WORLD PAINTED MAC

Sorry but I couldn't resist.

Listen with me to Slayer's world painted blood and sing along at 2:20

Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun

repeat

FRANK ZAPPA

if you are a hard core zappa phanatic I apologize in advance... my humble opinions are my own

Dweezil Zappa, son of the late Frank Zappa, comes to town on July 14th to play a show featuring Frank Zappa material. I'm a huge zappa fan (own more than half of his something like 100 cd releases - and heard most of the rest more than a few times...). At the prodding of my good friend Shai Yallin of Solstice Coil (or as he would say, of the Ambrosiac blog, we got tickets to go see the Dweeze. Back in 2002 I saw Project/Object which also does Zappa material and featured at the time Napoleon Murphy Brock, Don Preston and Bunk Gartner (and maybe Ike Willis???) and I that was one of the greatest shows I've EVER seen by any band EVER. But I digress...

I've been listening to Zappa since '95 when I saw a huge massive Rykodisc display in Tower Records Rockville and thought to myself "who the f*** is this???". After listening to Hot Rats in the store that was my first donation to the zappa family trust. Then I bought Fillmore East June '71 and again I thought to myself "what the f*** is this? this is the same guy who did Hot Rats???"

Zappa is a great musician but Zappa is also "a way of life" as they say in Joe's Garage. Its comic relief and the ability to take the piss out of anything - sex, politics, racism, consumerism, religion, and of course music and other musicians and musicianly things (lead guitar face, drum solos, etc)

In order to mentally prepare myself for the Dweeze show I'm revisiting all of Zappa's official albums and I thought I make an easy to digest mini list of some great ones which any fan of music should check out - even if he is only dimly aware of the great Zappa's genius.

So here goes. Go listen to these right now:

One Size fits All

Hot Rats

Joe's Garage

Apostrophe'

The best band you never heard in your life

Lather (a posthumous reconfiguration of material found on Studio Tan, Sleep Dirt and Live in New York but actually according to how FZ originally envisioned it - as a megalomaniac quadruple album experience)

Overnite Sensation

Live Roxy and Elsewhere '74

Waka/Jawaka

Chunga's Revenge

Yes I am partial to the 70s output (as I am for almost any band - including the Dead, Genesis, Neil Young, Yes...) and I am a big fan of Frank Zappa on a Gibson SG. Seeing a few DVDs (Does humor belong in music?) of him playing a Fender is something I still haven't come to grips with...

Happy Listening!

Writing sessions for the 2nd album

Behind the Sun are writing and arranging material in rehearsals for our second album, which hopefully will come out sometime early next year.

I can tell you we are using a methodology Dan came up with called "Dylanology" where we barnstorm through early arrangements of the songs without getting stuck on the tiny little details and then move to the next song. In theory, when we make the final arrangements for the songs on the album, the songs will sound more unified because we "closed the books" on them all at the same time.

We've got 6 songs Dylanized so far, I can probably get away with giving away the titles:

Art of Words, Silhouettes, City in the Dusk, Things Fall Apart, Lies Not Worth Repeating, The Burning

A bunch more in various stages of deconstruction - hopefully the final final arrangements will start this summer.

What can I tell you about the direction? Heavier, darker, bigger sounding if that makes any sense. A massive rock slide burying you in Earth. That's my impression from the inside...