How does it compare to the artist's other releases
Average
Value for Money
Satisfactory
Advantages:
First true orchestral outing since 200 Motels
Disadvantages:
Slightly Muddy sound, Early synclavier sounds
Recommend to potential buyers:
yes
Full review
I've been a fan of Zappa for many years, and could probably bore you to tears with the minutiae of every song, every piece of music released over the last 40 years. BUT here is my unbiased view of this particular offering.
This album is a collection of chamber works commisioned by the Ensemble InterContemporian, interspersed with some early works for Synclavier (here cited as the Barking Pumpkin Digital Gratification Consort).
The Ensemble InterContemporian perform three works on the album - The Perfect Stranger being the only substantially new work (Naval Aviation in Art? dating from around 1975/1976 being released on Orchestral Favorites and later on Lather, and Dupree's Paradise dating from around 1972/1973, but not actually released in it's original form until after the Perfect Stranger!).
The remainder - Girl in the Magnesium Dress, Love Story and Jonestown and Outside Now Again all highlight different strands of Zappa's work on the Synclavier. More about this later.
Some will decry me for saying this, but on this particular project, I feel that the Ensemble InterContemporian have produced a rather lackluster performance. Perhaps the twin attack of M. Boulez and Mr. Zappa during rehearsals ground their enthusiasm down. Zappa himself says that he used to berate "classical" ensembles having difficulty with his compositions by telling them that "my rock groups have no problem playing this." One can only imagine what that does to the ego of an Internationally acclaimed musician in one of the leading ensembles in the world!
The pace of both Perfect Stranger and Dupree's Paradise are just to slow here. Instead of making the pieces sound languid, it has the effect of making them sound tired. Add to this the early usage of digital recording techniques, reverb added in at the post-production stage, and Zappa's usual penchant for mixing orchestral combinations as he would a rock group, and the sound just gets too muddy.
The only piece that the Ensemble seems to attack with any gusto is Naval Aviation in Art? Perhaps having a reference recording (Orchestral Favorites) made it easier for them to relate to the piece, or perhaps it's rather simpler structure (call and refrain) made it simpler to rehearse?
In all, the human element on this disc just does not stand up to close scrutiny.
As mentioned above, the four Synclavier pieces represent different strands that would surface later in Zappa's work.
Girl in the Magnesium Dress was formed by taking semi-random elements from data input into the Synclavier, assigning them pitches, and then refining the result. Zappa once described the composition as "digital dust", highlighting the randomness of it's source material. Essentially, reading between the lines of various interview, Zappa took the pitch bend information from a MIDI controller (possibly guitar), and used just this one set of values to base the composition upon. The result is a high-speed pontillistic journey that owes as much to Webern (in it's use of silence) and Boulez (through similar scoring to Le Marteau Sans Maitre) as it does to Cage (the aleatoric source material). It was later adapted for human performance, and is now a regular part of the Ensemble Modern's repertoire.
Later works in a similar vein would be Times Beach, and None of the Above (originally commissioned by the Aspen Wind Quintet and the Kronos Quarter respectively), both of which also later resurfaced in performances by the Ensemble Modern.
Love Story represents the "Jazz from Hell" aspect of the Synclavier work. The phrases start from a rhythmic backdrop, but build rapidly to disjointed bursts of activity. In the right context, this works brilliantly, but against the rest of the programme represented by this album, it just doesn't seem to work.
Outside Now Again picks up an old strand of Zappa's compositional style. This time, he takes an existing guitar solo from his vault, has it transcribed (this time by Steve Vai), and then orchestrates it into a full-blown ensemble piece. The early synclavier sounds are what lets this particular piece down - Zappa played by the Bontempi Junior Orchestra! Better examples of this kind of work include Mo n Herb's Vacation (source - Cruisin for Burgers solo from "In New York") and Sad Jane/Bob in Dacron (source - unreleased guitar solo from 1968), both of which can be found on the LSO albums.
Jonestown is the closest Zappa gets to the soundscapes set out by Ligeti in his early phase (Atmospheres, Volumina), and by Nono in his later (A Pierre..., A Carlo Scapa, etc.). The backdrop is sustained quiet sounds, supporting the surface levels of short musical phrases , which in Zappa's case are aimed to create a certain programmatic image. This particular piece draws attention to the Jonestown incident, in which Jim Jones led his followers - the People's Temple - to mass suicide in 1978. After a visit from the authorities, Jones order all the inhabitants of his village/commune to drink a cyanide-laced punch. All of the adults were well aware of what they were doing, as Jones had held rehearsals for months before the final day. After all 276 children on the site had been given the punch, the adults proceeded to drink it themselves. Jones killed himself with a bullet to the head. The total death toll was 914.
The particular composition devices used in this piece later appeared in work for the soundtrack to the Cousteau Societies' "Outrage at Valdez" documentary, in which the society highlighted the environmental impact of the Exxon Valdez oilspill. Zappa used the device to again highlight cases of disaster and loss, evoking emotions of pain and frustration at the stupidity of unneccessary loss of life.
In all, there are some interesting pieces on here. None are brilliantly executed (with perhaps the exception of Jonestown), and the live ensemble is a little muddy. It would be unfair to label this disc as "completists only", but I'm afraid that there are better places to be introduced to all of the facets of Zappa contained herein.
Best kept until the listener understands a fair amount about Zappa's works and knows what facets they prefer.
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Good
Cover / Inlay Design and Content
Satisfactory
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