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Posts Tagged ‘Frank Zappa’

Before an audience can tell whether or not it likes a piece, it needs to listen to it.  Before it can listen to it, it has to know that it exists.  In order for it to exist in a form in which it can be heard (not just on paper), it has to be performed.  In order for a large audience to experience it, the performance must be recorded, released, distributed and given retail shelf space.
    —     Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
2022 Prayers For Mariupol
2021 Assumptions Are Fatal In Science
Starting To Look Back
2020 Down On Earth
2019 Are You Moving?
2018 We Can Only Pray
2017 Heavier At That End
2016 The Difference Is Craftsmanship
2015 However Vast The Darkness
2014 The Omnipresent Teacher
2013 Don’t Waste
2012 Earning Thanks
2011 Fuzzy Vision
2010 Movies and Book

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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.  When you compute the length of time between The Event and The Nostalgia For The Event, the span seems to be about a year less in each cycle.   Eventually within the next quarter of a century, the nostalgia cycles will be so close together that people will not be able to take a step without being nostalgic for the one they just took.  At that point, everything stops.  Death by Nostalgia.
    —     Frank Zappa
From his book: “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
2022 Understanding True Achievement
2021 Avoiding Corners
Nobody Knows
A Novel War
2020 First Buds
To Fly
2019 What If Nobody Believes Them Either
2018 It’s About Heart Not Skill
2017 Winning So Much I’m Already Tired Of It (Not)
2016 Punishing Red Binge
2015 Bits In The Soup
2014 More Beef, Less Bull
2013 Where Are Your Mountains
2012 Spherical Knowledge Of Hamsters
2011 Taking Stock Over Time

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I don’t have any pretensions about being a poet.  My lyrics are there for entertainment purposes only — not to be taken internally.   Some of them are truly stupid, some are slightly less stupid and a few of them are sort of funny.  Apart from the snide political stuff, which I enjoy writing, the rest of the lyrics wouldn’t exist at all if it weren’t for the fact that we live in a society where instrumental music is irrelevant — so if a guy expects to earn a living by providing musical entertainment for folks in the U.S.A., he’d better figure out how to do something with a human voice plopped on it.
    —     Frank Zappa
From his book: “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
2022 Jeopardy
2021 Will Republican Senators Convict A Former President?
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2020 Republican Acceptance Of Abuse Of Office
2019 The Courage Of Four Skills
2018 And Stable Genius, Too
2017 And So We Continue
2016 Feeling Endangered?
2015 One Day
2014 Too Bad
2013 Unfinished
2012 First Steps Along The Path
2011 A Small Part Of Future Webs

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A composer’s job involves the decoration of fragments of time.  Without music to decorate it, time is just a bunch of boring production deadlines or dates by which bills must be paid.  Living composers are entitle to proper compensation for the use of their works.  (Dead guys don’t collect — one reason their music is chosen for performance.)
    —    Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
2021 Why We Protect The First Amendment
When A Voice Can Make You Cry
The March Continues…
2020 #45: And State Prison Waits When You Leave Office
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2019 Looking For A Republican With A Profile In Courage
2018 Hammers, Bells And Songs
2017 My Friends
2016 In Need Of Some Work
2015 Elections Have Consequences
2014 An Ear Of Happy Accidents
2013 Powerful Substitute
2012 Heroes Restored
2011 As You Should

