Frank Zappa & The Mothers of Invention - Uncle Meat
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Free Music Notes for Uncle Meat
Free Music Review: Uncle Meat
Hit: 5 Stars
WOW!!! nothing compares to the original MOI! Uncle Meat is probably the most under-rated Moi album. It focusses mostly on chamber music and avant garde instrumentals. There is also rock, jazz, experimental, and of course doo-wop!!! The only down side of the album is the first three tracks on disc two. The film excerpts are intensely boring and Tengo Na Minchia Tanta does not at all fit in the album, but the album is still a five! The album contains brilliantly written chamber music such as the two part Uncle Meat, The Legend Of The Golden Arches, Dog Breath Variations, Sleeping In A Jar,and Pound For a brown On The Bus. It also contains some fascinating avant garde, such as Nine Types Of Industrial Pollution, Zolar Cyskal, The Voice Of Cheese, Louie Louie, Our Bizarre Relationship, God Bless America, Ian Underwood Whips It Out, We Can Shoot You, If we'd All Been Living In California, And Project X. The album also contains some rock influenced chamber music such as Dog Breath: In The Year Of The Plague, Mr. Green Genes, And Cruising For Burgers. The album also has some awesome doo- wop songs like Electric Aunt Jemima, and The Air. The jazz songs are the intense multi part King Kong. The whole album is brilliant, there is plenty of songs, plenty of variety, most of it listenable but all of it extraordinary. Very high recommendationFree Music Review: A sprawling journey through The Mothers' career...
Hit: 5 Stars
This is one of the more bizarre records in popular music. The original release was four sides of vinyl, covering many genres and styles. The CD is expanded to include a long sequence from the film, the official release, and outtake sequences, which isn't really necessary, but it does help put the concept of the finished film into context. Despite the rambling nature of the complete release, if you listen to it in its entirety, you do have a sense of going on a journey through sound, compliments of contemporary music's true pioneers, the Mothers Of Invention. Even though Frank Zappa was the group's spear-head, it becomes obvious that this particular group's sound and image were unique, even in the Zappa catalogue. At the time, he needed these musicians, however much he may have since said otherwise, and I don't believe this would have the sound, mood, and appearance that it has if other players were involved. Proof of this would be one of the tracks on the later release, "Tengo Na Minchia." Not the original band, and there is a night-and-day difference between this and the rest of the soundtrack. I am one of the world's biggest fans of FZ and The Mothers, but I think he messed with an ideal-sounding and ideally-paced release by including this. Just an opinion.
There is typical Mothers-style humor here, as with them playing the Whiskey-A-Go-Go in Los Angeles, a kazoo-accompanied "God Bless America," and the treatment they gave to "Louie Louie" at the Albert Hall, desecrating the "mighty, majestic Albert Hall pipe organ" in the process. Some serious pieces offset this, such as "Project X," and "Legend Of The Golden Arches." You get the definitive treatment of "King Kong," and no later band has played it with the fire of the original band performing this.
It's odd, this is a band that sometimes plays badly on purpose, and it sounds RIGHT. Proper technique can sometimes be a detrimint, and "Uncle Meat" proves this. It takes a little concentrated listening, but once you enter, you probably won't want to leave.
:)
Free Music Review: Uncle Meat and Electric Aunt Jemima
Hit: 5 Stars
What I love about Uncle Meat is the unpredictability in the music and the collages of music and dialogue with Suzy Creamcheese and Ian Underwood. The music sounds like something from outer space. Zappa makes it seem easy the way he arranges collages and composes the jazz-rock masterpieces. Where does the music come from? Zappa is a genuis and should be compared to the greats like Mozart, Ravel, Beethoven, Grieg, John Cage, Schumann, Prokofiev, and Varese. Great listen!Free Music Review: The most original and absurd work ever
Hit: 5 Stars
Uncle meat is a soundtrack to a film of the same name, which Zappa finished almost two decades later. It is definately the weirdest soundtrack ever. My five star rating goes to original Uncle meat vinyl that doesn't contain film excerpts. The power of Uncle meat seems sometimes to be completely beyond any analysis. First of all it works better as whole than separate pieces. The album flows perfectly from instrumentals to vocal pieces to conversations to musical jokes. Uncle meat is full of complex instrumental music that is quite enjoyable, but still very experimental and unclassifiedable. There are many jazz, classical, doowop, psychedelic rock and even opera influences. I think the vocal pieces are real meat of this album. The vocals are even more hilarious than usually in Zappa's work.
