Zappa quotes?

H. Snijder

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Oct 26, 1996, 3:00:00 AM10/26/96

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Hello!

I'm looking for quotes or remarks by Frank Zappa,

please post or mail some!

Thanks!

Philip.

Jukka Lehtinen

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Oct 27, 1996, 2:00:00 AM10/27/96

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A Good old one:

In a conflict between you and the world, place your bets for the world.

And what about this:

If you agree with someone, you have probably agreed with him already
and you always will. I have learned that peoples opinions cannot be
changed.

The best source for more compherensive Ultimate Truths is of course
"The Real Frank Zappa Book" (1988) available in your nearest library.

I might too be moving to Montana soon...

Peace!
Jari "Tekno-Kekko" Lehtinen, Lahti, FIN.

Dianne Hackborn

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Oct 27, 1996, 2:00:00 AM10/27/96

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Hark! The herald Jukka Lehtinen <juk...@sci.fi> posts:

| A Good old one:
| In a conflict between you and the world, place your bets for the world.

Ah, I haven't used that one yet. *snag* :)

I can include all of the FZ quotes that currently cycle through my .sigs...
and yes, the vast majority of these come from _The Real Frank Zappa Book_.
:)

[Signature number 18]
/ "The person who stands up and says, ``This is stupid,'' either is asked
| to `behave' or, worse, is greeted with a cheerful ``Yes, we know! Isn't
| it terrific!''"
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 19]
/ "The more BORING a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the
| child, receive adulation for being GOOD PARENTS -- because they have a
| TAME CHILD-CREATURE in their house."
\ -- FZ

[Signature number 20]
/
| "Jazz is not dead, it just smells funny."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 21]
/ "The worst aspect of `typical familyism' (as media-merchandised) is that
| it glorifies _involuntary_homogenization_."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 22]
/ "Gail has said in interviews that one of the things that makes our
| relationship work is the fact that we hardly ever get to talk to each
| other."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 23]
/ "The language and concepts contained herein are guaranteed not to cause
| eternal torment in the place where the guy with the horns and pointed
| stick conducts his business."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 24]
/ "My best advice to anyone who wants to raise a happy, mentally healthy
| child is: Keep him or her as far away from a church as you can."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 25]
/ "Information in not knowledge; Knowledge is not wisdom; Wisdom is not
| truth; Truth is not beauty; Beauty is not love; Love is not music;
| Music is THE BEST. . ."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 26]
/ "I like having the capitol of the United States in Washington, D.C., in
| spite of recent efforts to move it to Lynchburg, Virginia."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 27]
/ "Children are naive -- they trust everyone. School is bad enough, but,
| if you put a child anywhere in the vicinity of a church, you're asking
| for trouble."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 28]
/ "It would be easier to pay off the national debt overnight than to
| neutralize the long-range effects of OUR NATIONAL STUPIDITY."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 29]
/
| "Politics is the entertainment branch of industry."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 30]
/ "Star Wars won't work. Star Wars won't work. The gas still gets
| through; it could get right on you. And what about those germs, now?
| Star Wars won't work."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 31]
/ "Thanks to our schools and political leadership, the U.S. has acquired an
| international reputation as the home of 250 million people dumb enough to
| buy 'The Wacky Wall-Walker.'"
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 32]
/
| "Stupidity has a certain charm -- ignorance does not."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 33]
/ "The single-child yuppo-family that uses the child as a status object:
| ``A perfect child? Of course! We have one here -- he's under the coffee
| table. Ralph, stand up! Play the violin!''"
\ -- FZ

[Signature number 34]
/ "But women are pathetic when they make themselves stupid. There's even
| more of a stigma to being a smart girl than there is to being a smart
| guy."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 35]
/ "Do your part.
| Pull your weight.
| Don't be a flake."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 36]
/ "Another thing you have to remember about all science and all art: it is
| impossible if you're starving to death."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 37]
/ "I've seen people who will willingly arrest, try and punish their own
| brains. Now that's really sad."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 38]
/ "He [Barney Frank] is one of the most impressive guys in Congress. He is
| a great model for young gay men."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 39]
/ "I figure the odds be fifty-fifty
| I just might have some thing to say." -- Frank Zappa
|
\

