Overview:
According to Frank, “In 1966 and ’67, the L.A.P.D. and the Sheriffs Department went to war with the freaks in Hollywood.” People with “long hair” were regularly wrongfully detained, their hang-outs were under constant surveillance, and it was getting harder and harder to play their music on stage. “There was no place left to work in Hollywood.” So The Mothers picked up their things and moved to New York. For 18 months (roughly December ‘66 to May ‘68) they were based on the east coast, and in March of ‘67 they secured a residency at the Garrick Theater in Greenwich Village. It’s here where the original Mothers honed their craft and developed their special blend of excellent music, performance art, parody, theatrics and insanity. Unfortunately though, there are no known audio recordings from this residency, official or otherwise. Unless there’s a surprise discovery, all we have are written accounts of what happened. What we do have though, are a handful of recordings from The Mothers first ever European tour, right in the middle of their time in New York.
Throughout the first few years of existence, the band constantly gained and lost new members, but the line-up began to sorta solidify by the end of 1967. Billy Mundi, Don Preston and Bunk Gardner all joined the group shortly before their move to New York in late ‘66 and Ian Underwood became a Mother after seeing them play at the Garrick in the summer of ‘67. Finally, right before they left for Europe, Frank’s longtime friend Jim “Motorhead” Sherwood is promoted from roadie, to full band member (and roadie). There were also a number of other, short-term Mothers in ‘67. Guitarist Jim Fielder joined the band in late ‘66 (and can be heard on Absolutely Free), but he only lasted till February of the following year. Sandy Hurvitz (AKA Essra Mohawk AKA Uncle Meat) was a Mother for some amount of time in the middle of ‘67, but had left the group by the European tour (though she is present in photos of the band in London). Audience’s wanted Suzy Creeamchese, and because the original apparently went off the grid (FZ in ‘71: “Her name was Jeannie Vassar… we can’t find her anymore, she disappeared, she went to Mexico or someplace.”), Frank brought his friend Pamela Zarubica along for the European tour to just sit on stage and be Suzy (Pamela would go on to voice Suzy on We’re Only In It For The Money and Uncle Meat). Jim Fielder, Sandy Hurvitz and Pamela Zarubica are not present (or at the very least not audible) on any available live recording, and these 1967 tapes are the only known documents that feature Billy Mundi on drums, because he leaves in early ‘68 to join Rhinoceros. When Billy joined the group , Frank quickly made him the primary drummer. This means that on these tapes Jimmy Carl Back is primarily singing and playing bass trumpet (with occasional percussion duties), giving this era of the Mothers a somewhat looser flavor (compared to Jimmy’s steady rhythms in ‘68 and ‘69).
The Mother’s first European tour is surprisingly well documented (for the era). They played nine concerts in Europe, and we have three unofficially available shows (two audience recordings and one FM broadcast), along with two live clips on Uncle Meat and one on YCDTOSA5. We also have a short improvised piece recorded for a TV show in New York immediately following the tour. The shows in Europe were all between 25-40 minutes, and they consisted of a number of shorter tunes before ending with a long jamming instrumental (King Kong or The Orange County Lumber Truck Medley). The Stockholm and Lund shows demonstrate two deranged medleys that were likely a staple of this band’s repertoire, and the Copenhagen tape consists of a number of rare tunes and melodies pieced together with free and conducted improv. Each show is delightful, and each one demonstrates the wild things The Mothers would break out on stage on a regular basis. I’d love to see an official release of this tour, but I know there is very little available in the vault (but I’d take whatever I can get!).
I’ll end with this quote from Ian, which describes this transitional stage of the original Mothers very well: “[At The Garrick] We never did shows that duplicated records or other gigs. Originally it was almost free-form; you never knew what was going to come up. Then, just after I joined and we started touring Europe, we began getting larger audiences. This meant that they couldn’t be as close to us, so the kinds of off-the-wall things that would be easy to get into at the Garrick Theater really wouldn’t work anymore. You couldn’t do something free-form that might not work when you’ve got a lot of people who have paid money to listen to you. So, more and more, a balance was struck in favor of being more organized, based on doing things that were more likely to work consistently well. Then, if other free things came along in the middle of those pieces, that would be okay too.”
