Captain Beefheart
Printed From: Progarchives.com
Category: Progressive Music Lounges
Forum Name: Prog Bands, Artists and Genres Appreciation
Forum Description: Discuss specific prog bands and their members or a specific sub-genre
URL: http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=65796
Printed Date: November 28 2024 at 07:40
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Topic: Captain Beefheart
Posted By: Pimpernal
Subject: Captain Beefheart
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 13:27
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Hello, i started this thread because i couldn't find anything about beefheart in this forum, so what do you think of Captain Beefheart? What's your favourite album? ------------- 
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Replies:
Posted By: Slartibartfast
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 13:38
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I've known Beefheart for a while, but haven't collected too many of his albums. I've got Doc At The Radar Station, Safe As Milk, and Troutmask Replica. That's about the order I like them. Also Bongo Fury, which is more of a Zappa album. |
Posted By: MovingPictures07
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 13:46
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Captain Beefheart's Trout Mask Replica is one of my favorite albums of all time and is something really special to me. I have a few other albums which are solid as well, just not quite to that same level. Great artist though. ------------- 
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Posted By: Evolver
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 14:09
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Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller) is my favorite. ------------- Trust me. I know what I'm doing. |
Posted By: Vompatti
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 14:18
| Trout Mask Replica is pure brilliance. |
Posted By: Marty McFly
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 14:24
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Is it ? ------------- There's a point where "avant-garde" and "experimental" becomes "terrible" and "pointless," -Andyman1125 on Lulu  Even my |
Posted By: Vompatti
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 14:29
| Yes. |
Posted By: A Person
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 14:52
| I need to listen again, I got bored half way through TMR the first time, haven't listened again. |
Posted By: Equality 7-2521
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 15:16
------------- "One had to be a Newton to notice that the moon is falling, when everyone sees that it doesn't fall. " |
Vompatti wrote:Posted By: aapatsos
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 15:19
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Good timing, their debut just arrived in the post - I am listening now, quite enjoyable and a bit odd... mainly rock 'n roll stuff but in a bizarre way (?) - that is how I would describe it for the time being however, I have never listened to CB before, so I will need some time to form an opinion |
Posted By: Slartibartfast
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 15:53
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I keep TMR around more as a novelty. I listen to a lot of weird stuff, but it never clicked with me.
------------- Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened... 
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Posted By: Marty McFly
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 15:56
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If you like weird, experimental and "music done in a way you've never heard before", this artist is perfect.
------------- There's a point where "avant-garde" and "experimental" becomes "terrible" and "pointless," -Andyman1125 on Lulu Even my |
Posted By: zappaholic
Date Posted: March 15 2010 at 20:16
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Interesting stuff, but definitely an acquired taste.
------------- "Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard." -- H.L. Mencken |
Posted By: Marty McFly
Date Posted: March 16 2010 at 02:09
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I'm not sure what is meant by acquired taste, but if it means something like: "it has to grow on you / you have to have certain need, experimentation in your music taste / it's probably not love on first sight and it will take time", then it's OK. People warned me that Gentle Giant can be hard to get into, but except one listen I had two years ago (and I didn't like it), when I run through their first four albums recently, I loved it instantly. Same with VdGG, King Crimson. And these artists are names that people usually warn about, so that's strange. I "like" some of these dangerous ones and dislike others ? Well, that's one's taste I suppose :-) ------------- There's a point where "avant-garde" and "experimental" becomes "terrible" and "pointless," -Andyman1125 on Lulu Even my |
Posted By: Nightfly
Date Posted: March 16 2010 at 14:41
| I like Clear Spot the best, which is also probably his most accessible. |
Posted By: zappaholic
Date Posted: March 16 2010 at 19:29
Yup, that's pretty much it.
------------- "Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard." -- H.L. Mencken |
Posted By: J-Man
Date Posted: March 16 2010 at 19:50
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I only have Trout Mask Replica, and after 3 or 4 listens I'm not that impressed. I sense that it's a grower, though.
