Notes & Comments
Recorded: Live 11/5/70 (??????) (*#[at]%!)
Fillmore West, Nov 19, 1970
Length: ~45 min
Label: TSP 017
Sound Quality: Bad
Freaks & Motherfuckers vs. Tengo Na Minchia Tanta
From: Stadshypotek Bank AB [charlie1[at]algonet.se]
On my cd "Freaks & Motherfu*#" (Rhino) it says rec.live Fillm.East 1970.
On my cd "Tengo Na'Minchia Tanta" (boot:Lost Rose) (but also released on
Rhino) it says rec. live Fillm.East nov 1970. I went to the absolutely
brilliant "Bootlegs part 1" and "The FZ Shows Document" on the FAQ and
found (in both):
"Freaks &..." 19 nov 1970
"Tengo... " 5-6 june 1971.
[snip]
(The mentioned tracksection could fit in The FZ Shows Document on the show
14 nov 1970 but I do not know, I wasn't there.)
From: Biffyshrew [biffyshrew[at]aol.com]
I believe both boots are entirely from the same show, and that show,
despite the reference to Fillmore East on Freaks & Motherfu..., was
actually at the Fillmore *West* ("Paladin gestures hypnotically in San
Francisco..."). The box of Beat The Boots (Vol. 1) claims Freaks &
Motherfu... is from 5/11/70 [American style date]. This is obviously
wrong, as the Flo & Eddie band hadn't formed yet by this date. The June
1971 date given for Tengo Na Minchia Tanta is also definitely wrong,
because George Duke is in the lineup. 11/14/70 was a show at the wrong
Fillmore--the Fillmore East. According to T'Mershi Duween, the Fillmore
West tape that contains all the songs on both CDs is sometimes identified
as 6/24/70 and sometimes as 11/6/70. Either of those dates sounds
plausible to me.
From: spb0377[at]alpha.cc.oberlin.edu (Pat Buzby)
Both Freaks and Tengo are from November 1970 at the Fillmore East.
Bringing In The Sheaves
From: Chris Maxfield (zappalvr[at]aol.comhonza)
I think Zappa's (sheaves) reference in that song is more to the Rescue Mission
where winos might go for a bowl of soup and subsequently be forced to listen to
preaching and even the singing of songs like "Bringing In the Sheaves" by some
members of an organization like the Salvation Army. A sheave, for those who
don't know, is one of those upright bundles of cut oats or wheat that stand
looking so picturesque in old-time paintings of fields. Modern agriculture has
eliminated the need for sheaves, but I suppose they still exist someplace.
Holiday In Berlin
From: John Henley [jhenley[at]mail.utexas.edu]
The Mothers were playing in W. Berlin in 1968. During
afternoon soundcheck, FZ was approached by a group of German
youths, who paid him compliments, described themselves as
activists and asked for his assistance in a project. He asked them What
project? They said, tonight we are marching to the American Center in
order to burn it down, and we want you to lead the parade. FZ said, in so
many words, get lost.
At the concert that night, these same "activists," with reinforcements,
disrupted the concert, chanting anti American slogans and piling onto the
stage while the band was playing, and you know how pissed FZ got whenever
a concert was interrupted for no "good" reason. There's film footage of
the incident.
So "Holiday in Berlin" actually has lyrics that tell this story, and I
doubt if FZ ever forgot that night.
konradfs[at]netcom.com (Konrad) wrote:
when was this Berlin riot show? Anybody know the exact date, or at least
-- to answer John's question -- whether it was before or after the
Birmingham date?
From: Bill Lantz [lantz[at]primenet.com]
October 16, 1968 was the Berlin date. It would make sense that the
Birmingham date is around the 25th of October because they were at the
Albert Hall on that date. But they were in the UK in February and June of
1968 as well.
Mothermania Back Cover Article
Subject: Mothermania Translation
From: Konrad [konradfs[at]netcom.com]
Some people missed it the first time round, and I fucked up on one
sentence, not to mention several typos. And it also has the date on the
paper, which indicates the show must have been 10/16/68. So here it is,
corrected, one more time for the world. Happy Thanksgiving.