[Signature number 40]
/ "A composer is a guy who goes around forcing his will on unsuspecting air
| molecules, often with the assistance of unsuspecting musicians."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 41]
/
| "Anything, any time, anywhere -- for no reason at all."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 42]
/
| "Of course it's MEGA-STUPID. That's why I like it."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 43]
/ "``Conducting'' is when you draw 'designs' out of nowhere ... which are
| interpreted as 'instructional messages' by guys wearing bow ties who wish
| they were fishing."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 44]
/ "The creation and destruction of harmonic and `statistical' tensions is
| essential to the maintenance of -compositional- -drama-."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 45]
/
| "Without deviation (from the norm), `progress' is not possible."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 46]
/ "If you live life in pursuit of `certification,' `appreciation,' or
| `compensation' in any form from your parents, you're making a big
| mistake."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 47]
/ "We could improve worldwide mental health if we acknowledged that parents
| make you crazy."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 48]
/ "Parents have more to do with making their children weird than TV or rock
| and roll records."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 49]
/ "The only other thing that makes [children] weirder than TV and parents
| is religion and drugs."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 50]
/ "New wave evolved from punk, basically, by sterilizing its own safety
| pin."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 51]
/ "No change in musical style will survive unless it is accompanied by a
| change in clothing style."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 52]
/ "It isn't necessary to imagine the world ending in fire or ice -- there
| are two other possibilities: one is paperwork, and the other is
| nostalgia."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 53]
/ "There is something to be said for an executive who is willing to take a
| chance on an idea, even if he doesn't like it or understand it."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 54]
/ "Some people fear that if the unions were to vanish, the labor situation
| would return to the way it was in the beginning, with child labor and
| sweat shops. I agree with them."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 55]
/ "Most people offended by my lyrics seem to be rock critics. The audience
| usually likes them."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 56]
/ "The manner in which Americans `consume' music has a lot to do with
| leaving it on their coffee tables."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 57]
/ "Why do you necessarily have to be WRONG just because a few million
| people THINK you are?"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 58]
/ "Maybe there's a chemical in beer that stimulates the [male] brain to =do
| violence= while =moving in the same direction= as other guys who smell
| like them."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 59]
/ "We, as a group of MEN, will drink this refreshing liquid, after which we
| will get together and beat the snot out of that guy over there."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 60]
/ "With whiskey, you might want to murder your girlfriend -- but beer makes
| you want to do it =with your buddies watching=."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 61]
/
| "You can't be a Real Country unless you have A BEER and an airline."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 62]
/ "In contrast to Mr. Beer Guy, picture a guy who is religiously devoted to
| Chateau Latour. Is he marching? He ain't marching."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 63]
/ "People should be encouraged to look after their own self-interest, but
| avoid =inflicting= themselves on other people."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 64]
/
| "When Republicans really go at it, they ``let off balloons.''"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 65]
/ "There's no question in my mind -- the beer, the balloons =and= the
| bunting all start with 'B' for some Cosmic Reason."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 66]
/ "I say there is more =stupidity= than =hydrogen=, and THAT is the basic
| building block of the universe."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 67]
/ "Stupidity is =replicating itself= at an astonishing rate. It breeds
| easily and is self-financing."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 68]
/ "Our school systems train kids to be IGNORANT, WITH STYLE -- functional
| ignoramuses."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 69]
/ "I believe that U.S. schools have a Search and Destroy program, aimed at
| any hint of creative thinking exhibited by students."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 70]
/ "I think that a marriage without a friendship has to be pretty dreadful."
|
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 71]
/ "Anyone who is `the boss' in a business does not get to have `friends' --
| he gets to have employees and/or acquaintances."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 72]
/ "The rest of us may find televangelists entertaining, but
| eleven-year-olds generally don't."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 73]
/ "What was it that Adam ate that he wasn't supposed to eat? It wasn't
| =just an apple= -- it was the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good
| and Evil."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 74]
/ "Does anybody remember that Jim and Tammy Bakker were brought in as
| guests for Reagan's inauguration, and in 1983 Mr. Ron gave them a
| HUMANITARIAN AWARD?"
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 75]
/ "One reason people PRACTICE religion is that participation creates the
| illusion of belonging to an extended family."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 76]
/
| "I don't think prayer in its =truest sense= is anything to scoff at."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 77]
/
| "One man's `prayer' is another man's `unknown quantity.'"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 78]
/
| "Missionary evangelism is the height of cultural arrogance."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 79]
/ "The goal of U.S.-based evangelism has been, more often than not, to
| render docile a native labor force, so that it might be exploited later
| by a multinational company."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 80]
/
| "The strongest defense any nation can have is a robust economy."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 81]
/ "A nation is really strong when everybody's got a piece of the action.
| EVERYBODY."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 82]
/
| "We are not going to have a big-ass Mondo Nuclear War. Period."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 83]
/ "It is a strategic necessity (as much as a moral one) for the U.S. to see
| that apartheid is brought to an end."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 84]
/ "There has always been a symbiotic relationship between right-wing
| administrations and purveyors of `sinful goods.'"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 85]
/ "Alchohol prohibition gave us Eliot Ness. Drug prohibition gave us Nancy
| Reagan, George Bush, Manuel Noriega, Oliver North."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 86]
/ "Darlin', every crystal that crawled up your nose has helped to create
| the economic power base for a worldwide secret government."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 87]
/ "I believe that people have the right to decide their own destinies;
| =people own themselves=."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 88]
/
| "In a democracy, you own the government -- it doesn't own you."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 89]
/
| "A drug is neither moral nor immoral -- it's a chemical compound."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 90]
/ "Communism doesn't work. It's against the basic law of nature: ``PEOPLE
| WANT TO OWN STUFF.''"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 91]
/
| "The Cold War? Have another Pepsi -- it makes you moonwalk."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 92]
/ "In exporting their philosophy, the Soviets employed a technique
| reminiscent of U.S. evangelical TV ministries."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 93]
/ "In every language, the first word after ``Mama!'' that every kid learns
| to say is ``Mine!''"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 94]
/ "People want a piece of their own little Something-or-Other, and, if they
| don't get it, have a tendency to initiate counterrevolution."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 95]
/ "Americans like to talk about (or be told about) Democracy but, when put
| to the test, usually find it to be an `inconvenience.'"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 96]
/ "They used to give kids in sixth grade something called the Kuder
| Preference Test. My test results indicated that my destiny was to become
| a secretary. I scored highest in `clerical.'"
\ -- FZ