------------- 
Check out my YouTube channel! http://www.youtube.com/user/demiseoftime" rel="nofollow - http://www.youtube.com/user/demiseoftime |
Posted By: jammun
Date Posted: March 16 2010 at 21:04
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The early albums (Safe As Milk, Mirror Man Sessions) are pretty straightforward (for the times). TMR is to me brilliant and not. I've never listed to the whole thing in one sitting. There are many good songs lurking in there. I wish Lick Off My Decals was available...maybe it is now, I forget to check. What I've heard of it is much like TMR, but accessible (and I use the term loosely).
The Spotlight Kid and Clear Spot used to be available on a single disc, a bargain if there ever was one. These are a bit more commercial, but still very good. A couple albums followed that are near garbage. Then came the mighty Bat Chain Puller. I've only heard a couple songs from Doc .
As Slarti sez, there's the stuff with Zappa, Bongo Fury being the best known. But of course the Cap'n is there on Hot Rats, and unless my memory is completely shot, he sings The Torture Never Stops on one of the YCDTOSA albums.
My favorites...Clear Spot and The Spotlight Kid. Beefheart probably hates these, but songs like Click Clack and Big Eyed Beans from Venus don't exactly grow on trees, then or now. They have a definite more commercial bent, but underneath the sheen retain the good madness of TMR in their own way.
------------- Can you tell me where we're headin'? Lincoln County Road or Armageddon. |
Posted By: thellama73
Date Posted: March 16 2010 at 21:15
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I love beefheart! Mirror man is probably my favorite, but Safe as Milk and Trout Mask are also incredible. I also really like Clear Spot and The Spotlight Kid. I am less enamored with Doc at the Radar Station and Ice Cream For Crow than many seem to be.
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Posted By: MovingPictures07
Date Posted: March 16 2010 at 21:34
It's definitely a grower. -------------
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Posted By: jammun
Date Posted: March 16 2010 at 22:19
------------- Can you tell me where we're headin'? Lincoln County Road or Armageddon. |
Posted By: Marty McFly
Date Posted: March 17 2010 at 03:18
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I think that the important thing is that I'm still trying to "get into". And will. Hell, I even started to like Death Metal :-D If this one you can recommend to "newbie", so be it. I'm in. ------------- There's a point where "avant-garde" and "experimental" becomes "terrible" and "pointless," -Andyman1125 on Lulu Even my |
Posted By: snobb
Date Posted: March 17 2010 at 03:35
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I think Cpt.Beefheart is similar case as Zappa: he has some excellent albums, some great albums and some his works are total disaster. One of most accesible (but really clever) entrance to CB music is As Safe As Milk (if you don't afraid of some vintage sound, it's late 60-s, come on!)
Trout Mask Replica is briliant,but possibly most contraversial CB album. I believe it's better way to go step by step. If you will stoo somewhere by the way (listening other ,more accessible CB works) - so don't try to shock yourself with Trout Mask Replica. If you will like them more and more - than try this. But again - if you don't like Zappaesque way of thinking in music, just leave Cpt.Beefheart avant albums alone. By the way, he has many bluesy and other quite boring mainstream albums as well.
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Posted By: Alberto Muņoz
Date Posted: March 17 2010 at 10:37
I think that Mirror Man is an accesible album, if you like loooong songs.
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Posted By: thellama73
Date Posted: March 17 2010 at 20:27
It's Prog Archives. We all like loooooong songs.  -------------
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Posted By: ghost_of_morphy
Date Posted: March 17 2010 at 20:34
------------- 
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Posted By: jammun
Date Posted: March 17 2010 at 21:43
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Okay, checked Amazon. At least here in the U.S., you can still get The Spotlight Kid/Clear Spot doubled up on a single CD for a mere $13.99. ------------- Can you tell me where we're headin'? Lincoln County Road or Armageddon. |
Posted By: jacob s cracker
Date Posted: March 18 2010 at 17:39
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I love the good Cap'n because he took a form of music that I don't particularly enjoy (delta blues type stuff) and injected with a) his own inimitable vocal and poetic capabilities and b) the Magic Band who were brilliant.
I like TMR best I think, but some of the later stuff with Gary Lucas is great too.
