BBP
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Leeuwarder Courant translations
These come from the north east of the country: Leeuwarden. Fortunately they are in chronological order, rather than in a muddle.
The news sources are Dagblad van het Noorden and Leeuwarder Courant.
25-09-67
The MOI refreshed 2500 thirsty hippies
A "naked" concert and nothing else.
"Take off your coat, it'll be warm," the wardrobe lady said in the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, where the controversial MOI from New York performed
last night before 2500 hippes from the capital. She was right, after a warming up by some noisy Dutch beat groups, the long awaited Mothers came up at
ten o'clock. Fifteen long haired, sloppily dressed peope in their twenties and thirties, a lot of noise and ununderstandabe sounds, echoed a thousand
times by the echo installation and the good acoustics of the Concertgebouw. In the hall: hip boys and girls, refreshing themselves to the Mothers
music, drowsy with incense and intoxicated by the music. Reaction: sweet, calm, obedient towards the security and smiling... And the wardrobe lady was
right.
The fame of 26-year-old Frank Zappa, composer, lyricist, spiritual father of the Mothers, travelled way ahead of the group. Helped by befriended
magazines like Hitweek and Muziek Expres thousands of young Dutchmen know that Zappa's songs stand out with obscene lyrics, much sayig gestures, that
the music replaces LS and that the Mothers are tomorrow's rulers. Frank Zappa has announced himself as "the president of the United States".
"The future of America is with its youth, who will take over power. Through elections," Frank says earnestly. For him music is everything, replacing
religion and blessing for everyone. Most famous song: "Absolutely Free." Most controversial: "America drinks" (with subtitle: Orgasmic Ensemble
Statement).
The blackhaired American fith Lenin-goatee didn't really make the news until he was photographed sitting on a toilet for the International Times. All
that fame, the arguments in his motherland (no single radiostation plays the Mother's records) and the performance in the Royal Albert Hall in London
Saturday evening, where over 5000 English hippies were hanging on every word, lured large amounts of avant-gardists to the Museumplein, where several
cops flawlessly formed a long queue of waiting tweeners. The mass gave the Hermandad free passage, smoked shag, one chewed tobacco, others were making
out a little. People waited patiently untill the doors opened. Without pushing they sat down in the red plush room, where in several days neatly
dressed citizens will listen to master pianists like Arthur Rubinstein, Werner Haas, Nikita Magaloff and Rudolf Firkusni. Dressed after the most
recent hip-fashion: several wearing expensive Afghan shel leather coats with flower motifs, others were simpeler but not less colourful with old
curtains. We even saw someone in a gravedigger's coat... Like cows in the meadow others walked through the hall, clinging bells. A scala of colourful
elements, in which the rare elder person seemed lost.
The Mothers strewed their loving for an hour over a surprisingly calm audience. The only thing security really were busy with, was keeping the aisles
free ("Come on boys, it's fire brigade rules...") and keeping the photographers from flashing. This end of the press had an even harder time, because
you needed Paul Acket's permission to make photos. His assistent Piet de Wit concluded after the Mothers psychedelic sounds had finished: "The
Netherlands is truly progressive, the success of this group has proven this." Why couldn't the photographers flash? "It's for the audience, they
shouldn't be interrupted."
The Mothers performance was incomplete. They had to leave a number of light effects in the hall. The board of the Concertgebouw wanted to have either
a "naked" concert, or no concert at all.
As calm as they had come, the "future rulers" left the Concertgebouw. In a flower bed on the Museumplein several members of the bankrupt Sigma did
what couldn't be done in the concert hall: with a projector and bright lights they gave a decent bit of fireworks, that made even several cops smile.
American hippiedom goes into a pleasant hibernation after a summer with clouds drifting by. It hasn't been hot.
12-10-68 Announcement for the Mothers concert on Sunday. Two concerts, one at 7, one at 11. Prices are 6,50, 10, 15 and 20 guilders.
22-10-68 Don Preston of the Mothers, on laughing and crying.
"The audience last Sunday in Concertgebouw wasn't as enthusiastic as last year," said pianist and organist Don Preston of the MOI after their
performance. "But I don't blame them, last year our music was a lot easier."
Don Preston: "We have a certain pattern of playing with this improvisation music. There is not really a theme. It's a combination of Frank Zappa's
directions and of what you feel yourself.
We never know in advance what we're going to play in a show. We do rehearse: we had three rehearsals before this show, but we don't rehearse the show.
We only rehearse "the individuals" like mr Greenjeans, we hadn't played that in two months and that turns out very differently."
I never cry
What does Don Preston hate most in the world?
Don shuffles a little, and quickly says: "Berlin" (the place where the Mothers performed with considerably less success than expected) and asks to not
write that down. "No," he says, "I don't hate anyhing. I don't believe in hate. Hate is a product of the body and the body is a machine. The soul is
stopped in the body by hate. That's why I don't believe in it."
Laughing?
"Isn't the exact opposite. Crying isn't the exact opposite of it either. Laughing often is crying. I mean, a lot of people laugh when they want to
cry. In America it's not manly to cry. In Italy everybody does it."
And you?
"I never cry. I wish I could."
Don looks serious, really serious, with blue-green eyes. "My boy died five years ago. He was two and a half years old and I couldn't even cry, you
know what I mean? I was only sick until I could cry and I didn't cry over it until recently."
He changes subject. The Mothers among themselves. "We get along exceptionally well. Most groups fall apart quickly. But we like each other." He smiles
at the remark that when hearing the Mothers' songs make you stop wanting to visit America.
Sexual-neurotic.
"I wouldn't go to America if I were here," he notes. "The Netherlands is a lot better. No, to be honest, I think The Netherlands is one of the most
beautiful spots there are. The people here all look so happy. Friendly. Nobody fight. They're warm. If you go to a department store in New York and
you want something, they kick you out. You see what I mean? People fight with each other. They do things that make them guilty and then they drink to
drive away that guilt. They are sexually neurotic.
Holland should be sexually as pleasant as Sweden. I don't know why it isn't. How come?"Jimmy Carl Black suddenly gets behind the bar and makes weird
noises. Behind us Frank Zappa arrived.
Euclid Sherwood says something about hairstyles.
Don: "The Netherlands is good. Politically too." (who will he vote for as president) "McCarthy. If he's electable." Then he continues about The
Netherlands: "I was somewhere yesterday (he won't mention the name of the bar) where they smoked in public. That's unheard of. In America you get
searched on the street if you have long hair."
After a pause: "I do believe hush is kinda dangerous. Frank doesn't smoke it. He's the only one. He doesn't want it. I don't know. He thinks it
interrupts his thoughts. And that's true of course."
26-10-68 Quotes page has some Zappa quotes:
FZ: "Nixon isn't suitable as president, not as senator, not as congressman, not as mayor, not as dog catcher, not good for anything except trading
second-hand cars."
FZ: "You can put a lot more hope in the generation who is about twelve now. They grew up with Bob Dylan and see through the nonsense their older
brothers and sisters do."
02-11-68
Enthusiastic reaction by Two Mother-Lovers from Leeuwarden on the Nixon quote: Long Live the Mothers!
25-11-68
The Ugliest Part Of The Body, by Paul Bollen
Frank Zappa (27), the formidable leader of the American pop group MOI, was seen by me in the English pop magazine International Times on a picture in
a highly private contition: naked on the bathroom, trousers lowered to the shoes. Yes! That is the man who made, according to Vrij Nederland's
classical music reviewer Konrad Böhmer, one of the finest records with avant-garde music in the last few years, namely WOIIFTM, awarded with an Edison
recently. That photo looks like just a stunt, but who heard music and lyrics by Zappa and the other Mothers for a while, is tempted to see what's
behind the facade. The gesture becomes theatre, a reference to desillusioning, vulnerability, weakness, what is ugly? or just hideous enactment of a
curse. I thought for a while: I can picture Von Karajan doing it (to stay in vinyl athmosphere), but that is dry, because that world too turns against
Zappa's play-photo. Comparison may not be
too crazy: Zappa can make terribly good music. One hears he went to music school, but that doesn't have much to do with his music.
Zappa claims: "I am a composer, not a songwriter. I made music for two movies and wrote two symphonies. But nobody in the USA is interested in that
kind of thing, so the Mothers are my medium and my outlet. The problem is nobody wants to play present-day music. They would rather play Beethoven and
Mozart because then they don't have to pay copyright and more people will visit the concert. On top of that most musicians don't want to play new
music. I myself like Stockhausen, Varèse and Kagel. "
The strangest of all is, I think, that Zappa, by turning away from the "official" music finds the way to create something that is very special in the
opposing pop music. And I think that is closely connected that new art has more to do with new ideas than with new forms. I know too little of what
happened in the pop-scene before the Beatles came with their surprising collages of classical and popular music. But it is clear that the Mothers
exploited the new possibilities a lot more - and expanded them, with electronig music, not from a generator but with electronically distorted
instrumental sounds.
Zappa also included spoken voices next to singing ones, no complete sentences, but regular lines with which ordinary people say things about everyday
stuff. Sometimes you only hear snoring. Zappa about his latest output Lumpy Gravy: "The talking on this record is as much of a musical unity as you
can hear on the street, like birds, traffic, accidents, the sound of a transistorradio.
One can imagine it must be a miraculous collage if a record like that is a new exploration of sonic possibilities and still stuff to sing along with,
suitable for the pop cafe. Yes, it is and remains pop music. All special sounds are so integrated with lyrics and music that you don't experience them
as avant-gardism.
Zappa knows how the worldwide communication device pop style should be used. His lyrics are harsher and more ironic than those of the Beatles, and
that corresponds with what he said: "Our music is dangerous for the people in control, because we try to get the youth to think." How dangerous do
people think Zappa's music is in the States, is demonstrated that the Mothers (the name mocks the American matriarchy) are taboo for most radio and
TV-stations. It has, I think, not just to do with Zappa's criticism on American society, but also on the common taboos that chased away our "Zo is
het" {abbreviated title of Zo is het toevallig ook nog eens een keer, a Dutch sketch show that became infamous when they called TV a religion} and
"Hoepla" {first Dutch show to have a naked woman on TV was cancelled after three episodes} {for instance the frank sex-imagery in some country blues
songs).
On the other hand one can imagine that the bitter lyrics on the 1966 LA riots hit hard with the American leaders and their fast-shooting servants.
And right behind that a deadly tirade against Mom and Dad who all believe it, until their own daughter is shot too. The makers and buyers of the
hideously realistic toys get a nasty punch. To us, Europeans, no problem. We have the time, because our consumption-readiness of American miracles has
always lagged behind on that of the civilians there: for better or worse.
Directly applying to the European society is Call Any Vegetable, on Absolutely Free, in which the social-political carelessness of people is punched
at, by comparing individuals to cabbages, - the common people. Also the hippies on America's west coast, who tried to run from reality, get spanked.
Dead serious, but with a biting musical commentary the eulogy about the youth as victim of lies and carelessness of its parents. The lyrics in the
next freedom song is a cleverly written choir hymn wih several references to famous oratoria, both in lyrics (donner und blitzen) and in music.
To summarize, very special music. I'd almost say bewildering, especialy to the American who sent Zappa's recent output "Lumpy Gravy" back with
bulletholes in it (recently the revolver was used for some president). It was accompanied by a note that the bullets would be for Zappa himself next
time.
And then I think back to that toilet photo of Zappa and of the cute verse that occurs twice on the Edison-record:
What's the ugliest part of your body?
Some say your nose, some say your toes
But I think it's your MIND.
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BBP
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17-01-69 NVHN Ruben review teaser
Boy oh boy oh boy, puff, puff, puff, dear, dear, dear, so, so. Those were our initial thoughts seeing the new MOI record. RATJ. At the back a photo of
FZ of about ten years ago. At the front a neat picture of die Mutter der Eingebung (as our neighbors on the east say), on which they are portrayed
with large animal noses. Ruben (the record is dedicated to him) used to be with the band, but "he left the group when he was nineteen to tinker on his
car". RUben stayed friends with the leaders of the band. They listened to Ritchie Valens records and to more of that kind of artists. The words on the
back go: "We hope you too are sick with that weird far-out music and that you are ready to listen to real sharp music." Well, brace yourself, because
on the record is a collection of very weak rock texts like: "no no no no no no no no-o-o-o-o-h" and "I l-o-o-ve you only". Next week more on this
Mothers milestone.
24-01-69 NVHN Ruben review
(cover balloon text), asks an animal-like Frank
Zappa on the cover of their latest LP CWRATJ, we
wrote about last week. It is indeed a Mothers record (with Ray Collins, who just for this record joined the band again) and it is doubtful it'll be
played a lot on the radio. But it should be purchased by all those who love a good bit of pop, because it isn't just a very good album, it's also a
historical view on the fifties, as we wrote last week. In the tradition of people like Del Shannon, Neil Sedaka and Ricky Nelson, Ray Collins (lead
singer), Roy Estrada (falsetto) and Frank Zappa (deep grunts) sing songs like Fountain of Love, How could I be such a Fool, No No No and Jelly Roll
Gum Drop.
