Frank Zappa

Frank Zappa remains as much of a cultural oddity now as he first did when he broke onto the counterculture scene with The Mothers of Invention. As a moustachioed man who eternally went against the grain, he was the antidote to The Beatles, the Velvet Underground and just about every other buzz band he set his sights on. Heralding originally from the hills of Maryland, Zappa seems to have been cut from a different cloth.

Unlike most emerging musicians of the 1960s, Zappa was not inspired by blues and early rock ‘n’ roll but rather by avant-garde modern classical music. In fact, as a teenager in Los Angeles, he developed somewhat of an obsession with the French composer Edgard Varese during his days as a high school drummer. Thus, when he emerged with The Mothers of Invention in 1965, his underground output was never going to be straightforward.

Their debut album Freak Out! was only the second double album ever released after Bob Dylan’s Blonde on Blonde. It contained a similar sagacious political point of view to his beloved Dylan too. Zappa stood firmly against American consumer culture. Instead, he advocated a spiritual but strictly drug-free lifestyle. This sustained throughout his entire career.

Regarded as one of the greatest guitarists in history, he often spoke of how drugs hindered his esteemed cohorts like Jimi Hendrix. Nevertheless, the pair were friends and admirers of each other’s boundary-pushing work. This also stretched to his Dadaist lyrics and use of comedy. Later solo records like ‘Titties and Beer’ and ‘Don’t Eat Yellow Snow’ are near-enough pure comedic outings.

Nevertheless, Zappa had a very serious fanbase. His cult status was particularly legendary when it came to his live performances. Eventually, he played with the likes of Ringo Starr, Steve Vai, the London Symphony Orchestra, and many more as he aimed to put on ever-expanding shows. In fact, his final tour – when he was too sick to play – saw him enlist his own German chamber ensemble, Tom Waits, and more to recite a modern-classic take on his biggest hits.

When the late counter-counterculture icon passed away in 1993, his legacy was affirmed as an inscrutable man and a guitar master with a wicked sense of humour. As he said himself: “Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible.” Zappa deviated so far from the norm that he was almost an outsider artist.