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Frank Zappa: (birthname: Frank Vincent Zappa; Dec. 21, 1940 - Dec. 4, 1993) was born in Baltimore (MD), USA, and died in Los Angeles, USA, from incurable (prostate) cancer. He's son of a French-Italian mother and Italian father (from Partinico, Sicily).I believe, I must have been about 14 when I heard of Frank Zappa the first time. My elder brother had bought the Sheik Yerbouti (1979) album, and I remember that I really enjoyed "Bobby Brown" and "The Sheik Yerbouti Tango". Apart from that, I just thought it was really weird music. It didn't fit with ABBA or Boney M or Deep Purple, which must have been the most adult hard rock I listened to at that time just before realizing punk rock came about. The '79 album was also the first album that I got. When my brother moved to his own apartment, he gave me a big bunch of his old vinyl albums, including this brilliant gem.
Zappa is almost pseudonymous with The Mothers of Invention as he wrote, composed and conducted their music before studio recordings. Band members of The Mothers of Invention (1965-69): Frank Zappa (guitar, vocals), Ray Collins (vocals, harmonica, percussion, 1965-68), Roy Estrada (bass, vocals), Jimmy Carl Black (drums, percussion), Henry Vestine (guitar, 1965-66), Don Preston (keyboards, piano, Moog, 1966-69), Elliot Ingber (guitar, 1966), Jim Fielder (bass, guitar, 1966-67), Bunk Gardner (saxophone, woodwinds, 1966-69), Billy Mundi (drums, percussion, 1966-67), Jim 'Motorhead' Sherwood (saxophone, woodwinds, tambourine, 1967-69), Ian Underwood (piano, keyboards, woodwinds, 1967-69), Arthur Tripp (drums, percussion, 1967-69), Lowell George (guitar, vocals, 1968-69), Buzz Gardner (trumpet, 1968-69), Don 'Sugercane' Harris (violin, 1969). For a few years he established the band Ruben and the Jets (1967-68) with members of The Mothers, and he played with Captain Beefheart in the mid '70s calling themselves Zappa/Beefheart/Mothers.
Throughout his career, Zappa was often referred to as some kind of 'acid wreck' of the '60s and a left-wing provocateur who wrote unamerican texts, or wrote and said what was characterized as harmful matter because of his satiric texts on American consumerism. However, in his last 10 years as a musician he experienced how most of America praised him as one of the 20th century's most important American composers.
[ wikipedia has extensive info on Frank Zappa ]
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