Zappa.com

Läther, an Adelaide band that plays Zappa covers, appeared in the Queen's Arms hotel last night. These guys are bloody good at what they do and they play some of the more difficult numbers as well. It was great now that I'm back in out of the way Adelaide to be able to see a band of this calibre playing FZ's music.They have a line up of eight musicians, Drums, Percussion, Lead Guitar, Bass Guitar, Keyboards, Alto Sax, Tenor Sax/Clarinet, Vocals.

I'm hopeless at remembering set lists but I'll give it a go. In no particular order, Imaginary Diseases, My Guitar Wants To Kill Your Mama (complete Weasel's version), Let's Move To Cleveland, Läther, Tell Me You Love Me, Dirty Love, Big Swifty, Echidna's Arf, I'm The Slime, Andy, Blessed Relief, Cosmik Debris, RDNZL, Son Of Orange County, Peaches En Regalia. I'm sure I'm missing a few there, they played for over an hour and a half.

I even liked the vocalist - I've heard other FZ cover bands where the vocals were the part that spoiled it for me, but this guy did a great job. I don't know if these guys would meet ZFT standards, but I was in a live venue last night listening to Zappa's music and having a great time, which seems to be the important thing to me.

Edit 1: How did I forget Blessed Relief? There were two solos here, the keyboard player was excellent and the Tenor Sax player whipped it out on clarinet, very nice.

Edit 2: Ah, now I remember Big Swifty. A very credible version.

Edit 3: Andy was in there too.

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The way I see it Barry, this should be a very dynamite show.

Adelaide, isn't/wasn't it Gail Zappa's name?

This story reminded me of something grotesque from the good ol' 80s:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgttrS_DFTE

On topic: did they nail RDNZL? I'd love to see that performed live and properly... One of my Zappa favourites...

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Yes, but in this case, Adelaide is the capital of South Australia. Named after Queen Adelaide, the consort of William IV, who was the king of the UK at the time Adelaide was founded in 1836.

What the fuck is that? I assume it has nothing to do with my home town.

These guys are very competent and I would give their RDNZL at least a 9 (out of 10).

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The way I see it Barry, this should be a very dynamite show.

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A case in point is the version of Imaginary Diseases that was played last night. On the album, the recording and the mix is not the best, whereas last night it was as clear as a bell, totally enjoyable. And something else I should mention, the volume was perfect, no need to set my ears bleeding the way ZPZ was doing both times they came to Adelaide.

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The way I see it Barry, this should be a very dynamite show.

thats the kind of setlist i'd like! way better than ZPZ

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Who's this dude with his hair straight back?
His new white socks, 'n his pants all black
His T-shirts rolled His watch is gold
A '55 Chevy that his brother just stoled

Be careful...Trendmonger might hear you

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BANNED and FAT

Hah, wtf indeed. As I said, some grotesque 80s by-product. A commercial one-hit Tinseltown-like band. No, nothing to do with OZ...

In this case they are singing about a Paraguayan dwarf woman called Adelaide...

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and put me on his Foe list?

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Who's this dude with his hair straight back?
His new white socks, 'n his pants all black
His T-shirts rolled His watch is gold
A '55 Chevy that his brother just stoled

I saw these guys at The Governor Hindmarsh in January and they were pretty good! Some footage from that gig (with reasonable sound quality too!) has popped up on youtube if anyone wants to see for themselves...

They sound awesome, I would love to see Andy live.

p.s. I totally got named Adelaide after Frank's wife.

Hi,

Bootlegs were a lot more important in those days ... because the radio waves did not play Frank's music, and it wasn't until "Overnight Sensation" that it started getting played a bit more.

In Santa Barbara, just to give you an idea, the FCC had old ladies planted to count how many bad words and bad music was played, so they could turn it in and hurt the rock station KTYD. In Los angeles, I seriously doubted that KMET and/or KLOS violated the standards at all ... but I hear that Jim Ladd got in trouble for playing the "Money" that was not censored (missing the word on the radio version albums!), even though KLOS was, apparently, not fined for it, more than once!

All in all, too much of the earlier stuff is really not quite playable on radio, and it is much better suited for today's wide open Internet streaming, where you can hear these things that people are talking about ... In 1975 you COULDN'T. It's important to remember that.

I would like to hear that band ... someday ... I specially was extremelly disappointed that on a night that they are sharing the stage with Chick Corea, Stanley Clarke, Jean Luc Ponty and Lenny White, that ZPZ was not very good and they sound poor and not with it, as if DZ was trying to do things on his own and the band was not with it. A Band like the one that you are talking about, has a lot more to fight for, from musicianship, to a very caring appreciation for the artist ... to many other things, because any other comparison, would mean they are shit! ZPZ ... doesn't compare very well, and I find that the direction is way too focused on Dweezil, who is not as open and talented as his father was ... and we can not compare him to Frank! And shouldn't!

Moshkito, are you sure you're in the right thread?

I saw Lather in Adelaide at the Guv this year. They were really good. The only problem with that place is the acoustics. A lot of the mix was buried in the bass.

These guys are conservatory standard musicians that have also had a lot of experience playing live. Very creditable performances of FZ material, just as good as ZPZ. It's kind of funny that the band leader is very serious like Dweezil. The singer injects a lot of humour into the show.

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The way I see it Barry, this should be a very dynamite show.

Ha ha!! Irony!! They didn't even come to Adelaide this time, so from too loud to non existent.

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The way I see it Barry, this should be a very dynamite show.

Oh gosh yes, Cadillacs were quite the thing. But of course Sammy Kaye was popular in the swing community.