The fun thing about the music of RatJ is it doesn't just conjure up sentiments gives a historical view on fifties music and is made well (better than
in those days, musically), but it gets very satiric now and then. You don't just smile at the foreign effect the record gives, but also because its
absolutely top irony. For instance the pretty song Later that Night, in which the young man after making love is locked up somewhere by his girl,
after which she throws away his clothes and he reiterates what fantastic garments she threw away, and ends with the dialogue:
Man: "Huffa puffa. Huffa puffa, there's no room to breathe in here."
Woman: "That's allright honey. You can come out the closet now."
Lyrics they wouldn't use in the fifties, because the puritan America on that age didn't allow love stories that mocked "Libelle-love" {refers to
woman's magazine Libelle}
Still Frank Zappa and Ray Collins (who wrote three songs, of which one is ununderstandably not on the European edition) made songs that fit completely
in the idiom they ironise in other songs.
If we are to name one song that will be immortal for us, it's Fountain of Love by Ray Colins. The fountain (perhaps the symbol of love in
those days) in which coins are being tossed while it's septemer (the leaves were gold): We were young lovers strolling near the fountain of love,
that's not very far.
If we are to think of an advertising blurb, we'd shout: You can head in any direction with this record, except for the wrong one.
21-02-69 NVHN
Mothers release new LP
The gents Zappa and Cohen, bosses of Bizarre Productions, will probably release three double albums in February and/or March. By the MOI: Uncle Meat
and by the legendary underground comedian (who knows a better word?) Lenny Bruce: Wild Man Fischer and The Berkeley Concert. To let the release of
these LPs coincide with the American ones, record company Negram-Delta will initially import from the US.
21-03-69 NVHN
Zappa releases Uncle Meat
Negram-Delta has imported the new double album by the MOI straight from America. The LP will be called Uncle Meat and will cost f 39, and is produced
by Frank Zappa and David Cohen for the Bizarre label. Although the album would be in stores this week, there appear to be difficulties with shipping.
Negram expects the records in April.
30-05-69 NVHN Uncle Meat review
Uncle Meat: the coolest album by Frank Zappa
"Music from the film for which we don't have enough money to finish it." That is Uncle Meat, the latest double album by the MOI. Uncle Meat is a
scientist who, out of anger with the government because they fired him, wants to control the universe with the aid of monsters controlled by him and a
rock n roll group (Ruben and the Jets). How that goes, can be read in a very pretty little booklet that seals the album. And it has been showed in a
New York cinema, where the audience could watch a twelve-hour movie the Mothers made (not finished). If it started to get boring, the viewers could go
back to the ticket booth and pay for the amount of hours they watched.
The music, Uncle Meat is Frank Zappa's coolest work up to now. The record is divided into three themes (Uncle Meat; Dog Breath and King Kong) that
keep returning. One side of the album is devoted to King Kong and gives room to solos by Dom de Wild (piano), Motorishi Sherwood (sax), Bunk Gardner
(sax) and Ian Underwood (sax) to paraphrase Zappa's magistral King Kong theme. It's the most swinging part of Uncle Meat.
Next to these themes, some very good Ruben and the Jets songs can be heard, Suzy Creamcheese tells something about herself, her friends and her cat,
Ian Underwood tells how he got into the Mothers ("I went up to Frank Zappa and said I like his group and can I play with you. Frank asked: what can
you do that is fantastic? I said I play alto sax and piano. Well, grank said. Get started.") and the Mothers tell about their financial difficulties.
The RatJ songs are sung by Roy Estrada and Ray Collins, latter was still with the band during recording sessions (from October '67 to February '68). A
bizarre record, but it's the first one that is published on Zappa's and Herb Cohen's Bizarre-label. Its noticable that no expense, difficulty or
inventivity was spared on the cover. The flap cover looks amazing: photos, texts, drawings plus an explanation on how the record was made: recordings
(sometimes live, like on the pipe organ at the London Royal Albert Hall), with added studio work with clarinets that sound like trumpets and so on. As
it's called: overdub. And all that is produced by Frank Zappa with technician Dynamite Dick. Included with the price (some f38) is the booklet about
the film and illustrated inner covers. And to think Zappa also plays guitar very well (among others on Uncle Meat Variations).
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BBP
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14-06-69 LC: shorts...
Mother Superior Frank Zappa wants to organize a concert in Canada with Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, Vanilla Fudge and 1910 Fruitgum Company on the playlist.
There will also be a discussion between pop musicians and classical composers.
25-10-69 LC
The MOI have split up. Frank Zappa will now focus on producing and filming. The new album by French violinist Jean-Luc Ponty, full of
Mother-compositions, will be produced by Zappa. There is still material for 12 Mothers LPs. Reason for the split was the fact that the group isn't
very successful in America, that there weren't very many performances and no hit records.
Skipping some Holland Festival articles: because they use the same news source there is no difference between them.
06-03-70 LC Article on art to be visited in the region. Section on the 21-year-od Adje Kooi:
Besides artist he is also a musician in weekends. He plays in a pop band. His admiration tends towards FZ and his MOI. This worship doesn't stop with
music. It also continues in his painting. All 18 paintings he has exposed in the Klokstraat bear titles after Zappa lyrics. Contents of sound and
image have the same message.
28-03-70
Good news. The MOI are back together again, after FZ disbanded the group last year to work more on his own projects. The Mothers will perform again
and their new LP will be called Burnt Weeny Sandwich.
18-05-70 LC
Frank Zappa is currently working to edit his film Uncle Meat. The images, among others of a concert by Frank and the Mothers in the Albert Hall, have
to be brought back in length from 25 hours to 2 hours.
17-06-70 LC
Zappa in Piknik
Tomorrow, in the VPRO show Piknik, Zappa will perform with his MOI. They replace The Byrds, who weren't allowed to play Piknik by the organizers of
Holland Pop Festival in the Kralingse Bos. The MOI come in a new permutation. The group is composed of Zappa, Ian Underwood, Euclid Motorhead
Sherwood, Howard Kaylan, George Duke, Mark Volman, Jeff Simmons and Aynsley Dunbar. Their 40 minutes performance in Piknik is the only one on the
European continent. Immediately afterwards the group will head for England, to among others the Bath festival on June 27 and 28. The VPRO show will be
held in a secret place in the centre of the Netherlands because of the expected interest.
18-06-70 LC
Frank Zappa (third on the left) {see picture in next post} is in The Netherlands with his new MOI. He presented his group in Amsterdam. VPRO made TV
recordings of the Mothers for the show Piknik, that will be aired tonight from 19:04 to 22:30.
19-06-70 LC
Zappa possibly on Holland Popfestival
There's a chance that avant garde pop musician and composer Frank Zappa will perform at Holland Popfestival that is to be held in Rotterdam next week.
Yesterday Zappa could be seen and heard with the new MOI in the live show Piknik by the VPRO. By the end of next week he will perform at the pop
festival in Bath, England. For a concert in Rotterdam he initially charged 100,000, but the organizers didn't think about it.
By now his price has lowered to 18,000 dollars, according to his representative Barbara Scott in London he gets 30,000 dollars for the Bath concert.
She said it's very well possible that Zappa performs in The Netherlands with the MOI this september. In July he'll be at the jazz festival in Antibes
where he will probably play his piece "One hundred motels".
24-09-70 NVHN
A positive review on the Piknik show as a whole, confirms that VPRO will film the performance of 200 Motels conducted by Edo de Waart.
12-11-70 NVHN Weasels review
MOI: WRMF
"What we need is still a HIT," FZ sighed im June to Elly de Waard. I fear that the most recent Mother LP, with works from 67-69, won't give one. But
you can't want everything in life. Especially not if you accomplish as much as Zappa and his group, of which only Underwood and Sherwood were left in
Piknik. I managed to hear for you: Stravinsky, Charleston, Berio, Dieskau, bad big bands, snore snore and Dave Brubeck. More or less of them I found
in Toads of the Short Forest and Eric Dolphy Memorial Barbecue, highlights of the album for me. What makes them so special is the unexpected complete
climate changes, where for theMothers no technical sea (such as complicated polyrhythms) is too deep. Speaking of rhythmic: Directly From My Heart To
You is probaly intended as spoof, otherwise you don't whack on the 2nd and 4th beat so consequently. The song still has something about it like "we
don't want it but we can't resist." Maybe a hit after all!
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Zappa in Piknik
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BBP
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20-11-70 NVHN Article about groupies, a non-existing phenomenon in the Netherlands at that time. Barry Hay speaks of meeting the GTOs.
(We also met the GTOs, the female version of the MOI. I had some conditions with one of them, Miss Cinderella." Barry Hay says, laughing loudly. "When
we came to America for the second time, Cinderella was expecting from - she said - Jimmy Page or Keith Moon and she named several other celebrities.
Crazy man, here this would be a drama. John Mayall took her home and pampered her for a while. John, a real dirty old man who likes his groupies,
lived together for a while with groupie Nancy.)
Frank Zappa, in Los Angeles, is a sort of superfather to the local groupies and sees them as fighters for the sexual revolution. "Eventually most
groupies will marry men who work in the office or at the factory. But those guys are lucky to have a girl with such experience. They will be happier,
their work will be better, and that will have its effect on the national economy: it stimulates productivity.
05-01-71 NVHN Chunga review
That Chunga's Revenge by Frank Zappa can only now be found here, is the fault of either the importer or the mail, but it isn't mine. It is a strange
record. The new mothers can be heard in stereo in 6 of the 10 track. Hope and fear. Aynsley Dunbar possesses a drum style that is still captivating
when Zappa stops playing much and good and confusing guitar. Organ player George Duke, whose solo album Save the Country was buried deep by me, sells
undesired bar atmospheres on stage at top line. And that while predecessor Don Preston came to interesting things. We have to live with it.
Apart from his terrific laying out on the guitar, Zappa should be listened to closely as singer of layered texts.
13-01-71 NVHN
Article about politics quotes FZ's line from an interview with De Nieuwe Linie that was one week old at the time: "Politics is a game for old men, who
sit across from each other and talk until they start coughing."
09-02-71 NVHN
Boycot Frank Zappa show
The underground-show by FZ and MOI, that would be performed in the Royal Albert Hall in London last night, was boycotted by the board of the hall. The
board protested the contents of the lyrics of the piece and foul language.
11-02-71 NVHN
A VPRO team went to LA to make a portrait of Frank Zappa. This super individualist who isn't attracted to hippiedom or any group at all, is a hard
(nocturnal) worker. He is also the inspirator of the ones around him. He didn't just lead his group MOI to great heights, he also took part in the
performances of the group Girls Together Only and Wild Man Fischer. A programme of strange events, juicy quites and brilliant music.
12-02-71 LC Section from a TV review by Nico Scheepmaker on the VPRO doc.
(...)
And after that came Frank Zappa. Roelof Kiers (terrifically aided by cameraman Peter Bos and sound man Jan Rap) couldn't have been more topical, now
that Zappa's 200 Motels in London has been cancelled because the musicians in the symphony orchestra refused to shout an obscene word. There's a
well-known Zappa poster in which you can see him sitting on the toilet. Which proves that he is the original "mr Unceremoniousness". This showed in
this profile, in which nor he, nor some other excited thing that was named Miss Lucy, nor his group The MOI during their performance, mince words. The
naturality with which all kinds of sexual matters were dealt with, proved less that we had to do with foul mouths, but more that this was another
world in which these people live, with different norms.
"Progress is not possible without deviation from the norm," said Frank Zappa, and he apparently lives with that conviction. He stays with it, because
of his intelligence, his carelessness on what people think, and especially because of his unmistakeable personality, a "gospodin" as they say in
Yugoslavia (I wouldn't be surprised if Zappa had Slavic origins), a word that's hard to translate in this meaning, something between "lord", "boss"
and "master".
I thought it was a good piece of work by Kiers, in fact more captivating and better made than the profile CBS made of Simon and Garfunkel last year,
which was sent to Montreux and that possibly cost twenty times as much.
18-02-71 LC
CRM researches VPRO film on Frank Zappa
The secretary of culture, recreation and social work starts a research on the film on Frank Zappa by Roelof Kiers, shown by VPRO on Thursday last
week, many complaints were sent in regarding immoral parts.
When the research has finished, secretary of state Klompé will be advised if there have to be measures against VPRO. According to the law, the
secretary has the possibilitiy to give a reprimand or - in extreme cases - taking away show time. The VPRO film portrait will be shown to civil
servants of the radio and TV department.
