Some of the highlights are Wonderful Wino (Wino Man) with lead vocals by Frank himself. A true gem recorded at Trident Studios in London. The same sessions also brought the previously unreleased song Giraffe and an early unfinished version of Envelopes. Worth mentioning is also an early live version of Easy Meat.
Well good morning y’all.....I am at son James ....two new songs are being born ....one of ours and one with Donald Fagen ...yes ...I said that .... that one is called Rodriguez Tonight ....
Good news! Let's hope we get to hear it eventually.
A second track from the upcoming Zappa album "The Mothers 1970" has been released for streaming on Spotify. It is Sharleena, same take as the version on Chunga's Revenge but a different mix by Roy Thomas Baker (who later worked with Queen, Journey and others.
In these times and even after them, we could all do with a book or two. Or five. Reading is a great thing!
Rolling Stone recently listed the top 50 rock memoirs, and while we all know that best of-lists of any kind is likely to irritate more than inform, this is a nice list of books that you might or might not be interested in reading. Skip the chart side of it. It doesn't matter who ended up #1 and who didn't make it. See it as a few suggestions that might lead on to other books, other genres:
The new 4 CD set includes live and studio performances by Frank Zappa & The Mothers 1970. This features recordings from the first months by the new band that Frank formed after he broke the old Mothers up in 1969. It is often referred to as the Vaudeville band or the Flo & Eddie band.
The set includes the performance that the band did at VPRO, a dutch TV station. It has been bootlegged several times and it will be nice to hear this in better sound quality.
Some fans think that this era is already well covered and that it would be more interesting to hear recordings of others lineups. Others seem to enjoy any new Zappa release and appreciate that there is stuff being released every year.
This is an excerpt from the presentation by zappa.com: The Mothers 1970 encapsulates the band’s brief but productive span, which included two visits to the studio – resulting in the fantastic 1970 album, Chunga’s Revenge – and tours across the U.S., Canada and Europe. Divided into four parts, the collection is anchored by top notch studio recordings recorded at the famed London-based Trident Studios on June 21-22 with a then-young, unknown producer in the engineer chair by the name of Roy Thomas Baker, several years before he’d go on to have massive success working with Queen, The Cars and Alice Cooper to name a few. An unreleased early mix by Baker of the Chunga’s Revenge track, “Sharleena,” is just one of the many highlights of the studio recordings that also boasts several unearthed rough mixes of the Zappa/Simmons co-write, “Wonderfu l Wino,” including a rare version that showcases vocals and an alternate guitar solo by Zappa that has been lost to the ages as the original multi-track stems were recorded over. Of the material recorded during this two-day span, “Sharleena” was the only song ever officially released – so tracks like “Red Tubular Lighter,” “Giraffe” and an unheard version of “Envelopes” are completely brand new to fans half a century later.
The Fabriani Bros. = Steve Porcaro & David Kamp + friends, in homage to Messrs. Fagen and Becker.
Don’t be like the Covid Kid: Stay home, stay safe, and donate to the MusiCares COVID-19 Relief Fund for musicians whose livelihood has been affected by the pandemic: https://www.grammy.com/musicares/get-...
Let’s bridge this gap until we can hear our musician friends play live again!
Music by Steve Porcaro
Lyrics by David Kamp
Lead vocals by Billy Sherwood (Yes)
Guitars by Denny Dias (Steely Dan) and Marc Bonilla (Keith Emerson, Derek Smalls, Ronnie Montrose)
Drums by Shannon Forrest (Toto, The Dukes of September)
Keyboards by Steve Porcaro (Toto)
A Fabriani Bros. production
Mixed by Mike Ging
Video produced and directed by Ted Kamp
Video edited By Dan Wolfmeyer
Original illustrations by Ross MacDonald
Additional photos and video via Envato
King Crimson's North American tour this summer has been postponed due to the corona virus threat.
"...and it is our intention wherever possible to play exactly the same dates with the Zappa Band on very similar dates in 2021. The rescheduled dates will be confirmed over the coming weeks."
Several Jethro Tull concerts this spring have been cancelled or postponed due to the corona virus threat. Several shows in the UK have been cancelled. The three concerts in Sweden have been postponed to May 2021.
February 29 2000 was the day that Steely Dan released the first album of new songs since Gaucho back in 1980.
I bought the new one and after work I sat down in my sofa with headphones on and listened to the whole album once, twice. three times...
It was amazing to finally be able to listen to the record that had been rumoured for a long time and then announced for real. Twenty years after Gaucho.
I was a happy man that day. And will l give Two Against Nature a spin today on its 20 anniversary.
It ended up being a comeback as well as the band's next to last album. 2003 saw the release of Everything Must Go. And that was it. While the short time of three years between Two Against Nature and Everything Must Go had me hoping for more Steely Dan albums they never appeared.
The band concentrated on touring and Donald Fagen and Walter Becker recorded solo albums.
I was reminded of the day and date by a post in the Dandom.com Facebook group. So on I go ... listening to Gaslighting Abbie and the rest:
started in 2018 to offer "hi-fidelity rarities, demos, and unreleased tracks from Becker's archives, plus downloads, discussion boards, history, context, and pics" to fans old and new.
As of today you can listen to, download for free and discuss - also for free - 27 tracks.
Here's just a couple of them:
Nobody thought there existed any recording of the live show Walter Becker did April 7, 1995 at Slim's in San Francisco. The one and only solo show he did with songs from his album 11 Tracks of Whack. But a recording has been found and here's one song posted:
And this one has been doing the rounds for years as a very, very nth generation cassette copy among the hardcore fans. Returning in a sparkling, shiny way. The story behinf it well worth a read after you've had a listen:
For the first time photographer Keith Macmillan tells the story of how he designed the iconic cover of Black Sabbath's debut album (released in 1970).
Macmillan tells Rolling Stone about some alternate setups with the model Louisa Livingstone. “Any kind of sexuality took away from the foreboding mood. But she was a terrific model. She had amazing courage and understanding of what I was trying to do.”
Alex Winter's film "Zappa" will be premiered at the SXSW (South by Southwest) festival in Austin, Texas in March 2020.
The film is made possible through a kickstarter campaign and the material has been selected while digitalizing the Frank Zappa archives, but it has also been sent by fans to Alex Winter.
Alex Winter writes: "Here's the very first look at our special festival poster for Zappa. It will ONLY be used for festival screenings prior the public release of the film. Photo by the great Bill Gubbins."