[Signature number 97]
/
| "Don't forget to register to vote."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 98]
/ "Only the boring and bland shall survive!
| Only the lamest of lameness shall thrive!
| Take it or leave it, you won't be alive,
\ If you are overtly CREATIVE!" -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 99]
/ "If ever there was something [women's lib] could use to prove the
| inferiority of the male species, it's the extremely low number of women
| who play air guitar."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 100]
/ "I think the ear prefers variety, unless you happen to be one of those
| mongoloids who thinks that the drum machine is the greatest device known
| to mankind."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 101]
/ "Politics is involved with salesmanship. Government is involved with
| statesmanship."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 102]
/ "Failure is...an inevitability in 99% of all human undertakings. Success
| is rare -- that's why people get so cranked up about it."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 103]
/
| "Bedtime for Bonzo II: Terror of the Green Monkey."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 104]
/ "The Sexual Revolution: A world of sexual incompetents, encountering each
| other under Disco Circumstances."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 105]
/ "It's pretty easy to hate me, for whatever you choose to hate me for,
| because I'm virtually unrepentant. And I just don't care."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 106]
/ "Ugly is bad, and bad is wrong, and wrong is sinful, and sin leads to
| ETERNAL DAMNATION!"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 107]
/ "Beauty is a French phonetic corruption of a short cloth neck ornament
| currently in resurgence."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 108]
/ "All governments perpetuate themselves through the daily commission of
| acts which a rational person might find to be stupid or dangerous (or
| both)."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 109]
/
| "Welcome to the First Church of Appliantology!"
| -- L. Ron Hoover
\

