Latest news with #FrankZappa
The Age
24-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
Faith in the universal language of music
How do you find faith in people? How do you find, among the bombardment of grim daily news, the thing to hold onto that gives you faith? You listen. You watch, and then flowing from that, you feel. Where do these three things coalesce into one? Music. Music is, after all, elementally the sound of the human within us. It is the rising of the emotions that in their forming describe the singular and the plural strands of a life. To see, and hear, the connection from creator of the sound to the listener is to have one's faith in people, at that most basic level of commonality, that we are all the one species, restored, if needed, and reaffirmed. It is a joy to behold. Thus, it has been a joy to behold, and deeply moving, to have been watching the ABC series, The Piano. Here, a piano is set up centre stage in a public place, be it Southern Cross station or Preston Market, and piano players with no public profile are invited to play, to stretch their soul across 88 keys. Two quotes come to mind. As Beethoven said, 'Music is a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy.' Or as Frank Zappa said, 'Music is the best.' Loading A lot of the players had a story behind what they played. They did not tell it through words but in the music. Call it the key of life, as Stevie Wonder did. Some performed their own compositions that spoke of an event in their life. There have been songs of survival, redemption and love. The players captured it all in minor and major expressions, in the subdued touch and the hammered lightning. And, as equally importantly, in the space between the notes. You could see and hear the essence, the core of the creativity, flowing through heart and mind, down to the fingers, onto the keys, and then out into the air. This is where it fell into the hearts and minds of the audience. You could see it in their faces, the sway of their shoulders, the tapping of their feet. As a young player said, the piano holds the universe. As do the strings of a guitar. To paraphase Bob Dylan, and before him Walt Whitman, it contains multitudes, as do we. Loading In these bustling, busy places of transport and commerce, the players revealed that music truly has no frontiers. There are no borders to stop its travel. Of course, some will not like a certain style, and that's fine. Others will. But when it hits you, you stop. Or as Bob Marley said, when music hits you, you feel no pain. In the cacophony of wars around the world, in the cruel calculus of death and destruction, music is the haven. Of course, a sonata or a pop song cannot halt the flight of a bullet or missile, but it gives this: Faith, that through this universal language of music, we can all cross the bridge to the one humanity.
Irish Independent
17-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Independent
Kerry venue set to host world-renowned throat singing band hailing from the heart of Central Asia
That's if the reputation of legendary quartet Huun-Huur-Tu is anything to go by. The throat singing and music group, from the Russian republic of Tuva on the Mongolian border, will play at Saint John the Evangelist Church in Tralee on Sunday, June 1. The group's performance promises to be an inspiring one which will evoke the vast south Siberian steppe. On the night, the ensemble will play traditional instruments such as the igil (horse head fiddle) and doshpuluur (three-stringed lute) and dress in traditional Tuvan garb. Huun-Huur-Tu will appear at the Ashe Street venue as its members celebrate 30 years since the band was formed. Over the past three decades, the group has established itself as the one of the foremost throat singing and world music acts and captivated audiences all over the globe. The band has previously collaborated with artists such as The Chieftains and Frank Zappa. Huun-Huur-Tu will play at 8pm at Saint John the Evangelist Church in Tralee on Sunday, June 1.
Los Angeles Times
15-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Los Angeles Times
5 fascinating facts about motels, from murders and movies to Magic Fingers
Life, death, crime, kitsch, nostalgia, immigrant aspirations and witty design — all of these elements converge in the world of motels, which didn't exist before 1925. Here are five facts and phenomena from the century of history. From the late 1950s into the '80s, thousands of motels proudly advertised their Magic Fingers — a little collection of vibrating electric nodes under your mattress that would give you a 15-minute 'massage' for 25 cents, inspiring creators from Kurt Vonnegut to Frank Zappa. Alas, their moment passed. But not everywhere. Morro Bay's Sundown Inn, which gets two diamonds from the Auto Club and charges about $70 and up per night, is one of the last motels in the West that still features working Magic Fingers, offered (at the original price) in most of its 17 rooms. 