The Band:
Frank Zappa – Composer, Arranger, Conductor, Guitar, Vocals
Ray Collins – Lungs, Ingenuity
Jimmy Carl Black – Drums, Bass Trumpet, Vocals & Rain Dance
Roy Estrada – Bass, Arcane Gestures
Don Preston – Keyboards, Auxiliary Percussion, Nuclear Effects
Billy Mundi – Percussion, High-Pitched Noises
Bunk Gardner – Woodwinds, Mumbled Weirdness
Ian Underwood – Keyboards, Woodwinds, Teen Appeal
Motorhead Sherwood – Baritone Sax, Tambourine, Roadie
Recordings Available:
1967 09 23 – Royal Albert Hall, London, UK (Partial Official Release)
click here to listen to the one available track (from Uncle Meat)
This historically important show was the first time the Mothers performed overseas, and Pamela Zarubica used Frank’s tape recorder to capture the whole show, but in comically bad quality. Frank released one small edited snippet of the performance on Uncle Meat as Louie Louie (At The Royal Albert Hall In London). An audience member climbed on stage with a trumpet (or possibly asked for one, accounts differ), and Frank declares that he knows “the perfect thing to accompany this man’s trumpet. None other than… The Mighty & Majestic Albert Hall Pipe Organ!” Don Preston then scales the barrier covering the famed organ, and proceeds to crank out an insanely loud and distorted version of Richard Berry’s iconic tune. This is the only audio document from the show, and Frank basically used the rancid audio quality as an audial gag on the album, but this was a very interesting show musically and historically. Ten players from the London Philharmonic Orchestra took the stage for at least part of the show (reportedly consisting of five violinists, two violists and three cellists), and played two unknown compositions (Joe Travers has confirmed they were proto-Lumpy Gravy pieces). There were also a number of famous brits in the audience, including Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, Graham Nash, Brian Jones, Terry Gilliam, and Salmon Rushdie. Additionally, a first hard report from ‘ 67 states that FZ said “NOW we’re gonna play, and you’re gonna clap and then I say ‘now let’s roll along a little’ and we’ll play some more and then you’ll clap and we’ll play some more and then we’ll go home and the war will go on and stuff.”, which suggests to me that they probably played Medley #1 (the one starting with You Didn’t Try To Call Me). Overall this seems to be a musically interesting and historically important show, but because of the awful quality of the recording, we probably won’t ever hear much more from it (but I know us super-freaks would still love to hear it someday). Check out these links here and/or here for more excellent accounts from Information Is Not Knowledge. After this show, The Mother’s played at least four concerts (In Amsterdam, Hamburg, Copenhagen and Gothenburg) that we have no known recording of, so our next document of the tour comes from a week later in Sweden
1967 09 30 – Konserthuset, Stockholm, Sweden (FM A-)
This is an excellent recording (captured for broadcast on Swedish radio) of a solid, though mildly disappointing performance. This concert was a very popular bootleg (with the title ‘Tis The Season To Be Jelly), and was re-released by Frank’s publishing company in the early 90s under the Beat The Boots label. Joe Travers has said on a few occasions that it’s the best sounding document of this tour that exists, but Frank was unfortunately very sick for this show. He visited Rome on a day off from performing, and “made the error of drinking a minute amount of Italian tap water”, which gave him a “severe case of gastroenteritis”. He seems to be present for the entire recording (his voice and rhythm guitar are audible throughout), but there are numerous claims that FZ left the stage for the second half of the show, which leads me to believe that this may have been set one of two (but this is really just an educated guess). His sickness is apparent throughout; he sounds terrible during the introduction and only plays scant rhythm guitar through. But despite this, the band is firing on all cylinders, and totally saves the performance from mediocrity. Frank begins the show by talking to the audience, accepting a gift (“We have here a piece of chocolate, it looks like it might be very tasty. I’d like to have someone come up here and eat it, in a manner of speaking“), and then introducing the first chunk of the show (AKA Medley #1, consisting of You Didn’t Try to Call Me, Petrushka, The Bristol Stomp, Baby Love and Big Leg Emma). Frank is audible but clearly not in peak condition, and after Big Leg Emma they quickly head into Medley #2, which begins with No Matter What You Do. In this specific take of this tune, Ray talks about “Licking our coupons together, saving stamps, buying fruit together, [and] smoking some fruit.”, while a little later on Frank sings a line from the theme to the 50’s NBC sitcom I Married Joan. They finish up the medley with three silly but joyous covers (Blue Suede Shoes, Hound Dog and Gee), and take another quick break to tune up. After this Frank croaks out an introduction to King Kong: “It’s a story of a very large gorilla, who lived in the jungle. And he was doing okay until some Americans came by … They took him to the United States, and they made some money by using the gorilla. Then they killed him”. Frank was too ill to solo tonight, but we still got an excellent performance, with solos from Bunk (on a clarinet played through his Maestro Woodwind System), Ian (on alto sax), and Don (on keys). Frank conducts some improvised madness between the solos, and the tune totally devolves after Don’s jam. We get crashes, shrieks, screams, and moans. Eventually Ray comes in speaking in tongues (I believe it’s supposed to be fake Swedish), and a little later sings a couple seconds of Louie Louie. Right after this Frank starts to recite It Can’t Happen Here (a perfect fit). He makes it up to the Minnesota line, before leading the band into more tweaky weirdness. This heads into some great experimental, electronic improvisation featuring one or more radios playing random Swedish stations (a la John Cage). After a few minutes they wind down, and the show (or possibly the set), comes to an end. Despite Frank ailments, this recording is still well worth listening to for the top-notch performances from the rest of The Mothers and the fantastic sound quality.
