ZAPPA is the Greatest PROG Artist Ever | according to BEN WATSON
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- Опубліковано 28 вер 2024
- BEN WATSON (born 1956)
is a British writer on music and culture of Marxist views, known especially for his writings on Frank Zappa.
Watson is well known as a regular contributor to The Wire, as well as the author of numerous books, often entailing studies of popular culture from the perspective of Marxist aesthetics. Watson was a member of the British Trotskyist Socialist Workers' Party; his writing combines this background together with influences from Theodor Adorno and the Frankfurt School, the Situationists and wider cultural interests including the writings of James Joyce and J.H. Prynne.
His first full-length book, Frank Zappa: The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play argued that Zappa's work was part of the protest against capitalist society.
Watson calls his own field of study in this area Zappology. He is also an experimental poet and novelist; his first novel Shit-Kicks and Dough-Balls was published in 2003.
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Thanks for this.
To my ears Zappa is without peer.
This video ends with music, because music is the best
Apart from all the other brilliant things about Zappa is that he is one of the few artists who incorporate humour into the mix. A little radical since mainstream culture generally assumes humour means less serious and also of a lower grade than sober work. I find that the humour is also present in the instrumentation as much as the obvious verbiage. And aren't those vibes intrinsically funny?
Spike Jones was an influence... Of course, Zappa took it to the nth degree while throwing in these impossible instrumental passages into many of the "humorous" songs...
Excellent Mr. Watson, thanks for producing Andy.
I will agree with this Ben. Unlike you I did get into Zeppelin, Floyd, Genesis, Yes, King Crimson etc, courtesy of having a brother 7 years older than me. He is also a Zappa freak so he introduced me to him.
I remember finishing my Geography O level, coming out of the school and bumping into my bro …”what are you doing here?” I said.
“Taking you to see Zappa at Hammersmith Odeon!” was the reply :)
Wow, never looked back, adore the man and he became my hero, still is and always will be! Was so fortunate to see him live a few times :)
Imho, he was a genius, one I don’t think we’ll see the likes of again.
My favourite prog album has always been "One Size Fits All"
Interesting chat. Thanks
Thanks for listening
@@AndyEdwardsDrummer my pleasure. I agree with him
Nice t-shirt, Ben!
What came to be called "prog" was light years ahead of the other popular music being shat out, even back then, when even shit had a shine. It was pioneering and not regressive. The pioneering spirit today is in embrace of the new tools, rather than regressively clinging to their trusty rusty old guitars and such that everyTom, Dick and Harry know how to play. Alas...people who are only just now discovering prog are probably not pioneering spirits, but at least they have seen, nay, heard the light eventually. Many never do.
Most of the tech guys are all feeding drug habits of the dancers...
Zappa was quite opinionated about other artists who we today classify as prog. Personally I see him more successful as an iconic satirist of modern culture than as a prog artist, mostly because if I accept prog as a genre (albeit highly variagated in terms of stylistic range), I find calling him prog reductionist, actually. I prefer to call him a rather envious genius, in the sense that he didn't suffer "competition" lightly. His music is very adventurous melodically, rhythmically and harmonically, especially when compared to what most artists produce. I love it to bits, but he's not my faourite artist/composer by far.
I'm rather curious what the contemporary "classical" academia thinks of him; not composers/directors who champoined him like Boulez, but the run-of-the-mill classical world.
Some European orchestras and "modern" orchestras that Zappa worked with have embraced Zappa's work... The big boys who play the top 40 of classical? No dice...
@@DWHarper62 Thank you.
very much run of the mill pianist here, the few people in that environment that i've discussed zappa with (taking into account that mine is not an english speaking country, so frank's appeal is more limited by default) in the classical world seem to love his music; some parts of it or, like in my case, all of its stylistic variants. or most of them, anyway, i still cannot get into the man from utopia.
@@raulperez2308 Thank you Sir.
I'll go with Robert Fripp and Peter Hammill. Regina...
Giants in their own right to be sure...
To me, he's the greatest musical artist, period, prog or otherwise.
One of the best musical minds overall definitely!)
