Frank Zappa: Don’t let my music die
p2pnet news view | P2P | Music:- A clip from a quote attributed to the late Hunter S. Thompson says, “The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free …”
Or, “The whole music business in the United States is based on numbers, based on unit sales and not on quality,” said the late Frank Zappa.
“It’s not based on beauty, it’s based on hype and it`s based on cocaine. It’s based on giving presents of large packages of dollars to play records on the air.”
Does that look like Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony Music to you?
But it isn’t only them.
NPR is running a post which quotes Zappa’s widow, Gail (right), as wanting to keep his legacy alive, the most recent instalment being the three-disc Lumpy Money, a suite of three-minute movements, “built on Zappa’s love of 20th-century classical music (particularly that of Edgard Varese)” and which, “combines music â released and unreleased â that Frank Zappa recorded in 1967,” says the story, going on:
“One session produced the Mothers of Invention album We’re Only in It for the Money, the group’s third release. The other was a surprise.”
The story has Zappa’s wife declaring, “I want people to play Frank’s music,” going on, “Go ahead; try. Don’t hurt yourself, but just try it.”
Wonderful.
Zappa was a brilliant musician and a great performer. If you’re not familiar with him, check out his The Dub Room Special video for a taste. There are plenty of torrents.
But back to Gail and her efforts to make sure her husband’s work stays alive —-
—- hang on a minute, though.
“She insists that anyone who does try to perform it in public needs to pay royalties to his estate,” NPR has her saying.
“I don’t really care who’s doing it, as long as they get a license. The people I’m going after are not licensing the music.”
‘It’s some wretched version …’
Gail Zappa is, “going after cover bands she accuses of ‘identity theft’,” says the story. “Her lawyers have sent scores of cease-and-desist letters.”
Because, “Somebody goes out there, plays music â it’s not played very well; it doesn’t sound anything like what the composer intended,” she says. “And they are telling the audience that’s never heard it before that this is Frank Zappa’s music. It’s not. It’s some wretched version of it.”
However, NPR continues, “Many fans point to a message that was left on the hot line for Zappa’s record label shortly after he died of prostate cancer in 1993.
It goes on »»»
The message says, in part, “Just play his music if you’re a musician. And otherwise, play his music anyway. That will be enough for him.”
The message was read by Zappa’s daughter, Moon Unit. Gail Zappa insists that it’s not what some fans and musicians have made it out to be.
“We wrote something for Moon to say on the hot line,” she says. “But it was not a statement made by Frank. He never said that. He never told anyone that.”
Ike Willis would beg to differ.
“The main reason I’m doing this is because I love Frank,” Willis says. “I love his music. And he asked me to do it.”
Willis is a singer and guitarist who worked with Frank Zappa on and off for 17 years. He now tours with Project/Object and other unauthorized cover bands. Willis says he talked to Zappa a week before the composer died.
“He said, ‘I would really like it if you could be one of the people that could actually keep my music played, in some way, shape or form.’ Those were his words,” Willis says.
“He didn’t want it to die.”
Is Lumpy Money on online?
Yup.
Enjoy.
(Cheers, Marshall)
NPR – April 9, 2009
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April 10th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
so, do we have to wait until a particular artistic ‘work’ has fallen so far out of obscurity that nobody even remembers it before the copyright is released?
I love frank zappa, wango tango.. but his money grubbing cow of an ex can kiss my ass. Go get a job you fucking moose !
I will be SURE that my collection of Frank Zappa is digitized and available for file sharing on my networks this evening.
April 10th, 2009 at 1:05 pm
“I will be SURE that my collection of Frank Zappa is digitized and available for file sharing on my networks this evening.”
…ZOOT ALLURES!!
: )
April 10th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
I actually received a Cease and Desist letter for mentioning “Phrank Zahpa” in a newspaper review I wrote. It stated I was in violation for mentioning a trademarked name, even though it was a review and a favorable one at that. Fine I won’t talk about “him” or his music any more. He was a fantastic musician but it’s just too much effort and stress. RIP Phrank, Fuck you Gail!
April 10th, 2009 at 1:35 pm
Here’s the punchline from the NPR website:
“Hear The Songs
After our story aired, NPR was asked to take down the two Frank Zappa pieces we had been given permission to stream.”