[Signature number 110]
/ "What's the ugliest part of your body? Some say your nose, some say your
| toes, but I think it's your mind."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 111]
/
| "Who are the brain police?"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 112]
/ "If your children ever find out how LAME you really are, they'll murder
| you in your sleep."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 113]
/
| "Ketchup is a vegetable."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 137]
/ "Nuclear explosions under the Nevada desert? What the fuck are we
| testing for? We already know the shit blows up."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 138]
/ "Washington, D.C.: a city infested with statues -- and Congressional
| Blow-Boys who WISH they were statues."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 139]
/
| "The real question is: Is it possible to laugh while fucking?"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 140]
/ "There are a lot of reasons why musicians like to play solos on stage --
| but the usual reason in rock and roll is to get The Blow Job."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 141]
/ "The Ultimate Rule ought to be: ``If it sounds GOOD to YOU, it's bitchen;
| and if it sounds BAD to YOU, it's shitty.''"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 142]
/ "Americans use drugs as if consumption bestowed a `special license' to be
| an asshole."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 143]
/ "Every natural human urge has been thwarted in one way or another, so
| that some cocksucker gets to make a dollar off your guilt."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 144]
/ "Heaven would be a place where bullshit existed only on television.
| (Hallelujah! We's halfway there!)"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 145]
/ "If you took Beer, Balloons and Bunting, then stirred in the Bullshit,
| you'd wind up with ... how the Republican Party works its Special Magic
| on the American electorate."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 146]
/ "Nobody looks good with brown lipstick on, but Al [Gore] looked
| RIDICULOUS."
| -- Frank Zappa, commenting on the PMRC hearings
\

[Signature number 147]
/
| "My humble curse: May your shit come to life, and kiss you."
| -- Frank Zappa
\

[Signature number 148]
/ "I never took a shit on stage, and the closest I ever came to eating shit
| =anywhere= was at a Holiday Inn buffet in Fayetteville, North Carolina,
| in 1973."
\ -- Frank Zappa

[Signature number 149]
/ "Fairies and faggots and queers are `CREATIVE'
| All the best music on Broadway is `NATIVE'"
| -- The Evil Prince
\

[Signature number 150]
/
| "So long as somebody gets a laugh out of it, what the fuck?"
| -- Frank Zappa
\

-------------------------+--------------------------------------------
__ Dianne Kyra Hackborn | "Bedtime for Bonzo II: Terror of the Green
\/ Oregon State Univ. | Monkey."
hac...@cs.orst.edu | -- Frank Zappa
The wheel turns... |
<URL:http://www.cs.orst.edu/~hackbod/>

Matthew D Lavallee

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Oct 29, 1996, 3:00:00 AM10/29/96

to

In article <bwauhs.8...@asterix.urc.tue.nl>,
bwa...@urc.tue.nl (H. Snijder) wrote:

>I'm looking for quotes or remarks by Frank Zappa,

Here's a whole lot:

Remember there's a big difference between kneeling down and bending over.

You drank beer, you played golf, you watched football - WE EVOLVED!

Don't mind your make-up, you'd better make your mind up.

I have a message to deliver to the cute people of the world...if you're
cute, or maybe you're beautiful...there's MORE OF US UGLY MOTHERFUCKERS
OUT THERE THAN YOU ARE!! So watch out.

Number one ain't you...
You ain't even number two.

A prune isn't really a vegetable...
CABBAGE is a vegetable...

I'll do the stupid thing first and then you shy people follow...

Stupidity is the basic building block of the universe.

I'm not black, but there's a whole lot of
times I wish I could say I'm not white.

Another day, another sausage...

On a personal level, Freaking Out is a process whereby an
individual casts off outmoded and restricting standars of
thinking, dress, and social etiquette in order to express
CREATIVELY his relationship to his immediate environment and
the social structure as a whole.
--
from the liner notes of Freak Out.

There are more love songs than anything else.
If songs could make you do something we'd all love one another.

If classical music is the state of the art,
then the arts are in a sad state.

Some Scientists claim that hydrogen, because it is
so plentiful, is the basic building block of the
universe. I dispute that. I say there is more
stupidity than hydrogen, and that is the basic

building block of the universe.

Most people wouldn't know good music if it came up and bit them in the ass.
--
As quoted in Whole Grains, an early 1970's book of quotations

The person who stands up and says, ``This is
stupid,'' either is asked to `behave' or, worse,
is greeted with a cheerful ``Yes, we know!
Isn't it terrific!''