Yes frank sat so outside of everything else that was going on. And He was not the messiah but just a very naughty boy:)
Zappa has obvious genius as a composer and innovator of form, but his music is often sullied beyond redemption with the school yard puerility . For much of his career, his lyrics and monologues soundlike a thirteen-year-old who only learned to swear the week before. Also, his guitar work is not so virtuosic as his fans think. He has a unique and identifiable style, but that does not make for the simplicity and repetitiousness and sloppiness of his solos.
Sloppiness = you don't understand how Zappa uses rhythm and harmony... And he is the ONLY artist (Garcia too) who completely improvises every solo... You do understand what satire is? Right?
@@DWHarper62Well, we disagree. Zappa has a style perfectly suited for brief solos but is someone who gets messy and , honestly, dull, the longer he plays. John McLaughlin, who loves Zappa as a composer, thought much the same, saying "...he was taking very long guitar solos. 10-15 minute guitar solos and really he should have taken two- or three-minute guitar solos, because they were a little bit boring." Zappa and Garcia are not the only ones entirely improvising their solos, as many generations of brilliant jazz musicians before FZ's arrival demonstrate. Jazz, an an American art form predicated on virtuoso improvisations on melody. Lastly, of course I know what he does is satire, but giving his lyrics a classy literary genre to belong to doesn't make it funny, witty, insightful or truth -telling of any distinction. Again, Zappa is the most impressive composer to come out of the rock era, and it is his instrumental music that is the basis for the claim of genius. But the man did things that were a drag, the biggest offenders being his pedestrian humor and his interminable noodling .
@@TedBurke And Zappa thought McLaughlin was a wanker... Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar should be studied for centuries...
@@TedBurke This great composer you admire musically is creating out of thin air, complete compositions, every night, spontaneously using his knowledge, skill and instinct (he is NOT sloppy) and because YOU get bored, it's no good?...
@@DWHarper62 Again, we disagree. He was capable of being very messy as a soloist. And his improvisations, creating whole compositions from "thin air" every night, are hardly new with Zappa. Coltrane, Albert Ayler, Dolphy, Keith Jarrett, Larry Coryell, Cecil Taylor, generations of geniuses before them, have been doing since the early part of the 20th century. There is also a tradition of complex and precise improvisations in classical music from centuries before. In that regard, Zappa was late to the game, though one has to say he was , occasionally, sublime. I credit Zappa for his never equaled status as the best composer and band leader rock has ever had. But even geniuses have their weaknesses. Satire and long form improvisations were not Zappa's strongest assets.
I'm beginning to think that I think too much about music.
The end of this video is brilliant if you’ve watched this and you don’t get it, you never will go on asking yourself how much is that doggie in the window for the rest of your life?
Zappa, based upon actual output, is for me, another one of those artists put on such high a pedestal that should be more at ground level. I tried hard to give him a try but all that really came across in the end was jumbled, muddy, often incoherent, disjointed mess.
I did however note one thing that he shares with another massively overrated artists, Price, what a consummate guitarist he was. So in those moments of brief, rocking glory, I could enjoy. But that catastrophic mess that surrounded these short moments of enjoyment was never even close enough to allow for any form of continual and contiguous enjoyment.
Katie Price?
Yep. Gets a good tune going then spoils it by trying to be funny.
True beauty lies in the ear of the beholder. McOrd
A freak, but never a hippie.
Xenochrony
Ben seems a decent guy ! Here comes the but What a load of over intellectualised bollox ! Try doing a Mingus “Better git it in Your Soul”
We must have different definitions of prog if Zappa is prog. Huh? Zappa is Zappa--just because it is more complex than basic blues-based rock does not make it prog for me at least. Concept albums? Beatles and Dylan did it first and they weren't prog--or maybe for you Dylan is prog? Zappa was eclectic and inventive, yes, but lots of artists are and are not prog. If I had to put him in a box with a label, I would very grudgingly say (California) fusion pushed through a Weird Al Yankovic filter. If Yes is the ultimate prototype of prog-rock, then there is nothing except for the instrumental talent that Zappa has in common with them.
Dude, Sgt. Pepper''s was admittedly a rip off of Freak Out... Which concept album you speaking of by Dylan? He was a chameleon in the 60's but concept album?
@@DWHarper62 Admittedly by who? if a musician says they are influenced by another, that is not a rip off. If that were true then Freak Out! is also a rip off. Sheesh. Nothing is completely original. Oh, Bob Dylan--Nashville Skyline, John Wesley Harding--later Blood on the Tracks, Saved, Love and Theft. Oh, and what concept runs through Freak Out! except eclecticism? It's great musicianship and composition meets Wierd Al Yankovic.... Dude.