Back cover of Mothermania
-------------------------------------------------
Der Abend
Thursday, 17th of October, 1968
ALL THE TOYS ARE BROKEN
Spectacle and ruckus: "Mothers of Invention" at the Sportpalast
o It was a complete misunderstanding, last night at the Sportpalast:
America's most radical and engaged underground group, The Mothers of
Invention, saw themselves pressed into the role of "Mothers of Reaction,"
which they actually had intended for the audience.
· A radical force of superior strength, colorfully thrown together from
leftists, rockers and hooligans drove them from the stage like reactionary
boogie men. Frank Zappa's total music theater was brought down by the
demands of those who wouldn't buy his message.
It began harmoniously enough. They laughed at Roy Estrada's MGM-Lion roar
("The voice of the President of the United States"). They cheered the
song about the "Plastic People," watched with pleasure while a teddy bear
was "sexually aroused" with the arm of a little plastic doll. Frank
Zappa's blue overalls made you expect some action.
But the underground leader just shook his black lion's mane, plucked the
strings circumspectly -- now playing little Hansel and now the wicked
witch. And the wicked rhymes came nice and cute out of the speakers --
poetry on such unpoetic topics as war and racism.
The horns still resounded in the hall like ["Hertha": some kind of
literary reference by a Goethe wannabe rock writer?]: rousing. But
secretly Zappa's enemies had already sounded their attack.
The first shot, something pale green, whizzed by at around 8:40 pm.
Unperturbed the Mothers pulled their props out of the magic chest, a
hatbox, and symbolically play acted a little game of toy breaking.
Then the first rotten? egg burst onto Zappa's yellow guitar. The Head
Mother said, "You people are acting like pigs!" The battle lines were
drawn: "Evolution vs. Revolution."
12 minutes before 9 the stage fences were in tatters. The "evolution"
submitted and left the stage. Helpless from all quarters. The Mothers
manager Barber [sic] only outwardly the picture of calm, moaned, "No, no
-- this has never happened to us before."
The "revolution" took the stage in a surprise attack, set off cherry
bombs, plundered Zappa's hatbox, and generally messed up the equipment. A
little success for the opposition: a Greenager ["green-teenager" referring
to FZ as a radical young person] could be "disarmed" with 50 brown eggs.
Zappa scolded: "We came here as musicians and not to hear your drunken
slogans." And: "The situation in Berlin must be pretty desparate for you
to act this way." And: "You're acting like Americans!"
Promoter Rau tried unsuccessfully to throw himself between the factions.
"Let's talk about it, friends," he beseeched, hoarse from all these kind
words.
But there was nothing more to be done. The police, who had been holding
back discretely up til then, gave friend and foe 10 minutes to clear the
battle zone. The exodus proceeded without incident.
Frank Zappa meditated: "It was a very enlightening experience."
Helmut Kopetzky
[trans. konrad steiner]
--
^Z
Now The Version From The Maestro
FZ: We were in Germany recently. We played five dates in Germany last
fall. And the German youth today has not come very far from the ones in
the short pants singing the same song. Today the German youth -- you know
they have sort of their own brand of Flower Power over there. They have
hairy boys and girls with beads and funny close, and they're Nazis. Just
like their mothers and fathers.
The problem is they believe they are the new left. The believe they are
the new "what's happening" -- forefront of the youth revolution. You know
that student riot that happened last Easter in Berlin.... I's just a
crazed fantasy that these kids have that they are actually doing something
new. I talked with them and they're just
Female audience member: For the Germans that's new.
FZ: That's new??
Female: Wearing the beads ...
FZ: Yeah, well it's just a question of packaging
Female: Are they organized?
FZ: Yes they are to a certain extent. But like the purpose of their
organization is still a little bit cloudy, you know. They talk about a
revolution in sort of carnival terms. They're still thinking about
banners, gathering together in the street and yelling things at policemen.
That's their idea of a revolution, and it's so old-fashioned and corny
even.
Female: Do they actually think along Nazi lines or ...?
FZ: No that ACT along Nazi lines.
[elision on tape]
Interviewer: I hear that they wanted you to lead something.
FZ: We had an incident at a concert in Berlin where I was approached by
some "student leaders." They told me they student leaders -- you know
when someone comes and introduces himself to you and says hello I'm a
student leader. [laughter] Little red scarf around his neck, flowing over
the shoulder, sort of revolutionary flow down here on the side, down to
here, a little hair frizzing out to the side, little beard, little khaki
coat. Surrounded by people trying to dress like Che Guevara, you know.