The more boring a child is, the more the parents,

when showing off the child, receive adulation for

being good parents -- because they have a tame
child-creature in their house.

The worst aspect of `typical familyism'
(as media-merchandised) is that it
glorifies _involuntary_homogenization_.

The language and concepts contained herein are

guaranteed not to cause eternal torment in the
place where the guy with the horns and pointed
stick conducts his business.

My best advice to anyone who wants to raise a

happy, mentally healthy child is: Keep him or
her as far away from a church as you can.

I like having the capitol of the United

States in Washington, D.C., in spite of
recent efforts to move it to Lynchburg,
Virginia.

Children are naive -- they trust everyone.

School is bad enough, but, if you put a child
anywhere in the vicinity of a church, you're
asking for trouble.

It would be easier to pay off the national debt

overnight than to neutralize the long-range
effects of OUR NATIONAL STUPIDITY.

Nuclear explosions under the Nevada desert?

What the fuck are we testing for?
We already know the shit blows up.

Politics is the
entertainment branch of
industry.

Thanks to our schools and political leadership,

the U.S. has acquired an international reputation
as the home of 250 million people dumb enough to
buy 'The Wacky Wall-Walker.'

Stupidity has a certain charm --
ignorance does not.

Americans like to talk about (or be told about) Democracy but, when put to
the test, usually find it to be an 'inconvenience.' We have opted instead
for an authoritarian system disguised as a Democracy. We pay through
the nose for an enormous joke-of-a-government, let it push us around, and
then wonder how all those assholes got in there.

In every language, the first word after "Mama!" that every kid learns to say

is "Mine!" A system that doesn't allow ownership, that doesn't allow you to
say "Mine!" when you grow up, has -- to put it mildly -- a fatal design flaw.

From the time Mr. Developing Nation was forced to read _The Little Red Book_
in exchange for a blob of rice, till the time he figured out that waiting in
line for a loaf of pumpernickel was boring as fuck, took about three
generations. ...

Decades of indoctrination, manipulation, censorship and KGB excursions haven't
altered this fact: People want a piece of their own little Something-or-Other,

and, if they don't get it, have a tendency to initiate counterrevolution.

If it sounds GOOD to YOU, it's bitchen; and if it sounds BAD to YOU, it's
shitty.

In the fight between you and the world, back the world.

Interviewer: "So Frank, you have long hair. Does that make you a
woman?"
FZ: "You have a wooden leg. Does that make you a table?"

Without music to decorate it, time is just a bunch of boring production
deadlines or dates by which bills must be paid.

Whatever you have to do to have a good time, let's get
on with it, so long as it doesn't cause a murder.

Politics is the showbiz of industry.

Let's just admit that public education is mediocre at best.

Without deviation from the norm, 'progress' is not possible.

A composer is a guy who goes around forcing his will on

unsuspecting air molecules,often with the assistence of
unsuspecting musicians.

There is no such thing as a dirty word. Nor is there a word so powerful,
that it's going to send the listener to the lake of fire upon hearing it.

Fuck that! When did mediocrity and banality become a good
image for your children?

Why do you necessarily have to be wrong just because a few million people
think you are?

Life is like highschool with money.

Information doesn't kill you...
--
Senate Hearing on "Porn Rock", 1985 during an exchange with
a Born Again Christian.

A drug is not bad. A drug is a chemical compound. The problem comes
in when people who take drugs treat them like a licence to behave
like an asshole.

Speed: It will turn you into your parents.
--
1970 public service announcement regarding drug (namely, speed) use

There were 45 men in the jail cell, the toilet and shower
had never been cleaned, the temperature was 110 degrees so
you couldn't sleep night or day, there were roaches in the
oatmeal, sadistic guards, and everything that was nice.
--
Zappa 1969 interview

I was writing all kinds of positive and negative canons
and weird inverted this and retrograde that and getting as
spaced-out mathematically as I could and I was going
"Wait a minute (laughs), who cares about that stuff?" I
had always liked rhythm and blues so here I was stuck
between the slide rule and the gut bucket somewhere and I
decided that I would opt for a third road someplace in
between.
--
From an 1972 interview to Martin Perlich. On giving up writing serial music.

