The Feuding Zappas

From my personal point of view - if I was Dweezil and I'd spent as much time and effort as he has done in promoting his fathers music over the years and I got passed over in favour of Ahmet to take over the family bizniz... I'd be really...um...what's the word...'upset'.

 

The Feuding Zappas is a cool name for a band. Just sayin

 

Yeah, what Dweezil has done so far really is immense, especially in this day and age. He plays the music in concert, all over the place and almost year after year, for people who may get to hear it for the first time in a live context. It's very different than what his father did back in the day, but it serves the music and terrifically well. I have seen him twice and had a REAL good time!

The business job is probably a very different job though, I must say. For a different kind of mind (usually)...

 

By the way, this isn't new. Check out the 2010 dates on Zappa.com. This has been an ongoing thing.

Zappa Plays Zappa > Tour Dates »

 

I'm a Zappa fan but let's face it Zappa doesn't carry the same weight as Hendrix or The Beatles with younger generations. DZ is keeping the music alive in a live environment. They should be kissing his a$$.

 

Gail was a T.N.U.C.

 

Donated to the Kickstarter campaign before I heard the gossip. Kind of wish I hadn't.

Being in a family myself, I imagine that the "tensions" between the siblings (and their late mother) run very, very, very deep and go back decades. A battery of psychologists would be needed to sort through all the nonsense.

 

The promotion and attention that is gained from the Zappa plays Zappa tours is a huge benefit to selling Zappa recordings either from the existing catalog or new projects.

Its just bad business let alone a terrible way to treat family.

 

I already said that I don't know much, only what I read on the internet like most of you. I'm reacting to the article posted which tells you next to nothing and certainly doesn't give enough information to call anybody's behavior abhorrent. The "kids" have only been running things for about a year and so far, other than this article, I don't find a whole lot that tells me how they are running things.

On the surface of it, the decision to not let DZ use the name Zappa Plays Zappa does seem silly. Unfortunately the article gives no indication of the real story - a story we will probably never know though there almost certainly is a story.

I don't mean to pick on anyone here but I've never been the kind of music fan to care enough about this stuff to get indignant over it. What I believe is that a family trust like this must have its potholes unlike anything most of us know in our normal lives. So I'm reluctant to call anyone's behavior anything if I don't know the complete story.

 

As a fan, I just want more musical releases. Heck, the posthumous releases are the ones I listen to the most these days.

I was a little dubious of the whole kickstarter/save the vault fundraiser, but I went ahead and participated. To learn that Dweezil (and Moon) are not on board is a little troubling, especially since they're both beneficiaries of the ZFT. I wonder what their vision was for the post-Gail ZFT? Did he have his own scheme? It's seems clear its now become a spiteful relationship, which is just sad.

As someone mentioned above, a respected family friend should try to step in and mediate, bring them together. Of the "celebrity-types", the first person I think of is Vai. But I'm sure there are others.

 

So sad. I've seen the last 2 ZPZ tours. Dweezil's rendering of One Size Fits All was incredible.

He was on Marc Maron's podcast recently. He talked about playing the music to stay close to his dad. It was both touching and sad. This feud has to be really hard on him.

 

Surely the FZT is not fulfilling their role with decisions which are clearly not in the long-term better interest of the trust's goal of managing Frank's legacy.

 

Seems strange to me. As far as I know, you are always entitled to use your own name without encountering trademark issues. Would be different if it was 'Zappa plays The Mothers of Invention" as Dweeze wouldn't have the rights to that. Also, he has been using ZPZ for many years with the blessing and acquiesence of the trust (and whatever arrangement was in place), they would surely have no solid grounds for withdrawing it now?

 

Money - it always brings out the worst <or true nature> of people. Prince's heirs are beside themselves bustin' blood vessels since they found out he had no will - they want all that fat cash NOW!!!!

 

I seems they all need to shut up and play their guitars... so to speak...

 

^ Screw that.

I just want to collect and hear new FZ music before I croak.

I'm too old and cranky to go all ethical. My good behavior to this point hasn't paid off for ****.

