From Publishers Weekly
Pop culture biographer Miles (Paul McCartney; Ginsberg; etc.) paints an engrossing portrait of the troubled musical genius who died of prostate cancer in 1993 at age 52. Zappa endured a peripatetic youth and an early brush with the law that fueled his trademark anti-authoritarian strain; his musical brilliance eventually transformed him from class clown into one of rock's major icons, with such landmark records as We're Only in It for the Money and Joe's Garage. Miles skillfully weaves together the major beats and minor notes of Zappa's remarkable life, no small feat given the musician's many contradictions: he was a hard-rocking star, but also a meticulous, studious composer influenced by Varèse and Stravinsky; he despised drug use and the trappings of stardom, but he loved groupies (he partook of their favors freely, eventually marrying one and fathering...children). A virtuoso, a perfectionist and a shrewd businessman, Zappa alienated, sued or otherwise offended nearly everyone in his life at some point; he especially loved tormenting his audience. Miles hits the ups and downs of Zappa's life like a skilled composer in his own right, and he captures the contentious eras (from the late 1950s on) in which Zappa's genius emerged. The result is a penetrating look both at Zappa and at the social and political milieu in which popular rock music stepped to the fore.
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Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Booklist
Ten years after his death, Frank Zappa can be better appreciated than during the mercurial composer and performer's life, and Miles' attempt to do so is the most comprehensive biography to date. Zappa's early work, which he occasionally referred to as "comedy music," seemed to mock the music he had grown up with; political satire coexisted with R&B stylings in such songs as "Who Are the Brain Police?" in Zappa's first album, Freak Out, which also debuted his long-running band, the Mothers of Invention. Miles examines the mid-1960s L.A. milieu that spawned that album and how Zappa's first release stretched the limits of pop music, and he presents Zappa's earlier home and family life in more depth than anyone else has. Eventually Zappa became a target of Tipper Gore and friends' campaign for pop-music warning labels and Czech president Vaclav Havel's choice for his fledgling administration's U.S. trade representative. Well written and exceedingly well referenced, right down to the exhaustive discography. Mike Tribby
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