NVHN shows an article with about the same content, and adds another unrelated controversy.
24-02-71 LC
Reader's opinion against all the charges on things considered lewd.
17-04-71 LC
A readers poll Aloha, what Hitweek turned into, names FZ as best composer.
29-04-71 NVHN
2000 {sic} Motels nearly completed
The film 200 Motels by Frank Zappa, MOI, Ringo Starr and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, is almost finished and is to be expected in cinemas by the
end of this summer. The VPRO will soon show a TV documentary about recording of the film in the London Pinewood Studios.
200 Motels is the first and long awaited film by Zappa. It's a destillation of a rock era, a little surrealistic, an opera with decors changing from
concentration camp to underground cinema, from motel room to newt farm, all seen by a band on the road. Director of 200 Motels is Tony Palmer.
17-05-71 NVHN
Pupils from ballet school Terpsichore give a performance. The jazz ballet will be performed to music by "Franz Zappa".
22-05-71 NVHN The ballet performance is lengthy but gets a good review.
16-07-71 NVHN
Mr FZ, better known as the father of MOI, has an argument with record company MGM. The company recently released a double album by the Mothers that
many fans may be happy with, but not Zappa. He had condemned the songs for the record. He also felt that they don't fit in the musical image of the
group anymore. An official "white" album {illegal, like black market: since LPs are black
the adjective is white} The case has been taken to court.
14-09-71 NVHN Fillmore East review
The main section of this live recording is taken by a taste of 200 Motels. In a slightly different strength (Jeff Simmons is replaced by Jim Pons) and
shape Zappa's group put this story to music during their performance in The Netherlands, last December. Zappa himself doesn't do much. His part in the
extensive conversation between ex-Turtles Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan is little inspired and guitar work in his grand style can only be found in the
two chunks of Willie the Pimp. These give a nice interruption in the story of Mark and Howard on the pop singer who can't get a groupie and needs to
chat up. He finally gets a bird, but he won't get it in bed until he sings his hit single with a bullet to her. Talking and singing in juicy language
and with virtuoso screaming the partners turn around each other until the liberating hit is played. That is a version of the Turtles hit Happy
Together, not brought without self-criticism. For me the record ends here, becaue the encore only shows that Don Preston (on mini-Moog) and the other
ex-Mothers have really grown apart during their short separation. After the encore come two more songs, of which Peaches en Regalia gives a reasonably
virtuoso harmony. The hit spoof (with hit chance) Tears Began to Fall is, after the lengthy performance in this genre earlier on this record, barely
enjoyable.
On the whole the record, (of which the white cover with Zappa's handwriting in cliché would have lowered the production costs) only for
Mothers-maniacs for better of worse. Others can, hearing the small share of Zappa and the not quite convincing sacrifice of excellent instrumentalists
to vocal artists Volman and Kaylan, who I'm really done listening to after three times, should wait for
better times for the Mothers.
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Combined Efteling and problems on the site that hosts these articles made continuing this effort a little late, but here's the next batch:
18-09-71 LC
Frank Zappa and his Mothers intend to release nine albums in the next 18 months. On one of them, all ex-mothers, 18 in total, will be able to show the
world what they are capable of once more.
23-10-71 LC (also from the short news list Harrewar: Rainbow Theatre in London will be opened by The Who)
Frank Zappa's film 200 Motels will be released early November.
15-11-71 NVHN 200 Motels review by B.B. van der Kleij
200 Motels
The start of the longawaited events has come: the soundtrack to Frank Zappa's film 200 Motels has been released. The film itself comes medio December,
Zappa will be in our country on November 27, and the VPRO-TV will show a programme on this phenomenon. This far the planning of the entire campaign
seemed rather risky, because, apart from a couple of initiated (but those don't need all this action) not much was known about 200 Motels. So little,
that even the press information that comes with the records, doesn't correspond with the documented material. The live record too (Fillmore East) that
seemed to be a taste of things to come, didn't come over very well, so it seems to me.
The optimism from the organizers hasn't been based on loose ground. Zappa has given the idea he walked around with for four years, a very imposing
body.
The story of 200 Motels isn't as easy to follow as the history told on Fillmore East. This has two causes: the verbal work by Volman and Kaylan is
much more restricted than I thought, and certain conversation fragments are purposely drowned by Zappa in symphonic music.
The biggest surprise is the last part. Those who know the old Mothers records know that Zappa was as progressive with the human voice as "classical"
composers like Berio, Stockhausen, Cage and Ligeti.
But writing for a choir and large orchestra (Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Elgar Howarth) is something different from working with the
vocal means of your own group.
Tens of pop persons have kept themselves busy with symphonic music and its performance and the sonic results were always obnoxious and silly. Proably
because the musical development of those "composers" got stuck somewhere in the late 19th century. Not Zappa. His often quoted admiration for
Stravinsky and Varèse wasn't an empty shout-out.
The 200 Motels music shows that Zappa didn't just take the chance to see through and musically embody the entire crazy decor of the pop scene, but
also that he managed to use ideas from music by classical pioneers (besides Stravinsky and Varèse also Mussorgsky, Weill, Berg, Messiaen and Cage) in
his bizarre imagination in a way that is quite catching in his work. You can't really tell from the start, there it seems the orchestra is destined to
produce kitsch in the style of Gershwin and Bernstein. But from the start of side 2 the symphonic fragments and the group's songs grow more
effectively towards each other. Possibly because there is aimed less and less towards a synthesis of both, at any rate also because Zappa doesn't
attempt to be a new classical composer, but as a highly awake individual he manages to interpret the musical events by all means he deems
necessary.
The music on 200 motels has 34 songs on the record, which is different from the real soundtrack. Songs vary in length between 41 seconds and 11
minutes.
It's pointless and impossible to describe all those fragments. I still want to name a few tracks:
Touring can make you crazy, with a complete disproportion between musical context and expression, that brings immense tension. "Penis Dimension" with
the amazing vocal acrobatics by the ex-Turtles, and Zappa's beautiful guitar solo in Magic Fingers.
Unlike the earnest major productions classical and pop composers wrote in the last few years, for those who appreciate Zappa's destructive humour
there's a lot to laugh at. The maniest reason to spend hours with this double album filled with absurd, clever music and lyrics. The stereo
possibilities were used optimally, the recording is a little shrill (doesn't do harm with this music) and for as far as the pressing is concerned:
watch out for the bumps and ticking that make a bad appearance on my copy.
24-11-71 LC
FZ in Muziekmagazine
In the Wednesday evening Music Magazine, that the NOS-radio emits from 19:30 to 22:25 on Hilversum 1, from 21:00 to 21:30 a special devoted to rock
musician FZ and his fantasy-opera 200 Motels, that will be performed on Saturday in Ahoy in Rotterdam, can be heard. The radio programme has an
interview with Zappa recorded in Düsseldorf, that has musical interludes from a.o. 200 Motels. The special is composed by Piet Hein van de Poel.
FZ 200 motels in Ahoy by Harry Weites
When any Northern pop music fans have assembled in the Martini-hall in Groningen to watch and listen, in short enjoy, Leon Russel, at the same moment
in the Rotterdam Ahoy many pop music fans from all over the country are enjoying together the music by another group: the MOI.
The fact that Zappa plays Rotterdam tomorrow is something the true fan knows already, but to those who don't feel initiated yet, here's some more
information.
Zappa brings his mothers to Europe to perform 200 Motels, and this 200 motels is a pop event with a lengthy history. The piece, that according to
creator Zappa should be seen as a "musical collage", has had issues with lack of money, members of the British Royal Philharmonic Orchestra running
away, and with film companies that were anything but cooperative. Frank was prepared to take all his motels here last year, Edu {sic} de Waart was
prepared to conduct the orchestra and VPRO was prepared to finance the lot. Although so many people from all sides were willing, it wouldn't go on,
since there was not enough money.
And that was a consequence of the fact that WDR (German TV) wasn't prepared to handle a co-production.
Eventually American film company United Artists was prepared to shoot it all. Its consequence is that tomorrow night in the Ahoy won't be the
spectacular event, i.e. no philharmonic orchestra, no ballet, no acting. Just songs from 200 Motels performed by MOI. It seems worth the trouble, an
opinion VPRO shares with me, because this broadcaster will show the concert footage on 23 December.
This pop event is, according to Zappa who worked three years on it, "an integration between various forms of art and reality, of which sound is the
most important". The piece is about a pop group on tour. In one of the 200 motels is a room with built-in television, and that's the final goal. Truth
and fantasy run through each other all the time.
The criticism on society isn't as sharp as in other Zappa-works, it's all a bit softer. The sound is important to him and a logical consequence, so it
seems to me, due to the musical experiments, that the words play a subdued part.
The fact that three ex-Turtles are now part of the Mothers won't be very strange. These boys, who had world hits four to five years ago in "Happy
Together" and "She'd rather be with me", have reached with their commercial input that the group is on a higher musical level. One could conclude that
Zappa isn't as authoritative as he is made to believe, but more likely is that Howard Kaylan, Mark Volman and Jim Pons don't pay much attention to the
master. And they can afford that with their musical past and the fact that there's three of them.
This opposed to Ian Underwood, Don Preston and Aynsley Dunbar, guys who have been much longer with Zappa and who can tolerate his authority a lot
easier, for whatever reason.
Zappa, tomorrow in Rotterdam with his Mothers, his authority, his music, his mystique (?), and with many Zappa fans. An event to let George Harrison
slip for.
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Pictures with the Ahoy 1971 review. Captions:
Frank Zappa smoked continuously during the concert in Rotterdam. If he had to play he'd tuck his cigarette between the snares at the end of the
neck.
One of the few times that Mark Volman played guitar. He was primarily vocalist and show-maker in the MOI performance at the Ahoy
Attachment: fz_6.JPG (44kB)
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29-11-71 NVHN Concert review by Harry Weites
Ahoy: Mothers play little from 200 Motels
Zappa surprises 8000 people with premiere "Billy the Mountain"
Frank Zappa, the pop musicion who puts so many modern classics in his music, brought the European premiere of his new piece Billy The Mountain to a
sold-out Ahoy. This was probably to the surprise of the 8000 viewers who just expexted works from 200 Motels. Zappa can afford to pay no attention to
what is expected, and circumstances were with him: the MOI played well, thanks to the enthusiastic reactions of the audience.
Zappa seemed a little ess authoritive, but he is still clearly presend. Not as the star, and not as boss as he says, but as conductor. Saturday night
he brought a musical show with his Mothers, not a musical performance.
The audience was very enthusiastic, every song that was recognized scored an ovation for the Mothers. That recognition wasn't so strange, because
Zappa played a lot of work he also performed several years ago in Amsterdam. The result was Zappa gave an encore.
Film 200 Motels
All those old songs and the connected success give the impression that this entire European tour is a promotion for the film 200 Motels. And how
better to raise expectations than to play for recognition and adding a lot of show and humour, with the occasional criticism and satire on anyone. And
all that happened in Ahoy, but in such a way you were watching and listening captivated throughout the entire concert.
Before the interval there were only early Zappa-songs. He started with Call Any Vegetable and from this song you could tell the vocal qualities of
Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan. Without these two Zappa wouldn't be able to bring the work he wants to perform now (more musicality, less electronics
and less criticism on anything). To add to this, these ex-Turtles can put on an enormous act.
Billy the Mountain, the title of the new record that is being made, contains like all the other Zappa-works a bit of musical and a bit of humour. It
also has a clear show element. One works with cow bells, blow-tiddlers, whistles, a rattle and a toy accordeon and clearly rehearsed movements are
made.
Show
The entire group performs the show. Aynsley Dunbar comes out from behind his drum kit to do a little dance with Volman and Howard. In Billy there's
also a part that reminds strongly of a jam session, and in which Don Prestond {sic} on organ, Ian Underwood on clarinet and drummer Aynsley Preston
{sic} each have a solo. And that is the only musical novelty of this work, for as far as it was put on this stage.
The greater musical freedom Zappa gives his people now was also noticeable in comparison to the older songs. In those songs, Zappa was the only one
who could easily improvise on a predetermined chord scheme, and if he made a sign the others knew when it was over.
Jokes
The new bass player Jim Pons, another ex-Turtle, sufficed well. It could be noticed that he just did his own part on the older songs, but he was much
more active on Billy the Mountain. He was also the only one who pronounced a Dutch sung part well, possibly a consequence of his Dutch descent. The
Dutch song was about carpet needed beneath a sofa. In this song one used clearly the sympathetic fatness of Mark Volman (his opulent body was
jocularly introduced as a sofa!) Zappa clearly prepared his Dutch performance. He made jokes about Rotterdam tap water, the Queen, the Telegraaf
{sensation newspaper}.
