When Gail Zappa worked with Rykodisc Records to remaster and re-release her husband's albums there were more than 60 of them. Frank Zappa approached his music with meticulous attention to detail and great humor, what was often dismissed as flippant was stinging satire and complex music that is spoken of with near reverence by a wide range of musicians. Along with hundreds of studio musicians, his performances and recordings included Ike and Tina Turner, Jean Luc Ponty, the London Symphony Orchestra, Peirre Boulez, Yoko Ono and John Lennon, and Johnny "Guitar" Watson. Most would categorize his work as rock and roll, but his work included chamber music, reggae, jazz, dissonant avant-garde, and he found and recorded music composed by Francesco Zappa, an Italian working in Milan between 1765 and 1780. (No, it wasn't a put-on a la PDQ Back, this is for real.) I'm not enough of a musician to appreciate his genius, which may explain why I don't seem to own any of his recordings, but he was a rebel and he fought against censorship, taking the point when "a group of bored Washington housewives" led by Susan Baker and Tipper Gore attacked rock lyrics in 1985. He also made more than a few pithy comments along the way, several of which comprise today's quotes.
Today is the anniversary of the Pilgrim's landing in Massachusetts, the first cotton-spinning mill (and possibly the first organized patent infringement) in North America, and man's first trip to the moon - at least to orbit around the moon. And a 1954 murder occurred in which the doctor-husband of the victim was charged, convicted, and later acquitted. Hollywood substituted a "one-armed man" for the "bushy-haired intruder" and the legend of The Fugitive was born.
Most of the holidays listed in Twisted History start by identifying the country in which the holiday takes place. Today we have two calendar items that apply around the world. Note that I carefully call it the December Solstice, both because that seems to be the preferred technical name and because our readers in the southern hemisphere would rightly be offended if I called it the Winter Solstice.
1620 - A month after first anchoring in North American waters, and despite having a charter to settle in Virginia, the passengers of the Mayflower landed at Plymouth Bay, Massachusetts. The Leyden Separatists (Pilgrims, not Puritans) there established the first permanent European settlement in New England.
1790 - Samuel Slater opened the first spinning mill in North America at Pawtuckett, Rhode Island. An apprentice of the English inventor Richard Arkwright, he defied laws banning emigration of textile worker to accept a bounty offered in New England and created the equipment from plans he memorized before leaving England the year before.
1954 - Neurosurgeon Dr Sam Sheppard had fallen asleep when his wife, 31-year-old Marilyn, was brutally beaten to death upstairs in their home in the Cleveland, Ohio suburb of Bay Village. He awoke to the noise and ran upstairs in time to see the "bushy-haired intruder" leave by a window. "Dr Sam" was convicted in the first trial and spent ten years in prison before winning acquittal in a second trial.
1968 - Mission Commander Frank Borman, James A. Lovell, Jr, and William A. Anders were launched toward the moon in Apollo 8 at 7:51 am from Kennedy Space Center, the first manned mission beyond earth orbit. In the six-day mission all Apollo communications and tracking systems were tested and high-resolution photos were taken of potential landing sites for later missions.
December Solstice, The day with the least amount of daylight in the northern hemisphere where it is commonly called the winter solstice, the first day of winter. While the greatest length of sunshine in the southern hemisphere doesn't fall precisely on the same date, it is considered to be the first day of summer. Normally falling near 21 December, in 2000 it occurs at 13:37 UTC (Greenwich).
Hanukkah, Commemorates the rededication of the Second Temple of Jerusalem in 164 BC after the victory over the Syrians. Another name for the holiday, the Feast of Lights, refers to the Talmud's account of the Temple's one-day supply of oil miraculously burning for eight days. The eight-day holiday begins at sundown on the 25th day of Kislev, which is 21 December 2000 by the Gregorian calendar.
1940 - Frank Vincent Zappa, US musician - Born to second-generation Sicilian Greeks at Baltimore, Maryland, his father was a singer and guitarist. Started playing orchestral percussion at Monterey at age 12, by 16 he was the drummer for a blues band. Was influenced by rhythmic experiments in 'Ionisation' by Edgar Varese, mother made him close the bedroom door. Composed classical music and movie soundtracks in high school. A member of the San Bernardino vice squad hired him to make an audio sex tape in his studio, Zappa and his girlfriend provided the tape as joke and were convicted of 'conspiracy to commit pornography' in 1962. Took up electric guitar with a focus on traditional bluesmen's guitar solos. Joined the Soul Giants in 1964, started writing songs for the band. Joined Captain Glasspack and His Magic Mufflers, the group changed their name to the Mothers on Mothers' Day 1964, nervous execs at MGM added 'of Invention.' Their first album was 'Freak Out' in 1966, Zappa married Gail Sloatman in 1967. Skewered every aspect of modern life, including hippiedom, while maintaining extremely high musical standards. Zappa formed his own record labels, including Bizarre, Straight, and Barking Pumpkin.
A fire destroyed the band's equipment at Montreaux, Switzerland on 4 December 1971, the subject of a Deep Purple hit, and shortly afterward Zappa was pushed off the stage at the Rainbow Theatre in London, which lowered his voice and confined him to a wheelchair through 1972. First hit single was the comic 'Don't Eat the Yellow Snow.' Continued to tour and produce albums, over 60 in his career, musical style constantly changing and including jazz and classical elements, asynchronous rhythms, and scandalous lyrics - possibly precluding commercial success by never having a consistent style. Broke with Warner Brothers in 1976, fought to get his copyrights back. Warner refused to release ' Läther' and blocked efforts to release it elsewhere, he played the entire four-record set on KROQ Pasadena and urged listeners to record it off the air. Had a 1982 hit with 'Valley Girl' parodying the young moneyed culture of California and featuring his daughter Moon Unit (his other children were Dweezil, Ahmet Rodan and Diva, Zappa was sure that his kids would have more trouble with their last name). Fought the Parents Music Resource Center attempts to require content rating on albums in 1985. Long a hero of the underground in Czechoslovakia, in 1991 he was appointed as Cultural Liaison Officer to represent the newly independent country in the west, but the US State Department blocked it. Announced he would run as an independent candidate for the US presidency and promptly received several death threats. He was diagnosed with prostate cancer in November of 1991, was severely weakened by chemotherapy and died at Los Angeles on 4 December 1993.
Art is making something out of nothing and selling it.
Most rock journalism is people who can't write interviewing people who can't talk for people who can't read.
Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.
You can't be a Real Country unless you have a beer and an airline. It helps if you have a football team or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least, you need a beer.
- All of today's quotes are from Frank Zappa
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