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Frank Zappa | |
|---|---|
 Zappa performing at Ekeberghallen in Oslo, Norway, in 1977 | |
| Born | Frank Vincent Zappa December 21, 1940 Baltimore, Maryland, U.S. |
| Died | December 4, 1993 (aged 52) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Resting place | Pierce Brothers Westwood Village Memorial Park and Mortuary |
| Occupations |
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| Years active | 1955–1993 |
| Spouses |
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| Children | |
| Musical career | |
| Origin | Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Genres | |
| Instruments |
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| Discography | Frank Zappa discography |
| Labels | |
| Formerly of | |
| Website | zappa |
Frank Vincent Zappa[nb 1] (/ˈzæpə/ ZAP-ə; December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993) was an American musician, composer, and bandleader. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa composed rock, pop, jazz, jazz fusion, orchestral and musique concrète works; he also produced almost all of the 60-plus albums that he released with his band the Mothers of Invention and as a solo artist.[2] His work is characterized by nonconformity, improvisation[3] sound experimentation, musical virtuosity and satire of American culture.[4] Zappa also directed feature-length films and music videos, and designed album covers. He is considered one of the most innovative and stylistically diverse musicians of his generation.[5][6]
As a mostly self-taught composer and performer, Zappa had diverse musical influences that led him to create music that was sometimes difficult to categorize. While in his teens, he acquired a taste for 20th-century classical modernism, African-American rhythm and blues, and doo-wop music.[7] He began writing classical music in high school, while simultaneously playing drums in rhythm and blues bands, later switching to electric guitar. His debut studio album with the Mothers of Invention, Freak Out! (1966), combined satirical but seemingly conventional rock and roll songs with extended sound collages. He continued this eclectic and experimental approach throughout his career.
Zappa's output is unified by a conceptual continuity he termed "Project/Object", with numerous musical phrases, ideas, and characters reappearing across his albums.[4] His lyrics reflected his iconoclastic views of established social and political processes, structures and movements, often humorously so, and he has been described as the "godfather" of comedy rock.[8] He was a strident critic of mainstream education and organized religion, and a forthright and passionate advocate for freedom of speech, self-education, political participation and the abolition of censorship. Unlike many other rock musicians of his generation, he disapproved of recreational drug use, but supported decriminalization and regulation.
Zappa was a highly productive and prolific artist with a controversial critical standing; supporters of his music admired its compositional complexity, while detractors found it lacking emotional depth.[9] He had greater commercial success outside the US, particularly in Europe. Though he worked as an independent artist, Zappa mostly relied on distribution agreements he had negotiated with the major record labels. He remains a major influence on musicians and composers. His many honors include his posthumous 1995 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the 1997 Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.
1940–1965: Early life and career[edit]
Childhood[edit]
Zappa was born on December 21, 1940, in Baltimore, Maryland, to Rose Marie (née Colimore) and Francis Vincent Zappa. He was of Sicilian, Greek, Arab and French descent.[nb 2]
Frank, the eldest of four children, was raised in an Italian-American household where Italian was often spoken by his grandparents.[1]: 6 [10] The family moved often because his father, a chemist and mathematician, worked in the defense industry. After a time in Florida in the 1940s, the family returned to Maryland, where Zappa's father worked at the Edgewood Arsenal chemical warfare facility of the Aberdeen Proving Ground run by the U.S. Army. Due to their home's proximity to the arsenal, which stored mustard gas, gas masks were kept in the home in case of an accident.[1]: 20–23 This living arrangement had a profound effect on Zappa, and references to germs, germ warfare, ailments and the defense industry occur frequently throughout his work.[11]: 8–9
Zappa's father often brought mercury-filled lab equipment home from his workplace and gave it to Zappa to play with.[1]: 19 Zappa said that as a child he "used to play with it all the time", often by putting liquid mercury on the floor and using a hammer to spray out mercury droplets in a circular pattern, eventually covering the entire floor of his bedroom with them.[12]
Zappa was often sick as a child, suffering from asthma, earaches and sinus problems. A doctor treated his sinusitis by inserting a pellet of radium into each of Zappa's nostrils. At the time, little was known about the potential dangers of even small amounts of therapeutic radiation and mercury exposure.[11]: 10
Nasal imagery and references appear in his music and lyrics, as well as in the collage album covers created by his long-time collaborator Cal Schenkel. Zappa believed his childhood diseases might have been due to exposure to mustard gas, released by the nearby chemical warfare facility, and his health worsened when he lived in Baltimore.[1]: 20–23 [11]: 10 In 1952, his family relocated for reasons of health to Monterey, California, where his father taught metallurgy at the Naval Postgraduate School.[1]: 22 They soon moved to the San Diego neighborhood of Clairemont,[13]: 46 and then to the nearby city of El Cajon, before finally returning to San Diego.[14]
First musical interests[edit]
Since I didn't have any kind of formal training, it didn't make any difference to me if I was listening to Lightnin' Slim, or a vocal group called the Jewels ..., or Webern, or Varèse, or Stravinsky. To me it was all good music.
