Vastly expanded version of Zappa’s most Strictly Commercial album – Apostrophe – celebrates 50 years of its existence. Great googly moogly!
Release Date: 13th September 2024
Label: Zappa Records / UMe
Formats: 5CD + Blu-Ray / 2LP + 7” / 1LP / Digital
ANOTHER GOLDEN JUBILEE!
Just recently, the House of Zappa has been enjoying more Golden Jubilees than the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. The current series of deluxe reissues began back in November 2021. This is when the 50th Anniversary of Zappa’s movie and soundtrack project, 200 Motels, made its appearance.
Reflecting Frank’s always-prodigious output, that release was followed, in quick succession by deluxe repackages of Fillmore East – June 1971 (April 2022), Waka/Jawaka/The Grand Wazoo (December 2022) and, most recently, Overnite Sensation (November 2023).
Now, it’s the turn of Apostrophe (‘), Zappa’s most commercially successful (or, to use the term in the correct context, his most Strictly Commercial – ly successful) album to get the expanded, remastered, deluxe treatment. It’s another fine package that keeps up the now-established tradition of attention to detail.
THE OPTIONS
Once again, Zapp-o-philes have a wide choice of formats in which to enjoy this latest overload of the Zappa-senses and, whether your choice is a 5CD + Blu-Ray audio boxset, a double LP plus 7” single vinyl package or merely a 180-gram single vinyl remaster of the original album, there’s plenty to get stuck into here.
Sticking, for the moment, with the CD/Blu-Ray offering. This reissue contains 65 tracks spread across five CDs, plus the nine tracks of the original album. The album has been remastered in Dolby Atmos and 5.1 surround sound, Zappa’s original 1974 4-channel Quadrophonic mix (unavailable since the album’s original release) and hi-res stereo remasters in both 24-bit/ 192kHz and 24-bit/96Hz Stereo on the Blu-ray disc.
WHAT’S ON
Disc One features a 2024 remix, by Bernie Grundman, of the original album and, as always, there’s a whole plethora of early takes, outtakes and alternative versions of tracks, taken from the original album sessions in New York and in California to get stuck into.
Discs Two and Three comprise recordings of a concert in Colorado Springs, Colorado, in 1974. The venue and date of this show are technically unidentified but informed sources suggest that the recording is likely to be of a show that took place at the city’s Civic Auditorium on 21st March.
Zappa’s 6-piece touring band at that stage featured, alongside himself on guitar and vocals, Ruth Underwood (percussion), Napoleon Murphy Brock (sax and vocals), Chester Thompson (drums) Tom Fowler (bass) and George Duke (keyboards). It was, of course, during the Mothers’ Spring ’74 tour that the material that became the Roxy & Elsewhere album was recorded and the setlist for the Colorado show features several songs that appeared on that album, as well as dives into albums such as Uncle Meat, Chunga’s Revenge, Hot Rats and the more recent Overnite Sensation. The sound quality isn’t perfect, but it’s acceptable and, as always, it’s interesting to be reminded of how Zappa continued to push the envelope, even whilst he was releasing his most accessible run of albums.
1974
1974 was a typically busy touring year for FZ and The Mothers. The band toured the western states of the US between April and August before heading across the pond for a run of dates in Italy, Germany, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, France and Spain, then returning home to resume their US tour with a series of dates on the eastern seaboard.
It was during the latter stages of this marathon tour that the November concert at Hara Arena, Drayton, OH was recorded. That recording occupies the bulk of Discs Four and Five here. It’s a good-quality recording and the band are clearly well road-tested by this late stage of the tour. Their execution of the material, particularly of songs like Pygmy Twylyte and Penguin In Bondage is breathtaking. It’s interesting, too, to see how songs from Apostrophe (‘) had crept into the setlist (the album hadn’t been released when the tour set out).
THE CRUX OF THE BISCUIT IS THE APOSTROPHE (‘)
As already noted, Apostrophe (‘) was the biggest commercial success of Zappa’s career. It’s generally recognized as one of his most accessible albums. I’m sure that the jazz-funk and bad-taste humour of Apostophe (‘)’s predecessor album, Overnite Sensation, helped pave the way for the success of Apostrophe (‘). Plus, the TV and cinema advertising slots that Zappa and film director Carl Schenkel put together probably helped, too.
