Author: Peter Podbrežnik
Artist: Zappa, Frank
Label: Rykodisc Records
Release: 1967
Rating: 5/5
“Absolutely Free” is the second album from the legendary Frank Zappa, brilliant composer, excellent guitarist, occasional singer, social satirist, director and a whole lot more. After the release of his debut “Freak Out!” (1966), Frank expanded his backing band The Mothers Of Invention with keyboardist Don Preston and saxophonist Bunk Gardner. Just like on its predecessor, Zappa doesn’t skimp on political and social satire or complex musical compositions on “Absolutely Free” – the album boasts a thoroughly avant-garde mix of all kinds of musical elements, from symphonic music, rock’n’ roll, psychedelic rock, blues and jazz to musique concrète and assorted free, avant-garde forms. Although “Absolutely Free” is officially not a concept album, as it might seem at first glance (that feeling applies to plenty of his albums, which don’t actually carry a concept), it’s yet another of Frank’s social satires, aimed at consumerism, American “culture” and the all-round stupidity of human sheep who follow assorted shepherds and kitschy trends. One of Frank’s favorite pastimes, if not the favorite, throughout his entire career was satirically dissecting every pore of American society and mocking official media propaganda. In doing so, he never tried to push his political views on anyone; instead he mocked the whole thing in a supremely intelligent way and with a hefty dose of (self-)irony.
The album is split into two parts, or two mini suites. The first is made up of “Absolutely Free (1st in a series of underground oratories)”, while the second contains “The MOI American Pageant (2nd in the series of undergorund oratories)”. The reissue slips in, between the two parts, the single Zappa put out around that time – “Big Leg Emma” and ”Why Dontcha Do Me Right?”. Both parts were reportedly created with the aim of making the dumbest music possible, meant for the dumb teenagers who consume this kind of product. Even though plenty of listeners meeting Frank’s early output for the first time get the feeling that this is a band of comedians making fun of serious music, symphonic music above all, that feeling is very deceptive. Zappa always worked only with the best, and these musicians were simply far too good to stick to some fixed rock or symphonic frameworks that bored an artist of Frank’s caliber endlessly.
The album undoubtedly delivers some of the most experimental and absurd moments of Frank’s early period with The Mothers Of Invention, starting with the opening grotesque “Plastic People”, in which the “then President of the USA” addresses his citizens in the intro, an ignorant buffoon who couldn’t count to ten while he was shipping less fortunate citizens off to Vietnam. Bursts of absurd dissonance and numerous narrations form a grotesque about consumerist kitsch. The vocals are once again swapped around between Zappa, Ray Collins on tambourine, bassist Roy Estrada and drummer Jimmy Carl Black, who together also come up with some supremely grotesque multi-part harmonies. The psychedelic “The Duke Of Prunes” even has a pop element, based on a rhythmic combination of jazz and psychedelic rock, while a grotesque vocal accompanies the whole thing. The one-minute interlude “Amnesia Vivace” is a perfect piece of avant-garde absurdist theater, with vocals bordering on yodeling and psychedelic sounds in the background. “The Duke Regains His Chops” continues the main melodic motif of “The Duke Of Prunes” until it collapses into a flood of vocal absurdity. “Call Any Vegetable” is another of the album’s main bizarre experiments, a cross between blues, avant-garde and psychedelia, with an unabashed vocal parody of the Beach Boys in the closing stretch (Zappa generally loved to take a few satirical swipes at the popular acts of the day). The seven-minute instrumental “Invocation and Ritual Dance of the Young Pumpkin” is, fittingly for its absurd title, one of the most complex pieces on the album, almost a proper jazz rock fusion, with numerous time changes full of jazzy woodwind arrangements, boisterous percussion and bluesy guitar passages. It’s one of those pieces that proves Zappa’s instrumental and compositional genius without any satire, while the “circus” component is of course ever-present. “Soft-Sell Conclusion”, which closes the first part, i.e. the album’s first mini suite, is another absurd burlesque tied to various kinds of vegetables popular with American consumers, with crazy blues passages on guitar and harmonica and a final wheezing from one of the band members. In between sit the previously mentioned bonus tracks, which weren’t on the original version and came out on a single instead. Both are successful attempts at making the dumbest pop possible, the kind the brainless, dumbed-down teenagers of the day were supposedly listening to. “Big Leg Emma” is a teenage sexual innuendo, sonically somewhere between Presley-style honky tonk and country, with the dumbest lyrics and the most senile singing style they could dream up. “Why Don ‘tcha Do Me Right?” is a delightful attempt at crafting one of the most idiotic blues rock experiments (the genre was extremely popular right then), with a mangled vocal, typical blues guitar passages and pathetic lyrics.