The group proved she's on a high musical level. For instance, in the encore they played I Want To Hold Your Hand a lot better than the Beatles
probably would ever have done in a performance. But despite of all this musical skill Zappa and co put more and more show in it: it sometimes
overrides. The performance is more commercial, it will make more money, but it's a pity.
11-12-71 LC (note: this must've been after the Rainbow crash, but before that hit the news three days later)
after "200 motels" now "billy the mountain"
FZ steps out in new movie
FZ clearly tasted the blood of filming. Only recently did the Californian pop phenomenon and the spiritual father of the MOI delivered 200 Motels, and
he's already working on a new film. It will be called Billy the Mountain and will relate the love affair between a mountain (Billy) and a tree
(Ethel), who go on vacacion through America and have the whackiest adventures. Zappa already made 20 to 30 minutes of music for this movie, that was
presented during a beautiful concert on 27 november in the Rotterdam Ahoy for the first time in Europe.
Zappa didn't want to elaborate about the contents of this new film at his most recent visit to The Netherlands. In his suite at the Howard Johnson
hHotel on the Amsterdam Prinsengracht, he said: "I could tell you all kinds of things about it now, but I'd rather not do that, because everything is
due for changes. If I were to tell you the concept now, there's a good chance I'll have to tell you something completely different if I return here
next year. From the basic idea of 200 Motels we eventually realized about 50%."
Zappa did want to talk about 200 Motels. The film, that can be seen since late October in America and that will appear in cinemas in our country in
January, deals with the experiences of a pop group on the road. The film, for which Zappa made the design three years ago, was recorded in 7 days in
the London Pinewood Studios. There was worked with the video system, which had a.o. the advantage that the music could be recorded live. That music
was made by Zappa and MOI, with collaboration of the London Philharmonic Orcestra. The film, described by Zappa as a surrealistic documentary, was
financed by United Artist. The company invested 600,000 dollars in the venture.
Can you tell me what the original plan for 200 Motels was?
Zappa"I had written an enormous amount of orchestral music during the tours I made with the Mothers in the last few years." He adds to that with light
irony: "That was in the days I could sit quietly in my hotel room, and not, like now, have to do 14 interviews in 5 hours. Then I came in Holland and
it was the intention that VPRO would make a special TV-show from it. Edo de Waart was to conduct it. I came back a few times to talk it over with him.
But there were numerous difficulties. The most important one was the studios weren't large enough for the orchestra, the wings, etc. Fortunately
United Artist expressed interest in the project. They wanted to make a movie out of it."
You said only 50 percent of the basic plan was realized. What was left out of the movie?
Zappa: "They are mainly little things I left out along the way. There was only one large section, that didn't come in. That was a love story. I don't
want to talk about it, because I think there's little point in that. I left out that part due to time constraints."
Why was the film recorded in Europe, and not in America?
Zappa: "The videosystem used in Europe (the 625-line PAL system) looks better on film than the American system. The videobusiness is growing strongly
in the States, but the European system is still better."
The film largely takes place in the imaginery town of "Centerville". I get the impression this is a typical American town. Is that true?
Zappa: "No, Centerville can be the town on any place in the world. Where it's so boring that you need all your imagination to exist. I know a lot of
Centervilles. There are plenty in Europe." A little later he says: "I do agree with you the film is primarily based on American conditions. That gave
some difficulties with recording. Especially in the prop area this was triky. If we needed a letterbox, we had to specify we needed an American
letterbox, or else they'd bring an English one. At one point we had to bring in a cash register from America. They didn't have that in London."
United Artists financed the film. Did the company restrict you?
Zappa: "Not at all. They gave the money for realization and I handed in the final product and that's all they meddled with. That exceeded my
expectations."
How have the reactions been on 200 Motels?
Zappa: "In the States it has run for a month now.
I don't know exactly how the response is, but I think that's allright because I've heard it's played for full houses. I've also heard the film is the
most popular with students and high school kids, and especially with the boys. I don't know exactly why. I do have the idea 200 Motels will be a
commercial success. I don't know yet how that will be in Europe. The film is currently only playing in Stockholm."
How do you think Nixon and Agnew would react if they'd see the film?
Zappa: "Assumed they'd want to see it, I think they'd leave the cinema in five minutes. In the first minutes in the script there are numerous things
that would disturb them. And if someone would convince them to stay in cinema, they definitely wouldn't laugh. I'm convinced of that."
How do you think the reactions will be in Europe?
Zappa: "I think they will pay more attention to the artistic aspects of the work than in America. An American just goes to the cinema and doesn't
think too much over it, but a European has a more analytic disposition and pays more attention to the esthetic points. I believe a similar approach
goes for our concerts. This is especially true in The Netherlands: I think our music is understood well here."
Soon 200 Motels will be shown in various European countries. There are a number of controversial things in that film. Do you think there could be
censorship problems with it?
Zappa: "I've heard there will be problems in France. They have problems with translating various passages. They appear to have difficulties with
translating Penis Dimension. I'm sure they'll find a decent word for it."
Do you believe you and your group are still a menace to American society?
Zappa: "When Uncle Meat was released, there were several bits in it that scared people. For instance that part where the girl says she went to Europe
to do nice sexy things. A lot of people thought that this shouldn't be on a record. Because of the shock effect the album wasn't available everywhere
in America for a long time."
18-12-71 LC {Short news entry: this one is probably busted since Zappa was still in London at this time.}
Frank Zappa recently left London with somebody else's luggage.
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24-12-71 LC Review of 200 Motels VPRO documentary by Nico Scheepmaker
(...)
Whether 200 Motels besides two good LPs also made a good movie, I don't know yet, because I haven't yet seen the movie, although I do have my doubts.
It is certain that 200 Motels gave two excellent documentaries by Rudolf Kiers and the late cameraman Peter Bos. Or I'd better say: Frank Zappa,
because 200 Motels was still being made when the first documentary was made. That was the best of the two, it was also the most extensive, besides we
got to see Zappa as Zappa and not as busy bee, busy directing his dream.
The VPRO-tv had almost financed and produced the film, but there was no money. Now United Artist put in three quarter of a million. I think that, if
the money had been there, the VPRO wouldn't have been here anymore, so we would have missed this projected question: "Ever became member of VPRO two
days before Christmas?"
(...)
30-12-71 NVHN
{A mini-musical has been put on stage in Groningen, about the plastic world. It is clearly based on Plastic People.}
06-01-72 Frisia
{Youth centre Why? has a FZ-evening on 9 Jan.}
15-01-72 LC
The man who knocked FZ off the stage into the orchestra pit in London, has been summoned to court.
29-01-72 LC
Frank Zappa went back to California with his leg still in plaster. He needs to rest for six months. The sequel to 200 Motels, Billy the Mountain,
won't be filmed now. This was set to happen in England in March.
01-04-72 LC
Rainbow Theatre has financing difficulties, there appear to be debts and the board complains about groups that charge huge sums.
The attacker of FZ, Trevor Charles Howell, has to spend a year in jail. He attacked Zappa during a performance because his girlfriend had told him she
loved Zappa.
12-06-72 NVHN JABFLA review by B. van der Kleij
The businessman he is, Zappa chose for another live recording for his new Mothers album (JABFLA) after the success of the record with Fillmore
East-comedy and the stage experience with his act Billy the Mountain. Still I think Billy the Mountain, the 70s Peter and the Wolf, that takes up the
entire first side, a lot less interesting than side 2, on which a.o. a fascinating extended version of Call Any Vegetable can be found. The problem
with Billy to me is the singularity of the idea, that gets into every aspect of the output. Like the musical perodies, which ase very simple, and
takes off the fun of the very clear musical illustration of the story after only one or two hearings. I haven't had time to try how often the verbal
jokes of the Mothers can be heard without getting annoying, but I have the impression that because of the limited amount of musical information
someone could easily lose the lust to spin it. It's quite different on side two, on which the Mothers live up their virtuoso blend of speech, song and
music in four masterful sketches.
09-09-72 LC
FZ gives a concert September 16th in the Oval Cricket Ground in London. It will be his first record since he was knocked off stage at the Rainbow
Theatre in London last December and broke his leg.
15-09-72 NVHN
FZ and the Hot Rats Orchestra sunday evening in the Houtrusthallen in The Hague. That day Zappa will arrive with 35 people strong in a charter plane
at airport Zestienhoven in Rotterdam.
{the review in NVHN is nearly the same as the one from Provinciale Zeeuwse Courant}
16-04-73 LC
Article about Aloha, the magazine Hitweek turned into. It speaks of the Edison FZ gave to Hitweek in '68: it was sold in auction fot 850 guilders.
01-06-73 LC
Relates of a day for the Dutch Union for Reformed Youth Communities. One of the speeches was held by Gerrit Nijhof, who used Zappa lyrics to warn for
the dangers of pop music.
10-09-73 NVHN concert review by Willem Ennes:
FZ: more clever than really pretty.
Sunday afternoon, in the Amsterdam concertgebouw, the season was opened by the manieth formation of FZ. The most important changes in the considerably
smaler band is the new rhythm section, with Tom Fowler (bass) and Ralph Humphrey (drums). Also trombonist Bruce FFowler {sic} was added to the group.
The last one made with Ian Anderwood (flute, clarinet, bass clarinet, all amplified electronically, and synthesizer) and Jean-Luc Ponty for beautiful
sound characters.
My suspicion that the group would have lost quality with the departure of vocalists Volman, Kaylan and especially Aynsley Dunbar, one of the world's
best pop drummers according to yours truly, was confirmed for a large part. The old-fashioned fun, for which you could count on the ex-Turtles, was
decently compensated by a very funny, almost school-concert-like introduction of Frank Zappa. Also the performance was decorated with pretty dance
routines and a mime-act performed by the entire group in which everyone pretended to play along in deadly silence. A clear decline is in Dunbar's
replacement. After hearing the exceptional percussionist Ralph Humphrey I wonder if there is a drummer who can compete with Aynsley Dunbar in the
Mothers.
he rhythm section wasn't as firm as it used to be. Ruth Underwood, Ian's wife, partially caught this loss with fantastic percussion, she shone
especially on her marimba. Her work gave the entire erformance a hot rats character. with the difference that the compositions and instrumentations
were a lot more complex than on the record. Sometimes the enormous amount of talent was badly used, almost misused. Zappa proved again to be a capable
conductor, didn't play at his best, probably because of a defective amp. He made lengthy solos occasionally, when his definitely not childish fellows
had to use less time. ean-Luc Ponty and Ian Underwood both played a very good solo in a blues-like piece on an electrical violin with wahwah and bass
clarinet respectively. George Duke (back from Cannonball Adderley) wasn't very noticeable, mainly because the keyboards were amplified badly.
All in all Zappa's performance was a perfect execution of not very strong compositions with too little rest points. The audience was enthusiastic
enough to ask for an encore. But there was no such luck. Probably because of the evening concert. The pre-show was by the English group Nectar, who
are very popular in Germany. For the regular and often knowledgeable Zappa fans, this band's music must have been torture. The success this group has
in Germany, and probably soon in their own country, is probably connected to the rising kraut-rock. The compositions were so un-interesting and so
full of boring solos that I was surprised the audience didn't leave the hall in large numbers.
15-09-73 LC
Next year, the MOI will exist for 10 years. Leader FZ, also the only one who played with the Mothers for these ten years, wants to release a 4 LP box
set on this occasion. On these records there will be the yet unpublished material of the last Mothers formation. After the film 200 Motels it became a
little quiet on the side of Zappa and his Mothers, the last thing we heard was a publication of a book on the film. Until the concert in Groningen
last week: the hall was nearly broken down {= good thing}. We suspect Frank will get more attention when his double-double-LP is released: Zappa will
never be lost, not even after ten years, we say.
12-10-73 NVHN Over-Nite Sensation review by B. van der Kleij. Article printed near the fold.
The first record on the second Zappa-sublabel with Warner Bros. makes a skillful and very experienced impression. It looks like the Mothers will now
be billed without the suffix "of invention", and {ununderstandable}.
More than ever, ONS is a product of Zappa and not fron his group (bass: Tom Fowler; drums: Ralph Humphrey; piano and synthesizer: George Duke;
violins: Jean-Luc Ponty; winds: Ian Underwood, Sal Marquez and Bruce Fowler; percussion: Ruth Underwood). The record mainly offers swinging lyrical
rock. Those lyrics, of the usual Frank Zappa cunningness, the meetings and observations with often bizarre jokes and alluding that probably only the
BBC censors would be worried about. On the last, fourth track on the first side Duke and Ponty get decent space for their own input. Mainly Zappa
fills the predictable spaces with his typically curly guitarplaying. In the larger forms of the three songs on side 2, there is more variation in
structure and execution. Amazing is the unity with thich the Mothers find their way through the jumpy rhythms of the collective. But that makes you
wish that Zappa leaves his soloing in favour of a spontaneous outing of the Humphrey (great drummer) - Ponty or Ponty-Duke combination.