They had a sort of robin hood band of German rockers, okay? And we're
going to play a concert at the Sportpalast, which is one of the places
where Hitler delivered some spiffy speeches during the war. And we're at
the rehearsal in the afternoon and this guy says, "I'd like to talk to you
for a minute. We'd like your assistance with a political action this
evening at the concert." And I said, "Well what do you have, uh, on your
mind." And he said, "Well there'll be about 8,000 kids here tonight and
most of them have never demonstrated before. And we would like to have
you tell them to come with us while we go around the corner and set fire
to the Allied Command Center." [peels of laughter] I told him I didn't
think that was good mental health. [i.e., crazy] And he got really pissed
off, you know, and so they tried to wreck our show.
The minute we came out on stage, about 35 or 50 of these kids out in
the audience -- 'activists' I believe would be what you'd call them. They
whipped out a large red banner, waved it, sang "Ho Ho Ho Chi Min," blew
air horns, threw vegetables on stage, marched around in the audience while
the rest of the kids in the audience were going like this...they didn't
know what was going on.
So we continued to play. We had to play a two hour show in the
middle of all this bullshit. And these guys were out there stomping around
and rah and throwing stuff and the people on the bandstand are getting hit
with hard vegetables, you know, cucumbers [laughter], squash. you know
they really hit you like a rock up there. And they were throwing eggs,
and cherry bombs. And then they grabbed this big fence, like a restraining
device to keep the audience away from the performers at those events. It
was made out of pipes this big around with a chain link fence in between
and concrete feet. And about thirty of them picked it up and tried to
throw it on stage, which would have killed both of our drummers by pinning
them against the amplifiers, you see.
So our manager Herbie and this German promoter Fritz Rau caught it in
mid air and threw it back on them. And then this other guy charged the
stage and Herbie put his foot through his face. And then they kept on
throwing things, and then they kept on trying to get up onto the stage.
We kept pushing these guys back -- and we're up there humming and
strumming...[laughter] and it was really a very unusual situation.
So then we had to take an intermission, see. We left the stage after
an hour of fun and merriment. And during that time the ordinaries, that
the local promoter had hired to keep everything under control at the hop
thought that we had run off, so they ran away. And when they ran away,
about a hundred of these kids wailed up onto the stage and started
stomping all over our equipment.
So we come back from intermission, and here's all these people
milling around on stage. They don't even know why they're there. They
look like cows. They're standing there like this, But they're standing,
you know, on drums, and they're knocking things over, and a few of the
guys had stolen small pieces of equipment and disappeared into the
audience. They were just making a lot of noise and standing around. Just
completely blank. They don't even know what their revolution is about.
So we started pushing them of the stage. We started putting our
equipment back together. We got the PA system working. And I gave them a
speech for about 15 minutes, wherein I discussed the possibility that they
were acting more like Americans than anything I've ever seen. And that
pissed them off. And they're out there yelling "Revolution, Revolution"
-- and I'm saying "You people need evolution, not revolution."
And they said, "No take it back you're the Mothers of Reaction." And
I told them they were {beep}, and they understand English. I told them
whether they liked it or not we were going to continued to play the second
half of the program. So gradually they shut up, and they sat down. The
only thing that happened during the second hour was one cherry bomb on
stage.
And we had played about 45-50 minutes, and we were into a long
instrumental piece, which was going to be our closing number, and I'd
reduced the volume of the tune so that I could say good night to the nice
German people. At which point the student leader with the red rag around
his neck comes running up on stage and grabs the microphone and starts
raving in German. I just knew he was telling these people, "I've got the
matches come with me."
So we played real loud so nobody could hear what he was saying. Two
people were taking the instruments off the stage, you know piece by piece
pulling things away until it was just me and the organist left on stage
playing one full-volume fuzztone loud ugly note that was just going
BLAAAAAH. And it was the only thing that kept people back off the stage,
'cause they kept trying to get up onto the stage and this noise would hit
them and they'd go ...
Finally when they got all the drums and all the rest of the stuff out of
the way, we just unplugged and split off the stage, and they all came
milling back up there. And they looked around and they didn't know why
they were on stage again.
That's Germany today.
--
^Z
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