Trendmonger wrote:
No musicians that ever performed in any of Frank Zappa's bands have or ever will be the musician or composer Frank Zappa was. Some make very good music of their own but FZ was a composer of his work not Steve Vai or anyone else. Pierre Boulez is not the composer that Igor Stravinsky or Edgar Varese was but Pierre Boulez surely can get an ensemble of musicians to perform those composers works better then at any time those composers lived or conducted their own music. When someone studies at Julliard tons of dead composer music is part of the curriculum. Many musicians achieve superior performances than any given composer left us. What the composer did over his canon and recorded works is the standard of what the performance should minimally achieve.
The real issue is that most of them were just "players", and not composers per se ... the rock music crowd is not known for "composers" ... it's just known for who plays the scales better, or faster and can slide the neck faster, or use the most effects ...
Of course, that one of these "kids" can become a composer in their own right, but I doubt that many of them are even trying to do so ... I simply do not think that most of the folks have the internal constitution for "music" that Frank did ... or some of these musicians would have continued doing more and more ... instead of trying to cash in on some fleeting fame.
And while I can appreciate ZPZ, in the end, Dweezil is going to have the same problem ... and he needs to get started with his own material, not just dad's ... or the whole thing will die away.
I am not sure that ZPZ, or Frank's work, can improve in America until there is a sort of anti-commercial backlash ... that is going to get bad press but the more bad press it gets, the more attention (and eventually), and appreciation that it deserves. America, along the way in its hardcore media culture (Citizen Kane anyone ... kiss my rosebud!), needs to get some alternative media going big time, that will not get corrupted by the bigger name, or bought out by the bigger company so it can eventually be shut down, or shut up!
On that magical day, America will finaly develop music history, and art history, other than some Hollywood, or Broadway fucking musicals that you and I are sick of that everyone thinks is the only culture that America has!
With all due respect to anyone ... lilst me the ones that wrote a concerto ... or a symphony ... or something that was not a bunch of radio format'd like songs ... the amount of work out there by many of these folks is so small that it is pathetic ... and it tells you one thing ... that it takes a fucking lunatic that has visions up his head and down his butt, to create something new ... and then have the balls to see it through ... and many of those folks don't even understand it, or have any idea what they did either ... which is another story altogether!
Quote:
It's a matter of not only giving due diligence and but also professional live performance standards, audio systems, recording and playback technologies that are far superior to what was around then....
We probably should re-word that ... to "live performance standards that helped interpret the music better, and closer to our vision" ... instead of it just sounding like another stupid garage rock and roll band that someone is going to call "prog". And this is the worst part of it ... how many clubs here in Portland (for example) which are a fucking dime a dozen, only have a sound system that is better fit for your kids garage band? ... and that is not enough for what you want to do and show with your music ... you have to have guts, balls, and then say ... sorry ... not interested in playing in that place.
You have to have a standard of some sort ... and that standard has to be stood up for ... in one way or another ...
It's not always going to work, but the good musician and artist, will find a way to make it work, and Frank did! And this is not what most of the folks in those bands ever knew or understood ... I think they were way over their heads just trying to keep up as it is ...