"Nasal Retentive Calliope Music" is one of those pieces that I rejected immediately the first time I listened to it. I considered it unnerving noise. Fortunately, it didn't take long for me to love it. Frank was achieving amazing things at the studio that few people were doing back in those days. His musique concrete landscapes (probably inspired by Varèse) were not amateurish at all, but cleverly built and exquisitely edited blocks of heavily modified sounds. Razor cut madness! I've always thought of the Cucamonga-era surf piece at the end of the piece as an answer to Hendrix's "and you'll never hear surf music again". "May you never hear vloerbedekking again!"
Nasal Retentive- is like Zappa mocking the psychedelic music of the time. With all those effects and sounds that might have been Frank's intention. Maybe a little first half 60's Beach Boys thrown in.
I always wished the surf guitar bit went on longer. I wonder if when it sounds like the record skipping meant Zappa saying surf music is now dead.
Let’s Turn The Water Black: From avant garde to a catchier song, this song was inspired by two brothers/Musicians that Frank Knew coming up who that came from an eccentric family. The track is kicked off by the drums and melodically driven by Ian on piano. Lyrically the narrator reminisces about his early life and all the craziness that came with it. Initially I wondered what this had to do with the hippies and the squares, but now i realize Frank is essentially saying the supposedly plastic people are just as insane as the people they attack. And Frank would know conventional life as he grew up in a rather plain setting (and Motorhead and Beefheart too). Also, Frank can write a strong melody when he wants to; he can do the avant garde stuff but can really come with a good melody too. This is a fantastic song on this album, and in my Top 5, absolutely a great song.
"Let's Make the Water Turn Black" The first time we saw Zappa reveals his sympathy for the misfit side.
(Yet) another great song in the album. After the general social studies of the American society on side 1, we have the portrait of a couple of very singular characters to kick off side 2. Scatological anecdotes that pre-date the psychedelic era. On the last verses, we learn the characters' life at the song's enunciatory present is not very jolly. Ronnie got drafted and Kenny has drug issues (it is reported that Kenny actually died of an overdose in the 70's). The song closes with the very first appearance of Dick Kunc on a Zappa's album and Ronnie singing backwards.
Here's where you can here the backwards "Ronnie", after '..a little PH7, right here on Earth!' FORWARDS!
This was the original version that I heard .... but anyhow ... Like so many of Zappa's earlier songs this track was later translated into a great instrumental ... and they were often hooked together live (oh no, orange county lumber truck, lets make the water turn black and a couple of others.) What those instrumentals do is reinforce what @Zoot Marimba was saying about the melodic fullness Zappa could put together when the mood struck him. This track was another early favourite of mine and the fact that it was predominantly about Kenny and Ronnie smearing their snot on a window etc just made it bizarrely more interesting. Tracks like this also go a long way to dispel any myths that these guys weren't good players, which sometimes got thrown about when they were doing some of the more bizarre or avant garde stuff
As many times as I've heard this tune, I still crack up at "Kenny's little creatures on displaaaaay." Evidently FZ did know a kid who kept a booger collection. I sure hope the story's apocryphal.
That IS, in fact, part of the 'fun' of getting-into the man.... If you have the patience to navigate his world, he leaves these awesome bread-crumbs of conceptual continuity for you to find....sometime years later...and, if you're like me, get a thrill out of it!
