Frank Zappa & The Mothers of Invention - Absolutely Free (1967)
The early Frank Zappa albums are a fairly maniacal and bizarre experience - complex song structures, political ranting / social critique, avant garde editing techniques, genre-hopping, and an insane sense of humor that make for a disjointed experience. The albums often get called "schizophrenic," and there's no doubt that the style is an acquired taste. I would look at more straight-forward, melody-oriented pieces from some of Zappa's '70s albums to make an initial foray in Zappa-land, fwiw.
Absolutely Free is a set of musical suites on subjects bizarre interspersed with straight forward rock numbers and oddity pieces. The song topics are varied and bizarre, ranging from an excessive ditty on the Duke of Prunes to talking to vegetables to high school popularity to hypocrisy in straight-laced culture. Things jump around so much that it's hard to settle into a particular melody or movement before things take a left turn. I'm aware this is a stylistic choice, but I think that the effect on this album - besides just being disorienting - is the aural equivalent of heart palpitations, and it just makes things more uncomfortable to listen to than anything else. It's very interesting, granted, just a fairly harsh experience. You can simultaneously recognize something intellectually engaging and musically interesting while finding it uncomfortable/annoying - it falls short of some of my favorite avant-jazz in that respect. I mean, to be frank, I can only take crooning about prunes so seriously (even though, yeah, I get it, it's not really about "prunes" and "cream cheese" or whatever - very clever), and I can only take stop on a dime non sequitur genre changes so many times before I feel like I've just got my FM radio in scan moide across some bizarre stations.
One of the highlights on the album is one of my favorite things about Zappa in general: "Invocation and Ritual Dance of the Young Pumpkin" is an extended instrumental jam-fest with an overlaid fiery guitar solo that jumps all over the place in fantastic ways. It pulses along for 7 minutes but never loses steam, and even though it's something of an interlude on the album, it foretells of some of the things that would show up on later Zappa albums that I appreciate more than the bizarre music for bizarre music's sake. The other highlight is "Brown Shoes Don't Make It;" it's more of a highlight in the sense that it embodies the vibe of Zappa in this period more than that it is a fantastic and pleasant listening experience. It's a seven minute mini-opera kind of thing that jumps abruptly from style to style and worms all over the place with riffs and weird character voices - spoken word jazz, classical arrangements, psychedelic guitar freakouts, blues numbers, free jazz, you name it, all rear their heads. The general sentiment is a knock on conventional lifestyles and a big narrative about illicit desires that are covered by such lifestyles; both the music and the subject matter are effectively cringe-inducing (just trust that "smother that girl in chocolate syrup" sung in some kind of bizarre "hello my baby" cadence will stick with you for a while). The whole thing is very cool in terms of artistic composition, but very frustrating as a standard musical experience.
I should mention that the opener and closer of the album - a "Louie, Louie" take and a pseudo-live bar lounge act, respectively - make great bookends to the album. The closer in particular instantly brings to mind (and substantially predates) the Beatles' "You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)," and that in an of itself gives you an idea of how I take this album. As an art piece, it's thoroughly interesting, and if you're in that frame of mind, then it's definitely worth giving it a spin - you can appreciate all the musical nods and wacky humor infused throughout. I definitely enjoy this one more than some of the other lo-fi Zappa efforts from this era I've heard. On the other hand, "You Know My Name" is pretty annoying - if you're looking just to throw on some tunes and not be annoyed, Absolutely Free throughly disappoints. It's an acquired taste, and I suppose I'm not quite there yet, though I can appreciate that I should keep trying. Make sense?
Status: Recommended (solid) as an *art* experience, Not Recommended for casual listening
Nyet's Fave: "Invocation and Ritual Dance of the Young Pumpkin"
No comments:
Post a Comment