Aside from the experimental side project Lumpy Gravy, Hot Rats was the first album Frank Zappa recorded as a solo artist sans the Mothers, though he continued to employ previous musical collaborators, most notably multi-instrumentalist Ian Underwood. Other than another side project – the doo wop tribute Cruising With Ruben and the Jets – Hot Rats was also the first time Zappa focused his efforts in one general area, namely jazz-rock. The result is a classic of the genre.
Frank Zappa's liner notes for Freak Out! name-checked an enormous breadth of musical and intellectual influences, and he seemingly attempts to cover them all on the second Mothers of Invention album, Absolutely Free. Leaping from style to style without warning, the album has a freewheeling, almost schizophrenic quality, encompassing everything from complex mutations of "Louie, Louie" to jazz improvisations and quotes from Stravinsky's Petrushka…
One of the most ambitious debuts in rock history, Freak Out! was a seminal concept album that somehow foreshadowed both art rock and punk at the same time. Its four LP sides deconstruct rock conventions right and left, eventually pushing into territory inspired by avant-garde classical composers…
A fascinating collection of mostly instrumental live and studio material recorded by the original Mothers of Invention, complete with horn section, from 1967-1969, Weasels Ripped My Flesh segues unpredictably between arty experimentation and traditional song structures…
The Mothers Of Invention's Freak Out (2022 Japanese exclusive limited edition 17-track Mono CD, the debut album from Frank Zappa released in 1966, this edition includes the Bonus Single Version of Trouble Comin' Every Day and Who Are TheBrain Police?
Lumpy Gravy, Frank Zappa's first solo album, was released months before the Mothers of Invention's third LP (even though its back cover asked the question: "Is this phase two of We're Only in It for the Money?") and both were conceptualized and recorded at the same time. We're Only in It for the Money became a song-oriented anti-flower power album with one contemporary/musique concrète/sound collage hybrid piece by way of conclusion. Lumpy Gravy collaged bits of orchestral music, sonic manipulations, spoken words, and occasional pop ditties into two lumps of 16 minutes each.
Frank Zappa loved '50s doo wop music. He grew up with it, collected it, and it was the first kind of pop music he wrote ("Memories of El Monte," recorded by the Penguins in 1962). Cruising with Ruben & the Jets, the Mothers of Invention's fourth LP, is a collection of such music, all Zappa originals (some co-written with MOI singer Ray Collins)…
3CDs OF INVALUABLE ZAPPA BROADCASTS. INCLUDES SETS FROM HIS 1973 TOUR, COMPILED BY THE MAN HIMSELF. This triple CD features three rare recordings, all originally broadcast on FM radio, and now available here in this superb fold out digipack set. Featuring performances made at; Central Park, New York in 1968, with the original Mothers Of Invention (and featuring numbers from both the early and late sets on the day in question); from the TV & simultaneous radio transmission from Udel in Holland in 1970 (the first live show by the second incarnation of the Mothers, and featuring Flo & Eddie in the ranks) and, on the third CD, a collection of live performances from Zappa s 1973 tour, from a tape put together by Frank himself and broadcast on New Year s Eve 1974. The tracks and shows represented on this set illustrate the spectrum of Zappa and his various groups live abilities across the first decade of the man s career, and in so doing reveal a quite fascinating trajectory of Frank Zappa's live work.
Burnt Weeny Sandwich is the first of two albums by the Mothers of Invention that Frank Zappa released in 1970, after he had disbanded the original lineup. While Weasels Ripped My Flesh focuses on complex material and improvised stage madness, this collection of studio and live recordings summarizes the leader's various interests and influences at the time…
The Rockpile was Toronto's hippest club, and 4000 of the city's hippest heads flocked there on February 23rd 1969 to see the great Frank Zappa and his Mothers Of Invention. They did not disappoint, playing a remarkable set that combined their uniquely skewed take on rock'n'roll with virtuoso solos and improvisations, as well as their trademark humorous interludes.