It is said that true immortality is achieved only when one becomes part of the popular culture’s collective consciousness. This being said, I wasn’t too surprised to find this reference to Frank Zappa in the Serpent’s Tail anthology, Intoxication: an anthology of stimulant-based writing, edited by Toni Davidson:
“Rancy had only ever been in at Whitey and Bammo’s the five times. It would always be the same — one of his mates would be wanting a bit blow, and what with every other source in the town run dry, they’d’ve ended up at Whitey and Bammo’s; where, ritually, you got teased by the kids, got attacked by the cats and you had to listen to Frank fucking Zappa. ‘Zappaaaaahhhh!’ as Whitey called him. ‘Zappaaaaahhhh!'”
“Moving Target” by Gordon Legge, p.91
What’s wrong with listening to Zappa?!?!
Pff.
I don’t know. Should Great Musicians belong to present day popular imagination during their life time? Is that a criterion? It’s about ” to hit”.
That’s the US instant success rate.
That sort of approach made , no still makes them overlook their great ones.
I’m not even talking about Ives or Copland.
Just have a look at http://netnewmusic.net/reblog/
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. For instance I do it often.
Question is: when does somebody happen to be a great composer? I do not really believe that this should be directly linked to the fact that he/ she is an icon in popular culture. The answer- according to me is : history will tell.
By the way. Did you notice that the LA Philharmonic is programming FZ’s music in January 2008 ( Disney Hall LA)?
Unfortunately, there are people who simply do not like the music of Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention. This is no doubt why so many of us have taken on the “freak” sobriquet as our own.
Maybe if some hardcore Zappa fans hijacked a major radio station and make them play non-stop Zappa for a day, then maybe a lot more people will realise what a genius (P.S. I’m not advocating this for real, ‘cos it would be breaking the law!).