Gimme stuff!

 

I saw the title and thought this was about a music group. lol

 

Gail's issue with the alumni playing Frank's music was that they were using their association with Frank to sell tickets and she thought the family should be paid for that. That is kind of a reach, but based on all the crap that they went through with record labels and past management ripping them off, her desire to get paid isn't surprising. It looks like Frank's marching orders for Gail were:
take care of me,
the kids,
the house
and also deal with all these labels and promoters to make sure that the deals I made get done to my satisfaction, keep me apprised,
I'm gonna go play some music.
After 20 or so years of that, she probably ended up with a "everyone is out to screw us" view of everything happening with Frank and his music. You could call it "battered manager syndrome".
It looks like with the amount of material they have to deal with, it's like asking a hoarder to make decisions about disposing of their "treasures". While the family had a lot of assets, they were often cash poor. Frank supposedly told Gail to sell the whole thing after he died so she could be free of all of the toxic music business nonsense and cash out. She did not do that. I don't excuse the behavior, I can see how it happened. As much as Frank hated country music, maybe he liked "Stand By Your Man".
I'm gonna make a guess about the issue with Zappa Plays Zappa. I think someone looked at the receipts for the shows featuring Zappa alumni and the ones with just Dweezil's band. Dweezil doesn't want to go the all-star route, but that sells more tickets. By raising his potential fee to the trust, maybe someone figured they could force Dweezil into putting a alumni centered band together. That's just a guess. The whole situation is very, very sad.

 

Are you a politician by any chance?

 

Family stuff isn't susceptible to logic. Maybe it always rankled with the other siblings that Dweezil calls his show "Zappa Plays Zappa", as though it implied that there were only two Zappas and everyone knew who they were; maybe it just underlined the fear that they must have that the rest of them just inherited the money but Dweezil inherited the talent as well. Perhaps they're jealous that Dweezil was the one who played guitar lead on stage with their father at an early age; maybe they felt that Dweezil was their dad's favourite. So a lot of their feelings about Dweezil may be nothing about him: just displaced feelings about their father.

Outside that circle we're just guessing what's going on here, but we've all had families and it doesn't take a lot of empathy to see that - as with a bad marriage - arguments about money are usually really arguments about other things. So (although that's not what you meant) I could see a whole world of hurt in the situation.

 

Frank never put up with any bull, and he'd always call people out that were behaving stupidly. I'm sure he'd be banging his kids' heads together if he could.

What I don't understand is why ZPZ, playing Frank's music, keeping it out there and always getting excellent review and publicity, is in any way harming the legacy, or the income of the Trust. He's Frank's son for heaven's sake, the only child who is actually playing music, amazing music, and for his siblings to charge him for doing this, and not allow him to use Frank's image etc is just utterly baffling.

Very very sad. I hope they sort this out amicably, but it's not looking good.

 

Franks image was all over ZPZ merchandise, now doubt they were paying a royalty, i'm guessing they wanted a bigger cut. Possibly big enough to make touring under that name not financially viable.

 

When they asked Salvador Dali why he didn't have any children, he said, "History proves that the son of a genius is always a fool!"

 

Dunno about the legal and don't really care. Just sounds ugly and lacking in common sense.

I've seen Zappa Plays Zappa numerous times, and it's a class act. Inspiring, generous, first-rate musicianship. Any situation that makes that outfit unable to carry on under its established name is a real shame. If I showed up for a ZPZ show and it was some other family-sanctioned act, I'd be wanting my $ back.

I saw Frank Zappa and the Mothers as far back as 1967 and Zappa into the '80s. The show put on by Dweezil and his group is right up there with the original. In fact, Dad didn't have a problem mailing it in, while it's hard to imagine Dweezil and Co. ever doing that.

 

The ZPZ touring bands are excellent (saw them several times), but the business aspect has always been a mess... first tour was postponed for vague reasons after tickets were already on sale, another tour was supposed to feature Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan, which never actually happened... it's always amateur hour with the ZFT.