I was lucky enough to see the latter-day Magic Band with the Captain at Loughborough Univerisity in about 1980 and they were without a doubt, the tightest band I have ever seen. Nuff said. ------------- I wasn't there when I did it |
Posted By: Dick Heath
Date Posted: March 19 2010 at 10:29
Interesting you saw that gig. Gary Lucas who roadied for CB/MB and played a few tunes in that line up, has been after the rumoured bootleg recorded at that particular gig, for Beefheart archives. So are we at Loughborough SU Ents. (Yes we known about Mersey Trout from the same UK tour - but Lucas doesn't rate it highly). Anybody come across the Loughborough recording? ------------- The best eclectic music on the Web,8-11pm BST/GMT THURS. CLICK ON: http://www.lborosu.org.uk/media/lcr/live.php - http://www.lborosu.org.uk/media/lcr/live.php Host by PA's Dick Heath. |
Posted By: gidouille
Date Posted: March 22 2010 at 23:05
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Lick My Decals Off, Baby is my favorite.
------------- gidouille |
Posted By: Languagegeek
Date Posted: March 23 2010 at 14:09
| Mirror man is genius: the instrumental parts of (i.e. most of the song) Kandy Korn are absolutely transcendent and the title track has a wicked groove. TMR is a fine album, but it does not have as much instumental beauty that some of Beafheart’s other albums have, it’s dissonant with a lot of spoken word type of lyrics; in the end it leaves me wanting more. Albums like Clear Spot or Shiny Beast are better, I think, in that there is a mix of different kinds of song. |
Posted By: Drummerboy
Date Posted: March 23 2010 at 14:16
| As others have said, Clear Spot and Spotlight Kid are good starting places; Big Eyed Beans is an all-time great song. I saw them live at their peak in San Francisco, but their stage show was nothing special, so the recordings are the best memory. |
Posted By: shockedjazz
Date Posted: March 26 2010 at 10:28
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Safe as milk with great songs as abba zabba electricity yellow brick road, etc is great.
Mirror man is also great.
Trout Mask is a klittle bit too much and the band seems to play...not so good.
Spotlight kid is great more accesible but really enjoyable.
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Posted By: KingCrInuYasha
Date Posted: September 29 2010 at 22:23
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I actually found Trout Mask Replica to be disappointing. Not that it was a bad album - in fact, it's pretty good - but by the time I bought it, I was beginning to get accustomed to this style of music. So instead of having a "Wow, this guy's a genius!" or "Man, this is trash!" reaction, I ended up thinking "Oh, this is pretty nice". Nonetheless, he's one of the better obscurities of the60s, 70s and 80s, though I recommend starting with something lightweight like Safe As Milk first. ------------- He looks at this world and wants it all... so he strikes, like Thunderball! |
Posted By: SaltyJon
Date Posted: September 29 2010 at 22:33
Not sure if I'd call him an obscurity, TMR is #58 on Rolling Stone's top 500 albums of all time list. ------------- http://www.last.fm/user/Salty_Jon" rel="nofollow"> 
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Posted By: Man With Hat
Date Posted: September 29 2010 at 22:51
 Does not compute.
Awesome.
But still. ------------- Dig me...But don't...Bury me I'm running still, I shall until, one day, I hope that I'll arrive Warning: Listening to jazz excessively can cause a laxative effect. |
Posted By: SaltyJon
Date Posted: September 29 2010 at 22:59
Yeah, it doesn't make a lot of sense, but I'm not going to complain. 
------------- http://www.last.fm/user/Salty_Jon" rel="nofollow">
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Posted By: A Person
Date Posted: September 29 2010 at 23:04
It doesn't make sense to me either, especially when I think TMR is too long. |
Posted By: irrelevant
Date Posted: September 30 2010 at 02:14
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If you like TMR and haven't yet listened to Lick my Decals off, Baby, you need to. IMO it is as good if not better than TMR. ------------- https://gabebuller.bandcamp.com/" rel="nofollow - New album! http://www.progarchives.com/artist.asp?id=7385" rel="nofollow - http://www.progarchives.com/artist.asp?id=7385 |
Posted By: The Hemulen
Date Posted: September 30 2010 at 02:30
Ditto. |
Posted By: Rocktopus
Date Posted: September 30 2010 at 03:23
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Got into Beefheart pretty late. But by now I've gotten all his albums, except the two everyone seem to hate: Unconditionally Guaranteed + Bluejeans & Moonbeams.