1967 10 01 – Falkoner Theater, Copenhagen, Denmark (Audience B/B-)
“Well boys and girls we’ve got some trouble tonight, and if I were to say to you that there is a good chance that we were gonna sound shitty, would you believe it?” Don’t be scared by the low sound quality, this recording is quiet and a little hissy but very listenable, and the show is fantastic. Frank still sounds ill, but he’s clearly doing much better than the night before and is able to fully perform on stage. FZ warns the audience that they might sound shitty because they don’t have any of their own equipment. Their van drove “north from Stockholm” for some reason, so they played tonight’s two shows (of which we have one) on borrowed equipment. He talks about the other “problems that have happened since we first came to Scandinavia” (audiences have been great, but they’re all sick and horny) and informs us that their first song is about how Americans “drink until they go blind and then they beat each other up” (“They take the beer bottles and they hit each other in the face, in front of the bowling alleys and cocktail lounges of the United States, where they go to have a good time after their day at the office”). Frank asks the crowd to talk as loud as they can over the music (just like Americans do), but luckily they’re respectful Europeans and we can make out Ray’s “last call for alcohol” end of speech ramblings (““Monday’s a twist contest, Tuesday we’re going topless, Wednesday we’re going naked, Thursday we’re going to jail… should be a lot of fun.”). Frank abruptly declares “This is a song about tits!”, and we get the only known live take of Jelly Roll Gumdrop! It’s a lovely performance (it features a great sax solo from Ian!), and goes right into some terrifying keyboard and sax improv. In the middle of this improv, Don starts to play Octandre by Edgard Varese, and Frank and the other Mothers quickly join in too. It’s a really sloppy, out of sync take, but it seems to be on purpose (the crowd is laughing with them). After a bit the band devolves back into some more upbeat, but still scary improv. Then, suddenly, they morph into a beautiful, rare, instrumental performance of Absolutely Free (the song not the album), before quickly returning to tweaky improv (lead by Bunk this time). After a minute or so of this, we’re then thrust into a standalone performance of the second theme of King Kong! (apparently before it was even included with the actual piece). After this we are led directly into a delightful version of Toads Of The Short Forest! It goes into a short but sick guitar jam that’s quickly followed by a slow, quiet repeat of the main theme, and the tune ends after about two minutes. Almost predictably now, we’re launched into a minute of absolute, everyone-improvising-at-once chaos, before the peaceful relief of an immediate segue into an lively, up-tempo How Could I Be Such A Fool? Ray is fantastic, Bunk plays lovely flute throughout the tune, and there’s a hot guitar solo near the end! The music stops after this (the only break in the entire show), and Frank tells the story of King Kong (“He lives in the jungle, eating bananas, until the Americans come along and find him…”). Tonight’s King Kong is excellent; It starts with a lovely flute solo from Bunk, followed by another fiery solo from Frank. FZ switches to the backing to his ⅝ riff, and Don solos over it. After this Ian steps up, and we get the fantastic, timeless jam, later released on Uncle Meat as Ian Underwood Whips It Out. This brings the show to a close. This is an excellent, absolutely whacked, insane concert. The Mother’s put on a hell of a show for this Danish crowd, and it won’t be the last time they do so. Check this one out! [Additionally, Frank released a two and a half minute fragment of some tweaky horn improvisations from the second show as “Where’s Our Equipment?” on You Can’t Do That On Stage Anymore Vol. 5. Maybe we’ll get a vault release someday?, even if it doesn’t sound too much better, it would still be an upgrade!]
