FZ and Captain Beefheart (each with their own
band) at Winterland, San Francisco, December
1975...I'd only heard Overnite Sensation, thinking
back, I wish I knew then what I know now (in terms of
FZ's repertoire)...I was a wee tyke of 15, not too
sophisticated (like I am now)...
This was the FZ band that recorded "Black Napkins"
on Zoot Allures and "Ship Ahoy" from SUNPYG. If you
have the boot "Eyes of Osaka" or "Strange habits",
this is that band too... and of course the upcoming
"Zappa in Oz" release.
I remember "Black Napkins" being some pretty
awesome guitar, Roy Estrada as the Illinois Enema
Bandit, Napoleon Murphy Brock in overalls "taking his
clothes off when he danced", up until he saw the
"ugliest part of his body". Also, Frenchy the stuffed
poodle made an appearance and got rammed with a toilet
plunger.
Andre Lewis sat behind what might have been a B-3
console and Bozzio was exceedingly impressive. I had
never seen a drum set that huge. Napoleon was very
animated and amusing.
Frank sat on a stool and played his SG, which
reflected an intense beam back from the spotlights
that cut through the purple haze.
But in all honesty I mostly remember Beefheart,
who was (in my mindset of the time) terrible. Of
course I didn't know what he was about either. But he
seemed not to be having a good time and took it out on
the audience. We were down on the floor during the
first part, when people started to boo. CB screamed
something along the lines of "Are you talking about
boo? You don't talk about boo, you smoke it!" ("Boo"
apparently being some sort of beatnik reference to
marijuana).
He placed the bell of his soprano sax over the
microphone and blew incredibly loud screechy notes
which caused most present to take a step or two back.
Somewhere along the line someone in the balcony tossed
an apple core which bounced off the head of one of his
guitar players (could have been Denny Walley).
Bruce Fowler was playing "air bass" with CB at this
time and did not come out to play with Frank.