THE DUB ROOM SPECIAL!

I remember seeing the Dub Room Special when it came out in the 80s. Is it possible it's only released as a DVD now? This review is based on a fading memory...If I recall, it was a combination of the live show Halloween 1981 that was also broadcast live on MTV (I think the 1st live show they ever broadcast?). Great band with Steve Vai and Chad Wackerman. Then there were live in the studio segments before an audience with the 74 band, from the session that was in the 1974 European TV show, A Token of my Extreme. This I found on a DVD bootleg in Stockholm. This material is magic, for many Zappa's best band ever, and Napoleon Murphy Brock is a hilarious and charismatic frontman, who has a fantastic singer/comedy partner in George Duke, one of the best 70s keyboardists. I'm pretty sure that the version they perform here of "Florentine Pogen" is the recording used on One Size Fits All", which is mostly a studio album, which means the performance is flawless and perfect in every way. "Inca Roads" is one of the great masterpieces of 70s jazz-rock neo-classical fusion. And the live studio material was intercut with the brilliant clay animation of Bruce Bickford, which I believe also featured in the Dub Room Special. Token of my Extreme had a bit too much 70s video color effects on it, something they didn't overdo on the Dubroom version. Plus long interviews Frank makes with various studio cronies to show his work environment. A highly entertaining and virtuosic slice of FZs life, one that is dearly missed in the American music scene of today, to say nothing of his always spot on political commentaries. But I'm still waiting for the Roxy & Elsewhere DVD, promised as a preview on the Baby Snakes DVD I got several years ago...that will be an event, as the voluminous film material was never edited!!! 4 stars, only because 200 Motels and Baby Snakes are more perfect and rounded films as a whole, but this still should not be missed.