Zappa.com

I was wondering how some of you older fans felt when you first heard of his illness and passing? How did you find out? Did it hit you hard?
I was only 2 when he passed. I've been a fan for about 7 or so years now and a hard-core fan for about 4. I knew he was dead from the very beginning but it hit me like a ton of bricks how devastating it was after watching the famous Salad Party videos on YouTube a few years ago.

How do you feel after all this time?

I saw it on the main Brazilian TV evening news journal then. I was surprised, for I thought Frank Zappa was a fellow who used to play football matches in our neighbourhood. Besides we are friend with some genuine local Zappas. Only then I learned that FZ was a prolific musician and producer. I would have to wait one more full year and couple of months until I was exposed to a friend's mixed tape with Zappa, Hendrix and Ramones. Zappa (St-Alphonzo, (') title-track and Zomby-Woof) immediately blew me away, and I was obsessed with it since then... he never ceased to amaze me, to this day.

There are some ol' threads about this or related subjects around...

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I was shocked and devastated.

I didn't realize how sick he was. My father-in-law had been diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer in July, 1992, so I was preoccupied with that and how it was affecting my wife's family, and hence was out of the loop as to what was going on with Frank.

He died in the fall of '93, and then the estate had to be settled, etc. When I heard of Frank's death I was caught off guard. It hit me like a ton of bricks. I became depressed and grieved for a good 1-2 months.

Like many other forum members, I've never fully gotten over it and I still get upset thinking about it.

The only other ones I can mention in the same breath in terms of the effect it had on me when it happened is John Lennon (because of how it happened), Leonard Bernstein, and Stanley Kubrick.

But Frank's death was the absolute worst.

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I can't tell when you're telling the truth.
>I'm not.
How do I know anything you've said to me is...
>You don't.

If someone could dig up the old threads that would be great. I know I commented on them.

I was a hollow guy for many Months after learning of FZ's passing, it was as though I had lost a close friend.

The more I hear, see and read about FZ the more I miss him.....

Even after all these years there are some of his songs that can still make me tear up they are so beautiful.

When GZ passed away last October and zappa.com had her photo up with sofa playing I cried like a baby, sofa gets me every time




damn, here I go again!

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Hey Punk, where you goin' with that passport in your hand?

It was about three months after I emigrated to Australia - I was going through a major upheaval, and sad as it was, my own problems were foremost in my head.
TT

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and I know, I think

I remember that. It was hard.

When I hear the opening notes of the solo from WNIB? It really sends tingles up my spine. The song seems so alive yet nostalgic and it makes me feel as if I remember Frank's life.

We all knew it was coming. When YS came out, I remember looking at that sad cover and going oh shit. I didn't know how much time he had left, but that cover made me think it was sooner rather than later.

Looking back, I think I might have been in shock. I didn't go looking through obituaries or media articles about Frank. I sort of sat and let it seep in that a major part of my life was gone and that hole would of course never be filled. My wife, a Zappa hater, had kind words for me, to her credit. She had always called loving Frank's music my life's work, and perhaps she was right. There wasn't a forum then, and no place to really talk to anyone or listen to FZ's music with. I kept thinking there's not going to be any more new music. I'm a fan going back to 1967, and I'd never known what it would be like to not have this constant supply of incredible music year after year after year.....

I was also angry! What the fuck? No more Frank? I couldn't believe it. And then it came out that he was in a physician's care and they'd not given him the basic prostate test. Couldn't fucking believe it. Later, I think during an interview with CBS news, Frank dispelled that fact. But at the time, it pissed me off.

Damn. Sure do miss him.

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Everytime we picked a booger we'd flip it on this one winduh. Every night we'd contribute, 2, 3, 4 boogers. We had to use a putty knife, man, to get them damn things off the winduh. There was some goober ones that weren't even hard...

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may you have the bank account of a republican and the sex life of a democrat.

Thanks Pedro!

I was pretty blown away by it... I was just married that year, and I don't think I knew he was THAT sick. I think I knew he was having some medical issues, but figured that he was getting it sorted out since I don't recall too much publicity on it.

If I remember correctly.... I think I either heard it announced on something like the Today show (or my wife heard it and said "Frank Zappa passed away") and I seem to recall that I stood there with my mouth open...almost like when I heard Jeff Porcaro passed away a year earlier...and was just devastated by it, and sort of mad because I never got to see him live, having been a fan since about 1978-79-ish.

I listen to a few things (Joe's Garage, Sheik Yerbouti, and whatever the spirit moves me to listen to) yearly at that time of the season, just because I know what it is. Zappa's one of those artists that I get into different moods during the year, and can get about a good week's worth of stuff through my CD player..in fact. I just pulled a few things to toss up into my car when whatever is in is finished.

I felt great! I danced a jig and skipped and yelled "YES!!!"

I felt with my hands.

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You're probably wondering why I'm here
(not that it makes a heck of a lot of a difference to ya)

Creepy!

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I like skipping too! I'll PM you!

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I can't tell when you're telling the truth.
>I'm not.
How do I know anything you've said to me is...
>You don't.

I was driving to work Monday morning (6 December) and heard it on the radio. I felt resigned and a bit relieved.
I had known since the early 1991 (through Zappa fan grapevine) that he was fighting cancer. His then recent (1993) interviews in Playboy and Pulse magazines and on the NBC Today show informed me that he was dying soon, so his death wasn't a shock.

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Bill

Uh...I'm busy that day. Yes, any day.

I was taken by surprise as I didn't know he was ill, my life had got really busy at that time and music had taken a bit of a back seat.
The friend who introduced me to Zappa was the same one who informed me of his death, I remember feeling quite sad but then I had to carry on with my busy life!
My life is not so busy now and I have a lot more time for music and have been enjoying getting back into his music so much, his death seems more real to me now than it did when I first heard of it.

I knew that he was seriously ill, so it was no bigger surprise. I had bought tickets for the yellow shark and the most exciting question then was, would FZ still be alive when the concert would happen. I was shocked 1000 times more when i learned the 1st time about his disease a few month before. Someone, who obviously had no further interest in FZ, told it to me in a very offhandedly way: "He is very ill, aint he?" as if he had been speaking about a train having 15 minutes delay. I hated him immediately.

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I was fourteen at that time. I was a Zappa fan for around two years.
Some months before he died I read in a german magazine that he WAS fighting cancer and is better now and is touring the world again.
I was like: Yesssssss.

Than he was dead. A schoolmate called me and said that Zappa was on the news. I turned on the TV and ...
I was very sad. But I was young and went on listening to his music (there was still a lot to discover).

Now I am 38 and struggle sometimes. Lots of tears where shed while listening to some of the tracks (Blessed Relief, Amnerika, Filthy Habbits, the solo in Inca Roads (god, I become a baby listening to this…).
I had to get older to understand the emotional content of this music. It is now that I feel that his death is a really great loss.

We could use guys like him these days by the way.

Found out much later. I remember saying out loud 'SHIT... FUCK'

No chances to see him in concert, not even meeting him... Sucks, specially since the news came after I had just discovered him.