— Frank Zappa, 1989[1]: 34
Zappa started at the age of 12, learning drum rudiments at a summer-school group course in Monterey, California with a teacher named Keith McKillop. Frank said "Instead of drums, he had us practicing on wooden planks."[1]: 13 Zappa joined his first band at Mission Bay High School in San Diego as a drummer.[1]: 29 At about the same time, his parents bought a phonograph, which allowed him to develop his interest in music, and to begin building his record collection.[11]: 22 According to The Rough Guide to Rock (2003), "as a teenager Zappa was simultaneously enthralled by black R&B (Johnny 'Guitar' Watson, Guitar Slim), doo-wop (The Channels, The Velvets), and modern composers, such as Igor Stravinsky, Anton Webern and Edgard Varèse."[7]
R&B singles were early purchases for Zappa, starting a large collection he kept for the rest of his life.[11]: 36 He was interested in sounds for their own sake, particularly the sounds of drums and other percussion instruments. By age twelve, he had obtained a snare drum and began learning the basics of orchestral percussion.[1]: 29 Zappa's deep interest in modern classical music began[15] when he read a LOOK magazine article about the Sam Goody record store chain that lauded its ability to sell an LP as obscure as The Complete Works of Edgard Varèse, Volume One.[1]: 30–33 The article described Varèse's percussion composition Ionisation, produced by EMS Recordings, as "a weird jumble of drums and other unpleasant sounds". Zappa decided to seek out Varèse's music. After searching for over a year, Zappa found a copy (he noticed the LP because of the "mad scientist" looking photo of Varèse on the cover). Not having enough money with him, he persuaded the salesman to sell him the record at a discount.[1]: 30–33 Thus began his lifelong passion for Varèse's music and that of other modern classical composers. He also liked the Italian classical music listened to by his grandparents, especially Puccini's opera arias.
