Frank Zappa
Zappa In New York (40th
Anniversary) ZAPPA/UMC
Expanded package from
legendary Christmas ’76
NYC Palladium shows.
Uniquely, the first thing the true
Zappa aficionado hopes for
from a 40th anniversary digital
reissue is that the team at the
Zappa Family Trust (this time
led by project producer Ahmet
Zappa) have returned the
artefact they loved so dearly in
its original vinyl form back to
how it sounded before its initial
digital release at the dawn of
the nineties.
Zappa, always keen to
embrace fresh audio technology,
transferred his catalogue to
digital prematurely (adding
various after-the-fact
moustaches to Mothers Mona
Lisas along the way – fresh bass
parts, radical remixes – but that’s
another story). The format was
still in its infancy, 1991’s ZINY
sounded artificially bright and
hollow. Thankfully the first disc
(of this five-CD package, housed
in a neat round NYC-manhole-
mimicking tin with extensive
notes from Ray White and Ruth
Underwood) replicates the
original double LP’s ’77 mix, and
the sound transfer is excellent:
lush, warm, just as it should be.
And then there’s the four CDs
of unreleased material. The
controversial Punky’s Whips
(excised from the album’s
second pressing in ’78) is back in
all its glory alongside 39 other
selections, not least a mammoth
28-minute-plus Black Napkins
and fresh takes on bona fide
faves like America Drinks and
Montana. The downside? It’s
incredibly unreconstructed and
‘of its time’ in places. Opening
cut Titties & Beer doesn’t reflect
terribly well on Uncle Frank’s
much-vaunted liberalism in the
current climate.
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Ian FortnamPink Fairies
The Polydor Years
FLOATING WORLD
Freefest stalwarts’ first three
albums boxed and expanded.
Emerging from the ruins of
pioneering UK underground
house band Ladbroke Grove’s
Deviants (following frontman
Mick Farren’s sacking while on
tour in the US), the Pink Fairies
inherited hard-earned infamy
and an abiding taste for the
psychotropic, booze-fuelled,
freaked-out and anarchic.
The Pinks’ origins – in
a drinking club – were asshambolic as their rapid
collapse, but while in harness
Paul Rudolph (guitar, vocals),
Duncan Sanderson (bass) and
Russell Hunter (drums) made
a couple of albums you really
ought to hear. ’71 debut Never
Never Land (with Twink on
additional drums) finds a band
far more in tune with the
libertine end of anarchy than
the agitprop, and before getting
down to the serious business of
wigging-out delivers Do It, an
opener that defines the band,
presages punk and outclasses
all that follows. What A Bunch
Of Sweeties (’72) captures the
Pinks in turmoil, Right On Fight
On lumbers toward boogie,
there’s a drum solo, a couple
of covers. Rudolph left before
release. Larry Wallis arrived
up-front for the swaggering
gumby-esque Kings Of Oblivion
(’73), which isn’t bad, but
they’re no MC5. Its City Kids
highlight soon left with Wallis
for Motörhead.
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Ian FortnamBlack Label
Society
Sonic Brew – 20th
Anniversary Blend
5.99 – 5.19 EONE
When Zakk came back
in Black.
Cast your mind
back to a time
when Ozzy
Osbourne had
only one
farewell tour under his belt. As
Ozzy’s guitar wingman since
1987, Zakk Wylde endeared
himself to fans and looked set
for a promising career of his own
with Pride & Glory, only for the
band to release their Southern-
fried debut in 1994 and suddenly
split by year’s end. An acoustic-
based solo album, Book Of
Shadows (’96), followed, before
Wylde returned with a heavier,
groovier take on Pride & Glory’s
hybrid of metal and southern
rock, with hints of influence from
Black Sabbath and his pals in
Pantera. A breath of fresh air to
old-school headbangers in an
era when big-pants nu metal
bands sneered at the very idea
of guitar solos, Sonic Brew found
Wylde ramming blunt force riffs
(Peddlers Of Death, Hey You) and
ripping lead lines (The Rose
Petalled Garden, Mother Mary) to
the fore, singing with convincing
grit and aggression. Remixed
and remastered for a warmer,
fuller sound, it remains one of
the band’s strongest releases,
enhanced with two desirablePrimal Scream
Maximum Rock’n’Roll – The Singles SONY
Right on for the darkness: it’s the consummate
Scream singles odyssey.F
or a quarter-century, Primal Scream
were the UK’s most dangerous,
unpredictable and irrepressibly
maximum rock’n’rollers, relentlessly
reinventing their sound as they roller-
coastered from C86 beginnings through
euphoric ecstasy anthems into the
kaleidoscope of dream collaborations,
extreme noise terror and audacious
experiments that are hopefully not over.
Citing The Who’s Meaty, Beaty, Big And
Bouncy as aspirational template, this first
compilation since 2003’s Dirty Hits gathers
their singles like a panoramic odyssey,
starting with the glittering jangle of second
single B-side Vel o c i t y G i r l – now this set’s
single, with Edie Sedgwick video. After
three more early dalliances come the
magnificent Screamadelica-Weatherall
classics: Loaded (with Peter Fonda’s The Wild
Angels intro, groove from Edie Brickell),
original Come Together, Orb-transformed
Higher Than The Sun, Denise Johnson-sung
hedonist anthem Don’t Fight It, Feel It and
eternally joyous Movin’ On Up, produced
by Jimmy Miller. Their transcendence into
“the Scream Unlimited Arkestra” always
centres around Bobby Gillespie’s
vulnerable soul mantras, Andrew Innes
bottling studio uproar, Martin Duffy’s
eloquent keys and late guitar hero Robert
‘Throb’ Young facing down rockist jibes in
snakeskin boots.Screamadelica’s success enables the
rock’n’soul Fantasy Island scenario of 1994’s
Give Out But Don’t Give Up in Memphis, Rocks,
Jailbird and Cry Myself Blind solidifying as
classics. Bringing in bassist Mani, they enter
the savage purple patch of Vanishing Point and
Xtrmntr, including diverse sonic foraging on
speed-jagged Kowalski, ethereal Star, psyched-
out Burning Wheel, vicious Swastika Eyes and
Accelerator’s high-energy onslaught.
After 2002’s jittery Miss Lucifer, celestial-
krautrock Autobahn 66 and Kate Moss duet
Some Velvet Morning, 2006’s retro-romping
Riot City Blues spawns sprightly hit Country
Girl, balls-out homage Dolls (Sweet Rock and
Roll) and swooning Sometimes I Feel So Lonely,
bidding farewell to Throb before Scream
returned with Can’t Go Back and sublimely
melancholic Uptown (as Weatherall’s
remix), Mani’s swansong. The Scream
move into their current phase with More
Light’s Bowie-like 2013 , optimistic It’s
Alright, It’s OK and moody Jeffrey Lee Pierce
cover Goodbye Johnny, before Sky Ferreira
duet When The Light Gets In and 100% Of
Nothing from 2016’s Chaosmosis.
This relentlessly enjoyable set reaffirms
what every Scream fan knows: this is one
uniquely special band that lost a piece of
their soul with Throb’s 2014 death,
making this a worthy tribute.
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Kris Needs88 CLASSICROCKMAGAZINE.COM