08-04-74 NVHN Apostrophe review by B. van der Kleij
If someone in pop music survived himself, it's FZ. ON Apostrophe he, aided by some twenty (not all performing at the same time) musicians, gives us
songs and stories to enhance our dining and dancing pleasures, as he says on the cover. Even though it is suposed to be ironic, the nine subjects the
James Last of sub-culture deals with, are all treated following the well-known recipe: rock cut short, long stories and un-jokes on a blues base,
"nice" singing, guitar shreds etc etc. Even though this record is called Apostrophe and even though Zappa spells that that word as A'pos! Tro-Phe (!),
the period behind the Zappa appearance has been put behind 200 Motels years ago.
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Photos
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29-05-74 200 Motels still gets into the late slot at cinemas
21-09-74 LC
FZ cancelled his English tour, because he feels he is being discriminated by hall owners.
03-05-75 LC
Captain Beefheart has, at own request, joined Frank Zappa's Mothers. Frank Zappa himself was in London to attend a trial. He sued the Albert Hall
board, who wouldn't let him perform. The judge wasn't very introduced to the pop world, because Frank had to explain to him what words like groupie
and underground meant.
13-03-76 LC FZ secures two slots in the quotes page:
"I'm strongly against stupidity, wherever in the world. I am also anti-hippie, because to me that is a stupid movement."
"In the past ten years there have been many politicians who preached new society, but none of them would have proven capable of leading people or
ruling a state.
25-03-76 NVHN Popstar Frank Zappa paid a lot for a concert in Sweden. He didn't make a dime, because the Swedish tax seized the amount of f 50,000 and
will probably confiscate it. And all that because Zappa's tour organizer didn't follow the Swedish currency regulations. If he had applied for a
permit to export the money in time, there wouldn't have been a problem.
24-04-76 200 Motels still plays, and is called "an underground-classic you must have seen in order to know how the world turns".
28-01-77 Wolfgang Dauner is named "The Frank Zappa from Zwabenland".
31-01-77 NVHN Zoot Allures review
(after talking about a group who has only once performed the northern regions of NL) That last bit is true about Frank Zappa, but this gentleman is
such a world star (not in the least over his eccentric behaviour) that his concerts are preferably held in mass halls in the west of the country. Like
next Saturday in the Jaap Eden hall in Amsterdam. Zappa will probably bring some work of his latest LP Zoot Allures, which he recorded last year for
his new record company Warner Bros, after having worked for years on his own labels. The intellectual non-conformist from the 60s has gotten in the
background over the last few years, and that is a little justified. Zoot Allures is definitely not his best record, although that has to be seen
against the backdrop of Zappa's place in music. His pathfinder part is pretty much over, and a slight feeling of boredom I couldn't surpress while
listening to Zoot Allures. He does bring in a couple of new aspects, but just like was the case earlier, this all makes a stiff impression. Zappa
himself plays almost all instruments except for drums (Terry Bozzio), and is occasionally aided by familiar names like Roy Estrata and Ruth Underwood
and here and there with sounds by the technicians.
As always, Zappa is working with fhisper-like singing that continuously reminds of a sixties-group the Bonzo Dog Hand. The only thing that really
jumps out, is the lengthy guitar work by Zappa, and that too makes a suspicious impression. A few compact songs would have done well on this
record.
04-02-77 NVHN
Zappa plays Jaap Edenhal on 5 February, starting at 20:00.
04-02-77 NVHN prints the Peter Boyer interview
23-02-77 200 Motels still runs, theatre advises ticket reservation.
25-02-77 NVHN Syp Winia reviews 200 Motels in a thin way: calls it: "it doesn't follow up to its high expectations (...) but 200 Motels remains a
unique viewing experience".
14-05-77 LC
FZ sued the London Rainbow Theatre. He wants a million guilders because a man pushed him off-stage in 1971. He was so badly injured he couldn't work
for ten months. He now wants compensation for it.
05-11-77 LC
FZ on rock journalism: "It comes down that people who can't write, interview people who can't talk, for people who can't read." We are strongly
offended.
9-11-77 NVHN
Zappa's music is being used as accompaniment to the play Crankybox by Judith Herzberg
09-03-79 NVHN Sheik Yerbouti review
Finally another serious product by Frank Zappa
FZ is another person who hasn't put out any records in the last few years. Although, he did put out records, like recently the Sleep Dirt LP, but that
too was made from records that Zappa had on the shelf for years and that would normally never have made it onto a record. Zappa had an argument with
WEA and was contractually bound to giving tapes, it's that simple. For that reason, the level of his records has been lower since the 1977 Zoot
Allures and the design very poor.
His new album Sheik Yerbouty, that was released very shortly after Sleep Dirt on CBS, can be greeted with some joy. This double LP contains finished
compositions and no improvised studio chatter with musicians who dropped by. Which also means there are finally lyrics with the songs again, while
Zappa was prepared to give extensive cover information, so we at least know who play on Sheik Yerbouti. Also the title is a phonetic corruption and
with that a criticising parody on disco titles like Shake Your Booty.
Besides that, the cover information is very interesting to the European listener, and not just the non-English speaking part. Zappa is making such
inside-American cabaret, in which again the American Dream, womanhood and the semi-admired put on sado-masochism play a part, so his intentions are
difficult to follow for non-Americans.
This can be lived with, although it is clear that Zappa was in bloom in the late sixties. It is annoying, that probably because of the fact the basic
tape is largely live, the songs are very stretched, in which Zappas jazz-rock-like guitar playing has a large part Nevertheless we can be happy to
finally hear something on the record that Zappa could be behind.
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11-06-79
FZ cassettes cost 9,95 each.
04-04-80 NVHN
Zappa quote: Youth will sooner part from God, flag and motherland, than music.
07-05-81 De Feanster
Frank Zappa won first prize on the International Film Festival in Paris for the film Baby Snakes
29-05-81 De Feanster
TTR is 5th place in this week's best selling records.
18-06-81 De Feanster
Frank Zappa may be the most underestimated pop musician currently active. In the past 15 years he made an unimaginable amount of LPs. TTR is a live-LP
with a multitude of musical styles. There are also a few Zappa-classics on this album nl Brown Shoes Don't Make It and Peaches 3 (the third version of
Peaches en Regalia)
There is one studio song on TTR, the catchy Fine Girl. Motivation: "This song does not have controversial lyrics, so everyone can play it and the
existence of the LP can be so well-known, according to Zappa.
23-07-81 De Feanster
FZ released three guitar-LPs you can mail-order in the States. A special box will be released in The Netherlands around Christmas. There will probably
also be a "regular" LP in September first.
17-09-81 De Feanster
FZ started a mail order company under the name of Bashing Pumpkin Records {sic}. That company is different from Wehkamp {Du. mailorder company}. Zappa
tries to sell his all too experimental projects.
16-04-82
De Cirkel, record store in Groningen, sells 1st class Ahoy tickets + bus return ticket for May 15th at 60 guilders per ticket.
17-05-82 NVHN concert review by Max Palfenier
Zappa: the Cruijff {Du. football/soccer player} of rock music
That American musician Frank Zappa manages to fill the Ahoy-Sportpalace in Rotterdam year after year, shows that his value to present-day music hasn't
lost any of its strength. Speaking of a second youth is an offense to someone who is as strikingly versatile and original at 42 as he was fifteen
years ago. His discography embodies over 30 titles, of which 7 LPs in the last two years, among them several doubles and even a triple were
released.
The image we get from his latest albums is confirmed live. Zappa as satirist, who with his often sexual, anti-religious and criticising society lyrics
worked by shocking and obscenity, should by quantity make more and more space for the earnest musician and composer Zappa.
Mostly long and instrumental pieces, with complex structure and filled with musical trap doors were thrown into the hall in a two hour session,
without interruption. The band Zappa was working with was, apart from relative veterans like keyboard player Tommy Mars and rhythm guitarist and
singer Ray White, built from young musicians. Musicians that are all on his recently released studio album SATLTSADW. With Zappa's harsh and
dictatorial approach, this band is an adequate school for them, that will pay off later. They seemed to work effortlessly through these strangescores,
pieces that were tightly arranged from start to finish and in which Zappa himself - complete with baton - performed as strict conductor.
They are diverse types of music, that fit together miraculously. The heavy metal rock, with a lead role for ripping Steve Vai on guitar, modern
classic (a hideous term by the way), a doo-wop choir, the occasional waltz, it's possible without being disturbing with Zappa.
Fruit
In contrast with this complex music were the rather simple and free guitar parts of the maestro himself. Every time he seems to suffer the fact that
he is not seen as worthy on this field. On Saturday night he scooped up lengthy solos. At a glance barely earth-shattering, but with the interaction
of the manieth drum giant from Zappa-school, Chad Wackerman, above all musically interesting in a rhythmic point of view.
That Zappa wants nothing to do with the audience is well-known. With even the slightest - Saturday night it was a piece of fruit thrown on stage - he
threats to stop the performance. This, and the nature of the music itself, which demands the most of concentration from the musicians, created a
distant athmosphere, in which there is no room for emotions. But as long as he keeps compensating this with qualitatively high standard music, the
Ahoy will be sold out again next year. Those who don't want to wait that long can go to Schüttorf in Germany on June 5, where apart from The Stray
Cats and Simple Minds, Zappa will perform as well.
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11-06-83
Zappa's love/hate affair with The Netherlands.
VARA will show a concert registration of Frank Zappa on Friday, June 17, Nederland 1, 22:45. The concert, entitled YAWYI (also the title of a recent
LP) is the last in a series of Halloween-concerts he gave with his band Zappa. Halloween is Allerheiligen (Ock 31st) American style, when many
Americans get out on the road in fancy dress. The concert comes from Palladium Theatre in New York. Band members are: Frank Zappa, Ray White and Steve
Vai, guitar; Scott Thunes, bass; Tommy Mars and Bobby Martin, keyboard and saxophone; Chaad {sic} Wackerman, drums; Ed Mann, percussion.
Books have been filled about Frank Zappa. A life story on this page is impossible. One item is manageable: FZ and his love/hate relationship with The
Netherlands.
PAST
"Geef mij wat vloerbedekking onder deze zwevende vette sofa." FZ leads the singing, the group sings after him, and the audience is amazed. Two minutes
later Ahoy is roaring. Eight thousand people sing while jumping: "Geef mij wat voeoeoerbedekking onder deze zwevende vette sofa". An immediate
carnaval hit. Even De Bostella {try Youtube} turns pale.
On November 27th 1971, Zappa and his MOI gave the most successful concert he ever gave or will give in The Netherlands (although you never know about
that last bit). It was a concert filled with regional jokes and remarks, touching the sensitive toes of the chauvinistic audience. A lot of
appreciation too, because something like that does require some investigation. "Why," asked Jip Golsteijn that year, "that adorable love for The
Netherlands?" Zappa: "That has a special reason. When nobody in America was really interested in me and MOI, Frits Boer introduced us to Hitweek. The
consequence was that we sold better in The Netherlands than in America for a long time. Not relative, but in real numbers. When I tried to get 200
Motels (a project that proved too expensive and was later turned into a movie, FvG) off the ground, every possible candidate apart from the
Netherlands lost. Both from the side of the audience and from musicians, there was only really interest in The Netherlands for the project. With Edo
de Waart - a very strange boy who knows almost an absurd lot about music - I talked through all options a number of times. It eventually didn't
happen.
When the concert ends after two and a half hours and four encores, Zappa comes on stage once more and thanks Holland for the confidence it puts in
him. "You're welcome, Frank," the audience mutters back.
PRESENT
Almost 11 years later, in may 1982, Zappa gives his manieth concert in Ahoy. It hasn't been as cosy (or perhaps the 1979 concert, when the audience
was surprised afterwards with snow. Like happy dogs they started a snowball fight) This time it's a not very noticeable evening with smooth guitar
solos and perfect registrations without emotions. Is the battery empty? Not by a long shot according to Zappa: "I still have sounds in my head I very
much want to realize." Elly de Waard drags the answer out of him: "When the audience is in funeral mood, you know you're in Rotterdam."