'We've owned the hotel for 41 years, and the Magic Fingers was here when we started. We just kept them,' said co-owner Ann Lin. Ann's mother- and father-in-law immigrated from Taiwan and bought the property in 1983. Many motels and small hotels are longtime family operations. Sometimes it's the original owner's family, and quite often it's a family named Patel with roots in India's Gujarat state. A recent study by the Asian American Hotel Owners Assn. found that 60% of U.S. hotels — and 61% of those in California — are owned by Asian Americans. By one estimate, people named Patel own 80% to 90% of the motels in small-town America. The beginnings of this trend aren't certain, but many believe that one of the first Indians to acquire a hotel in the U.S. was Kanjibhai Desai, buyer of the Goldfield Hotel in downtown San Francisco in the early 1940s. There's no escaping the motel in American pop culture. Humbert Humbert, the deeply creepy narrator of Vladimir Nabokov's 1955 novel 'Lolita,' road-tripped from motel to motel with his under-age victim. Edward Hopper gave us the disquieting 1957 oil painting 'Western Motel.' In the film 'Psycho' (1960), Alfred Hitchcock brought to life the murderous motel manager Norman Bates. When Frank Zappa made a movie about the squalid misadventures of a rock band on tour, he called it '200 Motels' (1971). When the writers of TV's 'Schitt's Creek' (2015-2020) wanted to disrupt a rich, cosmopolitan family, they came up with the Rosebud Motel and its blue brick interior walls. And when executives at A&E went looking for a true-crime series in 2024, they came up with 'Murder at the Motel,' which covered a killing at a different motel in every episode. The 1968 assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. made the Lorraine Motel in Memphis globally notorious. But before and after that day, the Lorraine played a very different role. Built as a small hotel in 1925 and segregated in its early years, the property sold to Black businessman Walter Bailey in 1945. He expanded it to become a motel, attracting many prominent African American guests. In the 1950s and '60s, the Lorraine was known for housing guests such as Count Basie, Cab Calloway, Roy Campanella, Ray Charles, Nat King Cole, Aretha Franklin, Lionel Hampton, Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding and the Staples Singers. After King's assassination, the motel struggled, closed, then reemerged in 1991 as the National Civil Rights Museum, now widely praised. Guests follow civil rights history through the building, ending at Room 306 and its balcony where King was standing when he was shot. In 1980, a Colorado motel owner named Gerald Foos confided to journalist Gay Talese that he had installed fake ceiling vents in the Manor House Motel in Aurora, Colo., and for years had been peeping from the attic at guests in bed. The man had started this in the 1960s and continued into the '90s. Finally, in 2016, Talese spun the story into a New Yorker article and a book, 'The Voyeur's Motel,' sparking many charges that he had violated journalistic ethics.
The Independent
13-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Moon Unit Zappa on her childhood and father Frank
Moon Unit Zappa, daughter of musician Frank Zappa, reflects on her unconventional childhood in a new memoir, Earth to Moon. The book details her experiences growing up in a chaotic household marked by her father's emotional detachment and her mother Gail's erratic behavior. Moon recounts instances of her father's infidelity and her mother's unusual disciplinary methods, highlighting the emotional toll it took on her. After her father's death, Moon faced further challenges due to her mother's will, which favored her younger siblings and sparked a decade-long family feud. Now, Moon has found solace in yoga, meditation, writing, and focusing on her own well-being, moving away from the shadow of her parents' legacy. Moon Unit Zappa on her childhood with dad Frank, groupies and guns: 'I was primed for subservience'
Yahoo
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Frank Zappa's Unaired Concert Special to Be Released After More Than 50 Years
In June of 1974, Frank Zappa and his rapturous band, the Mothers of Invention, invited a small audience to the their rehearsal hall on Sunset Blvd. in Hollywood, Calif. Together, they performed for over two hours while a small film crew captured the evening, and a mobile recording truck picked up on the audio. Unfortunately, the audio and video weren't synchronized. As a result, the June concert that Zappa planned to pitch to TV networks was never released — that is, until May 9, when the special dubbed 'Cheaper Than Cheep' is set to arrive via Zappa Records/UMe. More from Variety Frank Zappa's Recordings, Song Catalog and More Acquired by Universal Music Group Alex Winter on Telling the Story of 'Paradoxical' Frank Zappa in New Doc: 'It Took Us Years to Get it Right' 'Zappa' Review: Alex Winter's Documentary Hauntingly Captures the Skewed Passion of Frank Zappa, a One-of-a-Kind Rock Legend 'Ladies and gentlemen, we'd like to welcome you to the world's cheapest television special, which is being manufactured for your edification right here in the midst of our Mothers of Invention rehearsal hall at 5831 Sunset Blvd., Hollywood, California,' Zappa says in the footage. 'Can you all turn around and look at each other so everybody who's watching this can tell where we are and what the inside of this place really looks like. As you can see it's cheaper than cheap.' Directed by Ahmet Zappa and produced by Frank Zappa, Vaultmeister Joe Travers and Ahmet Zappa, 'Cheaper Than Cheep' will be released exclusively on uDiscover Music and Sound of Vinyl in a variety of formats. A Blu-ray version (with Dolby Atmos) of the 'Cheaper Than Cheap' concert film will be available for purchase as part of a deluxe box set featuring a 2CD and 3LP of the performance. The box set also comes with an extensive 12-page booklet with rare images and informative liner notes from Travers alongside a detailed and heartfelt remembrance from musician Ruth Komanoff Underwood who performed percussion that evening. The Blu-ray includes four extras – two performances, a blooper reel, and a deep excerpt from the out-of-print Claymation film, 'The Amazing Mr. Bickford.' Additional options include a Blu-ray video and a 2CD set, in addition to a standalone soundtrack on 180-gram 3LP black vinyl. Watch the 'Cheaper Than Cheep' trailer below. Best of Variety New Movies Out Now in Theaters: What to See This Week What's Coming to Disney+ in April 2025 The Best Celebrity Memoirs to Read This Year: From Chelsea Handler to Anthony Hopkins
