WAKA / JAWAKA

This album and Wazoo are quite possibly my favorite Zappa albums (though that is difficult to say with the mass of material he has........there are so many favorites for me). The only thing that brings it down for me is the two vocal numbers. They are not particularly bad, but they are the kind of "comedy music" that I just can't get into from Zappa. But the two instrumentals, making up more than a third of the playing time, more than make up for it. Fantastic jazz oriented music with great solos by all involved. For me, this is essential Zappa. I wavered between 3 and 4 stars because for the most part with Zappa it is hard to say any of his ablums are an "Excellent addition to any prog music collection" because you can't really pigeon hole his music as being "prog" in the first place. He certainly was progressive in the most literal sense though. So take my 4 stars to indicate how much I like it, but if you are not familiar with Zappa or don't like a lot of his other work, approach with caution. For myself, I love just about all the instrumental work I've heard from Zappa, but am not crazy about most of the vocals (though there are a lot of exceptions). So for myself, I have to give 4 stars, though I would say I prefer Wazoo due to it having one vocal number I like as well as great instrumentals.