Good one Gail!
April 10th, 2009 at 3:56 pm
So, if I am understanding this correctly, then by Gail’s logic, it must be illegal and unethical for schoolkids to play their favorite songs on the piano while they learn. No! Never play the theme melody to your favorite movie! It’s not a tribute, it’s a sick, twisted rendition of an otherwise wonderful song!
April 10th, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Hey Jakykong – please email me – p2pnet @ shaw dot ca
Cheers! And thanks …
April 10th, 2009 at 4:50 pm
I could be wrong on this, but I don’t recall Frank being a big lawsuit guy, he was too smart for that. When he found out that bootlegs of his stuff was selling for big money, he released all of it in a series titled “beat the boots”, with the original bootleg cover art, at standard album price(I think some of those boots were going for up to $100). The only difference was that he crossed out the bootleggers name off the album covers.
April 10th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
“….I donât recall Frank being a big lawsuit guy…”
Indeed, he was notoriously “anti-establishment” in a number of ways.
He publicly ridiculed and invited debate on a number of things, like obscenity laws, warning labels on records, religions, etc., and the people that promote the thinking on any of it, and he did it on THEIR terms and right over the mainstream media (making a number of network execs pretty uncomfortable). There’s probably still some footage of some of those exchanges available on YouTube.
He also had a lot to say about the mainstream media itself, and the record labels, and copyright.
None of it was positive.
I have no doubt he would have wanted his stuff to be shared after his death by any who wanted it, and that he did express the desire to some aspiring musicians to take it and use it. That was Frank Zappa.
Gail’s attempt to lock it all away again is curious, to say the least.
April 10th, 2009 at 5:59 pm
@ DA
Nothing curious about it. She thinks she’s entitled to cash in on Frank.
Cheers!
April 10th, 2009 at 6:46 pm
Frank Zappa’s music sharing plan, from his The Real Frank Zappa Book as cited by TechDirt’s Mike Masnick – http://techdirt.com/articles/20090405/1806484395.shtml – (And Yes – it’s online):
“Just imagine how different the music industry might be today if heâd been able to move forward with that idea,” says Mike. “1983 was probably too early, but jump forward ten years⦠and weâd be facing a very different sort of music industry.”
Cheers!
April 10th, 2009 at 10:28 pm
“…so they can put an end to âTHE RECORD BUSINESSâ as we now know it.”
Yup! That’s the Frank I was talking about.
Needless to say, he didn’t have too many friends in the recording industry’s top echelon.
(Nor did he need or want them.)
April 11th, 2009 at 1:07 am
What boggles MY mind (other than her being a money-hungry bitch, and attempting to destroy anything even remotely mentioning “he who shall not be named for fear of cease-and-desist bullshit”(growl), is this notion that other’s performances are somehow “not what the composer ever intended.”
How the hell does this woman think creativity and culture work? Metallica (after attempting to kill off an entire new field of technology) now has to coax it’s dwindling “fan-base” into doing their own versions of Metalica’s stuff on their Youtube channel. Between that, and the fact that they built their entire early careers on EXPLICITLY ENCOURAGING “bootlegs” and “sharing” with your friends so as to turn them on to Metallica — well, they look like hypocritical schmucks, but at least THEY actually CREATED the stuff they’re mishandling.
Zappa’s wife is just another example of why the “heirs” of copyright-holders do NOT deserve perpetual monopoly power, and her attempts to re-write history should lead to NOBODY ever “buying” anything Zappa-related from the “authorized” channels, again.
That way, she can have something to mull over when she discovers that this type of shit alienates actual fans.
You can’t keep milking the cow seventy years after it’s dead. THIS is yet another reason copy’right’ needs to be destroyed.
April 11th, 2009 at 1:12 am
Oh yeah, gotta also wonder about that glib “We just wrote something for Moon Unit to say” bullshit: indicates to me that this woman was willing to use family-members as organizational mouthpieces. Not cool, and definitely not “motherly” by any stretch of the imagination.
Having the guy’s daughter essentially lie for propaganda purposes, right after the guy is dead is just…..pretty low.
Boycott the Frank Zappa “estate”, until she “ceases and desists” from this bullshit.