It is always advisable to be a loser if you cannot become a winner.

Sometimes you got to get sick before you can feel better.

The emotion of every player is the most important thing, what
stands behind this chord or tone. If you leave that out, the
music does not touch you.
--
Interview from Keyboard June 1980.

It's better to have something to remember than nothing to reget...

If you wind up with a boring, miserable life because you listened to your
mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest or some guy on TV telling you how to
do your shit, then YOU DESERVE IT.
--
From the Real Frank Zappa book.

A mind is like a parachute. It doesnt work if it not open.

You've got to be digging it while it's happening
'cause it just might be a one shot deal
--
From Waka/Jawaka

There will never be a nuclear war; there's too much real estate involved.
--
Zappa on the Tonight Show, C.A. 1988

Don't expect anything,don't expect fun, don't expect friends..
if you get something...it's a BONUS

Shoot low, they're riding Shetlands
--
European Zappa distributors Music For Nations on the occasion of some
anniversary of theirs.

The ONLY thing that seems to band all nations together, is that their
governments are universally bad....
--
F.Z. in German television interview

If we can't be free at least we can be cheap.

Nobody looks good bent over. Especially to pick up a cheque.
--
Guitar Magazine 1984

The essence of Christianity is told us in the Garden of Eden
history. The fruit that was forbidden was on the tree of
knowledge. The subtext is, All the suffering you have is
because you wanted to find out what was going on. You could
be in the Garden of Eden if you had just keep your fucking
mouth shut and hadn't asked any questions.
--
Playboy Interview, April 1993

When we talk about artistic freedom in this country
We sometime lose sight of the fact that freedom is
often dependent on adequate financing.

If you want to get laid, go to college, but if you want an education,
go to the library.
--
Quoted in the Pittsburgh Press in the summer of 67.

The gorilla is on an island,eats bananas and has a good time all day long.
He plays out there in the bushes. Some Americans find out about the gorilla
and they hear how BIG he is - you know.They're very impressed with the size
of the beast. So they catch the gorilla & they stick him in a boat & bring
him back to the US.
They show him off to everybody & make a bunch of money.
....Then they kill him !
--
The song King Kong.1968 tour Wisconsin.

Don't clap for destroying America. This place is as good as you want to make it.
--
Zappa introduced "Billy the Mountain" by revealing that Billy and
Ethel took a vacation trip across the united States, destroying it in the
process. This was Zappa's response to the applause and cheers from the
audience. Cleveland Colliseum, 1971

This is a really nice place. Don't fuck it up.
--
Chrysler Hall, Norfolk, Virginia in the Spring of 1984.
A very genteel place to see fine compositions performed live.
Usually the opera folks hang out there.

The whole Universe is a large joke.
Everything in the Universe are just subdivisions of this joke.
So why take anything too serious.
--
In September 1992 on SFB 3 when he gave an interview about the Yellow Shark.

You can't write a chord ugly enough to say what you want sometimes, so
you have to rely on a giraffe filled with whipped cream.
--
On a postcard from Rykodisc

Kid's heads are filled with so many nonfacts that when they get out of
school they're totally unprepared to do anything. They can't read, they
can't write, they can't think. Talk about child abuse. The U.S. school
system as a whole qualifies.
--
Discussing the state of the education system in America -
Playboy magazine, April 1993.

If something goes wrong and you tend to smile it away, then
you have someone to blame.

Drop out of school, before your mind rots from exposure to our mediocre
educational system. Go to the library and educate yourself if you've got any
guts...
--
Quoted from an article on FZ in the June 1995 issue of
"SLUG" magazine. Article titled "Zappa behind the Sneer.
I think the magazine may be a local (Salt Lake City) publication.

Never stop until your good becomes better, and your better becomes the best.

Now imagine a Moebius vortex inside a spherical constant, and you've
got my cosmology.
--
1992

It's not pretty, also you can't dance to it.

There's no single ideal listener out there who likes my orchestral music, my
guitar albums and songs like 'Dyna-Moe-Humm.'

It's all one big note.

