Quality work from lucid people

The blog is a harsh mistress. Here I am, sick some more, and home with my daughter. I'm so bad off that she's the one directing me to lie on the couch under the fuzzy blanket. Whenever I do, Daisy hops up and lies down on top of me, as if to keep me in place. (BB's still asleep at 10 a.m. God knows what's going on with him.)

Yet when they both leave the room, I get up and wander in here to check the blog. I'm compulsive. I'm worried that I have nothing to blog about. What to write, what to write? I'm losing readers, because I hardly write. And today will be no exception. Worried.

Wups - it's ten:ten. That means I have to take a picture of myself blogging and post it on Jo's site. OK - done. One successful post, at least.

So besides Jo's place, here are other blogs with posts of note this morning. If I can't write, I can refer. Go, have fun. Be back before curfew.

A tribute to the weirdness that was Frank Zappa. I notice people rarely mention Zappa's "200 Motels" anymore. Cinematic tour de force, or optical nightmare? History will be the judge. I myself could only withstand 10 or 15 minutes of it before my eyes threatened to jump out of my skull and donate themselves to science.

What Happened to What You Gave Me. A holiday caveat for modern times.

Mindy painted one wall of her bathroom blue. She says she means to paint more of them - possibly all four, but that's not completely clear. But I'm looking at the picture and thinking, one blue wall in a white bathroom is actually pretty nice-looking. Maybe she could save herself the trouble and leave it like that. I'm hoping she starts a poll to this effect. I'm ready!

Uh oh, my daughter found me. Off to let Daisy lie on me some more.

Comments

[Anthony]

"200 Motels" should be clearly repackaged for the Video-Killed-The-Radio-Star era with a new DVD presentation and maybe a "200 Artists Tribute to 200 Motels" concert video. First dibs: The Indigo Girls tackling "Penis Dimension"! Next up: Arvil Lagrine (sic) singing "What Will I Say The Next Day (To Whatever I Dragged To My Hotel Tonight)" Big Finale: all the artists gathered together for "This Town (Is Like A Sealed Tuna Sandwhich)"!
I predict a major revival of interest right around the corner!

[pops]

My immediate inner circle/ilk have a strong dislike for anything from the Flo and Eddie period of The Mothers. 200 Motels comes from the apex of that era and that's why I think it can get brushed aside. We went to the Seattle Symphony's Zappa Night and the program was free of anything from that time.

Please note that 200 Motels was one of the first records I ever bought and I still have very mixed feelings about it.

Besides it's not something you should concern yourself with. While you're home here's a real mom-n-daughter project.

http://receptionista.typepad.com/hammer_and_peg/2004/12/naked_music.html

You know, you, me, and Anthony could get together and chat and anybody who listened to us would need subtitles. You do realize that don't you?

[pam]

Back up, back up. "Seattle Symphony's Zappa Night"? You can just toss that comment off without a single fnord? Our Sacto. symphony has gone through two separate fiscal crashes, because it can't adapt to market forces that way. Dude.

[Amber]

Looks like Mindy got herself a man to do it for her! What is it will the magnetic pull of these damn blogs?! Get better soon.

[Anthony]

Zappa was in despair for most of his adult life trying to get orchestras to take his "side-hobby" as a classical composer seriously. Pierre Boulez, Kent Nagano and a few others were willing to program Zappa's music and try to get it recorded. Strangely, although a lot of Zappa's concert music is highly experimental (let's not forget that the first big influence on young Francis Vincent Zappa was the music of Edgard Varese) not to say difficult to play, a surprising amount of it is relatively acessible and even contains things like melodies that can be understood by the "average concertgoer."
I think the work on "200 Motels" clearly shows the dichotomy of Zappa's mental/musical universe: highly fragmented, difficult orchestral sound collages butting up against Flo and Eddie (who are often criminally underestimated as vocalists) and Zappa's amusing-if-sometimes-puerile sexual/social assaults on middle-class sensibilities. And let's not forget--Zappa was a KILLER guitarist and as much a pain as he (well reputedly) was to work with/for/around he always filled his bands with Grade A musicians (insert very long list of Grade A jazz/rock performers here).
Touring can make you crazy!

[pam]

I was going to ask you if you thought "200 Motels" was Zappa's "Love Beach", but you went and devoted so much time to this documentation, it would sound rude now.

[Anthony]

No ruder, really, than asking if "Love Beach" was ELP's "200 Motels"!
Zappa's works, even at their most offensively peurile (ie, "Jewish Princess" and "Bobby Brown Goes Down" etc) is still light months (if not light years) more inventive than the CRAP ELP passsed off as "Love Beach." Even BB, who (at some point) worshipped Greg Lake (the third stupidest lyricist in the universe) thinks "LB" is dreck. "200 Motels" is a still fascinating sonic tapestry, so for that reason I listen to it every few months.
On the other hand--"Brain Salad Surgery" still packs a punch and is quite likely ELP's best work ever!
"Keith, are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
"Gee Greg I don't know: I prefer the mountains myself..."

[Daisy]

Either I have to change my name or the dog has to go, I keep staring bug-eyed at the screen when I read that I've been lying on top of you all day ;-0))

I painted our bedroom with one blue (duck egg variety) and three white and if I may be a little boastfu, it does look rather nice.