Frank Zappa - Wazoo
I found out about the existence of this album from a post by Satchmo, who appears to have got hold of it before it was even released. Insane jealousy, etc. etc. It arrived in my mailbox yesterday. In a tiny concession to the obsession I have for FZ's music, I want to go into some details here. There'll be questions at the end, so straighten up and pay attention... or go read something else, as you may not be at all interested.
It's a complete live show from Boston in September 1972 with FZ being backed by the Grand Wazoo, a big-band ensemble of 20 players. It's connected with a few other albums that cover material from this period in Zappa's career:
'Waka / Jawaka' and
'The Grand Wazoo' are the two albums covering this material that were released in Zappa's lifetime. They are both brilliant for fans of jazz-rock instrumentals, especially the second. Posthumous releases from the same period are
'Joe's Domage', which is a hissy tape recording of the Grand Wazoo band being rehearsed, and is really for completists only, and
'Imaginary Diseases', which is a superb compilation of tracks from the Petit Wazoo tour, which featured a stripped-down version of the Grand Wazoo band.
One of the first things to say about this new release is that it's a clear sign that the Zappa Family Trust are really starting to listen to what FZ fans want. It's a complete show from a period that is not that well-presented in tapes currently circulating. Does this mean that the long-awaited Roxy DVD is any closer? Who can say. In the meantime, the ZFT should be congratulated on a great release.
So what's it like?
There are moments that recall 'The Grand Wazoo' album, but the music does move in other directions as well, some of it sounding oddly like the large-scale orchestral works Zappa recorded later in his career, particularly the London Symphony Orchestra albums. It's all instrumental, though there are tunes here that had been previously performed with lyrics ('Penis Dimension') and which would acquire lyrics later on ('The Adventures of Greggery Peccary'). There are tightly written tutti sections (the heads of each tune), solos from everybody and FZ's conducted improvisations. The music has lots of jazz improvisation and rock rhythm, but it's different from either. For the most part the harmonic sophistication of jazz comping isn't quite there, despite some glowing efforts from Ian Underwood. Tonally the music is far more diverse than most rock music, and the contrast between the written sections and the free sections is played on with Zappa's usual flair.
Things start off with a long introduction to all of the players, who are essentially lots of the people who appear on 'The Grand Wazoo' album, plus Jim Gordon on drums (he of the Derek & the Dominos' 'Layla' album and later matricide and asylum incarceration), and, wonderfully, Ruth and Ian Underwood. Ruth is one of Zappa's great collaborators, and just about any of his recordings that feature her on marimba are pure gold. Her husband, Ian Underwood is on keyboards, and does a convincing impersonation of ex-Mother Don Preston, who played on 'The Grand Wazoo' and 'Waka / Jawaka'.
Things get underway with the title track from 'The Grand Wazoo', which trundles along very nicely with solos from Tony Duran on slide, several unidentified horn players (there are 12 of them), FZ and Ian Underwood. The trombonist (probably Bruce Fowler) who takes the second solo sounds very shaky for a minute or so, then picks things up. FZ's solo is the kind of straight-ahead boogie that he was fond of during this period. He's the best soloist in the band as always.
After this, Zappa tells the audience that most of the stuff they play is different from that first tune, and that from then on the music is going to get a little more 'abstruse'. It's straight into 'Approximate', which is one of FZ's best set-pieces. It's a pieces with lots of specified rhythms, but few specified pitches, so it's a real 'ooh, they're so avant-garde' aleatoric "event" each time it's played.
Here's a great clip of the Roxy band doing it, with FZ's explanation. On 'Wazoo' it's fleshed out with solos from Ruth, Ian and Jim, who does a great job on the drums throughout. You'd not realise he could play twisted rhythms like this just from listening to 'Layla'. FZ conducts the band to a close, and next on the disc (although not next on the night) is 'Big Swifty', the tune that covers side one of 'Waka / Jawaka'. Lots of horn solos on this one, plus another from FZ. Things are back to the 'boogie' stylings of the first number; this tune was actually placed nearer the end of the show, but space considerations have led the ZFT to shuffle it around on the disc so it's before rather than after the centrepiece of the show, which is the 32 minute 'Adventures of Greggery Peccary'.
This piece later became an incredibly detailed cartoon epic tale about 'Greggery Peccary, the nocturnal gregarious wild swine', packed with sound effects, tape manipulations and tight playing. Here, it's still a collection of themes which are stuffed with solos from just about everybody in the band. Zappa just counts in each of the sections in between all the improv. At one point the band back a trumpet solo with a Phrygian I-bII vamp and it really reminds me of 'Sketches of Spain'; elsewhere there's chaotic jazz falling over itself, ambient improvised soundscapes, FZ's conducted improvisations, where he uses the whole band like one big instrument, an exploratory FZ solo in Movement III, where he gets into altered territory and hints at the closing 'New Brown Clouds' theme. I haven't found the 'Steno Pool' theme that pops up in the later version of this piece on the
'Lather' or
'Studio Tan' albums anywhere; it was still being used in 'Farther Oblivion' around this time. It's at times during 'Greggery Peccary' that the music starts to sound similar to his later orchestral work; here, as there, for a lot of the time there are fewer instruments playing at any one time than would be common in, say, the average symphony. On 'Wazoo', the balance between the heads and solos is played off effectively; on the
'L.S.O.' albums, it could get a bit too abstract for my taste. Here, there's some stonking playing from all concerned, and the audience love it.
The encore consists of 'Penis Dimension' and 'Variant I Processional March', the latter of which will be known to FZ fans as 'Re-gyptian Strut' from
'Sleep Dirt' and 'Lather'. 'Penis Dimension' is given a truncated (circumcised?) treatment with some horny interplay after the head [Music terminology is filthy, I know]. 'Re-gyptian Strut' sounds pretty well-developed even at this early stage, and it's a fittingly imperious way to end the show.
All in all, it's a hugely valuable recording for Zappa fans, although 'Imaginary Diseases' is probably a better place for instrumentally-minded neophytes to start getting into this man's 'jazz' music. There's more straight-ahead rhythm there, and some outstanding blues playing from Zappa. 'Wazoo' is built around 'Greggery Peccary', which it helps to know in its more developed form. Zappa was still developing his abilities as a composer for larger ensembles, and as a first stab at this, his work here is fantastic, but there are still some longeurs during the more abstract sections. I think he perfected this approach with his 1988 touring band, which could basically play anything that was thrown at them. Even on 'The Yellow Shark', the best of his orchestral albums, the best arrangements were done by Ali N. Askin.
Needless to say, 'Wazoo' has been on my stereo without interruption for a good few hours now. It's so good to have more decent material from this period that doesn't only exist in B sound quality, as on the great majority of circulating tapes.
Well done ZFT - keep 'em coming, and we'll keep buying 'em.