By 1956, the Zappa family had moved to Lancaster, a small aerospace and farming town in the Antelope Valley of the Mojave Desert close to Edwards Air Force Base; he would later refer to Sun Village (a town close to Lancaster) in the 1973 track "Village of the Sun".[16] Zappa's mother encouraged him in his musical interests. Although she disliked Varèse's music, she was indulgent enough to give her son a long-distance call to the New York composer as a fifteenth birthday present.[1]: 30–33 Unfortunately, Varèse was in Europe at the time, so Zappa spoke to the composer's wife and she suggested he call back later. In a letter, Varèse thanked him for his interest, and told him about a composition he was working on called "Déserts". Living in the desert town of Lancaster, Zappa found this very exciting. Varèse invited him to visit if he ever came to New York. The meeting never took place (Varèse died in 1965), but Zappa framed the letter and kept it on display for the rest of his life.[15][nb 3]
At Antelope Valley High School, Zappa met Don Glen Vliet (who later changed his name to Don Van Vliet and adopted the stage name Captain Beefheart). Zappa and Vliet became close friends, sharing an interest in R&B records and influencing each other musically throughout their careers.[13]: 29–30 Around the same time, Zappa started playing drums in a local band, the Blackouts.[18]: 13 The band was racially diverse and included Euclid James "Motorhead" Sherwood who later became a member of the Mothers of Invention. Zappa's interest in the guitar grew, and in 1957 he was given his first instrument. Among his early influences were Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Howlin' Wolf and Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown. In the 1970s/1980s, he invited Watson to perform on several albums. Zappa considered soloing the equivalent of forming "air sculptures",[19] and developed an eclectic, innovative and highly personal style.[20] He was also influenced by Egyptian composer Halim El-Dabh.[21]
Zappa's interest in composing and arranging flourished in his last high-school years. By his final year, he was writing, arranging and conducting avant-garde performance pieces for the school orchestra.[11]: 40 He graduated from Antelope Valley High School in 1958, and later acknowledged two of his music teachers on the sleeve of the 1966 album Freak Out![22]: 23 Due to his family's frequent moves, Zappa attended at least six different high schools, and as a student he was often bored and given to distracting the rest of the class with juvenile antics.[11]: 48 In 1959, he attended Chaffey College but left after one semester, and maintained thereafter a disdain for formal education, taking his children out of school at age 15 and refusing to pay for their college.[11]: 345 While in college, Zappa met Terry Kirkman and played gigs at local coffee houses with him.[23]
Zappa left home in 1959, and moved into a small apartment in Echo Park, Los Angeles. After he met Kathryn J. "Kay" Sherman during his short period of private composition study with Prof. Karl Kohn of Pomona College, they moved in together in Ontario, and were married December 28, 1960.[11]: 58 Zappa worked for a short period in advertising as a copywriter. His sojourn in the commercial world was brief, but gave him valuable insights into its workings.[1]: 40 [24] Throughout his career, he took a keen interest in the visual presentation of his work, designing some of his album covers and directing his own films and videos.
Studio Z[edit]
Zappa attempted to earn a living as a musician and composer, and played different nightclub gigs, some with a new version of the Blackouts.[11]: 59 Zappa's earliest professional recordings, two soundtracks for the low-budget films The World's Greatest Sinner (1962) and Run Home Slow (1965) were more financially rewarding. The former score was commissioned by actor-producer Timothy Carey and recorded in 1961. It contains many themes that appeared on later Zappa records.[11]: 63 The latter soundtrack was recorded in 1963 after the film was completed, but it was commissioned by one of Zappa's former high school teachers in 1959 and Zappa may have worked on it before the film was shot.[11]: 55 Excerpts from the soundtrack can be heard on the posthumous album The Lost Episodes (1996).
During the early 1960s, Zappa wrote and produced songs for other local artists, often working with singer-songwriter Ray Collins and producer Paul Buff. Their "Memories of El Monte" was recorded by the Penguins, although only Cleve Duncan of the original group was featured.[25] Buff owned the small Pal Recording Studio in Cucamonga, which included a unique five-track tape recorder he had built. At that time, only a handful of the most sophisticated commercial studios had multi-track facilities; the industry standard for smaller studios was still mono or two-track.[1]: 42 Although none of the recordings from the period achieved major commercial success, Zappa earned enough money to allow him in 1963 to stage a concert of his orchestral music and to broadcast and record it.[11]: 74 In March of that same year Zappa appeared on Steve Allen's syndicated late night show playing a bicycle as a musical instrument[26][27]: 35–36 — using drum sticks and a bow borrowed from the band's bass player he proceeded to pluck, bang, and bow the spokes of the bike, producing strange, comical sounds from his newfound instrument. With Captain Beefheart, Zappa recorded some songs under the name of the Soots. They were rejected by Dot Records. Later, the Mothers were also rejected by Columbia Records for having "no commercial potential", a verdict Zappa subsequently quoted on the sleeve of Freak Out![18]: 27