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I realize that a lot of people feel that speaking out against unions is almost:  ‘Un-American.’  I remind them:  not all of America is unionized — in fact, the vast majority of Americans are not — and glad about it.
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 sweatshops.  I agree with them.  Large employers do tend toward unscrupulous behavior when nobody is looking over their shoulder.
So, what the bottom line here?  I would like to see more honesty in business — at both ends of the table.  Honesty in U.S. business appears to be at its lowest ebb in history.
There are a number of reasons for that.  When political leaders do not demonstrate honesty, when people lie constantly in the media — everybody gets used to “The Big Lie” as a way of life.  At that point, honesty becomes a quaintly outmoded concept — nobody wants to be honest anymore, because if they are, they might finish last.
I would say that today, dishonesty is the rule, and honesty the exception.  It could be, statistically, that more people are honest than dishonest, but the few that really control things are not honest, and that tips the balance.
    —     Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
2021 Momentary Offering
Happy Noise
2020 No Crumbs
Too Many Detectives On This Case
A New Day Is Coming
2019 Or In This Case – What’s Wrong
2018 Just Passing Through
2017 True Torture
Happy Thanksgiving – 2017 !!
2016 Overtaken
2015 Alone Praying
2014 A Full Man
2013 Off Defending The Universe
Taking Precautions
2012 Never, Never, Never
2011 Testing 1, 2, 3

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The Ulitimate Rule ought to be:  “If it sounds GOOD to YOU, it’s bitchen;  and if sounds BAD to YOU, it’s shitty.”  The more varied your musical experience, the easier it is to define for yourself what you like and what you don’t like.  American radio listeners, raised on a diet of ____ (fill in the blank), have experienced a musical universe so small they cannot begin to know what they like.
    —     Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
2021 A Model Democrat
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2020 The Main Thing: Vote!
No Other Reason
2019 A Big “IF”
2018 Committed To Thinking
2017 More Pictures From My (Family) Retirement Party
A Fondness For Sins
2016 Are You Waiting?
2015 The Future Myth
2014 Hands
2013 Because You Have Lived
2012 47%
2011 Conservative Values: Low And Lax
2010 A Non-Zero Sum Game
What If “c” Isn’t A Constant?
2009 Pictures from UCLA trip…

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A person with a feel for rhythm can walk into a factory and hear the machine noise as a composition.  If we expand that concept to include light, behavior, weather factors, moon phases, anything (whether it’s a rhythm that can be heard or a rhythm that is perceived, i.e., a color change over time — or a season), it can be consumed as music.
If it can be conceived as music, it can be executed as music, and presented to an audience in such a way that they will perceive it as music
When someone writes a piece of music, what he or she puts on the paper is roughly the equivalent of a recipe — in the sense that the recipe is not the food, only instructions for the preparation of the food.  Unless you are very weird, you don’t eat the recipe.
If I write something on a piece of paper, I can’t actually ‘hear’ it.  I can conjure up visions of what the symbols on the page mean, and imagine a piece of music as it might sound in performance, but that sensation is nontransferable;  it can’t be shared or transmitted.
It doesn’t become a ‘musical experience’ in normal terms until ‘the recipe’ has been converted into wiggling air molecules.
Music, in performance, is a type of sculpture. The air in the performance space is sculpted into something.  This ‘molecule-sculpture-over-time’ is then ‘looked at’ by the ears of the listeners — or a microphone.
SOUND is ‘ear-decoded data.’ Things which MAKE SOUND are things which are capable of creating perturbations. This perturbations modify (or sculpt) the raw material (the ‘static air’ in the room — the way it was ‘at rest’ before the musicians started fu**ing around with it).  If you purposefully generate atmospheric perturbations (‘air shapes’), you are composing.
    —     Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
2021 An Afternoon Nap
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2020 Magical Voices In My Head
I Still Need Educating
2019 And I’m Not Letting Go
2018 The Continuing Failure Of Speaker Paul Ryan
Day 3: Approaching The Half Way Point
2017 Orange Comb-Overs Unite!
2016 Speaking Of Which
2015 Complexity Has A Strict Architecture
2014 Just Support
2013 Wandering Free
2012 Contribute = Paying Taxes
2011 How Will You Be Judged?

