The
Frank Zappa Review Page
Have I Offended
Someone? (1995)
This was the first Frank Zappa album that I
ever bought so naturally I have a great affinity for it, this album changed the
way I looked at music forever, I did not know that this sort of music existed
until I heard this. The first Frank Zappa song I ever heard was 'Jewish
Princess', when I was on kibbutz in Israel, I loved it! I got home and purchased this album and never
looked back. The technical sound quality of this piece is excellent it is as
clear as a crystal and the choice of songs on the album is well balanced. This
is a Zappa 'greatest hits' album of sorts, none of these songs were hits in the
charts but they are all 'crowd pleasing' favourites of mine and many Zappa followers. This is Zappa's interpretation of pop
music. Nearly all the songs are very good or excellent, I must have listened to
it over 100 times!
The affair starts with 'Bobby Brown' one of the most popular Zappa pop tunes, a
great parody tune this song featured originally on “Sheik Yerbouti” but this
version is far better. 'Disco Boy' follows, a great disco/rock track that
remains one of my favourite Zappa tracks again it is a livelier reworking of a
classic and is the best version by far. 'Goblin girl' is quirky and fun
and 'Titties and Beer' is
legendary, I would have loved to have seen this song performed live because
there is so much imagination in this story/song. 'Catholic Girls' is
outragiously funny and 'Dinah-Moe Humm' is one of Zappa's greatest
adventure/story songs. 'Valley Girl' makes a parody of West Coast American
bimbo's and 'Jewish Princess' sends up the well known stereotypical rich Jewish
American girl. The only poor track on the album is 'In France' which seems to
be lumbering and dull. 'Dumb All Over' includes some biting satire regarding
American evangelicists and 'He's So Gay' is another fun parody. These songs are
taken from ten of Zappa's albums from the mid 1970's to the mid 1980's and they
are remarkably straight forward stripped down rock songs for the most part. The
lyrics are as you'd expect brilliant, some of the best of any of Zappa's
albums. Some of the Zappa 'purists' will rubbish this album and say that it
represents a lot of the worst items of Franks music, I obviously disagree, it
is very different from his early works, but is still captivating. I would
recommend this album to any first time Zappa listener, it got me hooked and will
probably do the same to you!
Rating
– 85%