Like Father, Like Son
Jun. 2nd, 2008 07:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gvdubA friend of mine, Jamie Kime, is the other guitar player with Dweezil Zappa's "Zappa Plays Zappa" project. They've been gearing up for the summer tour season, and, as they usually do, opened up the last few production rehearsals so they could get audience reactions to the show. Every year, Dweezil picks a fair assortment of fresh material from the Zappa catalog, does necessary rearrangement for the 8-piece band, and they like to make sure that they've got it right before they hit the road. We went last night to see what was going on.
Despite requests from the band to "not post it on MySpace" word had gotten around and the joint (a large rehearsal studio in North Hollywood) was pretty full when we arrived. And people just kept coming until it was packed enough that new people coming into the room kept trying to push me into the garbage can that was behind me (it just looked as if I was standing a couple feet from the wall because nobody could see that I was being relentlessly pressed back into the trash). Despite this, it was a remarkable opportunity to see an incredibly talented bunch of musicians playing some really challenging music. When we arrived, Dweezil was doing some scale practice while waiting for the rest of the band to get set to go. As a guitar player, I could have watched that for a while, since he was doing some interesting picking patterns and complex runs, but it's probably for the best that everybody got all the gear fired up and their in-ear monitors in place so they could start the rehearsal.
Among the songs played were "King Kong", "Inca Roads", "Yellow Snow/St. Alfonso's Pancake Breakfast", and a "Joe's Garage" mini-suite. Overall it was well balanced between the social satire and the complex instrumental material. The musicianship was absolutely stellar. Everybody in the band was top-notch, and attempting to single anybody out would be unfair to the rest, although Ray White gets special props for doing some incredible vocals while suffering from a nasty cold.
If you're a fan of Frank Zappa's music and you see that they're coming to your town, folks, go get yourself tickets now and thank me later. Even if you're not particularly enamored of the Zappa canon, but appreciate challenging instrumental music (with the occasional vaguely profane joke thrown in) played extremely well, you could do far worse than catching this show. They'll be touring for most of the summer, both here and abroad, so keep an eye (and ear) open.
Despite requests from the band to "not post it on MySpace" word had gotten around and the joint (a large rehearsal studio in North Hollywood) was pretty full when we arrived. And people just kept coming until it was packed enough that new people coming into the room kept trying to push me into the garbage can that was behind me (it just looked as if I was standing a couple feet from the wall because nobody could see that I was being relentlessly pressed back into the trash). Despite this, it was a remarkable opportunity to see an incredibly talented bunch of musicians playing some really challenging music. When we arrived, Dweezil was doing some scale practice while waiting for the rest of the band to get set to go. As a guitar player, I could have watched that for a while, since he was doing some interesting picking patterns and complex runs, but it's probably for the best that everybody got all the gear fired up and their in-ear monitors in place so they could start the rehearsal.
Among the songs played were "King Kong", "Inca Roads", "Yellow Snow/St. Alfonso's Pancake Breakfast", and a "Joe's Garage" mini-suite. Overall it was well balanced between the social satire and the complex instrumental material. The musicianship was absolutely stellar. Everybody in the band was top-notch, and attempting to single anybody out would be unfair to the rest, although Ray White gets special props for doing some incredible vocals while suffering from a nasty cold.
If you're a fan of Frank Zappa's music and you see that they're coming to your town, folks, go get yourself tickets now and thank me later. Even if you're not particularly enamored of the Zappa canon, but appreciate challenging instrumental music (with the occasional vaguely profane joke thrown in) played extremely well, you could do far worse than catching this show. They'll be touring for most of the summer, both here and abroad, so keep an eye (and ear) open.