1967 10 02 – Akademiska Föreningen, Lund, Sweden (Audience B+)
“We may play some things that will sound strange, we may play some things that will sound pleasant. We may play some things you won’t understand at all, but I doubt it. Because so far audiences in Scandinavia have been very far and advanced of any other audiences we have played for… Music for Americans begins somewhere between Herman and The Hermits and The Monkees. Progressing forward to the Procol Harum. And then on to bigger and better things: Bill Haley…Do you know Laurence Welk? We will tune up. Get ready to work out for ya.” This is a solid, fun show captured on an above average audience recording. Frank starts us off by complementing the Swedish crowd, insulting his homeland, and beginning Medley #2 (consisting of No Matter What You Do, Blue Suede Shoes/Hound Dog, and Gee). This take of the medley is a little lively and more inspired than the Stockholm performance. Ray rants about more teenage dreams in the first tune (“Licking our coupons and our stamps and saving them and pasting them in a book… and then taking them down to the redemption center… and licking the people at the redemption center and pasting them in a book.”), and The Mother’s take on Blue Suede Shoes and Hound Dog will never fail to make me smile. Gee is surprisingly different tonight, with an additional bass and doo-wop vocal intro, and a longer outro with an amusing quotation of Duke Of Earl thrown in by Ray before the final crash. The Mothers stop after this and Frank gives a long, odd introduction to the first known performance of The Orange County Lumber Truck! FZ says that “California was probably a very nice place before the real estate agents moved in.” He goes on to say that they bought the land up, built “cheep, ugly houses” for “cheep, ugly people” and eventually “built the headquarters for a thing they call the John Birch Society” which “is a Nazi front organization in the United States that burns books with a smile” (“that’s the story of the song, and now you go to sleep”). Not exactly sure how that relates to the musical content of the tune, but it doesn’t matter to me because we get an excellent performance of the medley. Frank had yet to introduce the post-Oh No solo, so they play through all the composed material straight, and Frank rips into his guitar after the Lumber Truck proper. He plays an excellent solo, and afterward Ray performs a delightful (though hard to hear) vocal solo. The tune ends a little abruptly, Frank says “see ya later!” and that brings this concert (and the Mother’s first European tour) to a close. This isn’t the most exciting show from the tour, but it’s still a whole lot of fun. We get the only other known performance of Medley #2, and the only known OCLT medley from this incarnation of the Mothers, and that’s more than enough for me to be interested (but I’d still check out the other two complete shows first).
Bonus: 1967 10 10 – The Bitter End, New York, NY (TV B+)
click here to listen to the improvisations, and click here, here and here for video of the whole event
Shortly after Frank and The Mothers return from Europe, they were filmed at the Bitter End in New York for a local TV program. Ray Collins is not present on this recording, which leads us Zappa historians to assume he quit the group in early October, only to return a month or two later. There are three segments on the show that feature FZ, the first of which is a lip-synced performance of Son Of Suzy Creamcheese off of Absolutely Free. Frank’s mouth is moving for the entire two minute tune, and it never matches up to the spoken section. This was absolutely on purpose, and a clear “Fuck you” to whoever asked them to lip-sync one of their songs. Next is a six minute interview with the head Mother, who talks about composing, his audience, his looks, record companies and their upcoming album We’re Only In It For The Money. Finally, they improvise a piece of music which Frank had pre-titled “In Memoriam: Hieronymus Bosch”, after the Dutch early Renaissance artist. They start off by playing over a prepared tape, which includes snorks, sped up guitar and at least part of the guitar track heard at the end of “Are You Hung Up?” off of their next album. They play what I can only describe as deranged circus music, which is interspersed with some completely insane free-improvisations. About halfway through the piece, Frank starts to rip into his guitar, the band follows with a sick groove and we get a minute of excellent, rocking guitar before being thrown back into more pure craziness (including chicken squawks and air escaping a baby doll’s bottle). All while this is happening, true insanity breaks out on stage. Motorhead plays with a stuffed horse and a baby doll, and attempts to play a zither with a toilet plunger as a bow. The Mothers are all dressed up, Don’s got an umbrella over him, and a dog wanders on stage in the middle, amongst other events. In Memoriam: Hieronymus Bosch is a great example of the true spontaneity this band was capable of. The whole piece only lasts five or six minutes, but it is absolutely worth checking out, especially considering how little live music is available from this era of The Mothers. “It’s dynamite you guys!”