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All the old history was written for the amusement of the ruling classes.  The lower classes couldn’t read, and their rulers didn’t care about remembering what happened to them.
    —     Francis Zappa
As quoted by his son:  Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
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2021 Together Forever
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2020 Still Learning
2019 Almost Hallmark
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2018 Daydreams And Wanna-Be’s
Or Work For #45
2017 Summer Pale
2016 Ain’t It Funny
2015 At Both Ends
2014 Whiner(s)
2013 Just Passing Through
2012 Dog-gone Heaven
2011 Occasional, Sad Results

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Failure is nothing to get upset about.  It’s a fairly normal condition;  an inevitability in ninety-nine percent of all human undertakings.  Success is rare — that’s why people get so cranked up about it.
    —     Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
2022 Just Chill Dude…
2021 Don’t Let The Violent Take It From Us
Scratch Me
2020 Or Frightens Us
2019 The Best Gifts
2018 Sweep!!!
We Must Be Living In TRULY Historic Times
2017 The Best?
2016 Timely Opinions On “The Donald”
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2015 First Things First
2014 Without The Other
2013 Earn This
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2012 Stumblin’ Along My Way
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2011 Simply Unpredictable

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The Real Frank Zappa Book” (1989©)   —   book review
Today’s review is for the autobiography:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book“;  written by:  Frank Zappa and co-written by / with:  Peter Occhiogrosso.
Background:  a network system admin colleague was listening to some music when I approached him for assistance.  I asked about what he was listening to and he said it was Frank Zappa and the “Mother’s of Invention“.  He then proceeded to tell me how great Zappa was and that he listened to a Zappa show on the radio every Friday night where this little station ran a two hour program on Zappa’s music.  My friend said there was nothing more relaxing than sitting in an easy chair with a tumbler of Jägermeister and listening to Zappa to kick off a weekend.  I was familiar with the “name” but (honestly) could not recall a single song or album, but I said I’d check it out based on his (my friend’s) recommendation.
Well, I still haven’t gotten around to listening to the radio and I don’t know if the broadcast is still happening every Friday evening, but I was in the used book store (several years ago) and I saw this book and picked it up to add to my reading list.  I keep seeing Zappa’s name referred to in my guitar studies, so I finally made a point of opening (and reading) it.
Who is Frank Zappa and why should we care about him or his views (on anything)?  Zappa is / was (died 1993) an American musician, singer, composer, songwriter and bandleader.  He self-produced over 50 albums and his estate had published another 30+ albums of “new” material since his death.  He was a self-taught musician and composer.  He claims to not be a very great guitarist, but that is the only instrument I ever knew him to play and he’s said to be one of the top 100 guitarists in history.  His book says he originally learned music on a drum set and picked up guitar later.  He was also reasonably well known for his libertarian political views particularly about free speech and the separation of church and state.  Zappa is in both the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and has an album in the Library of Congress preserved for its historical significance.  Zappa’s music is a blend of rock, jazz, fusion, concert / symphonic music with a heavy dose of political / social satire – comedy.  He poked fun at both the left and the right.
What’s in this book and is it any good?  The book is really several parts:  1)  a personal biography;  2)  a discussion of his career and production thoughts about the music industry;  and,  3)  Zappa’s views on various political and social / societal trends.  I didn’t find his biography interesting.  I thought his comments on music and the industry were very insightful.  I was only mildly amused by his political stances and societal observations.  While I might personally agree with much of his stances and observations, I found his sarcasm / humor tiring long before the end of the book.
Part 1)  I grew up poor and we moved around a lot.  My escape was music.  I learned about it on my own by listening to an unfiltered variety of sound(s).  I got ripped off constantly by almost everyone else in the music business.  (Pgs 1 – 137)
Part 2)  Everybody is out to screw the composer / artist.  Including, but not limited to:  all production companies, all music unions, all venue owners, all governments (local and national), most fellow musicians, and, most hangers-on / groupies.  (Pgs 139 – 209)