Was Zappa prog? No, in my opinion. If he was any genre at all, it was the Frank Zappa genre. And he was the only one in it.
I think you should keep your banal impressions to yourself.
You should too
@@AndyEdwardsDrummer I don't make garbage videos showing my ignorance though.
No..just banal comments
Without deviation from the norm, PROGress is not possible...
Yes frank is the most important artist of the 20th century in my opinion.
Bob Marley also has good credentials, maybe even better.
Im not sure if i would use the word Prog
How about
Deviation from the norm music
Why is Zappa the greatest prog artist? Was working with orchestras while the Moody Blues were still a blues band, released concept albums from the very start, had total control of album artwork, wasn't tethered down to any one genre, was prog before the term was invented, was boldly creating his personal prog soundscape while everybody else was still awkwardly fumbling through psychedelia, and when prog went out of style in the late 70s early 80s doubled down on the virtuosity instead of retreating yet incorporating bits of punk & new wave & metal & adding some reggae & disco even rap to keep things current, & never compromising for the sake of selling additional units & getting more radio airplay, and built his own studio to remain independent & left the record companies to start his own labels, and sold by mail-order to compensate for the lack of distribution, and 30 years later is still more prolific than every other artist, you can't get more progressive than that ‼️
This is more Ben championing Zappa over our British prog bands with lots of personsl stories
Can you explain how you see 'never compromising' as compatible with his adding elements of current pop styles? I think most would view this as a compromise - I thought it was a widely derided practice of the creatively spent. And would you say this is equally the case with the live Zappa and the studio Zappa?
@@Mekchanoid Because in Zappa's case it wasn't "compromising", it was "assimilation"... groking and taking what was useful from current and popular genres, and incorporating into his repertoire to express his concepts and statements in different ways. For instance, his use of reggae in different pieces was used to parody, make political statements, ambience, etc, sometimes all in the same song (see "We Got To Live Together" on The Man From Utopia). Same with his use of punk and metal... possibly every genre he felt the need to use, including rock and classical.
pastiche music.
Very very well said! Hip hip hooray!
It's hard to avoid the impression that whoever set the sound levels for the music was desperate to prevent anyone hearing what Ben had to say!
He did say it was hard to talk over Zappa.
@@Les537 But it wasn't Zappa...
It wasn’t? I thought it was Frank noodling on top of other mothers also boiling noodles. I’ll agree Frank was so hard to define and he certainly is right up top with the greatest prog artists. I say that because because sometimes I want to hear Genesis or Tull or Yes. Which yes you can talk over or about.
Frank on the other hand, not necessarily the best at what he did, but was the only one who did what he did.
I would really have liked to be able to hear what is said in the last part of the vídeo.
That was on purpose. It was to simulate that style of production from early Zappa and the psychedelic stuff. Check out Didja Get Any Onya from Weasels Ripped My Flesh. Lowell George gets drowned out. It's the desired effect.
Zappa was the greatest melodist of the 20th century.
Footage of Zappa playing stratocaster is from "Illinois Enema Bandit" guitar solo, Barcelona (Spain) 1988 concert
Appreciate the P. K. Dick shirt. Brilliant author.
The first thing I noticed! It looks like the Robert Crumb drawing.
Hot Rats, in 1969, shredded all of these preconceptions.
HR hooked me in at a tender age.
Is this your new A.I. Andy?
Interesting talk, but as he dislike most Prog acts, I think on idealogical grounds, his view that Zappa is the greatest Prog artist doesn't hold much weight.
I like some of Zappa's stuff, but I find him to be redundant. He kind of played the same thing over and over again, it all being a variation of itself. I find his fan base to be a little bit too exclusive and close minded, a bit like some kind of cult. I think Zappa was an interesting person, sharp and witty, but he was kind of obtuse in his musical views. His uncompromising attitude worked against him, I think. His guitar solos are truly unique, but repetitive. But hey, he's Frank Zappa and it's good that we had him around.
For me it's funny that Mr. Watson slowly gets drowned out. Honestly I don't share much in common with his perspective. An arbiitour of " authenticity" deriding music that doesn't wear its primitive roots on its sleeve. An ironically elitist perspective in it's own way. I love Zappa but would have no desire to discover him based on Mr. Watson's discussion.
