Zappa and Machine

 
I Don't Even care
One Man, One Vote
Little Beige Sambo
Aerobics In Bondage
We're Turning Again
Alien Orifice
Yo cats
What's New In Baltimore?
Porn Wars
The odd mixture of tracks on this album made more sense on the original LP release, where a person was treated to one side of "band" material followed by a side of Synclavier pieces.

As such, Frank Zappa Meets The Mothers Of Prevention is a good album for anyone who is curious about Frank's Synclavier work but would like the cushion of some "normal stuff" as well.

The "band" material is from the Steve Vai period, for the most part, but I believe Ike Willis' vocals were added later. There are two instrumentals (non-synclavier) that are real classics and will help the uninitiated to get a better idea of where the Synclavier pieces are coming from.

The title itself comes from Porn Wars which is the real focal point of this album.

Taking the taped transcripts of the PMRC-instigated media circus (the 1985 Senate hearings on the possibility of rating rock records), Frank whipped up a 12-minute montage of Synclavier sound mixed with several of the speakers at the hearings saying things like, "Bend up and smell my anal vapors."

 

 
Night School
The Beltway Bandits
While You were Art II
Jazz From Hell
G-Spot Tornado
Damp ankles
St. Etienne
Massaggio Galore
Frank and the Synclavier go head to head, turning out an album of tense, challenging instrumentals.

Jazz from Hell has a bit of everything you could imagine from Frank (except vocals). although, it might take you a while to warm up to the fact that a machine is generating all those sounds instead of "real live" musicians.

This album is an inovative masterpiece and even earned frank a Grammy nomination.

If you can get your hands on Video From Hell, you will get to see frank performing the guitar solo St. Etienne (the only piece on the album delivered via "real" musicians), 6 minutes of clean-toned genius which, alone, is practically worth the price of this CD

 

 
"This Is Phaze III"
Put A Motor In Yourself
"Oh - Umm"
They Made Me Eat It
Reagan at Bitburg
"A Very Nice Body"
Navanax
"How The Pigs' Music Works"
Xmas Values
"Dark water!"
Amnerika
"Have You Heard their Band?"
Religious Superstition
"saliva Can Only take so Much"
Buffalo Voice
"Someplace Else Right Now"
Get A Life
"A Kayak (On Snow)"
N-Lite
---- I. Negative Light
--- II. Venice Submerged
-- III. The New World Order
-- IV. The Lifestyle You deserve
--- V. Creationism
-- VI. He Is Risen		 "I wish Motorhead would come Back"
Secular Humanism
"Attack! Attack! Attack!"
I Was In a drum
"A different Octave"
"This ain't CNN"
"The Pigs' Music"
A Pig with wings
"This Is all Wrong"
Hot And Putrid
"Flowing Inside-Out"
"I Had A dream about That"
Gross Man
"A Tunnel Into Muck"
Why Not?
"Put A Little Motor In 'Em"
"You're Just Insultin' Me, Aren't You?"
"Cold Light Generation"
Dio Fa
"That Would Be The End Of that"
Beat The Reaper
Waffenspiel
Lumpy Gravy turned inside-out, upside-down and multiplied to the nth degree, Civilization Phaze III is very likely the most challenging album in the Zappa catalog.

Conceived as an "opera-pantomime with choreographed physical activity", this album tells the continuing saga of those people inside the piano from Lumpy Gravy. Along the way, the listener is treated to several intense pieces of music that can only be described as visionary.

That said, there are probably few people who will ever appreciate the amount of work that must have gone into this project and fewer still who will ever come to truly understand where Frank was headed.

While I enjoy this album a lot, most of the time I find myself skipping over the dialog sections in favor of the music. I'm sure this is not what Zappa had in mind, but judging from his later interviews, he would probably be surprised that anyone even bothered to listen at all.