The Songs Played:
This Mothers seemed to have two large medleys they would play on this tour, in addition to a handful of other songs. Medley #1 was performed at the Stockholm show, medley #2 was played at both the Stockholm and Lund shows, and the Copenhagen performance contains a totally different set of tunes (apart from King Kong).
Medley #1 – “This is a song from our Freak Out! album…. The name of this song is You Didn’t Try To Call Me. After we play through You Didn’t Try To Call Me, there’ll be a brief pause and I will say, ‘Let’s roll along now’, that means nothing to you, into a piece of Petrushka by Igor Stravinsky, followed by the Bristol Stomp, followed by Baby Love by The Supremes, followed by our new smash flop single, There’s A Big Dilemma About My Big Leg Emma.” We only have one recording from 1967 of this whacked medley, from the Stockholm show. It begins and ends with FZ compositions, but the middle three tunes are covers (of a sort…).
You Didn’t Try to Call Me – This Freak Out tune was played as the opener at the Stockholm concert and the first song of the insane medley #1. The song has been “changed to a waltz for live performance”, and it’s significantly faster than the studio version. It’s definitely based on the Freak Out arrangement too, not the later Ruben and the Jets version (which Frank seemed to prefer once he re-arranged it). The tune stops cold after the “I’m all alone at my place!” line (skipping Frank’s improvised “teen-age thrill” ramblings), FZ says “Well, let’s roll along now…”, the band plays the instrumental introduction to Call Me again and then heads into Petrushka.
Petrushka – Frank declares “Petrushka!” and The Mother’s launch into 45 seconds of the Russian Dance from the First Tableau of Igor Stravinsky’s ballet. It’s a straight performance, and it perfectly segues into the ridiculous Bristol Stomp. Excellent!
Bristol Stomp – The Mothers play 40 seconds of this 1961 hit by originally recorded by The Dovells in the middle of medley #1. Ray only sings some of the lyrics, and ends it with an amusing little pre-written speech on “woah woah”s (“You show me your woah woah and I’ll show you mine”). They play the tune faster than the Dovells did, and it leads directly into a similar parody of Baby Love. What’s not to like?
Baby Love – The Mothers do the Supremes (for about a minute). This is a pretty straight parody/tribute to the 1964 hit single. Again, they play the tune way quicker than we’re used to, giving it a chaotic feel and they sing it in a goofy falsetto, which is the cherry on top. They wrap up most of the lyrics and head right into Frank’s own doo-wop parody: Big Leg Emma.
Big Leg Emma – Their new “smash flop single”. The bulk of the song is there, but it’s a little faster than the studio take, Jimmy Carl Black sings lead, and the lyrics are slightly tweaked. The chorus order on the single take goes “put on weight”, “face broke out” and then ends with a “face broke out” repetition, but on this tour the tune starts with an unused verse that goes “She used to knock me out until her teeth fell out”. Verse two is the “weight” one, and “until her face broke out” finishes off the tune. They end with a blues walkdown, as opposed to the fade out heard on the single (and Absolutely Free on CD). Overall, this is one of my favorite purposely-dumb FZ tunes; It’s a great finale to this medley and I love hearing it whenever it pops up.
Medley #2 – The other standard medley The Mothers would play on this tour is built in a similar manner. We start with an FZ original, and then head into a series of insane covers. Medley #2 starts with the (as far as we know) Zappa-penned No Matter What You Do, leads into two Elvis covers/parodies, and ends with a cover of Gee. The medley was played immediately following Medley #1 in Stockholm, but performed on its own in Lund.
No Matter What You Do – This unreleased FZ composition is a rockin’ number with a number of different segments. It starts off quiet with Ray announcing “I could be a slave for the rest of my life/As long as I know that you’d be my wife”, before heading into the “No Matter What You Do” intro (which Frank later gave to The Animals when producing their Animalism album). They then head into a fun, swinging, rock n roll section where Ray laments that “I don’t care how you treat me”. After this they slow down and Ray begins a pseudo-improvised speech about his “darling”. While he’s talking Don plays Tchaikovsky’s 6th (AKA his Pathétique Symphony), and Ray ends every performance with “you’ve got big tits!” They then repeat the intro and rocking section, and end the tune with another slowdown and some mock American Indian chanting. This only lasts for a second or two before we’re thrown into the ensuing Elvis tunes, continuing the insane medley. The Lund performance begins with a long drum roll that isn’t present on the Stockholm tape (probably just a creative decision by Frank, since this tune starts off the Lund show). Overall it’s a really fun tune that deserves an official release someday (Click here to read the unreleased lyrics).