I find Mr. Watson to be quite irritating yet also insightful. I suppose this reaction is not so far from my basic thoughts and feelings about Zappa himself: I truly dislike his personality, but the music is almost always worth listening to. There is perhaps no cultural figure about whom I feel so conflicted. In the end I agree that he probably is the greatest PROG artist ever.
Ouch. You must not live in the US, where Frank predicted a what is happening in this country 40 years ago. I think pretty much everything Frank had to say was informative, bright and way ahead of its time.
The USA needs Frank Zappa now more than it ever did anything to take down Trump and I think Frank could’ve done it
I had to turn on subtitles towards the end because the jam was mixed too bloody high. I feel like Frank would have loved it tho!
Then your feelings lead you correctly. It is on purpose. It's about Zappa, where is the conceptual continuity? Try next Wednesday
People always told me to listen to Zappa. So I did, many times. I never liked it. It sounds like something that would play on a cheesy comedy movie or cereal commercial. They're great musicians but I can't stand their joke type music. Some of their music starts out good but then turns into a joke. Sorry Zappa fans!
Frank Zappa played a bicycle on Steve Allen's Television Show in the 1950's. The dude PLAYED A BICYCLE!!!!! Do you know how off the wall away from the norm your mind has to be to do that? Zappa was an innovative genius and wrote from the very edge of the norm. Sometimes he stepped into that norm and sometimes he was a million miles away from it. But through it all, he was uniquely his own man and that is an artist.
I can't speak to whether FZ was the "greatest" prog artist, but he was surely the first. He was combining rock with classical, jazz, avant garde and world musics, as early as 1966. That combination of musics is the very definition of what prog is. And when you read interviews with the prog pioneers, they invariably cite Zappa as a prime influence.
I was a teen prog lover back in the 1970s, and I paid a lot of attention to what was going on with music.
If somebody else thinks something is great, that means nothing to me.
What matters to me is how a band makes me feel, which depends on how good their songs are and how they resonate with me.
Not coincidentally, what has been true for me has also been true for vast numbers of other people.
So, Yes made me feel something and took me away. Same for Led Zeppelin, Rush, early Genesis, the Grateful Dead, and sometimes Pink Floyd. Never even remotely happened for me with Frank Zappa. His songs had no meaning for me. No relevance. No connection to my soul. So, I have no reverence for him whatsoever. Same for Jeff Beck, btw.
It's great to finally have Bob Fleming on the channel
I would take anyone with a Phillip K. Dick T shirt's word as gospel ! Do one on the best sci-fi writers, Andy
Great point, progressive music can be viscerally compelling... it is the path to the sublime. A lot of bands lost sight of that protean force by the late 70's. It is also my main issue with late Steely Dan. Writing my press release for this debut preview single and this is great stuff to write to.
I was Friends with Urban Gwerder who released the quite famous Fanzine Hot Ratz Times in the late 60ties and early 70ties and lost his Zappa in the late 70ties when he felt that Zappa became ever more zynical and developed a Contempt for his Fans.
The Sidemen became more professional their Personality unimportant. They became Funktionairies like Musicians in a classical Orchestra.
I saw his 1988 Concert in Zürich and it was brilliant, but as we all know now, that Band hated its Musical Director, and instead of listening to his Musicians he disbanded the Orchestra.
I really like the bigger Part of his Music but not so much his Satire.
But since I can listen to English without digging the Words that is not so much a Problem for me.
Well yeah. If only Frank were Prog.
Man, I remember when I was a big Zappa fan in the early 90s and the only books I could get on him were the Zappa / Occhiogrosso book and Watson's Negative Dialectics. Needless to say I read the former but I've always wanted to go back and find out some of Ben's insights. Having studied a bit of critical theory since, I'm pretty sure I still wouldn't get any of it.
Shame you fucked up your video with these weird visual effects!
Kind of defeats the point having Ben talk underneath Zappas licks don't you think? (Unless it's intentional) I wouldn't mind hearing the rest of what he had to say, remix perhaps Andy?
I believe it made it sound very Zappa like.
Ben of the Watsonian Institute?
Hallo, Bob Flemming here...
Bob Fleming.
