Son of Frank

Tonight I was able to catch the Zappa Plays Zappa show in Wallingford , CT. I was really hesitant to go because, well it was really billed as a Dream Theater show and quite frankly, next to Aerosmith and Lynyrd Skynyrd, is one of the worst, most boring bands I have ever heard.

I am sure down the line I will discuss Dream Theater but tonight's focus was on ZPZ.

This band is a tribute to the legendary composer/guitarist Frank Zappa. I first heard Zappa on the album Apostrohpe(') back in college and soon became obsessed with his music. My favorite albums were always the more jam based ones like Hot Rats, Roxy & Elsewhere and Waka Jawaka.

Frank's son Dweezil who alot of people seem to forget was a voice on the not so hit show Duckman back in the 90's that also featured the voice of Jason Alexander. Dweezil looks and sounds just like his old man, I mean it is really uncanny when he speaks.
A few years ago Dweezil formed a band and began playing tributes to his father's music which was very well receptive. I believe this is now the 4th year the band has been running and after one studio recording it seems like it won't be slowing down.
When the tribute first started the band featured Zappa alumni which was a complete treat. Steve Vai, Terry Bozio, Ike Willis and Napolean Murphy Brock were the alumnists in attendists.
They performed all the Zappa hits with original voices it was great!!

This time there were no special guests but all in all the show was great. The band seemed to focus primarily on the more instrumentational tracks from Frank's very enormous song book. We didn't get Bozio playing the "Black Page" live but we did get some excellent vocals and a really tight band. One of the singers sounded exactly like Frank! When the band played "Montana" I really thought they were using Frank's voice from a recording or something. This guy had the Bass Vocals down and the voice inflection was great.
The set started off with a personal fav: "I'm The Slime" and then the band seemed to showcase the first few tracks of Roxy & Elsewhere, so I was obviously enjoying what I was hearing.
One of my favorite moments was "Village of the Sun" which is always been a favorite tune of mine.
Of course the band played "200 Motels" and "Filthy Habits" but what I liked was Dweezil seemed to grasp what made his father such a good band leader. Moments of cueing the band with hand signs, jumping and running in place moments really added to the show. Even Dweezil's soloing I thought was excellent.
The band ended the night with another favorite of mine, "Willie the Pimp" of course the vocals coudn't quite be there (God Bless Captain Beefheart) but it was a great performance.

I was sad when the show ended because I knew there wouldn't be an encore, or a performance of "Joe's Garage." After the band finished I departed for home, leaving Dream Theater to their non-melodic 16th note fest to some of the lesser human beings.