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At long last, the official
release of a song seminal to my career as a bassist. Z was playing
this song live well before I was in the band, and along with the
infamous "'70s Medley," it was the centerpiece of my audition
back in 1993. I recall Mike Keneally, Joe Travers and I playing
it as a trio during that audition. Keneally was sternly observing
me work my way through impossible lick after impossible lick when
Dweezil entered the room, smiling in what appeared to be disbelief.
We played it on a subsequent tour, but even after
several live performances I barely had it under my fingers. A couple
of licks were just damned near impossible to play on a bass, because
the guitars were tuned to an open 'F' and I had no such luxury.
My technical weaknesses were exposed when we set out to record it,
and I ended up punching in so many different sections that the final
bass track was disjointed to the point of distraction. Pro Tools
would have come in very, very handy back then.
The track was slated to be on Music
For Pets, but Dweezil rightly scrapped it and vowed
to fight the battle another day (though he did release it on a now-out-of-print,
limited-run, French-only CD called Live
Beef). That day turned out to be in 2000, when he re-mixed it
for this record. I think the bass is mixed way too low throughout,
but there are certain parts where it might have been done to protect
me more than anything else. Still, I think it's worth having just
to observe this one tune in awe and wonder how the hell we ever
performed it live to any satisfactory degree.
As for the rest of the record, it's a typically
Dweezil-like effort--scattered with technical genius, humor, and
some elements so inside-joke-ish as to be unexplainable. My pick:
"Fwakstension." It's a riotous, impossible "song"
that may have only been playable live by the stellar lineup that
toured on it in 1991: Dweezil, Mike Keneally, Scott Thunes, and,
in his first professional gig, Josh Freese. Bootlegs exist that
would make your head explode.
Click here
for the official
Zappa family website.
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