In 1964, after his marriage started to break up, he moved into the Pal studio and began routinely working 12 hours or more per day recording and experimenting with overdubbing and audio tape manipulation. This established a work pattern that endured for most of his life.[1]: 43 Aided by his income from film composing, Zappa took over the studio from Paul Buff, who was now working with Art Laboe at Original Sound. It was renamed Studio Z.[11]: 80–81 Studio Z was rarely booked for recordings by other musicians. Instead, friends moved in, notably James "Motorhead" Sherwood.[11]: 82–83 Zappa started performing in local bars as a guitarist with a power trio, the Muthers, to support himself.[18]: 26
An article in the local press describing Zappa as "the Movie King of Cucamonga" prompted the local police to suspect that he was making pornographic films.[11]: 85 In March 1965, Zappa was approached by a vice squad undercover officer, and accepted an offer of $100 (equivalent to $970 in 2023) to produce a suggestive audio tape for an alleged stag party. Zappa and a female friend recorded a faked erotic episode. When Zappa was about to hand over the tape, he was arrested, and the police stripped the studio of all recorded material.[11]: 85 The press was tipped off beforehand, and next day's The Daily Report wrote that "Vice Squad investigators stilled the tape recorders of a free-swinging, a-go-go film and recording studio here Friday and arrested a self-styled movie producer".[28] Zappa was charged with "conspiracy to commit pornography".[1]: 57 This felony charge was reduced and he was sentenced to six months in jail on a misdemeanor, with all but ten days suspended.[11]: 86–87 His brief imprisonment left a permanent mark, and was central to the formation of his anti-authoritarian stance.[11]: xv Zappa lost several recordings made at Studio Z in the process, as the police returned only 30 of 80 hours of tape seized.[11]: 87 Eventually, he could no longer afford to pay the rent on the studio and was evicted.[27]: 40 Zappa managed to recover some of his possessions before the studio was torn down in 1966.[11]: 90–91
1965–1970: The Mothers of Invention[edit]
Formation[edit]
By April 1965, Ray Collins, one of Zappa's friends during the early Studio Z days, was the singer of an R&B band called the Soul Giants, based in Pomona, California. That month, he asked Zappa to take over as guitarist in the Soul Giants, following a fight between Collins and the group's original guitarist.[10] Zappa accepted, and soon assumed leadership and the role as co-lead singer (even though he never considered himself a singer, then or later[29]). He convinced the other members that they should play his music to increase the chances of getting a record contract.[1]: 65–66 The band - comprising Zappa, Collins, Roy Estrada, and Jimmy Carl Black - debuted at the Broadside Club and was renamed the Mothers since this gig took place on May 10, 1965 – Mother's Day.[13]: 42 They increased their bookings after beginning an association with manager Herb Cohen, and gradually gained attention on the burgeoning Los Angeles underground music scene.[22]: 58 In early 1966, they were spotted by leading record producer Tom Wilson when playing "Trouble Every Day", a song about the Watts riots.[11]: 103 Wilson had earned acclaim as the producer for Bob Dylan and Simon & Garfunkel, and was one of the few African-Americans working as a major label pop music producer at this time. Wilson signed the Mothers to the Verve division of MGM, which had built up a strong reputation for its releases of modern jazz recordings in the 1940s and 1950s, but was attempting to diversify into pop and rock audiences. Verve insisted that the band officially rename themselves the Mothers of Invention as Mother was short for motherfucker—a term that, apart from its profane meanings, can denote a skilled musician.[30] Under Zappa's leadership, the Mothers' lineup would be ever-changing during their time together, with members including Collins, Estrada, Black, Elliot Ingber, brothers Bunk and Buzz Gardner, Don Preston, Billy Mundi, Jim Fielder, Jim "Motorhead" Sherwood, Ian Underwood, Art Tripp, and Lowell George.
Debut album: Freak Out![edit]
With Wilson credited as producer, the Mothers of Invention, augmented by a studio orchestra, recorded the groundbreaking Freak Out! (1966), which, after Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde, was the second rock double album ever released. It mixed R&B, doo-wop, musique concrète,[31]: 25 and experimental sound collages that captured the "freak" subculture of Los Angeles at that time.[22]