happen. For this show I did the opposite and intentionally kept myself in the dark so to not ruin the surprise. I wasn't disappointed, the show was fantastic. I won't give a song by song account, just some thoughts and personal highlights.

The band came on at just gone 8 and opened with a very brief sound check/improvisation followed by Black Napkin, complete with a solo from Frank, and played for about 2 hours 45. There were numerous appearance from Frank during the show, mostly taken from the 1980 tour. The video was well integrated into the show. Last year the video felt slightly eerie, as if it was the Ghost Of Frank Zappa. In hindsight last years show felt more like a tribute than a celebration, I guess this was inpart due to the rather formal surroundings of the Royal Albert Hall. This year however it was defiantly a celebration with Frank occasionally popping in to join the party. I think it's worth noting the time keeping skills of the drummers that were performing with Frank in the videos and also of the band on stage. Both would need to be exceptionally tight for this time-machine trick to be accomplished. My guess is that Joe plays to a click derived from the video.

The set list was completely different from last year, bar one songs but said song was performed in a different arrangement. There were a good number of Franks shorter compositions and less guitar solos. Dweezil is a great guitarist and I enjoy his solos, but Franks the star of these shows. The arrangements were more varied then last year, last year Dweezil performed a lot of the tricky part on guitar (the St' Alphonzos vibe section being a good example) this time the tricky bits seemed to be more evenly distributed around the band. Ray White was fantastic. His voice was just as powerful when he played with Frank and his improvisational skills were put to great use.

My one criticism is that I didn't think Zoot Alures was as tight as the other songs. The album version of Zoot is one of the few Frank tunes that has a prominent introspective aspect to it. However the live renditions from the 80's is performed bombastically. The beauty in the 80's version, for me, is the way the band manage to preserver the delicate melody, despite the power of the performance. Kind of like a ballerining grizzly bear. The rendition from last night wasn't one or the other, in fact it sounded fairly uncomfortable with itselfs. Dweezil did say that he'd "just learnt it" so lack of rehearsal is probably the culprit here. Anyway this one tiny criticism does nothing to undermine the otherwise exceptional performance and I feel like a party pooper even mentioning it!

The venue was great. I was just to left of the stage, in front of Pete and Scheila, and the sound was fantastic, not too loud and crystal clear. Being able to do shake my ass a bit was loads better than being in a seat. Some of Franks tunes have got such great grooves it's difficult not to move. Dweezil commented that he'd never seen a mosh pit to Illinois Enema Bandit. I really hope they use the same venue next year.... actually I really hope they pick a venue in Bristol, but I think that's unlikely.

Some minor points; the band is hairier than last time and Scheila's hot.

Cheers
Ben

The massive regret I have in my life is that I was too young to go to the only opportunity I ever had, realistically, of hearing Frank play live - the '88 tour. With Frank's death I assumed a decent live concert would be something I would only hear only on part of a CD. Last year, I couldnt see the ZPZ concert in the UK due to prior engagments and so I thought that was probably that.

How wrong I was - it returned , and how my long wait has finally been rewarded. A stunning concert, full of superbly played material. Hear I echo earlier postings of what an excellent choice of music too. For me Dweezil's playing and ability to solo in different styles was astonishing. The solo on Pygmy twylyte was awesome, and I was actually feeling moved by it. Also what a great choice to play Ship Ahoy too - a track I've always loved.

And to have RAY WHITE! I lept from my chair as Dweezil announced he was the guest. Still has an astounding voice.

I brought along an old friend who lives in London. Although I've only had an influence enough to get him to buy a few Zappa albums, he did want to come along. He was dumbstruck by the quaility of the composition and music. When I left him yesterday, he was off to buy some more!

It made me think of something Dweezil said at the show - "spread the word". Make the world realise what a genius Zappa was (and still is).

I'm already eager for next year's concert. Thank you so much Dweezil[/quote]

As everyone has said already, a great, great gig. Frank would have been proud.

I tried to post a link to a review I posted on another site. (Nothing to do with pump'n'dump stock options or dubious medication - honest!) But I haven't made enough posts.

So I will try again when I have.

In the meantime. Can we please, please, please have more UK dates next year? Not because I want somewhere nearer (though that would be nice) but so I can go to all of them!