It is Thursday and a high blue prairie sky hangs over us, a harbinger of good things to come. We walk towards the Arena, a squat and formidable monument to 'practical' architecture, across the black and dead asphalt territory of brave new world. We are going to a rock concert, an evening of life to distract ourselve's from the hurried classrooms of summer and the death of life in the wasteland. It should be a great show, we think hopefully. Zappa. At last we get to see the insane impresario of rock. A man with a Ph.D. in music whose defecatory prowess has graced a million bathrooms. With him, his group – The Mothers of Invention: musical prodigies united under Zappa's zany leadership. We've heard the records and know that he is weird and good but to see him in concert is bound to be something else totally again. My friend remarks that it never ceases to amaze him that Frank Zappa's real name is Frank Zappa. I murmur in agreement and pass him a smoke. What a show! The other act is Crazy Horse, a group that kicked around San Francisco for years, then catapulted to fame as Neil Young's superbly competent backing group. They helped ol' Neil to be a super star. It should be great. (read more)

Source: digitalcollections.lib.umanitoba.ca

This is the reaction I received upon informing the production staff that I intended to write an article about Frank Zappa. Yes, Frank Zappa. Seen 31 of his albums and you've seen them all (I think). Frank Zappa the forty-year-old guitarist who in the fifties attended the Kurse Für Zeitgenossische Musik (where the likes of Boulez, Stockhausen, Nono, Zimmermann, Ligeti, and Berio were teaching or studying) and was prompted to write by Edgar Varèse? Frank Zappa of the band that nobody comes to stay in but comes so they can leave and say that they've been there. Frank Zappa who for a considerable amount of genius still sometimes ends up the asshole he makes himself out to be. (read more)

Source: digitalcollections.lib.umanitoba.ca