Love the t shirt. My favourite author.
Can't understand a fucking word with those Images in the foreground!!!
Sorry...my bad....unless that was on purpose, but then this would be art and not information, and as you information is not knowledge, knowledge is not wisdom, Wisdom is not truth, Truth is not Beauty, and Beauty is not Love...
Andy you should host a prog-Jazz Fusion themed trivia show featuring the guys from Sea of Tranquility from- "In the prog seat".
You mean progressive? I keep thinking two things. with the terminology "prog" as a genre, and "progressive " as an adjective.
Agreed. Prog and Progressive are clearly two different beasts.
Ok, why did you drown Watson out?
Like Watson, I grew up in the 70s (more like straddling the 70s and 80s - I'm 9 yrs younger).
I turned on to Zappa with Joe's Garage. My friends and I thought it a naughty teen secret that we shared. The problem is, however, that I've had trouble appreciating most of his other stuff. I do appreciate his immense talent but most of it just doesn't click with me.... for the reasons Watson lists in his video. It demands too much. Every album is different which keeps one off balance. It's like a lot of jazz. People keep telling me I'm supposed to love it but I can't quite get into it. At times I almost feel like I'm just not smart enough to get it.
I think this is a common thing! I started with a tape of You Are What You Is and then spent years looking for a Zappa album that was anything like it. I persevered, learned about his various bands, and I now like loads of them. When I used to make electronic music I loved listening to his electronic works, there's so much to learn there once you get over how ridiculously quantised they are.
Follow up question re Joe's: Do you find yourself singing 'My balls feel like a pair maracas!' at inappropriate moments?
@@Mekchanoid "I love it... with leather..." We were all in cadets and amended the lyrics of 'Crew' Slut to 'Corps' Slut. It was the days before the internet so we had to scramble to look up what a Telefunken U 47 was.
Ben Watson once blatantly lied about our "Great Pop Things" cartoon in NME. He said in the bloody awful Wire magazine that we'd said Improvised Music is Rubbish when we had said nothing of the kind. He is a duplicitous twat. I happen to think FZ is the most interesting pop star ever, but caveat emptor.
Wow, I've never heard anyone describe the Wire magazine that way! I know it represents a different part of musical culture to NME, but I'd like to hear the reasons for the antagonism!
@@Mekchanoid er.....blatantly lying about our cartoon (see above) and refusing to print a retraction. I used to think "t's a lifestyle mag for pseuds but at least they're honest!" turned out I was wrong about that last bit.
I like only Zappas guitar solos on Gibson SG
Pink Napkins = Strat...
Most of SUNPYG is a Les Paul...
Dear Ben Watson,
I read The Negative Dialectic of Poodle Play from cover to cover while recovering from a spinal injury in 1999, truly a remarkable work, thank you. My appreciation of Frank Zappa’s work would still be deep, but incomplete, without your book.
If you ever do get down to London to see Ben, we’ll have to get together and get him into Cardiacs ( he tells me they sound like Queen to him(!!))
When I used to sit with my friend playing records, the evening would always end when Zappa went on. So dense, nothing else could follow it. Until we discovered Cardiacs… same, but more so.
No matter what you are gonna say in this video but it's true!)
Why?
If Frank Zappa was a prog artist, he was pretty much alone.
Who should then compete with him for the position of " The Greatest"?
With the genres that Zappa served, I can only think of one who was comparable diverse at high level: the Italian Franco Battiato.
So: how many composers of the 20th century other than these two, created music that transcended so diverse genre bounderies?
I could not agree more. Zappa was a one of a kind innovator.
I would enjoy a mammoth video with you and Ben discussing some of the ideas in 'The Negative Dialectics...' . I usually have a low tolerance for that kind of thing, but I thought that book was fascinating. (And FZ also thought so of course being as how he invited Ben to his house to read bits of it to him).
Never doubted Zappa's talent or even genius. He just made music that didn't grab me. It was stuff I never felt the need to hear more than a time or two. A lot of Zappa feels disposable to me. Greatest prog rock artist ever? Meh, whatever. I love prog but he just doesn't interest me.
I love the Time Machine music which proved Ben's point, sort of. Ben's book is enjoyable and insightful, though I have to disagree with Ben about Montana. I think it really is about starting up a dental floss farm. Why? Because the very idea is hilarious.
