THE MOTHERS OF INVENTION: CRUISING WITH RUBEN & THE JETS

Just for fun I guess, musically I can hardly take this album seriously, and I don't think that it was intended to be taken seriously. The music is based on 50's and 60's Doo-wop or however they call it. and somehow all the songs sound so familliar, but he treated them with a Zappaesque brush to make them fit his style. He'd done similar things on Freak Out and Absolutely Free, but then it were just single songs inbetween a bigger concept, as an album it's a bit too much the same for comfort. Funny elements are as usual incorporated in the songs (notice the sesame street tune as the core melody for Cheap Thrills). It's actually quite a nice album, so for Zappa fans it can be great fun, an enjoyable album, but certainly not groundbraking at any level. I want to give it three stars, but in light of his earlier and later work I can only give two.