Music Review: Frank Zappa - Trance-Fusion
Hoodini
Written by Bill Sherman
http://oakhaus.blogspot.com/
Published November 16, 2006
http://blogcritics.org/archives/2006/11/16/072252.php
Back when yours truly was a young and bony, somewhat speed-freaky
collegian, I used to bug my dorm mate by regularly playing Mothers of
Invention platters on my plastic Sears portable phonograph. My roomie
was a sometime guitarist who appreciated the band's garage-y
musicianship (if not their vocals), but he couldn't get behind their
early attempts at jamming. Listening to the group's first recorded
full-blown instrumental, "Invocation & Ritual Dance of the Young
Pumpkin" (from Absolutely Free), I remember him disparagingly saying,
"Nicely played. But it doesn't go anywhere."
Putting on the recently released Trance-Fusion (Zappa Records), the
much delayed final project overseen by Frank Zappa, I found myself
remembering my old roommate Marty's words. An instrumental set of a
piece with the composer's earlier Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar and
Guitar releases, T-F is primarily composed of solos that have mainly
been taken from 1984-88 concert performances, given their own unique
names ("Bowling on Charen," "Gorgo," et al) and left to fend for
themselves. With most of these tracks stripped from their original
context (one notable exception: opening instrumental "Chunga's
Revenge," which had its genesis on one of Zappa's first solo albums),
they really don't "go anywhere."
I need to be upfront about my bedrock bias here: as a fan, I favor
Zappa's early MoI work http://oakhaus.home.insightbb.com/zappa2.htm
above everything else he did in the course of his long contrarian
career. I love him as (to use Wilson & Alroy's phrase
http://www.warr.org/zappa.html) the Psychedelic Satirist – and have
much less use for his later pervy lyrical obsessions – and I equally
favor the band he started out with over all the professional sidemen
he later corralled to tour with him. What makes the Mothers
interesting for me, outside of their sterling garage punk chops, was
the way their limitations pushed against Zappa's high-blown
aspirations. Too much competence – as with many of Zappa's later
working units – and the man's complex compositions start to lose all
trace of humanity. I know there are guitar geeks who still worship at
the altar of Shut Up Zappa, but I'm just a poor pop nerd who prefers
his tunes with a beginning, middle and end, thanks.
As a result, the sixteen tracks on this set pretty much blend together
about five cuts into the disc. I've played Trance-Fusion several times
in the car driving to work in the past week. Each time I found myself
listening fairly intently to "Revenge," "Bowling on Charen" (which has
lines that sound like they could've come from Burnt Weeny Sandwich,
though apparently it's from a 1977 performance of "Wild Love") and
"Good Lobna" (Zappa-phile Matt Groening must've been tickled by the
Simpsons ref here) – than needing to be goosed back into full
attention by a good rhythm shift (as with the snippy "Soul Polka") or
a dose of bluesy familiarity ("After Dinner Smoker.") In most cases,
the titles don't particularly help: you'd expect, for instance, a song
called "Gorgo" to be a full-blown tromper much like "Chunga's
Revenge," but you'd be wrong.
To be sure, listening to the man's assured fingering can provide
slivers of pleasure – even to a musical dunderhead like myself. For
years, I've used earlier Zappa guitar collections for background music
while writing, and I suspect I'll be pulling out T-F in the future for
the same. (As a sonic experience, it's certainly much less intrusive
than, f'rinstance, the frequently annoying Sheik Yerbuti.) But when I
want to actively listen to the man and his music, I'm still most
likely gonna slip on something from the '60s or early '70s. That
pumpkin dance track on Free may not "go anywhere." But it's surrounded
by the front and back of the original "Call Any Vegetable," which
definitely does.
Despite his ability to occasionally bring out the worst in Moody Blues
fans, Bill Sherman is a mostly harmless pop culture nerd who, in
addition to his weblog, has put together tribute pages to some of his
bigger musical interests
http://oakhaus.home.insightbb.com/pop_music.htm (Kinks, Ramones, Rhino
Records, Zappa et al). He has far too many CDs, DVDs, comics & manga
paperbacks in his house.
