What can I say about this elixir? Try it on steaks, cleans nylons, small crafts warning! It's great for the home, the office, on fruits!!!Just a couple years after Zappa failed to get his Uncle Meat movie made (and had to settle instead for a double soundtrack album that is one of the highlights of his early career), he somehow managed to not only put out another double soundtrack album - this time we also got the movie, 200 Motels. I'm curious about how Zappa got this movie made after giving up on Uncle Meat. My guess is that the involvement of big-name rock stars Ringo Starr and Keith Moon is what gave 200 Motels the backing it needed to get finished. Well, not really finished - Frank said that he only achieved a fraction of what he was trying to do with the movie before the money ran out, but at least it was released.
The soundtrack is a blending of orchestra, rock band and spoken-word excerpts similar to what Zappa did on the Lumpy Gravy album, but this time on an even grander scale. You don't have see the movie to enjoy the soundtrack album, but it helps.
The plotline of the movie is simple on the surface - the basic plot can be summed up as "touring can make you crazy". We get to see a surreal, stylized version of what it's like to be in a rock band on the road, as they visit small towns, redneck bars, and of course, 200 motels. Meanwhile, the devil tries to tempt members of the band, some members leave for exciting new solo careers (not wanting to play Zappa's "comedy music" any more), and other members compete for the attention of groupies. In other words, Frank just observed what was happening around him and wrote a sort of rock opera about it.
The first side of the album, with all the tuna sandwich stuff, sets up the lifestyle of the touring band - rock and roll interviews, and discovering that each small town is just like the last small town. Next, the band encounters local redneck Cowboy Burt, who doesn't take kindly to these long-haired punks ("What the fuck was that...Hey twerp, play me something I can enjoy!"). After that, we learn about the lifestyle of groupies, as they prepare themselves for an evening of meeting the rock stars.
Side three begins with the music from an animated section of the movie. One of the band members does some drugs and ends up trying to steal his entire hotel room while making plans to embark on a fabulous career as a solo artist. Most of this occurs during "Dental Hygiene Dilemma", which is one of my favorite tracks from the album (and the source of the quote at the top of this review). After that, the band and the groupies finally get to interact. Then the album goes into a section that no one seems to know what to make of - the bits with the nun suit, the newts, the lad and the girl. This is dada in action, and Zappa music at its strangest. My theory is that by this point the musicians have finally gone crazy, so this section isn't really supposed to make sense. Maybe Zappa composed it after a long day on the road to that 200th motel.
The album concludes with the epic "Strictly Genteel / 200 Motels Finale". "Strictly" is one of the most conventionally beautiful pieces Frank ever wrote. In this version, the beauty of the song is downplayed by the addition of some goofy and humorous lyrics (which are appropriate for the movie) - those who would like to hear an instrumental orchestral version can pick up the London Symphony Orchestra album. After "Strictly Genteel", the rock band comes back to the forefront to end the album with an absurd but rockin' finale song.
For the CD release, Ryko added several bonus tracks. Nothing essential, but it's nice to have the radio promos. I love the one that has the serious-announcer-type guy saying "The wide screen erupts with absurdities; explodes with spine-tingling psychological terror. The mere human mind boggles at the philosophical implications as Frank Zappa's 200 Motels is unleashed in the totality of its pagan splendor, its primordial fury, star studded cast and everything!". Disc 2 also contains a three minute trailer for the movie in Quicktime and MPG formats.
The Flo and Eddie period of Zappa's output is probably my least favorite, but it's all redeemed by 200 Motels. This seems to be what it was all leading up to, and this album ties the conceptual continuity of that period together nicely. It's got several classic Zappa tracks - "Mystery Roach", "Lonesome Cowboy Burt", "Magic Fingers", etc. There's also the great orchestral material, some of which would get reworked later in Zappa's career (a lot of it shows up on disc 2 of the LSO album).
As an aside, I'd like to thank Rykodisc for this album's existence on CD. They had to pay MGM for the rights to the material, and then went all out in lavishly packaging it...only to have it sell poorly and have the Zappa Family Trust sic their lawyers on them (for reasons no one really understands). So thanks Ryko, at least a small group of hard-core Zappa fans appreciated it. Another aside - anyone else notice that Ringo is seen twice in the fold-out theater poster found inside the CD case, but in the same picture on the album cover, one Ringo has been painted out entirely and the other is given a white mask to hide his indentity? I wonder what the story is behind that.
One last word of warning about the sound quality - it's not great. As someone who paid $40 for a used vinyl copy just months before the CD version was released, I can testify that the album never sounded very good, so it's not just the CD transfer. It's kind of muffled and lacks low and high ends. But don't let that stop you from getting it if you think it would appeal to you - the quality of the music makes up for the slightly sub-par sound quality.
review by Bob Eichler — 3-2-05 —