FUTURE
It all gets worse in this interview. When asked why the Residentie-orchestra during the Holland Festival 1981 decided not to play a Zappa piece at the
last moment, Zappa responds furiously: "The reason this didn't work out, is that you can't trust Dutch businessmen and musicians. I've had very bad
experiences with the music business here. I once was forced to go to Dutch court because a Dutch promotor refused to pay me. He was convicted, but he
still hasn't paid. About the Residentie-orchestra: just when you think everything is neatly organized, it turns out that's not the case. Suddenly they
want royalties from the record that would be made of the concert, which is unheard of. First of all there is no reason to assume that, if a record is
to be released, it would sell, and secondly I'd paid for everything; all recording costs and their salary, so why would they want to have something on
top of that? If I make business contracts I stick to them and if somebody else doesn't and tries to cheat me with changes, then I say: fuck you. I've
totally had it with Dutchmen and I hope they will never play another orchestral work by me in this country, with or without me. I'll tell you even
stronger: if I die, I'll put it in my will that no Dutch orchestra is ever to play my music," spoke Frank Zappa.
{Over the next few articles, music groups in various formations (from orchestra to recorder consort) seem not to feel threatened by this and play
Zappa's music}
13-10-84
Zappa opens at position 10 in the Album Top 10.
20-10-84 NVHN Them Or Us review by Fred van Garderen
When Zappa announced he would never perform again - by his own words he had disbanded the group and sold the installation - and would restrict himself
to composing orchestral music, it seemed the Bizarre music era had ended: Zappa. It was not true. On the recently released double LP Them Or Us, the
master doesn't just demand the lead part, he also let son Dweezil (guitar) and daughter Moon (vocals) show their capacities. Son Ahmet made his
contribution by composing the lullaby Frogs with dirty little lips with his father. In short: we won't be free from the Zappa name for a while.
The reason for Zappa's swift return to pop music had to do with not following up on agreements. It was intended he would start a project with the
Berkeley Symphony Orchestra called "A Zappa Affair". Years of preparation had made all those concerned enthusiastic and it looked like success was
due. When it came to paying, the misery started. The orchestra manager refused to pay a doll maker, who had been working for the project and invested
11,000 dollars, let, against Zappa's will, illegal video recordings being made of the concert and didn't follow up on the financial agreement with the
dancers. Zappa had a very heavy financial loss on the project as well. In the past, the maestro had trouble before with his classical colleagues. He
cancelled a major project for the Holland Festical, because he accused the board and musicians of money pinching and too little effort.
Zappa returned to earthly rhythm and blues. Them or Us is filled with good honest pop music and there will be more in the future: there's a cassette
being produced with a three LP stretching musical (a story about fashionable gayness and an evil geniun that invented AIDS) and there are rumours that
from now, there will be a box with five LPs every year so his entire MOI (the band it all started with) discography will be issued. Listening pleasure
galore, because there is plenty of unpublished music in his LA studio. Zappa: "When I'm at home I work 18 hours every day. It's not a necessity, and
nobody will be angry with me if I work less, but that's how I work. I only feel happy if I do what nature tells me to do. When I wake up in the
morning and don't feel hungry, I don't eat. No logical thought could force me to have breakfast if I'm not hungry. When I want to write a song or an
opera or a symphony, I'll do that."
But making music and composing is not the only thing that keeps the 43-year-old pop star busy. Like a workaholic he pulls all work to him: "I pay
attention to futilities. I have no secretary at hand who does this or that for me. I do it all myself.
Look, when your equals aren't equal, you don't need them. Don't deal with them and don't have colleagues. The same goes for friends, you don't need
them either. What you do need is that you take care you like yourself. When you wake up in the morning and you're shaving and you look in the mirror,
you have to be able to love the guy staring back at you. If you feel you can stay faithful to yourself, you can have a good life, because as long as
you're satisfied with yourself and don't harm anyone else, you don't have to answer to anyone. That's how I live. I don't care if I'll ever have a
friend or not. I'm just as happy by myself. I don't need anyone who pets my head. I don't need anyone to criticise me. I can finish myself off better
than anyone. A lot more accurate. Nobody knows as well as I why I do the things I do. So how can they judge the result of my work?"
Clear language from the 43-year-old pop musician who says he's as old as he feels. And that's not old. Because when asked why he always works with
young musicians, he replies: "Because the old ones can't keep up with the tempo."
20-10-84 Zappa is now #9 in the album top 10.
10-01-86 LC
Frank Zappa's fight against morality preachers
FZ, once the fear of good parents, looks at 44 more like a Wallstreet highshot that the wild haired, eccentric pop musician he was fifteen years ago.
However he is not any less outspoken. The godfather of American underground found a new wind mill to battle: the increasing influence morality
preachers have in the USA, who right now want a record rating to protect the vulnerable child's soul against sex and violence on the black disk
{LP}.
A few months ago Zappa was even in the centre of the establishment, Congress, to give his opinion in a hearing on his opinion on the plans to give LPs
stickers. If those plans continue Zappa's records will without a doubt all receive a clear X. In the current film rating in the US the X means "watch
out, dirty and violent film". At least one senator was very offended by Zappa's performance in Congress and called his testimony "boorish and
intentionally offensive". Zappa himself was shocked by the governmental machinery he had seen from the inside for the first time, and he left with the
promise to battle it. His weapon will be youth.
"What I'll do," he said, "is find out what the most entertaining way is to explain what happened at this hearing, so a child can understand it. There
are a lot of 18-year-olds out there, and I believe those people in Washington are wasting everybody's time and money, being aware that they can vote
like crazy. And I am going to encourage them to do that."
The first phase in Zappa's battle plan is formed by his new LP with the appropriate name FZ meets MOP, that will be in stores in The Netherlands in
January. On the record is a 12 minute collage with the title Porn Wars, inspired by the hearing. It's a typical Zappa work with computer generated
electronical and electric music, mixed with quotes by senators and witnesses during the hearing. The texts are often presented slowed down or sped up,
giving it an extra strange effect.
Several times the following quote by republican senator Paula Hawkins from Florida can be heard: "Fire and chains and other objectionabe tools of
gratification in some twisted minds".
The democrat Ernest Hollings also makes a contribution, but his voice is distorted here and there into a squeaky squirrel from a cartoon: "Outrageous
filth. If I could find some way to do away with it, I would."
What will be the second phase of Zappa's action, is not yet known, but he hopes to make a music video in which parts of the hearing are being used.
"There is a number of people that need to be surgically cut out of a function, and kids can do that," Zappa said in an interview. "They have so little
respect for you as species, that they are capable to accept laws that make life even worse. It's truly unbelievable."
Zappa blooms if he can get angry at something. Since his shocking to many debut "Freak Out" appeared twenty years ago, he has continuously shot at
plastic people and their society of consumption with bitter satire. Inbetween he fought legal battles with record companies that censored his work or
didn't pay enough, until he eventually founded his own company Barking Pumpkin to mind his own business undisturbed.
With Barking Pumpkin he also moved into the area of modern orchestral music, in an attempt to break through as serious composer. In 1983 a digitally
recorded album with atonal orchestra music, performed by the London Symphony Orchestra was released. A year later the great Pierre Boulez conducted
Zappa's work in Paris and recorded some pieces of his chamber music. In 1985 the Aspen Quintet performed Zappa's work in the Library of Congress.
The "serious" music is no new ground for Zappa. "Until I was twenty I had never written rock n roll," he says. "I started with writing chamber music
and orchestra music, but I never could get that performed." The self-taught composer told that his influences were Arnold Schoenberg, Igor Strawinsky,
blues giant Howlin' Wolf and jazz bassist Charles Mingus, and of course the often quoted on his records: Edgard Varèse. Zappa started at age 12 with a
drum kit, composed his first piece at fourteen and switched to guitar at eighteen.
Since Freak Out, over forty records by the maestro of rock and roll have appeared. But although he was named pop musician of the year by Downbeat
magazine in 1970, '71 and '72, his success in the morally less suffocated Europe was a lot bigger than in the States.
"Americans don't like instrumental music and a lot of my music is instrumental," he said. "Something else is they don't love people who aren't
beautiful. I never felt anything for plastic surgery. I prefer to keep my profits at the current level and avoit altering my looks.
Still his act has changed much. Zappa, father of four children of whom two are on his latest LPs, has shaved off his manes and chose a tight haircut.
All that's left are the moustache and the Zappa-beard on the chin. Those are getting really grey.
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03-01-87 Jazz from Hell is #8 in the Album top 10
29-02-88 NVHN
FZ in politics
The American guitarist, composer and rock star Frank Zappa uses his current tour through the US to bring the youth in his motherland closer to
politics. In a grey past, when Zappa could consider himself youth, he already told his fans to register to vote, to end the Nixon presidency.
02-03-88 NVHN
After a lengthy silence, FZ will come to Europe again. He'll play one concert in the Netherlands: 3 May in Ahoy Rotterdam.
22-04-88 NVHN Review of Dweezil's MGWTKYM by Max Palfenier
Zappa jr follows sr's tracks
Is it an advantage or a disadvantage if you have a famous father? I don't know how you guys are doing, but when I hear that Dweezil Zappa, the
18-year-old son of the famous Frank Zappa made a record, I raise my eyebrows. Is he really good, or does he owe it all to his father, and you can ask
the same question about Julian Lennon. If the first is the case, his last name will only hinder him, if he only uses the family band as wheelbarrow,
he'll fall on his face some time. Let's be frank, when in the early start of your career the doors open for you, that is all convenient. Zappa jr had
the music poured into him. Follow me. When Dweezil was 12 he already played along in concerts of his father's band {sic}, a year later he made his
first single and after that he worked on a.o. the records of Don "Miami Vice" Johnson and the well-knowm American group The Fat Boys. And if that
isn't enough, he had a job with the American music video channel MTV and he played in three not too bad films.
This week the second solo-album by Dweezil Zappa was released. The record is called My Guitar Wants To Kill Your Mama and contains a type of hardrock
they love in America: melodious and not too rough. That Dweezil can play guitar is beyond doubt. Because although most songs are not sparkling with
originality, he can come home with those guitar solos. More noticeable than the music is that fact that the young Zappa turns out to be a decent,
smart and socially critic raised boy. The Coolest Guy In The World is a warning to not use drugs (make sure that what happened to Elvis Presley, won't
happen to you) and in Nasty Business he pleads for world peace now.
"While making this record we did not use drugs (not even cigarettes) and we worked neatly every day from 9 AM until late in the evening." he writes on
the cover. And to prove superfluously that he's cut from the right musical tree, he adds that no keyboards or synthesizers were used on this record.
Dweezil Zappa, he'll get there.
29-04-88 NVHN Review of Guitar and YCDTOSA 1 by Max Palfenier
Zappa Full Steam Ahead
1998 will be the year of FZ, that is as clear as water. On 3 and 4 May he will play The Netherlands with his band, his old, often unavailable LPs are,
whether or not in a new mix, released in high tempo on CD and next to that Zappa also releases thirteen hours of never before legally issued live
material on the market this year. And if that was enough, the double CD Guitar with nothing but guitar solos by the maestro, recorded in the period
1979-1984 was released this year. It's also striking to see the amount of respected avant-garde conductors - think Boulez - suddenly put Zappa pieces
on their repertoire.
While listening to Zappa's inventive, but also freaky guitar shenanigans for 2 CDs is a true marathon, part one of YCDTOSA offers 137 minutes of
unknown and varying listening pleasure. Although Zappa used no chronological order, the first fart of the series, that's already being called the
ultimate official bootleg, a highly clear image of the musician, and not to mention satirist Frank Zappa. On top of that, he adds an extra dimension
by extensively relating about the circumstances in which, band members with whom and time and place where the music was recorded. He tells at one of
the two performances of Sofa that this is a recording from a concert he gave in 1971 in London, the famous performance where a fan pulled him off
stage, causing Zappa to be non-active for almost a year. Another song, The Mammy Anthem, dates back to a concert Zappa and band gave on July 12 in
Palermo on Sicily When you read that a little while after, police, mafia and audience start to strike (on one of the next volumes a part of the
concert will appear where the shooting can be heard) you will listen to this music with a different mindset.
Like you are also spiked on the musical performance of a song about which Zappa tells it was a concert for 50,000 enthusiastic Italians and many times
more mosquitoes on stage.
30-04-88 NVHN
Nick Roovers suffers the Zappa-virus
The Groningen native Nick Roovers jr is a fan of Frank Zappa. That's for sure. He doesn't want to be called a devotee though. "I can relativate
enough.
Also for as far as Zappa is concerned. Together with someone from Rotterdam I am editor of the Zappa-magazine The Black Page, that appears four times
per year. I write articles for it too, but the 400 people who read it, those are the true fanatic Zappa freaks, that's just not funny anymore. They
sport goatees and moustaches. They're true clones. Those boys don't have music by other artists anymore.Nick Roovers remarks it himself. The view of
approximately 600 cassettes with live material by Zappa, the posters on the wall and the record closet with fifty regular LPs, as many bootleg albums
and records from people Zappa had to do with in one way or another, all of that gives the impression that in Roovers home too Zappa's spirit becomes
almost touchable.