Love it when the commentary fades into the music with the psychedelic visuals. Reminds me of "Didja Get Any Onya".......(ven i vas a young boy in guhmany)
At 10:45 the video does a Zappa and begins to take a leisurely turn into the weird, somewhat annoying but, as the talk is subsumed by the soloing , I begin to get the point. Great presentation.
But? --, Most great bands at that time (and still now I think to) were higher educated people, so they had the money to buy the equipment, it was not affordable these days!
That bit in the middle made me go all dizzy.
Dunno who Ben Edwards is but I liked what he had to say and how he said it. Ask him to do something about biscuits and spicey politics and I'll watch it.
Frank had control over a dynamic universe of music that actually had some reach in the golden phase of rock. He's the musicians hero of the scene if it clicks.
Thanks Andy & Ben.
Listening to Zappa before prog, 60’s.
Brilliant!!!
I could taste the middle earth section.
Agree with you 100% mate.
I couldn't hear half of it.
Actually a quarter
@@AndyEdwardsDrummer I was using an idiom. I'm a big fan BTW. I was in a band based in Stourbridge in the early 70s and Robert Plant would come to our gigs. Rubber Rhino it was called. And thank you for introducing me to Cardiacs.
Do you remember Jon Bates?
@@AndyEdwardsDrummer No. I didn't know Robert Plant well. Our conga player had been his landlord. That was the connection. There were vague promises of a record deal on their new label but nothing happened. We were with Elephant Management and supported a lot of their acts - Arthur Brown and Ian Dury in particular. Happy days.
Absolutely fantastic have a wonderful day Andy ❤😊
Thank you! You too!
I appreciate what you were doing (jolting us out of our compacency a la FZ) but it would be good if - as someone else suggested - you did another version where we could hear the stuff he was saying at the end.
No it wouldn't...unless I'm a fool and I don't have a plan...conceptual continuity!
You should do best Synth or Electric Organ solos. If you want you can make Krautrock a separate category (to be fair), and then prog. rock.
Hello Sailor
I really enjoyed that. Thanks, Ben and Andy.
Our pleasure!
Ben Watson, if I'm not mistaken, is still writing the official biography of Zappa - apparently it should be a funny book...
He did...a legend in the world of Zappa...stayed at Zappa's house too
Yes, I read his previous book about Zappa, and I also probably agree with him about Joyce)
Andy, have you heard “The Argus”, by Ween?
I have not
@@AndyEdwardsDrummer
You should check it out (rhetorically implied by the question). It’s a brilliant song that distills (IMO) the essence of prog into a 5 min, accessible masterpiece. Check out the UA-cam video from Live in Chicago.
Ween shifts gears and distills styles song to song. The opening track (“It’s Gonna Be a Long Night”) on the album, is Motorhead-esque, etc
That album (Quebec), and The Mollusk are really worth checking out. Claude Coleman is a fantastic drummer, but I’m pretty sure it’s Josh Freese on the studio track as Coleman had been in a car accident. The 90’s rock distillation “Transdermal Celebration” has a guitar solo(in Lydian) w a great anecdote:
“Dean Ween recorded the guitar solo on "Transdermal Celebration" illicitly using Carlos Santana's guitar and amplifier at a storage space where it was to be shipped to New York. After being informed by a roadie, he took a hard disk recorder with him and successfully recorded it in ten minutes without getting caught.” (Wiki)
I can't get in him - I tried - too much joke's and less music
Look up the fable of the blind men and the elephant... Frank is the elephant...
I think this might be a lazy cliche at this point because while they're are jokes, there's simply far more music going on than anything else
Never mind His Flo and Eddie day’s but dig deep for his atonal music Varese style for example Lumpy Gravy
Yes, we're here to debate. I say "Yes", because for me that band are the greatest purveyors of prog. Unless I've listened to all the wrong Zappa, the two elements missing are moments of stunning beauty (e.g. Soon, And You and I, Your Move) and satisfying climaxes (e.g. Heart of the Sunrise, Awaken). Feel free to direct me to such Zappa should it exist. I'm willing to convert!
I hold Yes as my #1 too. Zappa is my #2. What they share, for me, is brilliance: 'Wow! How (the fuck) did they come up with this?!' But that is in the head. 'Stunning beauty' is more in the guts?