Zappa

Camille Paglia

Barry Miles's new biography, Zappa, argues that he was a major artist in the line of Courbet and Duchamp. Despite sometimes tendentious overstatements, the book does indeed establish that Zappa, through his genre-shattering experiments, technical virtuosity and staggering productivity, deserves to be considered a central figure of late-20th-century American culture.
— The New York Times

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 Var se 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 three 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. Agent, Andrew Wylie. (Nov.) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

More than a decade after his death, rock guitarist, classical composer, political activist, and controversial songwriter Frank Zappa still influences popular culture. Miles has written a thorough study of Zappa's life and work. While not quite as fluid as his previous Paul McCartney: Many Years from Now or Jack Kerouac: King of the Beats, it delivers a well-rounded portrait of Zappa and a critical evaluation of his rock, jazz, and classical compositions, recordings, and live performances. Miles knew Zappa and was present at some of the musician's recording sessions; however, he also documents his study with numerous print sources. Along with Richard Kostelanetz's The Frank Zappa Companion, this looks to be one of the most important books on the enigmatic Zappa. Recommended for larger public libraries and highly recommended for academic libraries with larger music collections.-James E. Perone, Mount Union Coll., Alliance, OH Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

A new biography of the grungy "genius" of rock 'n' roll returns over and over again to a few themes, all carefully documented and likely to upset the faithful. A gregarious loner who grew up during the 1950s in the character-free towns littering the southern California desert, Frank Zappa displayed early on the odd mix of interests that would show up later in his work: doo-wop music, Hispanic pachuco culture, toilet humor, atonal avant-garde composers, and a love/hate relationship with trash culture. Pop-culture historian Miles (Jack Kerouac, 1998, etc.) is at his best when ably chronicling Zappa's early years, especially the 1960s, when he spread his freak flag via The Mothers of Invention (which he later disbanded, having come to see his bandmates as employees instead of collaborators) and such massively outsized compositions as Freak Out! An omnivorous music lover, Zappa boasted a legion of influences, which was reflected in his prodigious output; by the '70s, at least in this account, he seems to be releasing a double or triple album on every other page. This gives Miles plenty of material to sift through for references to things in Zappa's life, connections to other songs, and so on. Unfortunately, as the author himself often points out, for all his universally recognized musical talent, Zappa had a simply awful sense of humor, not to mention a viciously misanthropic outlook, and was always self-destructively undercutting his compositions with pointlessly smutty lyrics, "continually rubbing his audience's face in the dirt." Miles is far from an all-inclusive biographer, displaying as little interest in Zappa's personal life as the artist did himself and preferring instead to go intolengthy detail about his legendarily monastic editing and recording sessions. A portrait does emerge here, and it's a frighteningly soulless one: against it, Miles's occasional reminders of Zappa's musical genius seem more like afterthoughts than genuine analysis. Far from the last word on Zappa, but an interesting shot from the sidelines. Agent: Andrew Wylie/The Wylie Agency