Tracks: AI's Failed Dream / The Run Around / Strangle Rocket Fair / Android Forty 2 / Not A Lot Has Changed / Dark Reptilian Clown / There's Nothing To Do Now / Where Did You Go? / Advice / Parallel-O-Gram / Silly Song / I've Got A Secret To Tell You / Doubt And Fear / Another Universe - Please / The Saucers Are Here.

Hans Annellsson and/or his band The Vegetarians have appeared on the vast majority of the Zappa themed CDs I have compiled for Cordelia Records over the last 16 years - indeed, the last one (ZappaRap) was all Hans' idea! They also played at Zappanale in 2011. The Vegeterians here are essentially Hans with John Tabacco (formerly of Lennon Tabacco Zappa, who played at Zappanale #13). John too has appeared on a number of my Cordelia albums and possesses a lovely, warm singing voice, very much at the forefront of this collection of new tunes, mostly "about our increased dependence on A.I." The songs are all written by the pair, with a little help from guitarist Anthony Pomes on three numbers. They are also aided and abetted by a number of musicians on various tracks, but the duo are the real stars here. A mix of pop, rock and prog with lyrical (and some musical) references to Zappa, Beefheart and The Beatles. Not only a collection of memorable tunes, but some fun lyrics too. Grab your copy here.

One question this book raises is why did it take Moon twenty years to decide she needed to leave her chaotic family home?
    As you would expect, this is a very well written and engaging book - and well worth the wait. And like Nigey Lennon, Moon has opted to change some names to protect the privacy of those involved - for example, here 'Nellie Bly' becomes 'Kiwi Vicki'!
    The book's title comes from something Gail would say whenever Moon was in a brown study - which is better than it's working title of I Hope You (Die) Love Me.
    We learn that as a very young girl, Moon had a crush on Terry Bozzio (and, weirdly, Derek from the Bay City Rollers - even in later life, her fascination with drummers seems to continue); that she had harp lessons from Lou-Ann Neill (who plays on Zoot Allures, Orchestral Favorites, 200 Motels - The Suites and more); was told she had secret powers by Gail's psychic (and later put a spell on a mean girl at school who then fell off the monkey bars); that RDNZL was an FZ nickname for GZ; and My Mother Is A Space Cadet was written about Gail when she was engrossed in one of her magazines.
    Moon writes that Frank asked for a divorce from Gail on at least three occasions, but of course it never happened. A German lady named Gerda is cited as one of the main reasons for his desire to leave Gail.
    Of all the kids, Moon is clearly the most damaged by their 'unique upbringing' and bore the brunt of Gail's many outbursts, such that you do feel a little sorry for her.
    She yo-yos between blaming her cheating, absent father and her angry, unloving mother for all her ills. Once she finally does flee the nest, she undergoes therapy and gets an acting coach and a guru but remains lost and unhappy. Then Frank phones to tell her he has terminal cancer and Gail insists she sells her house to help pay for her uninsured father's hospital bills, so Moon can return home and devote her time to caring for him.
    After he passes, Moon's relationship with her mother gets no more harmonious, but her marriage to Paul Doucette and the birth of their daughter bring fleeting happiness - until three year old Mathilda becomes seriously ill and her marriage unravels.
    The book leaves few stones unturned and ends with her finally learning to love herself and forgive her siblings for the pain they caused following Gail's demise.
    As I say, it's very well written but there are some tiny errors (which could conceivably be fixed, as I have an uncorrected proof copy of the book): for example, she confuses the Pink Panther with Snagglepuss, plus the timeline seems a little awry in places as she talks about the Rainbow incident before introducing the GTOs, and also that she lost her virginity in London on 4 July 1982 after Valley Girl was a hit that enabled Gail and the kids to travel with FZ to Europe for his tour that started at the beginning of May (while an acetate of the record was played on an LA radio station prior to it's official release in June 1982, it wasn't a hit until September). Minor stuff, but this is a major contribution to the ever-expanding Zappa bibliography.
    For the record, there's no mention of: the German Playboy photo shoot; the 'delusional fanatic' who claimed she and her father had stolen his lyrics; recordings made with FZ prior to Valley Girl; recordings later made with DZ (or performing Valley Girl with him at London's Roundhouse); Uncle Dunt's threat to sue her; possible other siblings; or the Wild Man Fischer bottle incident.

Having had a similar book published several years ago, with a lot of the same interviewees (Frank Talk), I just had to check this out. I know of Tony and his Talking Zappa shows, but I'm not really a podcast guy - even as a part of the ZappaCast for several years, I rarely listened back to them. Reading is more my thing, but your mileage may vary.
    In his introduction, Tony talks about how he used an AI programme to transcribe his audio interviews, and then went through and corrected the resultant text. He acknowledges that he might not have done a perfect job and, in the first edition, there were indeed quite a number of typos, Happily, most of these have now been fixed. The interviews - all from 2014 - are interesting and include some 'new' info - for example: Ike Willis told Tony that Frank briefly went into remission in the summer of 1993 and laid out his plans to Ike for a 25th anniversary celebration of 200 Motels with a big reunion tour; Mike Keneally talks about a Synclavier version of Sleep Dirt that he helped Frank create; and Howard Kaylan bemoans the fact that most of FZ's guitar solos were edited out from the 'Vaudeville' albums in favour of more Flo & Eddie comedy.
    As I say, the interviews are quite engaging, and I'm jealous that Tony managed to do what I haven't yet succeeded in doing: a full interview with Cal Schenkel!
     The book comes in hardcover, paperback and on Kindle. Here's to a Volume 2.