"In 1979 I bought my first fifteen Zappa-tapes," Nick Roovers explains. "And it goes fast from there. You get into the network. It has fans from the
entire world, but also for instance a corrupt live mixer who lets a tape record along with the concert and reproduces that and sells it on. Those 600
live-tapes here, that seems much. But compare it to Bowie or Stones. They perform once in every four, five years and play evening after evening of the
same repertoire. Zappa studies about 160 songs for a tour with his band. Each concert is very different."
FZ plays Ahoy Rotterdam on May 3 and 4. Nick Roovers will be at the front twice. He has already seen three European concerts so far. "The show is
fantastic," Roovers tells enthusiastically. "Zappa is in shape. Much better than with the flat performances of 1984. Then it looked more like take the
money and run. Musically he really feels like it. He's also in a good mood towards the audience. He used to be a bit grumpy earlier on. If someone
threw flowers on stage it could happen that he'd tell security to get that man or woman from the audience. And then the unfortunate soul could eat the
bundle en plein public."
"What I appreciate in the man are first of all his technical skills. I always call it music school music with balls. After that I admire his work
ethics. He doesn't rehearse at 11 PM to sit in the pub two hours later. Zappa is a workaholic. He has three studios. One for rehearsing, one for
mixing and remixing, and one for playing with his modern equipment. At 3PM he starts to work until 9AM the next morning. In all those studios is a
chair with coffee on the left and an ashtray on the right. He doesn't eat."
"For his musicians, playing with Zappa is a tough school. Those boys are just rented for a year. And then you just have to submit yourself. Once a
musician got a few pounds for an interview he'd given. He could hand it in with Zappa. He sticks to his principles with that."
One fascinating anecdote after the other follow in high tempo. "Sometimes other fans visit me. They leave at 3 in the morning with a limp." A Zappa
biography? "A lot has been written about him, but there is still no complete story. That will be hard,because who writes will be sued."
He doesn't toy with the idea himself. No time. Because apart from Zappa there are more things in his life. For instance his band RTC, running the
Futuremusic-record label or his producing work for people like Teije Wijnterp, whose flamingo, LP {sic?} Il Gitano Punky should soon see the light of
day.
Currently Nick Roovers rehearses new material in Hilversum together with ex-Sound-singer and guitarist Adrian Borland. "He saw us in Amsterdam and was
very enthusiastic. I'm looking for a keyboard player he told me. Although I barely knew anything by The Sound I said yes straight away. We are
rehearsing now, then we'll make a demo and try to get record companies interested to make an LP."
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04-05-88 Zappa performance review by, I kid you not, Wierd Duk.
Zappa before 8000 visitors in Ahoy photo by Maarten Strik (coming up)
Phenomenon FZ remains inimitable
Event: concert by FZ & band. Location: Sportpaleis Ahoy' in Rotterdam. Audience: sold out.
"Thank you, see you tomorrow."
After three encores Zappa leaves his highly enthusiastic fans in the Rotterdam sport palace Ahoy'. Undoubtedly a large share of them will also attend
a completely different concert tonight. The 47-year-old American musician and composer can, during his current European tour, choose from 160 songs.
This way his 11 musicians get a different setlist on their plate each night, depending on the acoustics of the hall and the mood of the master
himself.
That last factor has been the least constant as far as memory goes back. Zappa his notorious for his grumpy moods, his cynical social-poitical
commentary and the enormous pressure and the enormous pressure he puts on his musicians. The real fans were mildly surprised yesterday to find Frank
Zappa in a reasonably good mood, the man even answered silly questions during the press conference before the concert. "That could be fun tonight,"
the grapevine whispered with anticipation. It is always awkward to watch, a musician who became a guru to tens of thousands of people. Zappa reached
that status long ago and gets with his music - a unique blend of styles, that always demands maximum skills from the performers - the halls like Ahoy
to sell out twice. Zappa is a phenomenon on his own and he is in no way depending on any spirit of the age whatsoever.
The phenomenon is also fickle. Three years ago Zappa announced to never play guitar again, and then opened last night's concert with Black Page, in
which the active American through a lengthy and untamable guitar solo shows he is still one of the best guitarists in the forld. A little more than
twenty - partly instrumental - songs from the extensive Zappa-repertoire follow, in which there is avid conjuring with time signatures, tempo changes,
and style quotations from rock, jazz and modern classical. Zappa, with balding head,dressed in T-shirt and faded jeans, conducts his excellent
musicians, sings, plays guitar and synclavier.
Next to a few new brass arrangements, in the first part the Beatle song medley of Strawberry Fields, Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds and Norwegian Wood
is striking. In Zappa's version, the leads are prostitutes, the questionable tv-preacher Jimmy Swaggart and STDs.
After the interval, in which various groups of Zappologists give their exegesis of the master's work, Groningen-based Zappa fan Nick Roovers finally
gets what he wants. By his request, the band plays the orchestral Sinister Footwear, a composition that was played live only once so far, in Helsinki.
Again, Zappa, who drinks numerous cups of coffee on stage, shares his singing melodies with the dark guitar player Ike Willis and keyboard player
Bobby Martin. Next to that the beautifully drumming Chad Wackerman (in More Trouble Every Day) and the pure brass section get all space they need. By
the end, emphasis is on a lengthy performance of Ravel's Bolero and classics like Joe's Garage and Why Does It Hurt When I Pee. But Zappa wouldn't be
Zappa if he wouldn't end with some comedy material, like a reggae-performance of Led Zeppelin's Stairway To Heaven. And tonight? He'll just do
something completely different.
03-11-88
Zappa makes a special appearance on TV-show Kippevel (goosebumps: something Dutch, not the kiddie horror show)
23-01-90 NVHN
The American rock-idol Frank Zappa met with Czechoslovakian writer-president Vaclav Havel in Prague yesterday to talk about cultural collaboration
with the new democratic government. According to spokespersons who attended the meeting, Havel gave his support to organizing a large rock concert by
Czechoslovakian and western groups in Prague this summer.
Zappa had arrived in Czechoslovakia on Saturday. Hundreds of fans of his music had come to the airport to meet him. He was invited to come for a visit
by Michael Kocab, tock musician and member of the Czechoslovakian parliament. Zappa told he planned to make a movie about Czechoslovakia.
21-12-90 LC
FZ birthday reason for radio marathon
by Fred van Garderen
Frank Zappa turned fifty today. The NOS celebrates it with a four hour marathon emission on Radio 4 (20:02) in the programme Supplement. In it, host
Vincent van Engelen and Zappa connaisseur Co de Kloet jr (saxophonist and music producer) guide the listeners past all sorts of facts about the enfant
terrible of modern American music.
De Kloet: "The programme is interesting to a wide audience. Music will be played from his regular catalogue and I had an interview with him in his
home in LA. That gave me the opportunity to bring exclusive material and we have some odd news and interviews with musicians he worked with. This way,
everybody will get something he'll enjoy: even the biggest Zappa fan will hear something new. De Kloet met a hard-working composer in LA. In his home
Zappa built a studio (UMRK), in which he is working hard on CDs for his own label Barking Pumpkin records. De Kloet: "A beautiful contrast, there in
LA. Zappa lives in a quiet neighborhood with his family. No traffic noise outside and there's much nature. Inside it's terribly busy. His wife does
business, his oldest children are active in music and acting, and visitors come and go. Zappa is in his studio. There he plays on his synclavier ("An
instrument in which the best musicians of the world live") and records. Early next year he will put two new CDs on the market. For the fan: on it will
be chunks of the concert Zappa gave in Rotterdam in 1988."
In the house are in the numerous rooms tvs that are tuned almost the entire day to CNN. De Kloet: "Zappa says in the interview that he is very busy
making music, but he has no time to listen to it, because right now in his spare time he chooses to watch the news. The interview is not so much an
interview with musician Frank Zappa, but more with the person.
Advantage
The radio show goes on air live. De Kloet: "That's a major advantage. Zappa gave me two pieces of digital music that last 40 minutes each, that we put
out digitally. If the programme wouldn't have been live, we would have had to record those pieces onto tape and the quality would be a lot less."
The collaboration De Kloet got from Zappa was as he called it, optimal. "He gave me material that has never before been put out on record or on the
radio. We are already being asked by Americans if we can make tapes of the show. People know about the emission, because Zappa gives information about
it on his hotline (a telephone line filled with information)."
An hour long cassette will be made from the emission. On that will be sections of the interview and pieces of music. The interview De Kloet had with
Zappa will also be aired in Switzerland, Germany, England and Latvia. In February there will be an autobiography by Frank Zappa published by Athos,
titled "The Real Frank Zappa Book".
21-12-90 NVHN
Zappa on the Gulf crisis:
It's an Arabic problem.
Several sections from the interview Co de Kloet jr had with Frank Zappa:
About his effort to get youngsters interested for politics to get them to register to vote (which you must do in the US if you want to vote):
"In Philadelphia, Washington DC and Detroit, the local politicians tried to keep us from registering. The Republicans in control expected that only
young Democrats would come to my concerts. I thought that was very sad. Those people don't want democracy, they just want to maintain their own
position."
He started with it in the seventies. "Back then, eighteen-year-olds weren't allowed to vote. I made a stand against that, because Vietnam was going on
and eighteen-year-old boys were sent to fight. If a government can sent you out to war, the least thing you can expect is you get to vote. Government
feared youth. That wasn't justified, because when they were finally allowed to vote, they woudln't."
About the Gulf crisis: "It's originally an Arab problem that should be solved by Arabs. But well, if there's a problem in the world, the American
government jumps at it and sends hundreds of thousands of American soldiers to it. They say they send them to fix democracy, but that's not true. The
only reason is oil. It's at least not about democracy, because both Kuwayt and Saudi-Arabia weren't democracies, but totalitary states."
If there will be war, Zappa expects more misery for the Americans than during Vietnam: "The US is prepared even more badly. The armory they sent there
is not right for the task. It was meant for a war in Europe, with lower temperatures and autobahnen and not for heat and sand. They have a special
tank there that needs 25 liters of fuel per mile {6 gallons}. I would like to know how they keep that tank topped off in the middle of the desert.
There are no gas stations, like on the autobahn."
He also gives his opinion on music censorship in the US, tells about meeting the conductor and composer Leonard Bernstein who died last month, and
talks about his colleagues and his musical preferences.
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21-12-90 NVHN
Has largely the same article as LC had, with the interesting addition: (Kloet says) "He has his own vision on the news and talking about that is more
interesting to him than looking back on his musical life. I called him this week to ask something about the emission and he shouted immediately "what
I've seen on the news now!" His interest in politics and the forms of religion and entertainment that goes with it is very big."
11-04-91 BBYNHIYL is 6 in the LP top 10.
18-04-91 BBYNHIYL maintains 6th position
06-06-91 Dweezil's Confessions gets 8th position in CD top 10
20-12-91: FZ makes the quotes page, on the difference between beer-drinking and wine-drinking people: "Winos do not march."
08-07-92 TV interview legend Ivo Niehe had an interview with FZ, which was aired on Nederland 2 by Tros at 22:43. NVHN notes: Attention fans! Ivo
Niehe will nag at Zappa!
18-09-92 LC
4 hours of Frank Zappa at NOS
Toight the NOS shows a four hour long programme about FZ. The main part of the programme is a concert registration of Yellow Shark, a composition by
Zappa, performed by the German Ensemble Modern in the Alte Oper in Frankfurt. Zappa-connaisseur and radio maker Co de Kloet attended that concert and
had an exclusive interview with the American pop artist. There will also be recent work in the programme. (Radio 4, 20:00)
19-11-92 NVHN about beer.
(...)Beer. It reminds me of the interview Ivo Niehe had with the American musician Frank Zappa. He assumes beer leads to pseudo-military behaviour.
"Winos do not march. Statistics prove that," Zappa supported his theory scientifically. He claims that the agressive behaviour found with
beer-drinking men is caused by the chemical reaction the liquor starts ("Beer stimulates making yeast in the body, and that influences how the brains
work"). He also says advertising plays a part: "If you drink beer, you're a cooler guy and you need to drink more beer. Your reward is a girl with a
bigger bosom that likes you, because you drink a certain brand."
07-05-93 Frank Zappa drawn by Henk Gubbels (image follows)
Ardent fans with desire to collect are in no end of a mess when they prefer Frank Zappa. The moustached American has doubtlessly the largest stream of
albums in pop music. Many people in their thirties can brag the lyrics of records like Roxy and Elsewhere, Live in New York, and especially Sheik
Yerbouti. By the end of the seventies you learnt the most beautiful fragments - especially the beautifully worded filth by the score - by heart. But
the first record, Freak out, was already released in 1966. And Zappa didn't go through the 80s unnoticed.