Blue Suede Shoes & Hound Dog – Out of nowhere, we get two very quick, surprising, stupid and hilarious Elvis covers. Out of the chanting that ends the last tune, Ray slowly starts to say “Knock me down…. Spit in my face…” before launching into the tune proper. It’s a condensed version of the tune, lasting only about 50 seconds. It ends with a mini-guitar boogie that heads directly into a hysterical, 15 second micro-performance of Hound Dog. Then just as you realize what’s happening, they head right into the next tune: Gee. Totally hysterical, and a great example of the ridiculous pre-planed things The Mothers were doing at this point in time.
Gee – For the finale of this ridiculous medley, The Mothers cover this joyous old R&B tune (originally recorded by The Crows in 1953). It’s played at a breakneck pace, and Frank inserted three repetitions of a deranged Who Needs the Peace Corps quote in the middle (The phrase played right after “oh my hair is getting good in the back”). Ray sings the whole tune, and it ends with another Peace Corps quote, but this time Ray sings along with it. In Stockholm they end with a crash after the final quote, but in Lund they go on with musical surges a little longer. Eventually Ray sings the beginning of Gene Chandler’s Duke Of Earl, and the tune (and medley) ends a few seconds after this. The Lund performance also has an additional bass and vocal intro (similar to the original recording), that isn’t present in Stockholm. It isn’t clear if these were in-the-moment changes, or part of a new arrangement, since this is the last known performance of this medley. Either way, this is a wildly fun song, and one of my favorite tunes from the ‘67 Mothers.
Other Songs – Almost all of these songs are exclusive to the Copenhagen show, but King Kong was also played in Stockholm (ending with an impromptu It Can’t Happen Here), The Orange County Lumber Truck medley was only played in Lund, and Louie Louie was only played in London (though Ray very briefly quotes it in Stockholm’s King Kong).
Absolutely Free – An early, rare, instrumental version of the We’re Only In It For Money tune arises out of free improvisations at the Copenhagen show. Frank starts by playing a very slow, embellished version of the title line of the tune (“You’ll be absolutely free/Only if you want to be”). He repeats the phrase, and then heads into the chugging instrumental/scat section right before the end of the tune. After this Frank plays a much quicker, more put together take of the title line, which brings the tune to an end (just like on the studio album). Once they finish, they quickly delve back into more freaked improv, and the show continues. A cool little oft-forgotten FZ melody that’s a joy to hear the handful of times it pops up live.
America Drinks – “This is a song about drunk Americans. “ This classic is essentially performed as America Drink & Goes Home on Absolutely Free, including Ray’s improvised, “closing time” end of song bar announcements and Bunk’s soprano sax throughout. FZ instructs the Danish audience to talk louder than the music like Americans do, but they thankfully don’t.
How Could I Be Such A Fool ? – On this tour we get a totally unique arrangement of this tune. It’s way, way faster than on Freak Out and starts with a guitar intro specific to this arrangement. Frank then plays an instrumental verse, and Ray comes in with the somber lyrics. Bunk plays flute throughout the tune, adding a really nice bit of color to the piece. Ray quickly sings the entire tune (though they slow to a crawl for “I’m a terrible… disgrace…..”) and once he finishes Frank plays a nice little guitar solo. They play an instrumental reprise of the chorus, Ray sings the final verse again and we end on a big dramatic “How Could I Be Such A Fool?” This is an excellent version of this Freak Out classic, it’s just a bummer the sub-par Copenhagen tape is the only recording we have of this specific arrangement.
Improvisations – This refers to the weird, creepy and perturbed improv The Mothers could burst into at any moment, though on the recordings available they really only do so in Copenhagen. There’s always discordant saxes and keys and assorted tweaky-ness. FZ would frequently quote Edgard Varese’s Octandre, like during the first set of improvisations at the Copenhagen show. He could also cue a number of different musical ideas with hand signals at any time, like the ⅝ riff later heard on Didja Get Any Onya off of Weasels (though I believe we only hear this in Copenhagen’s King Kong on this tour). The improv on this tour is extremely dissonant and scary compared to the later incarnations of the Mothers, which tended to be a little less overwhelmingly frightening (I’d say it gets to be a little more comedic too). The piece we have from New York, In Memoriam: Hieronymus Bosch, is a great example of the kind of true improv The Mothers would perform in this era.
