Zappa in New York was recorded in December 1976 at the Palladium and originally intended for release in 1977. It was held up due to arguments between Frank Zappa and his then-record label, Warner Bros. When the two-LP set finally appeared in March 1978, Warner had deleted "Punky's Whips," a song about drummer Terry Bozzio's attraction to Punky Meadows of Angel. When Zappa reacquired the album and released it as a double CD in 1991, he restored "Punky's Whips" and added four bonus tracks.
Of all the Zappa live albums out there (and there’s a lot, so we have to be careful what we say), the double album rendering of his December 1976 New York shows has always occupied a prominent position in the fan club’s “best of” ratings. There are misgivings, of course. The omission of the showstopping “Punky’s Whips”; the mass of edits and rearrangements that went into the final running order; the fact that close to two years elapsed between concert and LP…. But, if you stopped worrying about what could have been, and focus simply on what you got, it was a fabulous album.
Official Release #23. Zappa in New York was recorded in December 1976 at the Palladium and originally intended for release in 1977. It was held up due to arguments between Frank Zappa and his then-record label, Warner Bros. When the two-LP set finally appeared in March 1978, Warner had deleted "Punky's Whips," a song about drummer Terry Bozzio's attraction to Punky Meadows of Angel. When Zappa reacquired the album and released it as a double CD in 1991, he restored "Punky's Whips" and added four bonus tracks.
This March, Universal Music will issue a five-CD, 40th anniversary deluxe edition of Frank Zappa‘s 1978 live album Zappa in New York.
Zappa original motion picture soundtrack available digitally today via zappa records/UMe as acclaimed “zappa” documentary is now available everywhere in the u.s. 68-track album features 12 unreleased tracks from the vault including performances from The Whisky A Go-Go in ’68, the Fillmore West in ’70 and “Saturday Night Live” in ’78. Includes more than two dozen tracks from across zappa’s prolific four-decade career, rarities, interview clips plus 26 original score cues by composer John Frizzell.
Official Release #86. Another in the ongoing series of releases drawn from Frank Zappa's extensive archives of live recordings, Philly '76 contains a concert held at the Spectrum in Philadelphia on October 29, 1976. This period in Zappa's career is otherwise documented by the album Zoot Allures, which actually was released on that day, and by Zappa in New York, drawn from shows recorded two months later. But the lineup of Zappa's band is not exactly the same as that on either of those albums. The core unit is identical, with Ray White on rhythm guitar, former Roxy Music member Eddie Jobson on keyboards and violin, Patrick O'Hearn on bass, and Terry Bozzio on drums.