GUITAR

Guitar contains some killer live solos deliveredthrough the years by the avant-garde maestro, Frank Zappa. Fans already got the Shut Up 'N Play Your Guitar trilogy to appreciate Zappa's prowess, and it stands as a much better document than this. The problem here is that, naturally, the focus is given to the guitar. Thetrue genius of Zappa was his ability to find and use skilled musicians to craft weird yet amazing tunes where every instrument could shine. Here, however, it's all about Frank. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it is when most of the solos are average.

Zappa and guitar afficiandos will want this album, but I suggest sampling his talent in his "real" studio albums. The best solos are Were We Really Safe in San Antonio?, the redone Watermelon in Easter Hay, Sinster #3, and Outside Now. The rest is mostly bland for FZ standards.

Grade: D

Is there any need to compare?

"Guitar" blows the "Shut Up N' Play Yer Guitar" series out of the water! This is one of the few pure solo albums that I can listen to the full way through. (The other being Trace- Fusion, by the way!)This shows Zappa at his rawest and most intense guitar moments, and then it can also show his beautiful progressions. The heaviest hitters are the superb "Which One Is It?" and the classic "In-A-Gadda-Stravinsky", while he breaks out he raw intensity during "Jim & Tammy's Upper Room" and the extremely catchy "For Duane". How can you not clap along? Like I said, he can also play very toned down and make things sound perfect rather than intense. "Once Again, Without The Net" and "Do Not Pass Go" are prime examples of that. The funk that is delivered in "That's Not Really Reggae", and the bluesy "Sexual Harassment In The Workplace" are not to be forgotten either.

After you listen to this album, you will realize that if you have ever even seen somebody play guitar, they should be playing it like this guy. One listen, and trust me, you will regard Frank Zappa as high as I do. Those who don't appreciate his praise as a guitarist need to hear this. As a matter of fact, this would be an excellent compliment to any musician's collection. It can be relaxing and dangerous all in the same CD.

4 stars, not 5 because of the fact that some people could just not be able to appreciate the intense musicianship in this here album.

The songs on this double album are live and all instrumental. They were taken from many concerts(1979- 1984) and blended into each other giving the impression of one long suite on each disc. Steve Vai is on stunt guitar for many of these tunes. Zappa plays his Custom Strat for the most part, but he also uses his Hendrix Strat, Custom S.G. and Les Paul Custom.This didn't impress me as much as i thought it would, I think that a lot of the guitar solos have a similar style and sound, so with 32 tracks it's a bit much, especially with no vocals present. There are lots of highlights though, and i'll go over what impressed me the most.

"Sexual Harassment In The Workplace" is classic Zappa,and he's faithful to the original. This is such a relaxing tune that really stands out from the others. "Republicans" is dark, angular and raw. Not surprising given the title and Frank's thoughts on politics. Great song. "Do Not Pass Go" has some nice intricate guitar work after 1 1/2 minutes. "In-A-Gadda-Stravinsky" features an amazing rhythm section of bass and drums throughout as Frank makes his guitar cry out overtop. "Once Again, Without The Net" is a difficult but rewarding listen. I love the title of "Jim & Tammy's Upper Room" a reference to those televangelists of that era. Zappa really lets go on this one with some powerful guitar work.

"That Ol' G Minor Thing Again" has a catchy beat with the keyboards standing out for one of the rare moments. The guitar is almost dissonant after 4 minutes. Check out the drumming in "Move It Or Park It" and "But Who Was Fulcanelli ?". "For Duane" is really a long instrumental section lifted from a cover Zappa did of the ALLMAN BROTHERS "Whipping Post". Some passionate blistering guitar in this one. The guitar and drumming are outstanding in "GOA". "Winos Do Not March" is a brighter more melodic track that stands out. One of my favs. "Swans ? What Swans ?" is a reflective song with some prominant bass. Some ripping guitar in "Systems Of The Edges". "Watermelon In Easter Hay" is probably the closest Frank gets to soaring guitar melodies, and they are beautiful.

3.5 stars. Well worth getting for guitar and Zappa fans alike.

120 minutes of Zappa's delightful Guitar

In the 80s Frank Zappa was making two very different kinds of music; on one hand he was making a weird mix of commercial music tinged with his excessive humor, as he had shown previously with Sheik Yerbouti, while on the other hand he was making instrumental music led by guitar solos in which the musicians on board, while very capable, there role was really just settle the rhythm and mood . Frank with 'Guitar', already obvious by the name of the album, is headed to the later of the mentioned previously, just like the trilogy of Shut Up N' Play Yer Guitar which was released earlier.

