ABOUT THE IDIOT BASTARD
As many
of you probably know, from 1988 onwards I was a regular contributor to Fred
Tomsett's excellent little organ T'Mershi
Duween. During this period I also wrote a monthly From A to Z column for Cindy Zeuli's sadly now defunct Dweezil Zappa Fan Club Magazine, and
other bits and pieces for the also now-demised Society Pages and the short-lived Z-Zine. This activity led to credits and/or acknowledgements in
Michael Gray's Mother! The Frank Zappa
Story (Plexus, 1993), Ben Watson's Frank
Zappa: The Negative Dialectics Of Poodle Play (Quartet, 1994), Neil
Slaven's Electric Don Quixote: The Story
Of Frank Zappa (Omnibus, 1996) and Kevin Courrier's Dangerous Kitchen: The Subversive World Of Zappa (ECW, 2002). With
the ever-increasing gaps between issues of TD,
I asked Fred whether he'd mind me putting out a non-profit making newsletter.
Nothing happened for ages. Then I got around to buying a computer.
I have
posted this site purely so that I can continue to write about Frank, his music,
his collaborators, and any other old crud I choose to stuff up the cracks to
help keep the memory alive. The site's inception has resulted in: further
credits and/or acknowledgements in Billy James' Necessity Is...The Early Years of Frank Zappa & The Mothers Of
Invention (SAF, 2001), Greg Russo's 'son of revised' Cosmik Debris: The Collected History and Improvisations of Frank Zappa
(Crossfire, 2003), Nigey Lennon's updated edition of Being Frank: My Time With Frank Zappa (California Classics, 2003),
Barry Miles's Frank Zappa (Atlantic
Books, 2004), and the liner notes of the Tornadoes CD, Now And Then (Crossfire, 2005); Don Preston designing me the Idiot
Bastard Son logo (see above); the Muffin Men bequeathing a previously
unreleased tune and awarding me a Green Muffin (see above - from which Fred has
since taken a big bite); my recording debut on the Eyeinhand Sampler, Volume 1 (Vaso Music, VM 032), an album
dedicated to the memory of FZ and featuring a plethora of alumni; my helping
Thana Harris to rehearse two songs from Sleep
Dirt for her Zappanale #13 appearance; my liner notes for a number of
Zappanale CD sets; my compiling the Zappanale 17 and 18 double and Bonus discs;
my helping Napoleon Murphy Brock and the Muffin Men get together for Zappanale
#14; my listing as a private supporter of the authorised adaptation of Thing-Fish at the Battersea Arts Centre
in August 2003; regular contributions to the Arf Dossier; the appearances of Nigey Lennon, Ed Palermo and Candy
& Bob Zappa at Zappanale #13; copious unbecoming mentions in Academy Zappa - Proceedings Of The First
International Conference Of Esemplastic Zappology (SAF, 2005); the
uncredited inclusion of my 'inbetweenie' track (Lou-Lou) on the third disc of the Zappanale 15 CD set; my
appearance in the Muffinz Moovies Vols
2 and 3 DVDs; the compilation of the 20
Extraordinary Renditions (2008), 21
Burnt Weeny Sandwiches (2010), On
Broadway: Covers Of Invention (2013), Rare
Episodes (2014), Weasels Re-Ripped
(2015) and The Idiot Bastard Sons Of Mr.
Green Genes (2016) CDs for Cordelia Records; my becoming an auxiliary
member of the Zappa Early Renaissance Orchestra; the co-organisation of the
biennial Festival Moo-ah; and (organ rising music) the writing of my own books,
Zappa The Hard Way (Wymer UK, 2010),
documenting Frank’s final world tour, and Frank
Talk: The Inside Stories Of Zappa's Other People (Wymer UK, 2017), a
compendium of the interviews I have conducted with the people who knew and
worked with Frank over the last three decades.
The
last edition of T'Mershi Duween was published in April 2000, comprising both
issues 63 and 64. There are currently about 28 or so issues of the 64 still in
print, the earliest being 25. There are then a few extant between 29 and 39,
but Fred has a complete run from 41 to the last dynamic double issue.
Everything else is out of print and likely to remain that way. Stocks of some
of these issues are very low, so don't dawdle. Fred can be contacted at hope.pandorasboox@tiscali.co.uk if you
have any queries or want to order copies.
Pip!
Pip!
The Idiot
Bastard
(a.k.a. Andrew Greenaway and, occasionally, Stanley
Hope)
Somewhere in
October 2017
Contact: disco.boy@blueyonder.co.uk