--
Flat Mouth never met George W. Bush...
"Tell him I blame him for the children we have lost, for the sickness
we have suffered, and for the hunger we have endured. The fault rests
on his shoulders."
~ Aysh-ke-bah-ke-ko-zhay (Flat Mouth), Leech Lake Ojibwe speaking of
Territorial Governor Alexander Ramsey
The old geezer
> I need to be upfront about my bedrock bias here: as a fan, I favor
> Zappa's early MoI workhttp://oakhaus.home.insightbb.com/zappa2.htm
> above everything else he did in the course of his long contrarian
> career. I love him as (to use Wilson & Alroy's phrasehttp://www.warr.org/zappa.html) the Psychedelic Satirist - and have
> much less use for his later pervy lyrical obsessions - and I equally
> favor the band he started out with over all the professional sidemen
> he later corralled to tour with him. What makes the Mothers
> interesting for me, outside of their sterling garage punk chops, was
> the way their limitations pushed against Zappa's high-blown
> aspirations. *Too much competence* - as with many of Zappa's later
> working units - and the man's complex compositions start to lose all
> trace of humanity. I know there are guitar geeks who still worship at
> the altar of Shut Up Zappa, but I'm just a poor pop nerd who prefers
> his tunes with a beginning, middle and end, thanks.
>
> .....My thoughts exactly!!!! Very well put!!!! This man knows Zappa & what happened to him!!!!!!
The old geezer
NP: So Flows the Current - Patrick O'Hearn
ND: Saranac Black Forrest
knucmo
Hoodini wrote:
> I need to be upfront about my bedrock bias here: as a fan, I favor
> Zappa's early MoI work http://oakhaus.home.insightbb.com/zappa2.htm
> above everything else he did in the course of his long contrarian
> career. I love him as (to use Wilson & Alroy's phrase
> http://www.warr.org/zappa.html) the Psychedelic Satirist - and have
> much less use for his later pervy lyrical obsessions - and I equally
> favor the band he started out with over all the professional sidemen
> he later corralled to tour with him. What makes the Mothers
> interesting for me, outside of their sterling garage punk chops, was
> the way their limitations pushed against Zappa's high-blown
> aspirations. Too much competence - as with many of Zappa's later
> working units - and the man's complex compositions start to lose all
> trace of humanity.
What a derp:
I. Firstly, the units Zappa had later on were not only competent, they
were probably one of the BEST rock units out there.
II. Just what the fuck do critics carp on about when they mention
Frank has no "emotion" in his composition. What is it about me
striking a note on a guitar that has the predicate "humanity" or,
"cheese", or "bland". There IS nothing. And it's precisely the
subjective biases and conditioned emotions of the critic at hand.
Here's a revealing passage from the man himself:
"I don't care about souls; that's the Maharishi's department. See, I
take a real cold view about that stuff. I think that music works
because of psycho-acoustical things--like the way in which a line will
interact with the harmonic climate that's backing it up. And all the
rest of it is subjective on behalf of the listener. Maybe you WANTED to
hear a sad trumpet solo, but it wouldn't be sad unless the notes he was
playing were interacting in a certain way against the background. The
best test is: if it was a 24-track recording, take the same trumpet
solo, change the chord progression behind it, and see if it sounds sad
any more. People see and hear what they want to see and hear."
Conversely, you might take one of Frank's melodies which is somehow
"demeaning", and change the chord progression, it could be really
moving.
I think these counterexamples prove my (and Frank's) point.
Bossk (R)
> Firstly, the units Zappa had later on were not
> only competent, they were probably one of the
> BEST rock units out there.
The guy said they had "too much competence" -- how can you
try to counter that by saying they were more competent than
anyone else?
Still, I don't understand why he would want to explain why
he doesn't like the guitar solos with a criticism of
"complex compositions". Neither of you seem to be thinking
clearly.
Bossk (R)
Zappa Fans United in Righteousness