However, despite at how mediocre you think that this album may sound which is purely based on endless guitar solos and below Zappa's standards on the composition side, this album truly makes a place of it's own in Zappa's wide and diverse discography.

Obviously while having simple, yet effective, compositions, you won't find obvious standouts in which either complexity or top-notch musicianship is found, but still tunes like 'Sexual Harassment In The Workplace', 'Which One Is It?', 'Chalk Pie', 'Variations On Sinister #3', 'GOA', 'Winos Do Not March', 'Do Not Try This At Home' and 'Things That Look Like Meat' all present some grabbing and emotional guitar playing. However, I must recommend you to listen this album as a whole piece, not detracting from each track, if not all like one single long piece in which flows smoothly that'll chill you completely.

No, it doesn't match Roxy & Elsewhere and Zappa in New York in terms of complex composition and exceptional musicianship, but none of those two give such a chilling performance of Zappa's guitar for around 120 minutes. If you already have listened to the Shut Up N' Play Yer Guitar trilogy, either you liked it or not, this shouldn't be much of a worthy addition, but if you haven't listened to that yet, I would definitely recommend this as a damn great chilling experience, as well as to get another point of view from Zappa's versatility.

Frank Zappa was so many things. First and foremost, he was possibly the greatest composer of the late twentieth century. He was also a funny and entertaining performer. But also, he was one hell of a guitar player. Unique and exciting, his solos were one of the highlights of every live show. This is the second collection of guitar solos that Zappa released (the first being "Shut Up And Play Your Guitar" - if you don't count the separate LP releases of that set). Both sets spotlight Frank's unusual and amazing guitar style.

I have heard complaints about how Zappa always played over fairly simplistic chord progressions. My thought was that he did that to contrast the complexity of his playing. In fact, his solos usually consisted of many of the odd timing and melodies that made his written pieces so interesting.

While I love this whole set, two pieces always stand out to me. On In-A Gadda- Stravinsky, Zappa dares to play "The Rite Of Spring" over the famous Iron Butterfly riff, until the piece breaks down into "Taps". And It Ain't Necessarily The Saint James Infirmary Frank, along with keyboardist Tommy Mars, play a great bluesy version of the Gershwin classic.

I highly recommend this for the serious guitar freak.

I kinda get the feeling that any edition of this kind of album from Frank, unless something made it exceptionally good or exceptionally bad, would almost automatically get a high *** from me. This is a 2-CD successor to the Shut Up 'N' Play Yer Guitar set from several years earlier, and here as there it's just one guitar solo after another. Here, as there, no context is given for the solos (though the title of one betrays that it comes from a performance of "Whipping Post"), and just as with the previous set, I absolutely cannot get through this in one setting. Once again, though, this absolutely works as a collection of individual performances.

The biggest difference between this and the previous set comes from the obvious: that set featured performances done with Frank's 70's bands, while this set features performances done with Frank's 80's bands. The 80's version of Zappa live was generally louder, more abrasive and more technophilian than the 70's version of Zappa live, and this set reflects that amply. Frank's playing style is essentially the same here as there, but there's more emphasis on noises and effects that weren't demonstrated on Shut Up. I would tend to say that a lot of the solos on here could easily pass for heavy metal solos, only more experimental on the whole. For that reason and others, I could actually see the possibility of somebody enjoying Shut Up and disliking this, but I can't really buy that. The relative weaknesses of Zappa's 80's live shows came from plenty of factors that had nothing to do with his guitar playing; if anything, his guitar playing was often what saved the day.

Some particularly memorable performances come from three tracks: "In-a-Gadda- Stravinsky" (where Frank starts off with the opening theme of "The Rite of Spring" before going in other directions, while the bass player plays the "In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida" riff), "Watermelon in Easter Hay" (not identical to the gloriously beautiful original, but a good listen regardless), and "For Duane" (taken from "Whipping Post," as mentioned before). Oh, and the opening Sexual Harrassment in the Workplace could actually pass for a regular 'song' on a regular Zappa live album. Other than that, none of the performances really stand out as either especially good or especially bad. They just kind of feed on one other, creating a good overall effect.

