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Post by maarts on Sept 12, 2005 9:01:14 GMT -5
As far as the influences go, there's no denying that Zappa was more interested in classical and jazz-influences whereas Beefheart was more into his particular brand of cut-up blues and avantgarde (well before that term was coined officially). That doesn't make him a charlatan in my eyes. What started to was his ultrasensitive demeanour at one side and his rigorous demand for perfection within his band on the other. The constant bickering with Zappa (with whom he started his career off in the first place, messing up rock 'n roll with the blues) for apparently no reason but to find his way back to Zappa again when the chips were down, for instance like using his studio for recording Trout Mask Replica or, later, after the Magic Band fell apart and his record company started to threaten him, to record Bongo Fury with him. Beefheart's brilliance is undeniable but (for me) he thought too much of himself. I remember in one of the last interviews he gave when he retreated in the Mojave-desert where he said: "I got too good at the horn and it got to the point where I thought I'd blow my head right off."...and he seriously meant it (I still got the mag in which he said that). He sounded very self-obsessed, to a point where he denied the great work from people like Zappa, Zoot Horn Rollo and later on, Richard Snyder who contributed a lot of magic to the overall sound of the man. Sure, the Captain is a personality and his character-traits might have led him to be so but I always thought that he believed that he was much more than that really was there and acted accordingly.
If you don't appreciate Zappa's different influences to the Captain's ones, that's fair enough. Zappa never pretended to be a jazz-artist, a rock-artists or a blues-artist but he did manage to seclude these different styles for different projects. You'd almost be able to say that there was a Zappa for everyone. And shit, I LIKE how Zappa wore his heart on his sleeve! He didn't distinguish himself in political correct behaviour but, on the other hand, he didn't drown himself in satire. The diversity in his output proves that. He was also incredible well versed in theoretical knowledge of music, politics and science. Reading some of his interviews in the seventies and eighties and it was clear for me that he had an enormous concern with where the world was going but also an endless empathy with the individual inside of it. He could poke fun at himself too. I can't find a single artist these days who is capable of doing the same things as he did. In that regards has the music world become a bleak desolate landscape of self-obsessed faceless people.
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Post by phil on Sept 12, 2005 9:06:52 GMT -5
And Doo Wop !
Don't forget Frank's love for Doo Wop !!
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Post by Kensterberg on Sept 12, 2005 9:07:01 GMT -5
Godspeed is a good example. I find the passages where they don't use words (i.e. as in some of the bands' side projects) the most interesting. It also stems from me growing up,in the Netherlands listening to music that was dominated by all these foreign bands and where lyrics for a large part weren't important because you couldn't understand them. I sang alon to the Beach Boys not knowing what the hell they were on about and it was the most enjoyable that way too. But also by being interested in a whole bunch of other musical styles which challenge you to change your perceptions of the stuff you are used to listen to. This is actually a very common attitude outside the U.S. Even our British cousins are much less concerned about being able to understand the words to songs than we in the States. (I'm afraid I don't know enough about you good folks down under to say just how important it is to you to know what your singers are saying). It makes sense when you think about it. Many of the biggest international stars are Anglophones, and for most of the world English is at best a second language. As maarts said, the experience of growing up hearing US music without knowing what the hell the singer's saying opens up a person's ears to be more receptive to voice as instrument, rather than primarily as a conveyer of narrative or other such information. This is one reason African (for example) artists are able to have hits in Germany or France, while going completely under the radar in the States.
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Post by maarts on Sept 12, 2005 9:21:11 GMT -5
And Doo Wop !
Don't forget Frank's love for Doo Wop !!
...or vaudeville, gospel or honkytonk. Virtually everything, except for squaredancing perhaps?
Ken- good point you make about language...when I tell (Anglophone) people that I speak 4 languages, most of them respond in a kind of awe and regret that they only speak the one. I keep on pointing out that I need to learn at least one foreign language to make myself understood abroad.
As to African artists scoring hits in France- that mostly has got its roots in the fact that there are large communities of (North-)Africans living in Berlin and Paris. A lot of Algerian/Moroccan artists (like Cheb Khaled and Cheb Mami) moved to these cities and, in some cases, have recorded in French to widen their appeal but the music as such has been played very often and has become very succesful that way. I guess the largeness of the States doesn't 'allow' for a widespread popularity of that music, but then again, you've got hiphop....
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Post by Rit on Sept 12, 2005 9:37:46 GMT -5
Maarts, well said. the defence for Zappa was great. but you're saying basically that while both men were one-man universes, Beefheart was self-absorbed and Zappa was humanitarian?
I think i read the same interview done in the Mojave as you did, and i recall Beefheart's sincere frustration with the music industry as a soulless machine. Are you going to pillory him because he was too sensitive about it? He wanted to be an Artist, first and foremost, with a self-contained mythology to express. He was definitely a more spontaneously intellectual counterpart to Zappa's measured stance. The two are titans, clearly, kind of like a Yin to the other's Yang.
