Jump to content

You Are What You Is

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Pbuzby2014 (talk | contribs) at 14:18, 8 March 2023. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

You Are What You Is
Studio album by
Frank Zappa
ReleasedSeptember 23, 1981
RecordedJuly 18–September 11, 1980
StudioUMRK (Los Angeles)
Length69:23
LabelBarking Pumpkin
ProducerFrank Zappa
Frank Zappa chronology
Shut Up 'n Play Yer Guitar
(1981) 		You Are What You Is
(1981) 		Ship Arriving Too Late to Save a Drowning Witch
(1982)
Singles from You Are What You Is
  1. "Harder Than Your Husband"
    Released: 1981
  2. "You Are What You Is"
    Released: 1981
  3. "Goblin Girl"
    Released: 1981

You Are What You Is is a 1981 double album by American musician Frank Zappa. His 34th album, it consists of three musical suites which encompass pop, doo-wop, jazz, hard rock, reggae, soul, blues, new wave and country. The album's lyrics satirize a number of topics, including hippies, socialites, fashion, narcotics use, cultural appropriation, religion, televangelists and the military draft.

Production

After the release of Joe's Garage, Frank Zappa set up his home studio, the Utility Muffin Research Kitchen, and planned to release a triple LP live album called Warts and All. As Warts and All reached completion, Zappa found the project to be "unwieldy" due to its length, and scrapped it, later conceiving Crush All Boxes.[1][2] Crush All Boxes would have been a single LP containing the studio recordings "Doreen", "Fine Girl", "Easy Meat" (a live recording with studio overdubs) and "Goblin Girl" on the first side, with the second side being occupied by a suite consisting of the songs "Society Pages", "I'm A Beautiful Guy", "Beauty Knows No Pain", "Charlie's Enormous Mouth", "Any Downers?" and "Conehead".[2]

During the production of Crush All Boxes, Zappa decided to scrap the album and conceive a set of releases drawing from both Warts and All and Crush All Boxes, which would emphasize different aspects of his multiple talents, formatting the two albums into You Are What You Is, Tinsel Town Rebellion and two series of live albums, Shut Up 'n Play Yer Guitar and You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore.[2]

Zappa had performed most of the material from You Are What You Is on a tour running from March to July 1980 with a band including Ike Willis and Ray White on guitar and vocals, Tommy Mars on keyboards, Arthur Barrow on bass and keyboards and David Logeman on drums.[3] In 2023, Zappa Records/UMe released the live album Zappa '80: Mudd Club/Munich including the band's performance at the Mudd Club on May 8, 1980 as well as the tour's final show in Munich on July 3, 1980.[4]

This band recorded the basic tracks of the album in the summer of 1980 after finishing the tour, with guitarist Steve Vai and vocalist Bob Harris adding overdubs and joining the group for Zappa's fall 1980 tour.[5] However, You Are What You Is was not released until after Tinseltown Rebellion and Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar although the latter two albums included material from the fall tour.[6]

The album also included guest appearances from former band members Jimmy Carl Black and Motorhead Sherwood from the ‘60s Mothers of Invention, as well as the first recorded solo vocals of Zappa's children Moon and Ahmet.[7]

Music and lyrics

You Are What You Is was described by uDiscoverMusic writer Jamie Atkins as "a thrilling ride through 20th-century pop music. Doo-wop, jazz, hard rock, reggae, soul, blues, new wave, and country are all negotiated with aplomb over a series of three sharply edited suites, rammed with witty musical phrases, call-backs, and reference points."[8] The album is made up of three suites. The first two suites are single sides of the vinyl edition's first record, while the third suite is spread across both sides of the second record.[8] "Harder than Your Husband" is a country rock song, while Atkins classifies "Doreen" as "power doo-wop".[8] The reggae song "Goblin Girl" includes musical quotations from "Doreen".[8] "Theme from the 3rd Movement of Sinister Footwear" is a jazz fusion instrumental which took guitarist Steve Vai 1–2 weeks to learn due to its complexity. It closes the album's first suite.[8] "Mudd Club" combines barbershop quartet-style vocals and "malevolent monologues" with a "slow reggae skank".[8]