And thus they make a good overall album. Again, very few people will have any chance of suriving a listen to this from start to finish, but as music to randomly interspere with other tracks from your collection, it's totally worthy. I definitely recommend it.

This album is simply a collection of guitar solos taken out of the context of the concert and the main song and renamed and pasted together so that you get over 2 hours of FZ jamming on the guitar. Each track is melded together and starts when the solo starts and ends before the band returns to the main melody again. The way these solos are presented makes for a somewhat painful listening experience if you are not a lover of FZ's solos. If that is all you want to hear without any context to the song they are being performed in, then you are in luck because this is wall to wall guitar. Or if you are a guitar student and want to hear what amazing things FZ can do on the guitar, then this is for you. Or if you are a completionist, then you must have it I suppose. However, if you want something entertaining or enjoyable to listen to, then there are many other FZ collections and recordings that are much better. To the layman, this will sound like a continuous guitar jam, which is basically what it is, but taken out of context like it is and pasted together as one jam after another, it takes all of the character out of the solo and sounds too much the same all the way through. So, in other words, for me at least, this is very hard to listen to in a single sitting. Little bits at a time, it isn't quite so bad.

The linear notes on this collection tell you the concert venues and dates (but they are not always correct) and it also tells you what performance (or the name of the song) the solo was taken from. If you are familiar with FZ's jamming songs, then these notes will be of some value and will help return some of the character of the jam as long as you can imagine the context that it was taken from. Many of the tracks are taken from performances of "Ride My Face to Chicago", "Black Napkins", "Let's Move to Cleveland", "Black Page", "Zoot Allures", "City of Tiny Lights" and so on. There are a few of the tracks that do stand out a bit, like "Ina-Gadda-Stravinsky" which takes the hook from the Iron Butterfly song as the base for the jam and includes the opening notes from the bassoon line of Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring" and if you listen close you'll hear "Taps" played by the bass further into the song. This is one of the highlights of the album. There is a great solo taken from a performance of Gregg Allman's "Whipping Post" called "For Duane" in remembrance of Duane Allman who originally played the guitar solo for that song. There are other great solos that stand out in this mish-mash of solos, but you will only catch them if you are a careful listener and most of these get lost as it is hard to make a point of reference unless you are following closely along.

Zappa hardcore fans will be interested to note that the track entitled "Outside Now" is named after the track on Joe's Garage of the same name. However, the jam is not taken from a live performance of that song, the jam comes from a performance of "City of Tiny Lights" which was the original song where the "Outside Now" track was based on in Joe's Garage. There are little secrets like that here that wouldn't mean much to a regular listener. This album just does not hold a lot of appeal for the person that wants to explore FZ's discography, even if they are only interested in his guitar work. You are better off getting "Zappa Plays Zappa" or listening to some of his better albums like "Zoot Allures" or any number of live albums where he was likely to play extended jams.

Personally, I can only recommend this to hardcore fans, especially fans of FZ's guitar work who are more familiar with his repertoire. As such, I can only rate this with 2 stars. It's just not a collection that's easy to sit through, even for a Zappa fan like myself.

The triple LP Shut Up N' Play Yer Guitar set proved there was an appetite for people to just listen to Frank Zappa's guitar solos shorn of context; Guitar, its sequel, proves that you can't just fill two CDs with this stuff, throw it out there, and call it a day and expect to produce something as interesting as that set was. For one thing, thanks to the triple LP format Shut Up N' Play Yer Guitar could at least be absorbed in digestible chunks; here Zappa pretty much fills two CDs of material and throws you in at the deep end.

For another, Zappa had already mined his archives fairly thoroughly to put Shut Up together in the first place; the selections on that hail from 1972 to 1980, the selections here come from 1979 to 1984. That's a tighter period of time - the start of which had already been raided for Shut Up's purposes, the latter end of which doesn't represent one of Zappa's more beloved live bands (or at least, not so beloved by me). A shorter time period means less musical variation and development over the course of the set - and by the end of the 1980s Zappa's guitar technique had matured to the point where it just didn't develop that much from year to year.

A lot of this ends up running together to my ears in a rather unmemorable fashion; the only times it really makes me sit up and pay attention is when I recognise the backing song Zappa's playing his improvisation over, or when he starts quoting someone else's material. And when the least interesting thing about a collection of improvisations is the most imporovisational and original parts, that's not a great sign.