It Can’t Happen Here – This Freak Out “tune” arises out of ashes of King Kong at the Stockholm show, and is a pretty faithful reproduction of the creepy vocal weirdness found on the album. Frank starts to recite the tune as the rest of the band mumbles incoherently. FZ recites up till the “Minnesota” line, and changes “Kansas” to “Sweden” in the penultimate line. Frank’s recitation is followed by a few minutes of tweaky keyboard improv and someone playing a radio broadcast a la John Cage. A creepy, engaging performance that acts as a perfect cap to the Stockholm show.
Jelly Roll Gum Drop – “This is a song about tits!” The Copenhagen show holds the one known live performance of this Ruben and The Jets track. It’s the same arrangement that will later appear on the doo-wop album, but there’s a hot Ian Underwood sax solo to finish off the tune. Also, Frank yells “braziers!” during the first brief instrumental break (supporting the “song about tits” theme). This is a wonderful little performance, and another reason the Copenhagen show is mandatory listening.
King Kong – The European tour marks the earliest known appearance of one of FZ’s most enduring compositions: King Kong. The main theme is followed by a long jam where really anything can happen. Various band members solo depending on the performance, with the rhythm section providing a very steady beat and FZ conducting the band along the way [See the solo chart below for a breakdown on the individual takes]. The Stockholm performance eventually morphs into weird vocal-nonsense improv that then turns into It Can’t Happen Here. The Copenhagen performance is the source of Ian Underwood Whips It Out off Uncle Meat, but the whole Monster tune is excellent too. There are no secondary themes in these performances, but…
King Kong (Secondary Theme) – At this very early stage in the history of this King Kong, its second theme was actually played independently of the first and was likely considered a different song altogether. It arises out of some weirdo improvisations in Copenhagen and is immediately followed by the next song: Toads Of The Short Forest. It sounds to me like a standalone transitional piece, but it’s possible Frank considered it an intro to Toads. By the time this melody next appears in September ‘68, it is firmly joined to the rest of King Kong.
Louie Louie – Our one standalone take of this song comes from Frank’s crummy stage recording of the September 23rd gig in London, which he later released as a gag track on Uncle Meat. Don scales the barrier between him and the Royal Albert Hall pipe organ to play a wild version of the classic tune, and when the whole band comes in everything gets comically distorted. Not much too it, but a very amusing listen.
The Orange County Lumber Truck Medley – This tour holds the first known performance of this classic instrumental medley. The songs featured in the medley, in order, are Let’s Make The Water Turn Black, Harry, You’re A Beast, The Orange County Lumber Truck, Oh No and The Orange County Lumber Truck again. The ‘67 arrangement is largely the same one used by the OG MOI for the next couple years (with the horns carrying the bulk of the melody), but at this point there are no solos in Oh No (the “and in your dreams” sections heads directly into the Orange County Lumber Truck proper). Also, Oh No is performed as an instrumental, meaning Frank probably had not written lyrics yet. After the OCLT reprise, Frank rips into his guitar, performing a long, mean, entertaining solo. Ray follows it up with a more reserved vocal solo, which brings the tune to a (somewhat abrupt) end. It’s an excellent arrangement of some of Zappa’s most celebrated compositions, and a treat for years to come.
Toads of the Short Forest – This little Weasels Ripped My Flesh tune shows up once in Europe, emerging out of the standalone, secondary theme of King Kong (it’s possible Frank considered these one piece at this time, but I’m going to assume they’re separate). Frank skips the intro heard on Weasels (if it was written at this point), and heads right into the main theme. The melody is played mainly on guitar, with Bunk’s lovely flute joining in throughout. After a complete performance of the theme, they go into a brief little guitar jam (like the extended version released as Arabesque on The Hot Rats Sessions), but it quickly morphs into a slowed down partial repetition of the main theme. They then make a hard transition into more crazed improv (not unlike the edit released on Weasels). A wonderful tune from Frank’s early years, that I wish I saw more appreciation for (especially the Hot Rats Sessions version, WOW!).
Solo Table:
Life On The Road 