By late 1986, Frank Zappa seemed to have shed the last vestige
\nof being considered a rock musician. Turning almost exclusively to
\nhis Synclavier, he created
\nJazz From Hell<\/i>, an all-instrumental collection of tracks
\nranging from Stockhausen influences to performances bordering on
\nrock music. But if this disc proved anything, it showed that Zappa
\nneeded a live band behind him desparately, if only to provide the
\nmusic with a hint of humanity.<\/p>\n
The album opens up well enough with “Night School,” a track that
\nalmost sounds like something that could have come from the mind of
\nMike Post, and would have fit in well as the opening music for some
\ntelevision cop show. (That’s not meant as an insult, by the way.)
\n“Night School” is an exciting piece of music, if not a little too
\nelectronic, but has enough power and craftsmanship to make the
\nlistener believe that this Synclavier experiment could actually
\nwork.<\/p>\n
Likewise, “G-Spot Tornado” later on is a flurry of excitement,
\nthough this one shows a few clinks in the armor, as live musicians
\n(especially maybe recruiting someone like L. Shankar for the main
\nriff) could have made this piece come alive. Still, this version is
\nexciting enough to keep the listener coming back to it for more and
\nmore.<\/p>\n
If only the rest of
\nJaz From Hell<\/i> had the same lofty aspirations. Tracks like
\n“The Beltway Bandits” and “While You Were Art II” are soulless,
\nmeandering numbers that make it seem like Zappa is trying to
\nre-create past glories, say from the
\nUncle Meat<\/i>-period of his career, but with little success.
\nWhile one could argue that these numbers fit in with a lot of the
\npseudo-classical work Zappa had been producing around that time, it
\ndoesn’t make them any more interesting to listen to. Likewise, the
\none instance of any type of vocals, on “Massaggio Galore,” sounds
\nincredibly out of place and should have been left on the digital
\ncutting room floor.<\/p>\n
The only performance by live musicians, “St. Etienne,” is proof
\npositive of why Zappa needed actual bodies behind him playing his
\nmusic. Not surprisingly, it is the only natural-sounding track on
\nthe disc, but it is also the only one that really sees Zappa come
\nto life. I don’t believe I’ve ever heard a finer guitar solo from
\nZappa than on this track – and if Zappa truly was bored with rock
\nmusic, then no one ever made being bored sound so beautiful.<\/p>\n
\nJazz From Hell<\/i> is not the kind of disc that one can fully
\nappreciate on a cursory listen, but even the most stalwart fans of
\nZappa have to admit that, while there are some great performances
\non this disc, Zappa as the electronic mastermind is not nearly as
\ninteresting as Zappa the bandleader.<\/p>\n
2005 Christopher Thelen and “The Daily Vault.” All rights
\nreserved. Review or any portion may not be reproduced without
\nwritten permission. Cover art is the intellectual property of the
\nZappa Family Trust \/ record label, and is used for informational
\npurposes only.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27201,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5625],"rating":[5614],"class_list":["post-38547","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-frank-zappa","rating-rating-c-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38547\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38547"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=38547"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=38547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}