In order to keep up with the ever-growing field of published music, Riff N' Ralk, Music Tock has expanded to the printed word to review music. Want Alex, Ryan, or Corey to write a lengthy, well-thought-out essay about your favorite albums? Leave a comment below, or write on our Facebook wall and we will give it a fair shot!
By: Alex Gomory
After
scrapping a relatively meta review of an album review, I struggled with what I
wanted to write next. I tend to leave most new albums alone in case Ryan
and I want to do them for the podcast which leaves me crate digging for older
material that I think would be interesting to read about. That thought in
itself is rather pious as I am assuming people need an album review for a 8
year old prog album, a 40 year old disasterpiece or a punk album that just
rubbed me the wrong way. I guess I figure if you really wanted another
review of The Knife's Shaking the Habitual you
would go to Tiny Mix Tapes and read possibly the worst piece of literature I
have read in 2013. I have just now saved myself the trouble of having to
review that piece of garbage album review. The album itself, check it out
if you have 97 minutes to waste and don't mind a lack of succinctness in your
music.
So
we come back to the original quandary of what to write about, and as
I go through my shelf of records and my somewhat obscene collection on iTunes I
seem to run into a repeating pattern: Adrian Belew. If you are not aware
of whom Adrian Belew is, there is a good reason. The guitarist is not
known for ever being the front man of
any commercially successful bands, but he has been in just about
every album and band you love and adore. Frank Zappa, David Bowie,
Talking Heads, and King Crimson have all had their Adrian Belew eras, with King
Crimson being a long standing home for the balding virtuoso. This is sort
of the brilliance of Adrian, he ends up being in everything you like, but you
just never realized it. He toured with all the above mentioned bands,
ended up on at least one of their records, and somehow sneaks himself onto so
many other songs. Remember the glorious Paul Simon single "You Can
Call me Al"? Those are not horns driving the song, it is just Adrian
Belew. From Nine Inch Nails to Mariah Carey, he's sort of the photo
bomber of records, sneaking in places you never imagined.
Belew
fans and lovers also know him for his completely insane guitar effects. From
elephants to birds, Adrian covers the lot of animal sounds, bizarre
frequencies, and just general guitar insanity, which is also why I love his
work so much. I usually get excited by a guitarist when it seems their
first instinct is "How do I get my guitar to sound like the exact opposite
of a guitar"? I could go on, but if you are interested in hearing
more of his 6 stringed tom-foolery check out tracks such as Elephant Talk,
and Matte
Kudosai, from Discipline an album I will be getting
to later.
As
it is seems obvious at the is point, I am a big Belew fan, going so far as to
think he is one of the greatest rock guitarists to ever take the stage.
Sadly though, as mentioned, he rarely gets the credit he deserves,
instead standing in the shadow of more overhyped and underqualified guitarists
who set their gain to maximum and wah pedal to "maximum erect cock".
The subtleties and insanities of Belew's style will likely never reach
their level of proper recognition, which is why I decided on a little Adrian
Belew album tour for the blog, for the next few posts I will be writing
exclusively about albums that feature Adrian. Now, it is important to
note that just because he was on it does not mean he was a principle writer or
composer, in fact, our first stop is Sheik Yerbouti which
features as much Adrian Belew writing credit as possible on a Zappa album
(Translation: as close to nothing as possible). Still, my hope is that
those gems in Belew's history get a little more attention than they have and he
gets more credit he deserves. Our four stop tour of Sheik
Yerbouti, Ledger, Remain in Light, and Discipline will
show Adrian progressively getting more and more writing credit until he is
standing center stage as a lead performer. Are you excited? I sure
am!
Stop
#1 Sheik Yerbouti by Frank Zappa
I
am always perplexed at how overlooked Zappa's musical catalog is. Music
journalists will gleefully go on and on about how much of a genius he was,
mention Don't Eat The Yellow Snow, say something about how his
kids have weird names, but then fail to mention any of his albums in any
collection of great albums be it rock, 70s, or all time. Now, I will
admit that not everything Zappa does is golden, as Ryan and I have explored,
but needless to say he has some near perfect items in his catalog that are often
over overlooked for one reason or another. It is easy to see why they are
overlooked as well. Zappa's style of rock was never exactly conventional,
with many complicated interludes and dynamic style changes throughout his
records. His lyrics borderline offensive on a good day, cracking jokes
about every group of people on the planet, which you could at least give him
credit for his fairness. His live shows too, were a strange carnival of
antics, from cross-dressing Adrian Belew to Roy Estrada making out
with a blow-up doll on stage....and that was just one show, not to mention he
had a knack for hiring some of the ugliest people in music. The
combination was ripe for Zappa to always be a name people knew, but never his
music.
Sheik
Yerbouti was released in 1979 and is pseudo live album.