Zappa has many loves, among them the guitar. His solos are sometimes brilliant, but also often confusing and unlivably long. Written compositions
bring the finest classical musicians to the edge of desperation, becaue the man also has an output on this terrain. He had a good nose {Du proverb I
like to leave untouched} for attracting supermusicians. Lowell George was one of the first; later people like George Duke, Steve Vai and Adrian Belew
worked with Zapp. But the stream will dry. The news that the man suffers incurable cancer, is several years old.
23-07-93 BBC shows 200 Motels past midnight. Described by LC as silly (Monty Python silly) and psychedelic concert film.
05-10-93 When Jan Hekert Experience performed Paradiso, FZ told Jan Hekert: Nice band you got there.
06-12-93 Rock musician Zappa died of cancer
The rock musician Frank Zappa died yesterday aged 52. A friend of his announced this. He died in his home in LA and was buried last night in a private
funeral. The musician is primarily known for his satiric and sometimes extravagant songs.
Zappa got in the foreground in the early sixties. With his band MOI he focused on a-melodical music, which he called sound mutilation.
Zappa blended rock, jazz and classical music, and sang satirical lyrics filled with social commentary. With his band or as solo artist he made some 50
albums, among them Freak OUt, Hot Rats and Sheik Yerbouti.
The final years Zappa battled cancer. He was active until the end and said he didn't care how humanity would remember him. "People who worry about
being rememered are guys like Reagan and Bush... I don't care," Zappa said on TV in May, referring to politics, one of the sacred cows he liked to
kick.
In his songs he often talked about American sexual morality, music industry - according to record companies his music wasn't commercial - and the
education system. In an interview in 1988 he rejected the thought he was too direct in his lyrics. "This time just asks for a baseball bat," said
Zappa.
Francis Vincent Zapa {sic} was born on December 21 1940 in Maryland. His parents were Italian immigrants. He started playing drums at age 12. At age
14 he learnt to compose and switched to guitar. Freak Out, released in 1966, was the first double album in rock history.
Among the hits Zappa had were Dancin' Fool - satire on disco - and Valley Girl, in which his daughter Moon Unit kicked the spoilt Californian
children.
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06-12-93 NVHN Continued from page 1
Zappa posed against politics
Contains much from the earlier article, and:
The singer was, among others, active against Tipper Gore, the wife of vice-president Al Gore, when she suggested a campaign against unconventional
lyrics on sound media. (...)
Zappa won a Grammy in 1988. He beat his son Dweezil, also a capable rock guitarist.
07-12-93 NVHN by Louis du Moulin
Zappa couldn't be fifteen minutes without music
America has lost in Frank Zappa one of the most creative and critical minds from the post-WW2 era. Kicking all possible sacred cows, that was his
speciality he practiced in various disciplines. As lyricist, composer, band leader, producer, director and actor did the Baltimore-born son of Italian
immigrants mercilessly mock American society. Inbetween all that he was often seen as discoverer and strict guardian angel of talent. A long line of
adventurous musicians owes their career to Zappa.
Francis Vincent Zappa jr {sic}, born 21 December 1940, got in the public eye in the middle if the sixties with his group MOI. Zappa - started at the
age of 12 behind the drumkit, but switched to guitar two years later - had been through quite a few bands and lesser experiments. Like the film
project Captain Beefheart Meets The Grunt People, that never got off the ground and was the source for friend and musical partner Don van Vliet's
stage name.
Sound mutilation
With MOI, grown in 1964 out of Soul Giants, Zappa put himself to a-melodical music he called sound mutilation. As undoubted leader he blended rock,
jazz and classical music, to which he sang satirical words filled with social commentary. Initially he only got through to a small, intellectual
audience, but over the years - through albums like Hot Rats (1969), Chunga's Revenge (1970) and 200 Motels (1971) he got a growing audiences. Which is
thy an original copy of the debut album by MOI, Freak Out (1966), at one point fetched hundreds of guilders in auction. Nothing was safe from him.
Zappa hit sneakily both ways in 1967 {sic} with the third Mothers-album WOIIFTM, both the blooming hippie culture and the capitalistic side of pop
music were mocked. Zappa would never have a good time with record companies: if there were no censorship issues then there were conflicts about
distribution and promotion. Eventually he would found his own label, Zappa Records, in 1988. More or less the record company owner he also held a
press conference at his last concert in Ahoy'. During the questioning he indicated to know what his importance was to present-day rock music.
"My influence has been that on the record I worked with techniques that non-music students didn't think was possible. You can say I meant more to
musicians than to the audience I could never reach well through TV and radio.
Frank Zappa, who also took the occasional classical detour after the age of forty (with Pierre Boulez, London Symphony Orchetra - placed himself over
other present-day composers. "Because I'm one of the few who worked in all styles, and that in rock business. I tour like a rock artist and play in
halls that weren't made for my type of music," said Zappa, who let us know he couldn't be without music for longer than 15 to 20 minutes. "This is my
calling, and after all those years I know exactly what to do now." Given this attidude no-one was very surprised that he remained very active, after
it became known by late 1991 that he suffered from cancer.
15-01-94 NVHN by Fred van Garderen
No more Stinkfoot, no more Plastic People, no more Billy the Mountain. On December 4th last year there was suddenly an emptiness in concert life that
could never be filled. "Frank Zappa has left for his final world tour."
What remains is a gigantic amount of compositions (1200) of which a small section has been released on about 70 cd's, the occasional video and a film;
a few posters, a few books. But that's it. he Zappa fun will have to be lived at home. Cocooning, a living room filled with colourful sounds, a head
filled with spiritual thoughts and drinking coffee until the body shakes, because the maestro did that too.
A naive thought, we find a month later. Because after seeing the video Zappa's Universe, everything becomes clear. Frank Zappa wasn't like Frank
Sinatra, Bob Dylan or The Rolling Stones. Zappa was Zappa. A personality, sure, but also a composer. Someone who wote music. Also for others. Like
Mozart, Varèse and Ravel did. Zappa is not dead, he just smells funny.
The video is filled with 90 minutes of total theatre. The music is by Zappa, but others play it. A band works with an orchestra. Two choirs and a few
soloists. And they give a smashing concert.
The true Zappa-fan knows what it means when the MC announces "The way I see it Barry, this should be a dynamite show." You don't have to be a
Zappa-fan to enjoy listening to Elvis Has Just Left The Building (to climb up the heavenly stairs). It seems like a beautiful form of self-ridicule,
if it weren't for the fact that Zappa lived during the recording of the concert.
Zappa's Universe was recorded in the NYC at the Ritz theatre in 1991, on the occasion of the 25-year anniversary of Zappa the artist. On the programme
is a colourful pick from Zappa's litter. From the sensitive The Idiot Bastard Son to the compositional highlight Edchina's Arf, and from the satirical
Fembot in a Wet T-shirt (soloist Dale Bozzio sings about her Big Wet Ones) to the church critical Heavenly Bank Account (There's a great difference
between kneeling down and bending over).
The 6 man strong band sticks well to the sheet music. Ex-Zappa bassist Scott Tunes still knows his licks, drummer Morgan Agren reminds a little of
Terry Bozzio and Mats Oberg plays the keys like a computer keyboard. Singer/guitarist Mike Keneally has taken the ungrateful task of filling Zappa's
shoes. He does all-right Other solos are by ex-Mother Steve Vai and Zappa's son Dweezil in Dirty Love, and the gentlemen musicians of the Orchestra of
Our Time freak out to Waka Jawaka. The quartet The Persuaders add dark voices and the other quartet Rockapella just thevoices. To close with a Thank
You from Dweezil an a Tia Maria poem read by Dale Bozzio: "Information is not knowledge/ knowledge is not wisdom/ wisdom is not truth/ truth is not
beauty/ beauty is not love/ love is not music/ music and Frank Zappa are the best.
{The video cost f 39,95.}
21-09-94 NVHN
NOS brings final Zappa composition
The NOS has the world premiere on 22 October (Radio 4, 22:00 - 01:00) of Civilization Phase III, the final piece by American musician Frank Zappa. The
over two hour long composition will be emitted non-stop in the three hour programme Folio 2. Besides Civilization Phase III the programme brings some
archived material. Initiative is by Co de Kloet jr, the ultimate Zappa connaisseur. He was allowed by the next of kin to premiere the piece fourteen
days before it is to appear on the radio.
"The NOS did a lot of Zappa over the past few years. When he turned 50 in 1990, we devoted a four hour show to him; in 1992 the Yellow Shark project
was featured in a show and shortly after his death we had a four hour memorial concert. Next to the fact that I know the Zappa famiy well, that
attention is noticed. Hence the permission," said De Kloet.
10-01-95 CP3 got 4th place in the Album top 10.
12-04-95 In Leeuwarden a family was robbed of 200 cds, a CD player, a video camera and a VCR. The burglars took some 100 CDs by Frank Zappa.
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Last batch of translations. I left out a lot of interesting things, like a recent performance of Joe's Garage, and an entertaining bashing of the
Miles Monstrosity.
01-10-96 Zappa's Läther is #10 in the CD top 10
11-06-97 Kees 't Hart translated two Zappa lyrics.
Zappa pop quiz: what song is this?
Lullige traantjes
En daarom lig je in je lullige jongensdelirium
heen en weer te woelen tussen je lullige lakenjes
in dat kamertje met die lullige psychedelische
houseposters
en je rooie lampje en de stank van je geblow
en je houseplatencollectie
en je Guust Flater-stripboeken
en dan komen ze de waterlanders, die lullige
traantjes, die lullige traantjes, die lullige
traantjes
02-10-98 NVHN Mystery Disk review of which the author wasn't brave enough to list his name
In '85 Frank Zappa found another way to squeeze lolly out of his diehard fans, by re-issuing his albums in expensive boxes and put them on the market.
As a geste, the first two had a so-called mystery disc: historical recordings that were only available on bootlegs. Those two mystery disks have now
been put together on one CD, because getting started on the true musical legacy of Zappa is not going anywhere and money must go around.
There is nothing new on this CD, at least not to the collectors, but for people who want to get acquainted to the Mothers its the manieth nice
compilation (although Zappa cut in some historical life {sic} tracks): the first truly brilliant collaboration between Zappa and Beefheart on the
bootleg classic Metal Man Has Won His Wings, the first superior instrumental chamber music Zappa wrote around '68 and put out in a silly show later
that year with members of the BBC orchestra in London (that show has been put out on CD already), unique early Mothers-recordings and much humour to
laugh at. All of this with the foot note: Frank "where's my money" Zappa is not dead, he just smells funny.
22-12-98
NPS radio will, starting Saturday, emit a musical piece by Frank Zappa every week at Radio 4 (23:00) This way, the broadcaster tries to keep a
chronological overview of the composer/rockstar/performer who died five years ago.
In the overview pretty much all musical genres will be played. The oeuvre by Zappa is both quantitatively and qualitatively impressive, with over 70
cds, partially re-emissions of old LPs with aong others MOI, Captain Beefheart and a number of solo projects. The emissions start with Freak Out (the
first double LP in pop music) and will end with the Zappa CD that will have been released then, somewhere in the year 2000 (still the Zappa family
releases CDs partially with music that had never appeared before). Next to music, there will also be interviews with and about the composer. Editor of
this project is NPS employee and Zappa-connaisseur Co de Kloet. The project can't just be followed by radio, but also via Internet.
21-06-2000 LC
Orchestra members don't want to play Zappa
Two members of the Dutch Philharmonic Orchestra refuse to play along with the world premiere of the live performance of 200 Motels, next Friday.
The two imstrumentalists are offended by the scabrous lyrics and the fould language he uses. For instance in the song Penis Dimension, in which the
length of the male organ is elaborated on, with as conclusion "Anything over a mouthful is wasted".
While the orchestra members do not have to say these words themselves, they didn't want to join in.
According to the spokesperson of the Philharmonic Orchestra, their refusal will cause no problems and the performance can continue on Friday and
Saturday.
The music of 200 Motels goes with the movie of the same name Zappa made in 1972. The film deals with a tour of Zappa and his band MOI. Initially the
organizers of Holland Festival was negotiating with the two foremost singers of the band to join. This didn't work out, because they charged too much
according to the organization.
Besides that, the organization decided together with Zappa's widow Gail Zapp that their participation would look too much like a reconstruction of the
seventies, which wasn't the intention. It will now be a new version, with new sections added.
The Holland Festival had a little programme printed, but Gail Zappa didn't give her permission for the publication because she didn't agree with the
accompanying texts. There will be a brochure about Zappa and his 200 Motels, according to the Holland Festival spokesperson.
24-06-2000 Holland Festival has attracted a record number of visitors.
09-11-2000
Solo theatre Civilization, based on CP3, hits theatres.
November 2001: Frank Scheffer's Present Day Composer Refuses To Die hits theatres
June 2002: Zappa: Phase II - The Big Note is released in cinemas.
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