The second mini suite opens with “America Drinks”, which together with its closing counterpart forms a peculiar satire of American nightlife. It’s a perfect burlesque, with Zappa packing in the most off-the-wall circus sounds imaginable, mostly from assorted nightclubs. It’s a parody of the completely drunk bands he played with in the early 60s. “Status Back Baby” is a sonic parody of the British pop invasion of the 60s and the still fairly fresh phenomenon of groupies, with a string of absurd sounds slicing through an otherwise ear-friendly melody. “Uncle Bernie’s Farm” is one of the most entertaining burlesques on the album: besides the waddling rhythm and bluesy guitar passages, you can hear a xylophone and even outright laughter, caused by the singing of a supremely grotesque lyric about a ranch owner who hosts “plastic” people on his land. “Son of Suzy Creamcheese” recalls their favorite “heroine”, an imaginary singer and occasional groupie of Mormon descent (here her role is played by Pamela Zarubica), who had already shown up on their debut and on a few albums that followed. “Brown Shoes Don’t Make It” is one of the best-known pieces from Frank’s early career found on the album, and one of the most interesting. The main inspiration for its title comes from the fashion habits of the aforementioned president and Frank’s old “friend” Lyndon B. Johnson, who turned up to some interview in mismatched brown shoes and a gray coat. Frank once described the track nicely as the music of the entire album, quickly stirred together and condensed into just under eight minutes, since it contains numerous motifs that appeared earlier on the album, alongside some exceptionally absurd moments that form this incredible avant-garde collage. It opens as a blues burlesque, then gets sliced up by motifs that could just as well belong in some Looney Tunes cartoon (Frank would happily use that trick a lot on future albums too), followed by some dark, decompressed sounds tied together by a deliberately “drunk” vocal, “farting” noises and musique concrète with Don Ellis’s trumpet. The interlude circus vocal absurdities à la “oh, baby, baby”, with a dumb lyric about a “dirty” little girl, once again satirize teenage culture, and there’s no shortage of barroom jazz elements either. One of the most memorable moments is when a child asks his father what he’d do if the aforementioned “dirty girl” were his daughter, and after long deliberation he answers that he’d pretty her up with chocolate syrup. If there was one thing Frank never held back on, it was surely his famous “toilet” humor. And at the end of the composition, a completely deranged fusion awaits us. The closing nightclub grotesque “America Drinks and Goes Home”, which portrays the decadence of high American society (you can hear slot machines, clinking chips and excited female squealing along the way) and has Frank cast as a drunk crooner accompanied by piano, once again demonstrates his mockery of the biggest social parasites.
“Absolutely Free” is without doubt one of the most original and experimental albums of the late 60s, and it had a major influence on the general development of experimental music and the rise of progressive rock. On release it must certainly have been quite a shock and a challenge for the music audience of the day, who hadn’t yet recovered from the surprise caused by “Freak Out!” Frank took another step forward here compared to the cult debut and gave even more room to improvisation and actual playing (without the longer stretches of “farting”, “burping”, “snoring”, “barking” and “chirping”), while with his political satire he went, without question, far further yet again than anyone else at the time dared. It’s certainly one of the most important and best albums of the artist’s extremely rich creative career, one that helped define him as a musician and composer who was always ahead of his time and simply too good to take any musical trends seriously, using them merely as tools for his dissections of a society of unnatural, “plastic” people who faithfully followed every new trend and leader.
Line-up
Frank Zappa – vocals, guitar
Ray Collins – vocals, tambourine
Roy Estrada – bass guitar, backing vocals
Don Preston – keyboards
Bunk Gardner – saxophone, woodwinds
Jimmy Carl Black – drums, backing vocals
Bill Mundi – drums, percussion
GUEST MUSICIANS:
Don Ellis – trumpet on “Brown Shoes Don’t Make It”
John Rotella – percussion
Jim Fielder – guitar, piano
Pamela Zarubica – backing vocals
Herb Cohen – backing vocals
Lisa Cohen – backing vocals
Kurt Retar – backing vocals
Terry Gilliam – sound effects
Production
Frank Zappa, Tom Wilson
Track list
1. Plastic People (3:42)
2. The Duke of Prunes (2:13)
3. Amnesia Vivace (1:01)
4. The Duke regains his chops (1:50)
5. Call any vegatable (2:20)
6. Invocation and Ritual Dance of the Young Pumpkin (7:00)
7. Soft-Sell conclusion (1:40)
8. (Big leg Emma) (2:32)
9. (Why don’tcha do me right?) (2:37)
10. America drinks (1:53)
11. Status back baby (2:54)
12. Uncle Bernie’s Farm (2:11)
13. Son of Suzy Creamcheese (1:34)
14. Brown shoes don’t make it (7:30)
15. America drinks & goes home (2:46)
Album length: 43:43