The album's lyrics satirize a number of topics, including hippies ("Teen-age Wind"), socialites, fashion and narcotics use (the entirety of the suite that takes up side two of the album's vinyl release's first record), cultural appropriation ("You Are What You Is"), religion ("Dumb All Over"), televangelists ("Heavenly Bank Account") and the military draft ("Drafted Again").[8]

Release and reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic[9]

The title song was the only song of Zappa's career to have a music video.[8] The video contained a sequence in which a man resembling then-President Ronald Reagan was electrocuted in an electric chair. MTV banned the video from airing on its network.[8] In 1981, the album charted at #93 on the Billboard 200.[10] In a retrospective review, AllMusic's Steve Huey wrote that while "'Jumbo Go Away' is perhaps the most offensive song in Zappa's huge canon of potentially offensive songs, [You Are What You Is] is quite ambitious in scope and in general one of Zappa's most accessible later-period efforts; it's a showcase for his songwriting skills and his often acute satirical perspective, with less of the smutty humor that some listeners find off-putting." He gave the album a score of 4 out of 5.[9]

Track listing

Side one
No.TitleLength
1."Teen-Age Wind"3:01
2."Harder Than Your Husband"2:29
3."Doreen"4:43
4."Goblin Girl"4:07
5."Theme from the 3rd Movement of Sinister Footwear"3:34
Side two
No.TitleLength
6."Society Pages"2:27
7."I'm a Beautiful Guy"1:56
8."Beauty Knows No Pain"3:01
9."Charlie's Enormous Mouth"3:36
10."Any Downers?"2:09
11."Conehead"4:20
Side three
No.TitleLength
12."You Are What You Is"4:22
13."Mudd Club"3:11
14."The Meek Shall Inherit Nothing"3:10
15."Dumb All Over"5:50
Side four
No.TitleLength
16."Heavenly Bank Account"4:03
17."Suicide Chump"2:50
18."Jumbo Go Away"3:42
19."If Only She Woulda"3:47
20."Drafted Again"3:05

Personnel

Musicians

Production staff

  • Frank Zappa – producer
  • Mark Pinske – engineer
  • Alan Sides – engineer
  • Bob Stone – remix engineer
  • George Douglas – engineering assistant
  • Dvid Gray - engineering assistant
  • Amy Bernstein – artwork
  • Jo Hansch – mastering
  • John Livzey – photography, cover photo
  • Thomas Nordegg – Frank's personnel assistant
  • Santi Rubio – Studio Secretary
  • Dennis Sager – digital engineer
  • John Vince – artwork, graphic design

Charts

Album - Billboard (United States)

Year Chart Position
1981 Billboard 200 93[10]

References

  1. ^ Kelly Fisher Lowe (2007). The Words and Music of Frank Zappa. U of Nebraska Press. pp. 161–. ISBN 978-0-8032-6005-4.
  2. ^ a b c Neil Slaven (17 November 2009). Electric Don Quixote: The Definitive Story Of Frank Zappa. Music Sales Group. pp. 287–. ISBN 978-0-85712-043-4.
  3. ^ "1980 - Spring-Summer Tours". zappateers.com. Retrieved 24 December 2022.
  4. ^ "Zappa.com". zappa.com. Retrieved 8 March 2023.
  5. ^ Arthur Barrow (2016). Of Course I Said Yes!. Cydonian Music. pp. 107–109. ISBN 9781522979838.
  6. ^ "Official Discography Archives". zappa.com. Retrieved 24 December 2022.
  7. ^ "Discogs". discogs.com. Retrieved 25 December 2022.
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i Atkins, Jamie (September 23, 2022). "'You Are What You Is': Frank Zappa's Savagely Satirical Pop Masterclass". uDiscoverMusic. Retrieved 2022-09-27.
  9. ^ a b Huey, S. (2011). "You Are What You Is - Frank Zappa | AllMusic". allmusic.com. Retrieved 22 July 2011. Zappa
  10. ^ a b "Charts and Awards for You Are What You Is". Allmusic. Retrieved 2008-08-22.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=You_Are_What_You_Is&oldid=1143561188"