How bad are they, really? I don't mind if its catchier or more
conventional, as long as his energy is intact. Should I give them a try? So far I think all his albums are great, with a slight preferance for the 67-72 period. ------------- Over land and under ashes In the sunlight, see - it flashes Find a fly and eat his eye But don't believe in me Don't believe in me Don't believe in me |
Posted By: The Hemulen
Date Posted: September 30 2010 at 04:51
Of the two I only know Bluejeans and it's really not that great. It's not the mainstream sound that's the problem per se, but you can tell Beefheart's not into it so the whole thing's lackluster and pedestrian. Worth experiencing though, if only to satisfy your curiosity. |
Posted By: Slartibartfast
Date Posted: January 15 2013 at 19:03
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Happy Birthday (and RIP) to the Captain. Credit to John Fugelsang.
------------- Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened...
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Posted By: Horizons
Date Posted: January 15 2013 at 19:04
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I mainly listen to two albums - his debut and Mirror Man. I enjoy both but i haven't really gotten into other releases. ------------- Crushed like a rose in the riverflow. |
Posted By: darkshade
Date Posted: January 15 2013 at 19:16
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I listened to Frank Zappa's "The Lost Episodes" earlier, an album which is second only to "Bongo Fury" for most Beefheart vocals on a FZ album. RIP ------------- http://www.last.fm/user/MysticBoogy" rel="nofollow - My Last.fm 
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Posted By: Slartibartfast
Date Posted: January 15 2013 at 20:50
Bongo Fury was my first Zappa album. I got a copy of Doc At The Radar Station a few years later. (Making love to a vampire with a monkey on my kneee.  ) Trout Mask Replica, though revered by some around here kind of turned me off to exploring further. I decided to take a chance on Safe As MIlk and like that one.
------------- Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened...
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Posted By: zappaholic
Date Posted: January 16 2013 at 18:54
That particular track also appears on the album Songs In the Key Of Z: The Curious Universe Of Outsider Music. (It's listed as "Vampire Suite" because it's preceded by a couple of scratch tracks that show how it developed.) Beefheart was definitely an outsider, no question about it. ------------- "Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard." -- H.L. Mencken |
Posted By: Jonathan
Date Posted: January 26 2013 at 05:55
| Do you guys think that the lyrics in Beefheart's song "When I See Mommy, I Feel Like a Mummy" are controversial? |
Posted By: HarbouringTheSoul
Date Posted: January 26 2013 at 06:11
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Considering that no more than a few thousand people in the world or so have ever heard the song and even fewer have ever taken explicit notice of the lyrics, I don't think there's much opportunity for controversy. I guess you could read sexism into the lyrics if you really wanted to, but you could do that with just about any song about sexual obsession. |
Posted By: Jonathan
Date Posted: January 26 2013 at 08:38
| Does anyone here find the song to be offensive? |
Posted By: thellama73
Date Posted: January 26 2013 at 09:05
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I don't. I think it's a mistake to read too much into Beefheart's lyrics in general. I expect he just noticed that "mommy" and "mummy" sounded similar and built the song up around that in his typical stream of consciousness way. -------------
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Posted By: HarbouringTheSoul
Date Posted: January 27 2013 at 03:51
