603 The Mothers of Invention - Uncle Meat (1969)

Studio Album - Avant Garde

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About the Act:

It’s hard to know what to say about Frank Zappa. There has been a lot written about him and it would be easy to parrot a lot of that. If you want to dig into his history, there’s plenty to go at.

He was prolific. Between 1966 and his death in 1993 he released 62 albums. Since then, 50 more albums have been released. Oh, he was American, I guess that’s relevant. He had a band in the early days, The Mothers of Invention. Soma albums are credited to "The Mothers of Invention" some to "Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention" and after the band was disbanded, they were just credited to him.

He is musically hard to describe, some of his output could be classified as Prog, some as Jazz-Rock, some as Avant-Garde Classical, and often it owes more to German Cabaret than anything. It can be complex, and he was an amazing guitarist, who surrounded himself with amazing musicians. He apparently got frustrated with orchestras for hire because they couldn’t play what he wanted them to. Later in life he was starting to embrace cutting-edge synths and sequencing.

So sometimes, the music is front and centre, but often it is the backdrop to his songs. Subject matter: social satire, often disguised as songs about banal things, but then he seems to take just as seriously songs that truly are about banal things. It would not be safe to put one of his albums on at work, or in front of the kids, if you didn’t already know the content, as it is often very adult. And that includes the spoken stuff on live albums. Be prepared for explicit sexual content, political commentary and anti-religious sentiment, all of which is mixed up with a peculiar absurdist humour.

He has a cult following. Presumably some people have bought all 100+ albums. I have listened to a good number of them and am still undecided about him. 

About the Album:

This was a relatively early album by The Mothers. It was conceived as a film, which never got released. Instead it became part of a project called "No Commercial Potential" which produced this album, Cruising with Ruben and the Jets, We're Only In It For The Money, and Lumpy Gravy. It was a double album, and used a number of unusual recording techniques, including multi-layered overdubbing. It did well commercially and critically.

My History with this Album:

I have probably listened to it before. After a while certain bits of Frank Zappa become a continuum. I possess a data copy of this which I acquired as part of a large collection of Zappa stuff a few years ago.

Review:

Nobody had done more than Frank Zappa in terms of bringing together Contemporary Classical, Rock, Free Jazz, German Cabaret and Do-Wop. His contribution to this mixture is unparalleled, and maybe that's a good thing.

Musically, this is bonkers and largely inaccessible. Below the review I will paste in my re-usable statement on weird music. 

Description can be difficult. Let's try anyway. There are parts of this album, mostly the last of the four sides, that is kind of jazz-rock, extended improvisation. In fact this last side seems to be 6 versions of the same track. In other places there are discordant but obviously very structured parts which use orchestral instruments a lot. There are "tunes" but they are generally not hummable, and both rhythms and harmonic structure remind me of some of the most Avant Garde of "Modern" classical. There are some bits that might be easier described as free jazz, in that they are less structured, and seem to rely on improvisation. These may have some structure, but what the different instruments play seems less choreographed, as a result of sounding completely disconnected. Some of this is reminiscent of Miles Davis, especially in the sparse soundscapes. There are bits which are more musically accessible (not necessarily by much) and often these are the songs, sung with affected voices to indicate satire or comical delivery. There are bits of this that are similar to American Do-Wop groups but are obviously done in a parodying way, most obviously by not being in tune. There are other bits that sound more like a carnival or German Cabaret, sometimes using comical sound effects and sometimes with a marimba or celeste mirroring the tune. And there are some spoken parts, quite a few of which are "by" an invented character called Suzy Creamcheese who appears on other albums also. Mostly these are Not Safe For Work. The sung lyrics tend towards the deliberately banal or surreal, like Mr Green Genes which suggests you eat your shoes, and the box they came in, and the slimy garbage truck they came in. 

There is also a short, bizarre version of Louie Louie from the Albert Hall.

The overall effect is bonkers, dense and difficult listening. It drags you into the bizarre world of Zappa and leaves no prisoners. I listen to a reasonable amount of musically unusual stuff, but this is a relentless barrage and only suitable for people who really like their musical weirdness. It's too much for me, to be honest. Too formless, too discordant, and as an album too disjointed. Some of the recording is very good, but some is more mushy. They have done some odd things at times like changing speeds to bend instrument notes, sound effects, other speed effects and crazy vocal sound interjections.

6/10

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/album/7lRcWdFIW2mrDOu0igcfR0

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLW79q83govkUvrGUT37oaIlabj29iqVUY

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncle_Meat

Re-useable statement on musical weirdness

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Some music is weird. When I am reviewing something that is, I often feel the need to say the same things, and so, this re-useable statement is born.

Quality is a strange thing, whenever I try to get to grips with it, it fizzles away like mist. There are many different qualities we look for in music, some objective, but many are contextual. For music that steps outside the mainstream, an additional quality is added, that of subverting the form. From a pure skill perspective, some modern art paintings could be described as "a child could have painted this" - to which the presumed response could be "Exactly. Isn't that great?". Some of the most influential Avant Garde music deliberately demonstrates what stepping out of convention can sound like. Given the many dimensions of music (form, harmony, melody, rhythm, performance, lyrics, production, and probably more) there are many ways of stepping out of the circle of "normal".

This means that "being weird" can be an easy win. Sometimes unusual music is clearly highly skilled, sometimes it seems to reject the norms of skill also. Where is the boundary between bad and deliberately bad? Is there a boundary? Is it all about perception? Sometimes it seems like artists can do anything at all, and it will be accepted as ground-breakingly subversive, as long as the artist takes it incredibly seriously, almost making people applaud it by force of will. There is a dichotomy here, because in order to have acclaim, the music needs to be accessible enough to enough people to gain that acclaim, while the nature of "being weird" is, by its nature making it less accessible. 

There are some people who seem to deliberately embrace things that are difficult or inaccessible to others - and in music this can be the most challengingly unusual, loud, aggressive, sweary, or nice parts of music. I'm OK with this, but I struggle when they then give the impression that it makes them a connoisseur, a better listener than other people, because they "get" the weird music. I deplore this attitude, and don't think anybody should be looked down on because they don't like Frank Zappa, or Rammstein, or Henry Cow, or Patagonian Nose Flute music, or anything else for that matter. However, I'm not immune to this musical elitism, so if you really like Baby Shark, please don't tell me.

I have found that I like some unusual music, but not all, which makes me wonder what are the qualities I enjoy in the stuff I like. I have no clear answer to this, but I think I am more open to it being unusual if that is not all of the music, so unusual sections in the context of more "normal" music seems to impress me more. Maybe because it becomes clear that the musicians can play well.

At the end of the day, regardless of something being ground-breaking, challenging, subversive, ironic, clever, badly-recorded, experimental, deliberately tasteless or just aggressive, the bottom line is whether I enjoy listening to it. It's all about the listener experience.