The audio is a combination of 4 days of concert footage mixed with loads
of studio overdubs. The end result is an odd hybrid of studio and live
with audio quality that fluctuates pretty frequently between songs. You
can in fact hear one of the original concerts, which was released 2 years ago
titled Hammersmith Odeon. It is a three hour epic, but well
worth the investment for Zappa
fiends.
Sheik also
has the luxury of having arguably one of the greatest Zappa line-ups;
featuring, as mentioned, Adrian Belew, Terry Bozio, Tommy Mars, Patrick
O'Hearn, Ed Mann, Peter Wolf, and a few other vocalists in the studio.
Although maybe not the most complex of his line-ups I always felt this
was one of his most exciting groups, and easily the heaviest rock oriented.
That is not to say they could not change styles, but this group definitely
had a more visceral sound than the 80s line-ups that while impressive were way
too clean and "perfect". I
think this particular line-up was slightly less abraisive enough than his early
70s late 60s line-ups to not completely alienate the audience. It was a
brilliant line-up that sadly lived all too shortly due to members being caught
using drugs, which was banned in Zappa's touring groups, but we'll talk more
about that later.
To
briefly explain, Adrian ended up on this touring line-up and album through word
of mouth. Frank's limo driver informed him that the band Sweetheart were
worth checking out, while he was in Tennessee. So Frank did, liked what
he heard from Adrian, offered him a one year touring offer, and the rest is
history.
Sheik is
a brilliant collection of rock songs, both semi-serious and comical with some
brilliant instrumentals peppered into between. Starting off with the ever
charming I Have Been In You, Frank swoons the listener with a story
of how he's just been in you, and is going to do so again and again and again.
To the Zappa novice your ears might already be crying bloody murder at
the audacity of Frank's serenade, but to the Zappa familiar this is simply
Tuesday. Frank, is no stranger to controversy, but at the same time his
songs have some sort of meaning to them and aren't typically just a collection
of fart jokes with complex music behind them. I Have Been In You is
no exception either, being a jab at Peter Frampton's I'm In
You.
Frank's
typical joking manner progresses into Flakes, a song about
Union workers who don't do what they are supposed to which features one of the
finer moments on the album, Adrian Belew's Bob Dylan impression.
During the bridge you can also hear what would become a somewhat typical
Adrian Belew guitar solo filled with bird noises and whammy swells. It is
a bit clearer on Hammersmith Odeon, but it is still plenty audible
and you can tell Adrian is already figuring out some of his signature sounds.
I
Have Been In You and Flakes seem like one large
introduction to the trio of hard-hitters Broken Hearts Are
For Ass-Holes, I'm So Cute, and Jones Crusher,
the latter most also being sung by Belew. The three are their own little
jokes about one subject matter or another, with Broken Hearts ending
with a chant of "It's going right up your poop chute" which may lead
it to be one of those songs you choose not to blast with your windows down. The
lyrics may make you chuckle or cringe, but the music is what really shines in
these Zappa pieces. His ability to create a unique rock song with hammond
organ stabs, and even some xylophone is a skill known to so few. Broken
Hearts also showcases Frank's knack for seemingly not taking himself
too seriously. While Led Zeppelin was singing about
Greek and Norse Mythology and The Who were making epics about
pinball wizards, Zappa was singing about the concept that a relationship can go
so badly it would turn you homosexual. You could go on to analyze the
lyrics and determine how many times around the irony scale we have made or just
shrug, accept it, and go. Respectfully this has always been the biggest
issue with Zappa's music; swallowing the pill of offensive. To be honest most
times he is not just pointing and laughing at people who are not him in
some Adam Sandler style way, but just making weird
Zappaesque observations. Either way, the trio works as a great hard
rocking break from the ballady introduction.
The
middle portion of the album Whatever Happened to All the Fun in the
World, Rat Tomago, Wait a Minute, Bobby Brown Goes Down, Rubber Shirt, and The
Sheik Yerbouti Tango is, like the three rock tracks, one big suite, a
combination of odd spoken word and noise pieces, instrumental solos, and
smashed in the middle Bobby Brown Goes Down a deliciously
satirical piece about how the white male norm thinks they can do whatever they
want and be considered great for it. The song was oddly enough a smash
hit in Scandinavian countries where the listeners were not aware of
the lovely lyrics such as "I can take an hour on the tower of power/So
long as I can get a golden shower." The rest of this section is
easily the most difficult to absorb in this album. Weird combinations of
layering solos on top of other solos, or jams can come across as a difficult to
absorb for a more casual listener. More musically adept individuals may
appreciate the layers of different time signatures, but even then it can be a
tougher pill to swallow compared to the straight forward, albeit absurd, first
third of the album. Still, those who are willing to take the plunge will
not be disappointed as the performances are fantastic and they are as close to
a live performance as you will get on this album.
The
next suite, is easily my favorite, and filled with some of Zappa's best songs.