You can tell what they think of our music by the places we
are forced to play it in. This looks like a good spot for
a livestock show.
--
April 1968, Chicago,
Mothers of Invention open for Cream

I'm not going to be Bill Clinton and say I never inhaled. I did
inhale. I liked tobacco a lot better.

Consider for a moment any beauty in the name Ralph.
--
In an interview with Joan Rivers who had just asked him why he gave his
children such odd names, Frank gave the reply above.

I write the music I like. If other people like it, fine, they
can go buy the albums. And if they don't like it, there's always
Michael Jackson for them to listen to.
--
Frank was talking about his music from the Yellow Shark.

I never set out to be wierd. It was always the other people who called
me wierd.
--
To the Baltimore Sun, October 12, 1986

I don't want to spend explaining myself whole my life.
Either you get , or you don't!

Why doncha come on over to the house and I'll show 'em to ya?
--
Senate hearing on pornography in music, when Tipper said ...
"I'd like to see what kind of toys your children play with."

Throwing objects such as this are capable of damaging
expensive musical equipment and musicians. Any more of this
and there will be no more music.
--
FZ, Autumn 1981 at Northrup auditorium in Minneapolis,
Minnesota. After someone threw a plunger on stage about
two-thirds of the way through the show, he stopped the band
with a wave of his hand speaking in the general direction
that the dangerous object was thrown, while holding it in
his hand. This did not prove to be an amusing act and Franks mood
hardened.

Music is the most physically inspiring of all the arts.
--
Said as he gave the keynote address at the American Society
of University Composers in Columbus Ohio in 1985.

With the power of soul you can do anything you wanna do.

It's fucking great to be alive, ladies and gentlemen,
and if you do not believe it is fucking great to be alive,
you better go now, because this show will bring you down so much
--
from Just Another Band From L.A.

The crux of the biscuit is: If it entertains you, fine. Enjoy it. If it
doesn't, then blow it out your ass. I do it to amuse myself. If I like it,
I release it. If somebody else likes it, that's a bonus.

It makes me wanna dance.
--
From a FZ interview about some music he had composed (on the synclavier).
It was written in 17/35 (or something like that).

Rain is good for you...
Rain is bad for electrical equipment...
--
Outdoor concert, Jones Beach, NY, Circa 1984

You can't be a Real Country unless you have a beer and an
airline - it helps if you have some kind of a football team
or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer.

Nobody looks good in brown lipstick

Get yer ass out there and register to VOTE!

Whenever your down, just think about how you got there.

I can't think of anything I like more than audience participation
--
From the Mothers of Prevention

You see, when I was a kid I used to save up for a month, so I could get
an R&B album and, the same day, the completed works of Anton Webern.
Maybe that means something. Maybe that tells you something about my music.
--
Excerpt from the book "Rock and Other Four Letter Words", copyright 1968.

All year long you people manufactured this crap, and one night a year you've
got to listen to it!
--
Frank introducing "psychedelic music" to the audience of the National Academy
of Recording Arts & Science dinner in New York (1968) at which the
Mothers were invited to play

Did anybody dance?
--
Said after performing the highly, shall we say, evolved "Black Page #2" on
"Zappa In New York". (And as you probably already know,
this was the song that alerted FZ to the existance of his stunt guitarist to
be Steve Vai, after recieving a sheet music transcription of the song,
made by young master Vai.)

May your shit come to life and kiss you on the face.
--
to Mrs. Gore about parental advisory labels on album covers

Bad facts make bad laws
--
Said during the PMRC hearings.

Well, you know people, I'd rather have my own game show than enough votes
to become president.

The drummer's playing in 4/4, the Saxophone player is playing 5/4,
the guitar player is picking his nose....

Anything can be music
--
Answer to critics accusing him of not doing actual music on Uncle Meat

Seriousity is something to be laughed at.
--
FZ responding to Ivo Niehe from Dutch television after being told that
Europeans take Frank's music very serious.