Now I think you're underselling him. Captain Beefheart did more than just string words together. Many of his lyrics, especially in later years, have a pretty straightforward message, even if it's delivered in obscure words. It's rather obvious - to me at least - that "Mummy" is about a man's sexual obsession with a woman who shows no interest in him - in fact she doesn't even notice him ("her interest fades like breath on a mirror", what a great line). He barely catches a glimpse of her before she passes him by, and he wishes he could grab ahold of her (the metaphor he uses is wrapping her up like a mummy) just to get a good look at her. It's very much in the blues tradition of songwriting: Taking a sexual topic and dressing it in colorful metaphors. I'm not denying that what sparked the song is that Beefheart noticed how similar those two words sound. In fact, that's probably exactly what happened. But that doesn't mean that the lyrics are only built around those two words and whatever else came into his mind at the moment, because they're not. "Bat Chain Puller" is stream of consciousness. "Bellerin' Plain" is stream of consciousness. In fact, most of Trout Mask Replica is stream of consciousness. But "Mummy" isn't, "My Head Is My Only House" isn't, "The Smithsonian Institute Blues" isn't, and many other songs of his aren't either. In general, I think too much has been made of Captain Beefheart's strangeness, as if he were some kind of incomprehensible, erratic madman. He had his own logic, and I like him best whenever he makes that logic apparent to the listener. That's why my favorite albums of his are Lick My Decals Off, Baby and Shiny Beast, not Trout Mask Replica, which too often seems to be chaotic for its own sake. It's sad how many people have probably dismissed Beefheart because they only heard Trout Mask Replica. I almost fell into the same trap. |
Posted By: KingCrInuYasha
Date Posted: January 29 2013 at 10:22
Actually, Trout Mask Replica isn't that chaotic. I'm not sure if this was a deliberate decision or not, but for an album as freaky as this, it frequently gives the listener moments to catch his or her breath, including "The Dust Blows Forward And The Dust Blows Back", "Ella Guru", "Hair Pie" (both bakes), "Moonlight On Vermont", "Paucho Cadaver", "China Pig", "Dali's Car", "Well", "Sugar 'N' Spikes", "She's Too Much For My Mirror", "The Blimp" (maybe), "Old  At Play" (not sure if I can say ) and "Veteran's Day Poppy". Nearly half the album. But maybe it's just me. Oh, another thing - Is it me, or does the first few notes of "Dali's Car" sound similar to the main riff of King Crimson's "Red"? ------------- He looks at this world and wants it all... so he strikes, like Thunderball! |
Posted By: HolyMoly
Date Posted: January 29 2013 at 12:00
------------- My other avatar is a Porsche It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle if it is lightly greased. -Kehlog Albran |
Posted By: HarbouringTheSoul
Date Posted: January 29 2013 at 13:02
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I don't want to give off the impression that I think Trout Mask Replica is all chaos and insanity. There are many logical, comprehensible and - with a bit of adjustment - even memorable songs on the album, and I like it overall. But it makes it harder for the listener than any other Beefheart album. Lots of "field recordings", incomprehensible lyrics, odd vocal intonations (need I mention "Pena"?) and some of the most dissonant and incoherent guitar "interplay" the world has ever seen. The segments where the two guitars plus the bass guitar all play independently of each other are hard to swallow. Most Beefheart albums have some of this stuff , but not that much. I much prefer the two drums, one guitar setup on Decals or even two-guitar albums like Shiny Beast where the interplay is more conventional. Also, I've always felt that it's frontloaded with some of its least accessible tracks. "Frownland" hardly has a semblance of a steady rhythm or a guitar riff, "Dust" is a cappella, "Dachau Blues" pairs disturbing lyrics with a nursery rhyme-like melody, "Ella Guru" is kind of catchy but has Don using a really odd voice, "Hair Pie: Bake 1" begins with two minutes of sax noises for no good reason. I would say "Moonlight on Vermont" is the first relatively normal song on the album, preceded by five of the most difficult ones. Pretty much all other Beefheart albums begin with comparatively straightforward and riff-oriented bluesy numbers.
Oh yes, absolutely! When I go track by track, I find surprisingly little stuff on it that I outright dislike. But taken as a whole, it's such a giant, sprawling mess that I rarely find myself getting through the whole thing (or even one disc, although the second one is slightly less manic, so I have better chances there).