Baby Snakes, Tryin' to Grow a Chin, City of Tiny Lights, and Dancin'
Fool are fantastic tracks on their own, but as one short string , each
building off the former, it is some of the best rock music you will ever hear.
Baby Snakes a cute, short jingle about short penises, or
snakes, or something is a charming welcome after the dense The Sheik
Yerbouti Tango. The music's sudden 180 degree shift from complex
musicianship to high pitched singing is startling at first, but never
unpleasant. Tryin' to Grow a Chin, sung by Terry Bozio, has a
rough and ready rock sound, like a 50's juke-box jam cranked to eleven, or a
punk song parody. Terry's scream-like tendency fits perfectly with the
chanting of "I want to be dead/in bed please kill me/cause that would
thrill me." It is also a plus to have a song that you can play in
front of your parents in the mix here. Like Baby Snakes it
is short, but perfectly so. City of Tiny Lights is arguably
the best of the quartet and features our hero, Adrian Belew on vocals.
The catchy Bass pattern is one you'll catch yourself humming to yourself
days after, and not to mention Adrian's Cookie Monster impression. The
guitar solo crashes with a ferocity that has been building since Baby
Snakes started, with live versions of the song featuring much longer
guitar solos and even keyboard solos as well. Part of you wants to wish
the rhythm would last another 5 minutes, but another part realizes this is not a
Phish concert and we need to get on with this album. Dancin'
Fool wraps up the section. Being one of the few Frank Zappa
songs to get any sort of commercial recognition, a statement that
needs to be recognized in the context of Frank Zappa, Dancin' Fool is
a critique of the disco culture, but not without being a fun dance song on its
own. It was also nominated for a Grammy, and helped Frank get banned from
SNL. The song's end features some gloriously awful pick-up lines which
have some brilliant, albeit subtle references.
The
final trio, Jewish Princess, Wild Love, and Yo Mama create
a pleasant come-down from the music high that was the previous set.
Unfortunately, however, we have to deal with the subject of Jewish
Princess. Now, musically amusing (Who does not love a Kazoo?) Jewish
Princess steps beyond the realm of typical Zappa satire into a realm
that could easily be considered bad taste. Frank, as was apparent in this
album, was never the sort to shy from controversy or raunchy lyrics, but
throughout his career he tended to be craftier about his word choice, and
avoided straight forward statements such as those in Jewish Princess.
Even as a lover of Zappa I am hard pressed to defend the song, and can
only really make the statement "at least the music is good."
Sadly, Jewish Princess would be the continuing trend for
Zappa in his later career as he seemed to write lyrics more so to piss off the
PRMC than for his own artistic endeavors. His slightly more
tongue-in-cheek or subtle commentaries would become replaced with blatant, bold
faced claims that didn't really work well at all, but that is for another day,
one where I feel the masochistic need to relisten to Man From Utopia.
Wild Love's synths and grandeur bring the album back from the
awkward listen of Jewish Princess. For some reason it is the
one song I have the hardest time talking about, it has the unfortunate problem
of being wedged in between the controversial Jewish Princess and
the powerful concluding Yo Mama. It is a great item, but it
is like the middle child in between two siblings. Yo Mama is an
amazing conclusion, with a soft airy beginning with barely any music besides Ed
Mann's percussive works. Some comical backing voices carry Frank's
humorous, but fortunately not so raunchy lyrics. Perhaps he had exhausted
his vulgarity during the first 60 minutes, it is hard to say. The song
then ascends into a guitar solo driven jam for quite a few minutes,
bringing the whole band into the mix at the end, before coming back down to its
beginning. Frank introduces the band and thanks the audience for coming
to the show before closing out the listen. It is a fitting listen after
an exhausting album, and as the listener you almost feel as if he is thanking
you for sticking with him until the end.
It
is a crime that Sheik is ignored by critics and not placed on
any 'best of' types of lists. Yes, it is hard to deny the vulgarity and
general insanity, but to say that it does not compose a brilliant listen is
somewhat insulting. Frank's quirky musical stylings fits together quite
nicely in this package and introduces the listener to many great songs from
Frank's daunting catalog of music. Many other brilliant tracks
from the era would have fit in quite nicely here; especially songs that were
lost in the Läther fiasco such as Punky's Whips, but
that would result in the removal of other material, which would have ruined the
near perfect balance of this album.
For
those unfamiliar with Frank's carnival of eccentricities this is a fantastic
starting point, as it gives the listener a musically tame, albeit lyrically
offensive, sample of Frank Zappa's exhaustive work. I would
argue this is a must listen for anyone, especially those who fancy themselves
classic rock experts of the highest order. Lovers of simpler pop music
may be taken aback by the complex song structure and daring nature of the
album, but as I have mentioned before it is good to be challenged by your
music, and this is a perfect album to do it with.
Next
time: David Bowie's Lodger
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