Get smart and i`ll fuck you over-Sayeth The Lord
About the basics of Christianity and it`s perpetuation of ignorance as a
way of life

Scientology, how about that? You hold on to the tin cans and then this guy
asks you a bunch of questions, and if you pay enough money you get to join
the master race. How's that for a religion?
--
Concert at the Rockpile, Toronto, May 1969

Yeah, I tell them to change the channel if they see
some guy in a brown suit with a telephone number
at the bottom of the screen asking for money.
--
on being asked by Tipper Gore if there was anything
on the TV he _didn't_ allow his kids to watch ...

Producing satire is kind of hopeless because of the literacy rate of
the American public.
--
A quote in response to criticism of "Jewish Princess" ("People" magazine,
circa 1979)

For some real personal satisfaction, try yelling out your own names.
--
At a concert in Boston, Massachusetts to some fans (my friends) who kept
yelling out Frank's name.

I wrote a song about dental floss but did anyone's teeth get cleaner?
--
In response to Tipper Gore's allegations that music incites people towards
deviant behavior, or influences their behavior in general.

The manner in which Americans "consume" music has a lot to do with leaving

it on their coffee tables, or using it as wallpaper for their lifestyles,
like the score of a movie -- it's consumed that way without any regard for
how and why it was made.
--
From "The Real Frank Zappa Book" (ch. 11)

Never stop and keep going
--
Giving advice to young musicians. early 80's interview with
pennsylvania state police officer whom is also a zappa fan.
originally to be shown to local high school students of the
area but frank ended up on the subject of politics and you
can just imagine why the kids never seen this video.

Well Mike, I'm abnormal.
--
When FZ appeared on the Mike Douglas show (solo, playing guitar with
recorded backup), Mike said "Your latest album is called Zoot Allures.
How do you come up with such names for your records?" (or something equally
banal)

So long as somebody gets a laugh out of it, what the fuck?
--

From Guitar Player's "Mother of All Interviews" part 2, summing up...well ,
everything!

All right kiddies, we'll play "wipe-out" for you in a moment.
--
Frank's comment to the crowd at a 1968 concert in Dallas, Tx

People who think of videos as an art form are probably
the same people who think Cabbage Patch Dolls are a
revolutionary form of soft sculpture.

People make a lot of fuss about my kids having such supposedly 'strange names',
but the fact is that no matter what first names I might have given them,
it is the last name that is going to get them in trouble.
--
From the Real Fran Zappa Book - Mr. Dad chapter

My, you sure are slow here in Texas aren't you?
--
During a 1968 Dallas, Tex. tour, Frank was conducting the Mothers by flipping
the bird to the musician he wanted to perform. He turned to the audience and
using both hands, he swept his fickle fingers wildly into the air. The crowd
of several thousand at the convention center sat silent. "My you sure are
slow here in Texas, aren't you?" he yelled and the punks went crazy!

You think our music- the Monkees music is banal and insipid?"
--
Frank replying to Mike Nesmith on an episode of "The Monkees"
on which Frank and Mike pretended to be each other for several
minutes before the opening theme.

It began with lyrics, but even looking at the PMRC fund raising
letter in the last paragraph, at the bottom of the page, it starts
looking like it's branching into other areas when it says 'We realize
that this material's pervaded other aspects of society' and it's like
'What, you gonna fix it all for me?'

You don't have the slightest understanding of the difference between
government action and private action, and you have certainly destroyed
any case you might otherwise have had with this Senator.
--
Senator Gorton, to which Frank Zappa responds with
"Is this private action?"

I think you should leave it up to the parent, because not all
parents want to keep their children totally ignorant.
--
Frank Zappa in response to a question from Senator Hollings.

Well, you and I would differ on what's ignorance and educated.
--
Senator Ernest Hollings to Zappa

Yes, Ladies and gentleman, even in this agricultural enviroment, We're gonna'
play a love song
--
This was about 1974 in Harrisburg Pa. at the Farm Show Arena, a week after
the Farm show had left town... Frank never admitted to playing there, and I
can't say as I blame him. But, I will never forget what a magical night that
was.

Tax the FUCK out of the churches!

If there's ever an obscene noise to be made on an instrument,
it's gonna come out of a guitar! On a sax you can play sleze,
on a bass you can play balls.but on a guitar you can be
truely obscene! Lets be realistic about this, the guitar can
be the single most blastomphous device on the earth!
the guitar makes a stink noise. thats why I like it!!