But the crux of the biscuit is surely the quality of the music, and its expert execution by a stellar array of performers – an impressive list that, alongside members of that remarkable touring band includes such luminaries as drummers Johnny Guerin and Aynsley Dunbar, bassists Jack Bruce and Erroneous and violinists Sugar Cane Harris and Jean-Luc Ponty.
Apostrophe (‘) gave FZ his first US Gold Disc; it reached the heady heights of #10 on the Billboard 200 album chart and spin-off single, Don’t Eat the Yellow Snow, reached #87 on the singles chart, the first time that Zappa had breached that hallowed territory.
Creation of Apostrophe (‘) began in 1971, with build reels that were put aside for the Hot Rats sessions and from Fillmore East (1971) live recordings. Recorded simultaneously with Overnite Sensation the main sessions took place between early 1972 and early 1974 at Electric Lady Studios in New York and at Bolic Sound in Inglewood, California. Mastering was completed at Artisan Sound Recorders in Hollywood. The album was released on 22nd March, 1974. The end result is an electrifying mix of left-field lyrics, ribald humour and fantastic music, including several of the best, most engaging guitar solos that you’ll hear on any Zappa album.
APOSTROPHE
Opening Apostrophe (‘) are three songs that follow a loose theme wherein Zappa recounts a dream in which he became an Eskimo named Nanook. Nanook’s adventures bring him into conflict with a fur-trapper who raises Nanook’s ire by assaulting a baby seal. One thing leads to another until Nanook takes his revenge on the trapper; rubbing the trapper’s face in snow that’s soaked in dog-wee.
It makes a good point in a typically silly Zappa way and the music – a mix of whirlwind jazz, heavy metal and doo-wop is irresistible. Zappa’s vocal delivery alternates between the drawling spoken-word style that he pioneered on songs like Montana on the Overnight Sensation album and something that you might describe as ‘almost musical.’
Continuing the story, the blinded fur trapper is urged to visit a mysterious St. Alphonso who, it is suggested, may be able to cure the blindness that the dog-wee apparently caused him to suffer. When he arrives, St Alphonso is having breakfast – pancakes that have been made for him by Father Vivian O’Blivion, another mysterious character. Are you following this?
The story is told with great urgency and at breakneck speed, with lyrics that describe how the holy man Whips up the batter for the pancakes of his flock, whilst singing Rock Around the Clock and quoting Latin blessings. It’s marvelous!
Moving on from the tribulations of Nanook, the fur trapper and the other increasingly surreal characters of the opening concept, Zappa then turns his attention to his disdain for self-proclaimed gurus and phony science in the scathing Cosmik Debris. It’s another song that features Frank’s gritty spoken-word vocal as he spits out lyrics like “Take your meditations and your preparations and ram it up yer snout.”
EXCENTRIFUGAL FORZ
Side two of the original album opens with Excentrifugal Forz. A tune noted particularly for Johnny Guerin’s drum part, it was apparently lifted from those Hot Rats leftovers. Arguably, the centrepiece of the entire original album is the album’s title track. This is a glorious 6-minute burst of electric ecstasy, in which Frank’s guitar and Jack Bruce’s resonant bass vie continuously for pole position.
After the gyrations of Apostrophe (‘) (the track), the untypically serious messages of Uncle Remus seem almost subdued. Frank follows up his rant of Trouble Every Day with another, more cryptic statement of his distaste for racism, before the album is taken to its conclusion. Stink Foot, Frank’s lengthy treatise on the subject of bromhidrosis (aka smelly feet), is hilarious. It’s one of Zappa’s wordier songs, with a punchline that declares: “Your stink foot puts a hurt on my nose!” That’s probably a line that only Frank Zappa would even think of trying to get away with!
Zappa Records/ UMe have done it again. This 50th Anniversary Edition of Apostrophe (‘) is yet another excellent package that will set the salivary glands of FZ’s army of followers dripping. Like the rest of the series, it’s not exactly cheap. If you’ve got a spare £80 lying around, then this is as good a place as any in which to invest it.
Get in the mood for a long Apostrophe (‘) session with this 1974 version of Frank and the band performing Cosmik Debris; taken from the Apostrophe reissue. Whilst you do so, check out our archive of Frank Zappa articles here.
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