Part 3)  Small, efficient government is the best.  Taxation should be limited to sales and should not include income – to have some hope of charging taxes on the wealthy as well as the workers.  All organized religion(s) and “church” institutions are corrupt (themselves) and corrupting to governments which allow them to have political influence.  There should be a full separation of Church and State.  Public education is a “mostly” a waste of money.  Education post-high school should be paid for by the individual only.  Special interest groups (guns and religion lobbies) have too much influence in America.  You cannot legislate morality and you should not be allowed to use morality to limit freedom of speech (particularly in the arts and music industries).  (Pgs 211 – 352 / end)
Final recommendation:  moderate to strong.  As stated previously, I didn’t find Zappa’s personal life (growing up or music performing) very interesting.  I found his thoughts about the concept of music (and art in general) VERY interesting.  This section was the strength of the book.  I would have been over the moon if he had devoted the rest of the book to elaborating on his theories of sound / art / artistry / and music production.  Unfortunately, he didn’t.  The final chunk of the book was “really” only moderately interesting.  My impression was:  “this is filler to add 80 extra pages”.  Again, just because I agree with an authors’ statements, doesn’t mean I like / enjoy how they choose to express the statements.  The book was worth the time invested in reading it , if only to gain an appreciation of a historic music figure.  I will be offering up some quotes from it in the future.  – BUT – except for the discussion on music / art, I can’t say the book inspired much after-thought / reflection.  (Actually, I’ve already posted a few of Zappa’s quotes, but didn’t know they were from this book.  I will probably get around to updating those prior posts at some point.)
Afterwords:  I have made an effort to go to YouTube and sample some of Zappa’s performances.  I’ve yet to be impressed.  Mostly, what I’ve heard has been ok.  JUST ok.  They remind me of what you’d hear at a county / state fair.  If anyone reading this can provide specific suggestions, I’d be more than happy to check them out.  I will say, I have found the video’s of his interviews to be much more interesting than the music I’ve listened to.
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On This Day In:
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2021 Every Time It Gets Better
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2020 I’m Persuaded
2019 Hungry For Trust
2018 Mutual Assistance
2017 The Toughest Job
2016 Congratulations!!
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2015 Even If It Kills Us Slowly
2014 Fun To Play God
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2013 Legal (Almost)
2012 Great Scots!
2011 The GI Bill – A Simple History Lesson
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A mind is like a parachute.  It doesn’t work if it is not open.
    —    Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
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2020 Mo, Cilla, Mushy Peas And Rain
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2019 An Epitaph For #45 (#LyingDonald)
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2017 Verbs
2016 Not Too Tidy
2015 Little Understanding
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2013 Movies And A Lifetime Of Lyrics
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2012 Cheaper To Hold
2011 Resistance Is Futile
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Take the Kama Sutra.  How many people died from the Kama Sutra as opposed to the Bible?  Who wins?
    —    Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
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2017 I Think They Are Starting To…
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2014 Winning?
2013 Still Inventing
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I never set out to be weird.  It was always other people who called me weird.
    —    Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
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2020 Organized Skepticism
2019 An Interest In Life
2018 Two: A Current President With Both
2017 Watch This Space
2016 Beyond The Foundation
2015 Become An Affliction
2014 Just Setting Out
2013 Scott’s Inscription
2012 Good Knowledge
2011 Social Safety Nets

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Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible.
     —    Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
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On This Day In:
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2020 I Hope She Keeps Laughing
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2019 Ruff Clean
2018 Sounds Like A Blog To Me
2017 My Fear For America
2016 Proceeding Still
2015 Seeing Rainbows
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2014 The Law Of The Perversity Of Nature
2013 One Standard Deviation
2012 High Anxiety
2011 And I’m Taking Me There
2010 1,000

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Without music to decorate it, time is just a bunch of boring production deadlines or dates by which bills must be paid.
     —    Frank Zappa
From his book:  “The Real Frank Zappa Book
[And love has nothing to dance to…     —    kmab]
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