Seems to me that Beefheart was walking a tighter rope, raised higher off the ground than Zappa was, figuratively speaking. And Beefheart's sexuality was rawer.. he played music sometimes like it was the soundtrack to some (real or imagined?) ferocious sex life. Zappa composed quaint smirky little ditties about fucking, on the other hand. The difference is small, but subtle.
Beefheart influenced Johnny Rotten, the post punk movement, PJ Harvey, etc, so profoundly for this very reason: there was an earthy rootedness to his avantgardisms. I'd say both were difficult men anyhow.
As for the Zappa ethic, i suggest that Brian Eno held to the same theoretical starting point, but with much more perceptive and inclusive, and urbane relevance. Eno went on to produce scores of important moments in rock, Zappa spun on in a cyclical universe with very little relation to mentoring future rockers, nor to fostering any communal concern (musically). He's a clear genius, no doubt, but an abstracter with very little penchant for feeding growth. You appreciate him from afar, but can never cross a line. There's a place for that.. but in rock music, i think Beefheart had more soul.
i think i'll revise what i stated earlier: Zappa was a one man universe, Beefheart was a one man army.
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Post by phil on Sept 12, 2005 9:49:03 GMT -5
If you can put aside the "stupid lyrics" for a moment (stricking too close to home for comfort maybe ?) Frank Zappa's immense body of work is the most eclectic collection of sounds you can find this side of Modern Classical music...
He did combine various genre of music - 50's Doo Wop - Jazz Fusion - R & B - 20th century classical - computer music - Rock 'n Roll - Reggae - Avant Garde... to create music with multiple layers of textures and harmonies.
He was also a damn fine guitar player.
Most of all, he was the definition of an iconoclaste (as in image breaker) and all his life, he spoke of the true freedom we all should seek and defend against the hypocrisy of our consumers' mass marketed, sanitysed, self-censuring society !!
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Post by phil on Sept 12, 2005 10:02:00 GMT -5
OH ! The remark about Zappa's social satire hitting too close to home was not meant to be taken personaly by anyone here but in the general sense of the american society ...
It is a fact that Zappa was widely popular in Europe due to the fact that people there focused more on the music and the underlying message about life's absurdity and the need to fight for our individual freedom
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Post by Rit on Sept 12, 2005 10:07:04 GMT -5
i disagree, Phil. combining various genres of music so hamfistedly smacks of dilettante-ism to me. and this multiple layers of textures and harmonies you talk about? what relevance does that have to good music? Is he creating furnishings or is he creating something with vision? A good strong artistic vision betrays its roots if it shows concern for form as opposed to content. he was a great guitar player though. and had an exceptional compositional ear. I'm thinking of his instrumentals in this case. Zappa was an iconoclast. He spoke out against consumer hypocrisy. But Beefheart did the same, that's all i'm saying, and with more soul
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Post by Galactus on Sept 12, 2005 10:29:56 GMT -5
Phil and Maarts have done a fine job of defending Zappa. I agree with them. That is all.
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JACkory
Struggling Artist
Posts: 167
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Post by JACkory on Sept 12, 2005 10:36:59 GMT -5
If Don Vliet was a charlatan, then what legitimates the Zapp? too much snide, snickering humour in Zappa. that kind of cynicism doesn't appeal to me at all. i mean, what can you do with it, other than.. what? giggle quietly to yourself? it's music with small limits. On this point Rit and I are in TOTAL agreement. Zappa may be THE most over-rated icon of the rock music genre. Snarky, annoying, amusing ONLY when the brain has been modified by illegal substances. His guitar technique is as sterile as a good surgeon's scalpel. He attempted to legitimaize weirdness, and that was a mistake. He should have taken Beefheart's lead and just wallowed in it, the general public be damned.
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Post by Galactus on Sept 12, 2005 10:42:34 GMT -5
I would like to state for the record that I have never taken any illegal substances but I am quite a big Zappa fan...I'm listening to YCDTOSA Vol. 3.
I also don't agree that Zappa's guitar playing is sterile...a tad overly disciplined perhaps but not sterile.
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Post by Rit on Sept 12, 2005 10:48:11 GMT -5
you are wrong, Mantis. i think we should fight to the death on this one. Kung fu only. i call dibs on Grey Mongoose fighting style.
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Post by Galactus on Sept 12, 2005 10:50:14 GMT -5
Am not, stupid head.
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Post by Rit on Sept 12, 2005 10:51:12 GMT -5
are too, times 100.
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Post by Galactus on Sept 12, 2005 10:56:02 GMT -5
When the cobras are finished with what appears to be a high school musical based n the Karate Kid will see who the best really is.
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