Posts Tagged ‘Aynsley Dunbar’

FRANK ZAPPA And The MOTHERS – ” The Mothers 1970 ” 50th Anniversary Box Set

Posted: June 21, 2020 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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Zappa Records/UMe will next month issue “The Mothers 1970”, a four-CD Frank Zappa box set which features 70 unreleased tracks from the short-lived 1970 line-up of the Mothers of Invention.
The band during this period last around seven months and was Aynsley Dunbar, George Duke, Ian Underwood, Jeff Simmons, and Flo & Eddie (aka Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman).

This new box set features over four hours of unreleased music, with the first CD featuring unheard studio sessions from Trident Studios in London England (with engineer Roy Thomas Baker) and the remainder offering historical live performances mostly captured by Zappa’s own tape recorder (a UHER recorder).

All recordings were sourced from their original tapes discovered in The Vault and digitally transferred and compiled by Travers in 2020. Some tracks were mixed by Craig Parker Adams and the collection was mastered by John Polito at Audio Mechanics. The Mothers line-up that included Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman, is one of my favourite periods in Frank Zappa’s musical history. Howard and Mark did some amazing vocals for their group, The Turtles, and as back-up singers for Marc Bolan & T. Rex, but really stole the show when doing lead vocal harmonies (and naughty satirical dialogues with Frank) as the reincarnation of The Mothers for the 1970-1972 live performances. I loved this stuff when I was in my early teens, plus the fact that my mom and dad really hated it made it even more alluring.  Historical live performances mostly captured by Zappa’s own tape recorder.

The Mothers 1970 is presented in a clamshell box and includes a booklet and a button. It has been produced by Ahmet Zappa and Joe Travers and will be released on 26th June 2020.

FRANK ZAPPA and The MOTHERS OF INVENTION – ” Carnegie Hall ” October 11th 1971

Posted: April 14, 2020 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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Frank Zappa

The American composer and rock & roll provocateur, Frank Zappa, died at age 52 almost two decades ago, on December 4th, 1993. At the time of his passing, his official discography totaled 62 albums released under his own name and that of his landmark combo, the Mothers of Invention.

He is still putting records out, at a remarkable pace, under the vigilant aegis of his wife Gail and the Zappa Family Trust’s Vaultmeister, archivist Joe Travers. According to the fine print on the back, Carnegie Hall – a four-CD set of Zappa’s two shows at New York’s symphonic palace on October 11th, 1971

Zappa Records and UMe have repackaged this 2011 website-exclusive 4-CD set in more compact 3-CD fashion for general release.  “Carnegie Hall” chronicles Zappa and the Mothers of Invention’s October 11th, 1971 shows at the famed New York venue from the original mono tapes.  This version drops the opening set by The Persuasions but includes all of Zappa and the Mothers’ material from both shows.  The Mothers’ lineup includes three alumni of The Turtles – bassist Jim Pons and vocalists Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman, a.k.a. Flo and Eddie – plus Ian Underwood, Don Preston, and Aynsley Dunbar.

According to New York promoter Ron Delsener’s Carnegie Hall liner note, Zappa and his ’71 Mothers keyboard players Don Preston and Ian Underwood (the latter also on alto sax), ex-John Mayall drummer Aynsley Dunbar and three former Turtles, bassist Jim Pons and singer-jesters Mark “Flo” Volman and Howard “Eddie” Kaylan –only got through the backstage door because Delsener told the venue’s booking manager that the boss Mother “was a very accomplished classical musician.” Which was true, although the only strings in this band were on Zappa’s guitar.

The complete 7:30 and 11 p.m. shows in this box were recorded by the leader in mono with a single microphone and concealed tape machine (probably to avoid union hassles). The fidelity is remarkably clear and full-bodied, even with the inevitable room echo. This is also a rare chance to hear the “Flo and Eddie” Mothers’ full range of operatic lunacy and underrated small-combo instrumental drive. An LP-sized dose, Fillmore East – June 1971, had been issued shortly before these concerts; another, 1972’s “Just Another Band from L.A.”, had just been taped.

But Carnegie Hall is all that fun at length – the bawdy rock-star mockery of “The Mud Shark,” reprised from Fillmore East; an even longer “Billy the Mountain” than the one on “Just Another Band” plus surprising excavations from Uncle Meat, a long new piece called “Divan” (about a sofa and a magic pig) and a weirdly funky rewiring of the paranoia in Freak Out! “Who Are the Brain Police?” A chunk of “King Kong” 30 minutes goes to an overlong drum solo, but such were the times.

Ironically, Zappa’s orchestral work was never performed in Carnegie Hall in his lifetime. After his death, though, Zappa’s long-form fable, “The Adventures of Greggary Peccary” (issued on 1978’s Studio Tan), rendered in full, by an orchestra. Carnegie Hall marked Zappa’s first and last night on that stage. He never left the building.