I don't know. Doc has some great songs, but there's some stuff in the middle that's uglier than anything he'd done since Trout Mask Replica. For instance, the two chord guitar part in "Sue Egypt" strikes me as one of the dumbest-sounding things Beefheart ever did, and the vocals in "Telephone" are just a step too far. I'd hand the crown to Decals, whose only flaw are the stupid saxophone loops he plastered all over "Japan in a Dishpan" and "Flash Gordon's Ape". |
Posted By: Jonathan
Date Posted: February 22 2013 at 18:33
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Posted By: PrognosticMind
Date Posted: September 11 2014 at 15:50
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Searched for Beefheart, and found this thread. On a TMR kick as of late. Always one of those artists that's stood out in ways that strike my "abstract expressionism" chord in all the right ways. What an amazing record and artist. ------------- "A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous. Got me?" |
Posted By: Xonty
Date Posted: September 11 2014 at 16:48
| Like Frank Zappa, I love bits of his work but always find it hard not to see something like TMR as some psychedelic, interesting artefact instead of a musical masterpiece. Zappa was a little more down-to-earth if you could put it that way - he had a more controlled eccentricity which can been seen as both "heritage" and classics. Basically, I never fully got into the Captain Beefheart ethos of playing, even though I understand it, but TMR sounds better to me with every listen. |
Posted By: HolyMoly
Date Posted: September 11 2014 at 17:18
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Coincidentally, I was just about to buy the "33 1/3" series audiobook about TMR. Can't wait to see what new insights I'll get into this crazy thing. ------------- My other avatar is a Porsche It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle if it is lightly greased. -Kehlog Albran |
Posted By: zappaholic
Date Posted: September 11 2014 at 17:41
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Sometime last year I picked up Doc At the Radar Station. Damn good record. ------------- "Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard." -- H.L. Mencken |
Posted By: Toaster Mantis
Date Posted: September 12 2014 at 04:23
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Does anyone know exactly what are the copyrights issues that prevent Lick My Decals Off from getting a proper re-issue? I'd have guessed it had something to do with Beefheart and Zappa's mutual falling out, but then again not so long ago the Zappa Family Trust finally released Bat Chain Puller which had been caught in exactly that kind of legal limbo, so... ------------- "The past is not some static being, it is not a previous present, nor a present that has passed away; the past has its own dynamic being which is constantly renewed and renewing." - Claire Colebrook |
Posted By: HolyMoly
Date Posted: September 12 2014 at 04:55
Of course, now there's a new Beefheart box coming out which finally restores Decals to CD, albeit as part of a 4 disc package. And it's been on LP now for a while. ------------- My other avatar is a Porsche It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle if it is lightly greased. -Kehlog Albran |
Posted By: PrognosticMind
Date Posted: September 12 2014 at 05:41
This is totally understandable. Beefheart truly is something different. I'm a huge Zappa fan myself, and I can easily admit that while they do have similar aesthetics and expressionism - Zappa is by far the easier of the two to digest. TMR is one of those records where you start to truly "hear it" with subsequent listens. The only other record that's ever done that for me (and ironically led me to discover Captain Beefheart due to someone mentioning the similarity in a review) is Gorguts Obscura.
I was just watching the Captain Beefheart documentary last evening, and from what I can gather, Zappa was saying that Beefheart would just sign whatever was put in front of him. This led to all sorts of legal conflicts down the road, and were the main source of all that red tape. It's probably a little more complex than just that, but it wouldn't surprise me if that's a huge part of it, lol. ------------- "A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous. Got me?" |
Posted By: PrognosticMind
Date Posted: September 15 2014 at 15:35
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Trout Mask Replica is officially my favorite record at the moment. Are there any others who are as "obsessed" with this record as I am right now? ------------- "A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous. Got me?" |
Posted By: HolyMoly
Date Posted: September 15 2014 at 16:12
------------- My other avatar is a Porsche It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle if it is lightly greased. -Kehlog Albran |
Posted By: PrognosticMind
Date Posted: September 15 2014 at 16:23
Who would've guessed, right? The poetic lyrics are one of my favorite aspects here. In particular, the ways the production sets and resets the stage for Beefheart's musings. The last spoken poetry portion of "Old Fart at Play", where it sounds like a single track recording from a tape recorder in the center of the room is an example of this. His annunciation and vernacular are unparalleled here, IMHO. "Neon Meate Dream Of A Octafish" is another personal favorite .------------- "A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous. Got me?" |
Posted By: HolyMoly
Date Posted: September 15 2014 at 19:32
------------- My other avatar is a Porsche It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle if it is lightly greased. -Kehlog Albran |
Posted By: PrognosticMind
Date Posted: September 16 2014 at 05:56
Nothing's out of bounds with the captain, lol. ------------- "A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous. Got me?" |
Posted By: aaroncliftmusic
Date Posted: September 19 2014 at 12:00
"Trout Mask Replica" for sure. That album has frightened several friends away, though. 
