Tír Na HiFi

markof wrote:
Could almost be a Zappa album in places.

I didn't know we had another Steve Vai fan here. I don't feel so lonely now.

I think that the high point of Vai's and Zappa's work together was on the track, Drowning Witch, from the album Ship Arriving Too Late To Save A Drowning Witch.  Zappa was continually sidetracked with throwaway comedy fare like Valley Girl and Teenage Prostitute during the latter half of his career, but the wonderfully inventive Drowning Witch is exactly the kind of work he should have concentrated on more often in the 1980s.

As a fan of Zappa alumni like Steve Vai and Mike Keneally, I have never managed to get into the man himself. I'm partly too bewildered by the breadth, partly put off by the zany.

Diapason wrote:As a fan of Zappa alumni like Steve Vai and Mike Keneally, I have never managed to get into the man himself. I'm partly too bewildered by the breadth, partly put off by the zany.

I found a way in to his music through the albums "One size fits all" and "Hot Rats" both of which are light on the zany and strong on the music.

I agree.  I'm firmly of the opinion that Zappa recorded too much music and in later years concentrated his attentions on the zany a little too often.  He delighted in outraging Christian  fundamentalists in the States as well as Republicans in general by writing songs directed in their direction.  At his best, and Hot Rats and One Size Fits All are two of the best examples (to which I would also add We're Only In It For The Money), Zappa could combine a spirit of musical adventure with a liberated sense of humour.  His music influenced me profoundly when I was finding my feet in music and beginning my explorations into jazz and classical.  Indeed, it was his passionate advocacy of composers/musicians like Mingus, Dolphy, Stravinsky, Webern, and Varese that convinced me to embrace these strange new sound worlds.  (And, for that alone, I find myself continually in his debt.  Undoubtedly, my life would have been materially  richer but spiritually poorer had I lived my life in perpetual ignorance of the great music.)  In my opinion, he was also one of the very greatest guitarists (rivalled only by Robert Fripp) and his collections of guitar improvisations, Shut Up and Play Yer Guitar and Guitar, are essential listening for students of the instrument.

Thank you, gentlemen, I'll look those up.

Three massive ego's one small stage :~)
Pure rock and roll.

Any Beefheart fans in the building? Grow Fins :)