Customer Reviews
Among his 10 best!!!!!!!!!
It was a total surprise for me to find this classic album worthy of such high praise but it certainly is!!I easily put it with Joes Garage,Freak Out,Overnite Sensation,Jazz From Hell etc. I hate to admit my penchant for angry lyrics and gritty screaming guitars but Chungas Revenge caught me from the beginning,took hold, and never let me go. . . as among Franks best dont let me forhet the newer Transfusion as another great album not to be missed from anyones collection. The cover of Chungas Revenge shows a wild looking Frank screaming Madly about smething looking very angry and angry is how you should feel if you see a copy of this Cd and pass it up. Thanks Bob Repple, Chicago .
Two essential, career-best FZ tracks on this one
The title track is sort of "Theme From Burnt Weeny Sandwich Revisited". Regardless of what you might think of the whole Flo & Eddie "experience" in Frank's timeline, this CD has two tracks which get right down into the heart of his best music. . . a tense, slithering, honking beast that explodes on a few occasions and is one of the best Zappa guitar workouts of all time. Second is "Sharleena," in which Kaylan & Volman set aside the junior high scatology and dive waist-deep into a furious tribute to Zappa's beloved pachuco-flavored doo-wop. "I called up all my baby's friends and asked 'em, where she done went. . . " This song also appears on "You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore Volume 3" in a 9-minute concert appearance from 1984 featuring Dweezil Zappa on lead guitar. All of the original's irony is stripped away (vocalists Ike Willis, Ray White and Bobby Martin do a nice job on the harmonies but approach the song with giggles a-plenty), and the point seems to be Dweezil attempting to prove that he can "shred" like Steve Vai (he can't). Zappa shared one thing in common with Bob Dylan. . . in his never-ending quest to continually "reinvent" his classic songs, sometimes the primary result was driving the listener back to the far superior original. .
"The Mothers: The Next Generation"
He had broken up the original band, The Mothers Of Invention, right after the Spring tour of 1969, on VERY short notice, and seemed to want to distance himself from that whole thing. This was a period of intense activity for Frank Zappa. He put together a new band after experimenting with new musicians, mostly from the "Hot Rats" sessions, as well as producing Beefheart's "Trout Mask Replica" LP, but still cashing in on the old group's efforts, releasing "Burnt Weenie Sandwich" and "Weasels Ripped My flesh" by the old band, as well. All this, while doing production on the "Uncle Meat" project with material recorded by the old group and some newer material for it, and where did he find time to sleep?
His obvious favorite musician from the old days was Ian Underwood, and technically, he played more music on "Hot Rats" than Zappa did. So, FZ keeps Underwood, hires Jeff Simmons, George Duke, and Aynsley Dunbar for a tour, and calls the new band "The Mothers. " A little back pedaling? Maybe. The new band does a show with Zubin Mehta's orchestra, Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan are in the audience, Kaylan's cousin is Zappa's tour manager, and they are invited to join the band, do another tour, cut some records, and make a movie.
Most of the material from "Chunga's Revenge is from the period where Flo & Eddie (Volman & Kaylan) first joined the band, and it is fleshed out with leftover material from "Hot Rats. " The sound is a little raw, but one instantly hears what Zappa was after. A streamlined rock combo, with a bit of a pop feel. The songs are, for the most part, about life on the road, and the idea of groupie-related lyrics and concepts weren't yet driven to the extreme they were driven to later. This excess, I guess one can call it, is tempered with some fine instrumental work, the delicate "Twenty Small Cigars," the dark and brooding title track, the silly "The Clap," which is just filler, but it does help in segueing the material before and after it, and the opening "Transylvania Boogie," as well as the extended jam, "Nancy & Mary Music. " People don't seem to like this, but it is a good jazz-rock jam from one of the concerts of that era.
He began the new decade on an optimistic note, Volman and Kaylan being as funny as any comedian you'll find anywhere, and a new band. A lot of people malign this period in Zappa's career, with all the juvenile locker-room humor, and the fascination with bizarre sex practices of people in the band, but even that can get a little tedious, some very good music was recorded here.
Zappa in transition.
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. You can see a complete list of all Frank Zappa discography, or go back to the Frank Zappa tabs
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