This work is full of absurd humour, which probably only the band members truly understand, but musical jokes like God bless America can still be funny or at least make you smile. The whole album sounds like that Frank Zappa had a very weird dream and he put it on the album. I think this album is more mysterious than many psychedelic albums and this album actually contains one of the best psychedelic songs of all time Mr.Green Genes. The album has a tight absurd atmosphere, if you listen it throught. It contains some of the most imaginative and brilliant popular music ever Electric aunt Jemina, Uncle meat, Mr.Green Genes, Uncle meat variations and Dog breath in the year of plague. It breaks many barriers of popular music and turns everything upside down. It is not perfect. Some of the material is absolutely crap, but it is the brilliant and the most unique work ever. I'm a poet and this work has inspired me more than any other. In Uncle meat Frank Zappa has once again created a new musical universe. Certainly not a starting point for your Frank Zappa collection, but if you already own some Frank Zappa albums, give it a try. I highly recommend this for you.
Free Music Review: Even a Genius Can Make a Mistake
Hit: 5 Stars
I've been a total Frank Zappa and original MOI fan since first hearing W'ere Only in It for the Money in 1968. It was clear from the first that Zappa was an absolute musical genius, who's incredible creativity, energy, iconoclasm, hard work, and chutzpah make him the greatest composer and musician since the likes of Stravinsky and Prokofiev. His ability to compose in a variety of styles -- rock, doo-wop, jazz, country, and neo-classical (to name a few) -- seems unmatched; and he is probably the most prolific musician ever.
That he was primarily a "Rock" musician (who sometimes pandered to a teenage audience often less interested is his music than his audacity) should not be envoked to attempt to diminish his accomplishments and talent. The orchestral scores scattered throughout 200 Motels are proof of his exceptional ability for innovative and complex composition. No less extraordinary are the remarkable and progressive pieces found on Lumpy Gravy, Uncle Meat, Hot Rats, Jazz From Hell, The Yellow Shark, and Civilization Phase III (to mention a few) -- the likes of which have not been approached, let alone equalled.
As his guitarist, he is unsurpassed -- and his oeuvre is replete with some of the most amazing, beautiful, intelligent, and scintillating solos and passages ever heard. Frank referred to his playing as "air sculpture." But I always thought of it like "expositions" or "conversations," as Zappa's playing seems distinctly related to language and the spoken word, with its exclamations, pronouncements, and subtle nuance. Examples include Son of Mr. Green Genes (Hot Rats), the two extended solos on side one of Burnt Weenie Sandwich as well as the shorter solos on side two (within The Little House I used to Live In), The Orange Country Lumber Truck (Weasels Ripped My Flesh), Transylvania Boogie and The Nancy & Mary Music (Chunga's Revenge), Magdalena (Just Another Band from LA), Son of Orange County/More Trouble Every Day (Roxy and Elsewhere), and Inca Roads (One Size Fits All) -- just to mention some of my favorites.
But geniuses can and do make mistakes -- and one of Zappa's (IMHO) was to include Uncle Meat Film Excerpt Part I, Tengo Na Minchia Tanta, and Uncle Meat Film Excerpt Part II as part of both the original CD and remastered CD releases of Uncle Meat. These 3 pieces were NOT part of the original 1969 vinyl-album release of Uncle Meat. I think their CD inclusion definitely detracts thematically and musically from the original -- and I urge listeners to simply SKIP them when they listen to Uncle Meat. Similarly, Frank made (and subsequently corrected) a mistake when he changed the bass and drum tracks for the original CD release of We're Only in It for the Money (and I remember my disappointment when I first heard that original CD).
Maybe, if Frank had not died he would have expunged Uncle Meat of these 3 "spurious" pieces (which are far better suited to CDs like Playground Psychotics or The Lost Episodes) from a new original-version Uncle Meat CD. Hopefully, the Zappa Family Trust will do the same at some point.
Zappa said "Music is the best" -- likewise, Frank is the BEST...
P.S. I recommend "Ahead of Their Time" to all Zappa fans -- on which you can hear the extended/complete Orange Country Lumber Truck guitar solo (about half of which is on Weasels Ripped My Flesh), as part of the last track entitled Orange County Lumber Truck (Part 2). The solo and the entire CD is AMAZING..!!