Eat That Question: Frank Zappa in His Own Words Page #7

we always settle for something that's cheesy,

because of some economic expedient,

and we're too eager to believe

when people tell us

that budget-cutting is the way to salvation,

that all we have to do is

cut the budget of something,

and everything will be okay. This is wrong.

And we're not concerned enough

about the quality of our lives.

I sense though that there is a deep,

permanent, irreversible cynicism in you.

And I wish that I could have

other people catch some of it.

I used to play all kinds of stuff

And some of it was nice

Some of it was musical

But then they took some guy's advice

To get a record deal, he said

They would have to be more punk

Forget their chops and play real dumb

or else they would be sunk

So off they go to S-I-R

To learn some stupid riffs

Oh, no

- No!

- Oh, no, no, no, no, no

- No!

- It's the '80s again

No, no, no, no, no, no, no

No, no, no, no, no, no, no

And when they think they've got it

They launch a new career

Who gives a f*** if what they play

Is somewhat insincere?

Let's dance the blues again, get down

Dance the blues again, everybody

Dance the blues again, hey

I write the songs

That make the young girls cry

Did you know that in Tinseltown

The people down there think

That substance is a bore?

And if your New Wave group looks good

Well, hurry on back for more

of leather groups

Why do I

Go rock you like a nincompoop?

And plastic groups

Whip it good

And groups that look real queer

I'll tumble for ya, I'll tumble for ya

I'll tumble for

Moo, moo-moo, moo, moo

Moo, moo-moo, moo, moo

Moo, moo-moo, moo, moo

Moo, moo-moo

Moo Ann

The Tinseltown aficionados

Come to see and not to hear

But then again, the system

Works as perfect as a dream

It works for all of those

Record company pricks

Who come to skim the

Cream

The thing that sets the

Americans apart from the rest

of the cultures in the world

is we're so f***ing stupid.

This country's been around

for a couple hundred years,

and we think we're hot sh*t.

And they don't... We don't even realize

that other countries have thousands of years

of history and culture,

and they're proud of it.

And when we deal on an

international level, you know,

with foreign policy and stuff like that,

and we try and go in as,

you know, a big American

strong country and all that stuff,

they must laugh up their sleeves at us,

because we are nothing.

We are culturally nothing.

We mean nothing.

We're only interested in the bottom line.

You know, every other country

has their own art,

their own music, their own theater,

their own drama, their folk dances,

folk songs, folklore,

and it means something to them,

and they're proud of it,

and that's their ethnic heritage.

We have Levi's, we have designer jeans,

we have hamburgers, we have Coca-Cola,

we have REO Speedwagon, we have Journey,

we have this one, we have that one.

And then we go out there and we say,

"Yeah, but we also have

neutron bombs and poison gas,

"so maybe that makes up for it."

I mean, it's really kind of sad

when you evaluate it that way.

And I think that a country

that doesn't do something

to sustain its culture, whatever it is,

doesn't invest in it,

doesn't keep it happening, isn't proud of it,

maybe they just shouldn't exist,

because it's the culture

and the beautiful things

that a society produces,

those are the things that should survive

for thousands of years,

not the designer jeans.

Tomorrow night,

the London Symphony Orchestra

are giving a concert at their

home in the Barbican Centre.

Nothing much new in that.

But what is new is that

the program of orchestral music

they'll be playing is music written by

the celebrated

American rock star Frank Zappa,

a man once banned, if you remember,

from the Royal Albert Hall

because his lyrics were

thought to be too obscene.

Robin Denselow's been looking

at the least known

and the least commercial side of Zappa's art.

Frank Zappa has been quietly writing pieces

for a full orchestra,

alongside his rock work, for years.

For their first ever performance,

he's using the London Symphony

Orchestra and so many musicians

that they might not fit on the Barbican stage.

It's going to be difficult.

It's going to be maybe even

painful for some of them.

The LSO are rehearsing compositions

that Zappa has written from 1975 on,

but which he is only hearing now

for the first time.

The conductor, Kent Nagano,

mostly works in San Francisco

and was chosen by Zappa.

As the LSO grapple with

the highly complicated,

unusual rhythm structures,

Nagano agrees he's not

given them an easy time.

He regards the compositions

as very important.

For Zappa, it doesn't seem to matter

that his simpler rock songs

are far better known

than these serious compositions.

I think that it's just as serious

to write a song like Valley Girl

as it is to write a ballet called

Mo 'n Herb's Vacation.

To me, they're equally

serious problems in music.

Really? I mean, one must take you, what,

a matter of days, and the other

a matter of months and months.

Well, in the case of Valley Girl,

it took me a matter of moments,

but in the case of

some of the orchestra pieces,

they'll take, like,

six months to write, but that doesn't mean

there's any less seriousness

involved in the construction

of each piece, because

they're for different mediums,

they're for different audiences,

and they deal with different

kinds of musical problems.

At the rehearsals, Zappa sat out in the stalls,

but made sure that Nagano and the orchestra

were always aware

of exactly what he wanted.

Why don't we split it up

with all 1-As doing that?

- How about that?

- Okay.

Excuse me.

So could you take

a look please, everyone. 159.

Ready, and...

Don't get ahead.

And...

Do you expect to actually make

any money out of the concert

and the recordings that you've

come here to make with the LSO?

No. No.

Why, then, do you do it?

Well, I think that any artistic

decision that is based on

whether or not you're going

to make money is not really

an artistic decision, it's a business decision.

And there are a lot of things

that I can do to earn a living,

and a lot of things that I've

already done to earn a living,

which have produced

the amount of capital needed

to do this project.

I came here to spend money

on an English orchestra,

to record my music so I can take it home

and I can listen to it.

And if somebody else likes that kind of stuff,

I will make it available on a record

so that they can hear it.

That is my part of the public service

of spending the money

to make this event happen.

No foundation grant,

no government assistance,

no corporation, no committee,

just a crazy guy who spent the money

to hire English musicians

to do a concert at the Barbican

and make an album

for Barking Pumpkin Records.

Frank, is it good? Is the music good?

I think it's fantastic.

And you're on.

All right, we're rolling.

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