Baltimore is celebrating by unveiling a statue of FZ. Gail will speak at 10 and Dweezil will give a free concert with ZPZ at 2. Story here.
Think I’ll start by playing ‘One Size Fits All’ and see where it goes from there.
Good on Baltimore. Frank’s the man. I wrote PBS to get them to do an American Masters on him but they didn’t go for it. I think they will some day.
As his influence continues to grow 17 years after his death, I think they’ll have to.
A taste of Frank’s astonishing talent - G-Spot Tornado, with choreography by La La La Human Steps.
Crank the “Inca Roads” guitar solo. I mean crank it! I want to hear it from all the way over here in Kansas!
Interesting bit of trivia - about 2/3rds of ‘Shut Up ‘n’ Play Yer Guitar’ and its cousins are solos taken from ‘Inca Roads’. It’s as fascinating to hear how the band changes up comping a two-chord vamp as it is to hear how FZ would come up with something different every night.
On to ‘The Yellow Shark’…
Hot Rats is still in heavy rotation in my car’s cd changer.
Did Billy and Ethell make an appearance?
Frank was the greatest. I’m glad I lived in his time and, even better, saw him in concert a few times.
There’s tons of Frank on YouTube but “Muffin Man” has always been a favorite:
This and “Black Napkins”:
The guitar playing on these makes me cry and I’m not even a guitar player.
You could also watch a 22 year-old Frank Zappa playing a bicycle on the Steve Allen show in 1963. Four parts.