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Posted By: matty3198
Date Posted: September 20 2014 at 13:49
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Trout Mask has it's moments but its the albums he made later that really do it for me. Lick my Decals, Shiny Beast and Clear Spot. |
Posted By: dr wu23
Date Posted: September 20 2014 at 19:48
------------- One does nothing yet nothing is left undone. Haquin |
Posted By: matty3198
Date Posted: September 23 2014 at 14:29
Spotlight Kid has some good songs,but its one of his weaker albums IMO. |
Posted By: PrognosticMind
Date Posted: September 26 2014 at 11:14
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Doc at The Radar Station is amazing. ------------- "A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous. Got me?" |
Posted By: brainstormer
Date Posted: September 26 2014 at 13:27
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Since this isn't an "appreciation" thread but merely a discussion, I'll chime in. I have tried to enjoy his work but can't get very far in listening to it because it's not my taste. I enjoyed his work with Zappa when I was barely a teen, the Bongo Fury album. After that, I really outgrew this guy. The kind of bluesy rock they create combined with Bukowsky meets the more drugged out hippies poetry hardly qualifies as prog in my book. It's a variation of what I call the "greasy spoon" aesthetic, in this case, too chaotic and simplistic to me to be considered good music. Maybe Bach and Mozart would concur Did this guy ever do a semi-normal album, or what might be called classical or instrumental, or was it all this blues-based stuff? I imagine he probably did some with chromatic type stuff thrown in to essentially a rock/blue/free jazz type backdrop. ------------- -- Robert Pearson Regenerative Music http://www.regenerativemusic.net Telical Books http://www.telicalbooks.com ParaMind Brainstorming Software http://www.paramind.net |
Posted By: PrognosticMind
Date Posted: October 26 2014 at 06:58
Beefheart truly is avant garde at its finest and most poignant, IMHO. You won't find much in the way of traditional blues with him beyond the ways he bends and twists those influences into his particular style. "China Pig" off of TMR is about as close to traditional blues as you'll get off that record, lol.
------------- "A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous. Got me?" |
Posted By: dr wu23
Date Posted: October 27 2014 at 16:20
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For Brainstormer....
I think his most accessible or commercial albums are Unconditionally Guaranteed and Moonbeams and Bluejeans but they are also his weakest according to Beefheart fans....which I am one.
For me Clear Spot is the ultimate album since it's accessible, has blues and rock , and still maintains his weird musical vision and imho Big Eyed Beans From Venus might be the best blues rock thing he has ever written with his classic magic band lineup. ------------- One does nothing yet nothing is left undone. Haquin |
Posted By: Toaster Mantis
Date Posted: October 28 2014 at 12:51
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For me it's The Mirror Man Sessions that helped me "get" the Captain though if you're not into less narratively aimed psychedelic jamming it might neither be the right place. The last two LPs Doc at the Radar Station and Ice Cream for Crow might be better entrance points, though, they hit the just balance between the "mutant blues" of Safe As Milk and Bongo Fury on one hand the avant-garde mindbending free jazz surrealism of Trout Mask Replica on the other. ------------- "The past is not some static being, it is not a previous present, nor a present that has passed away; the past has its own dynamic being which is constantly renewed and renewing." - Claire Colebrook |
Posted By: PrognosticMind
Date Posted: October 28 2014 at 21:13
Ice Cream for Crow has really grown on me in the last month or so. It feels like Beefheart evolved. ------------- "A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous. Got me?" |
Posted By: Tom Ozric
Date Posted: October 29 2014 at 01:07
| Earlier this year I finally acquired an LP of Bongo Fury. It's a wonderful album, and Beefheart just adds to Zappa's usual quality. As for the Captain's work, i only have a couple of LP's and I love Mirror Man for sure. |