The Virtues of Cynicism

One of the CDs that made into the car's CD changer this week is Zappa (and The Mothers') Weasels Ripped My Flesh. It's an album for which I have a good deal of affection despite being a messy hodge-podge of live and studio material with no real centre - well, not one I've ever been able to find. To be honest, I think it's the wonderfully offensive cover art that accounts for the nostalgic glow the thing evokes for me. I remember admiring it as something approaching the height of cool in a record shop near my secondary school back in 1969, or thereabouts, thinking one day I'm going to own that. And now I do.

It also contains what I consider one of Frank's all-time-great compositions: Oh No. (In fact, the segue into The Orange County Lumber Truck really means the album contains two such compositions, but I tend to hear them as one, which is how the Mothers live generally played them in this period.) To be honest, this first recording of Oh No is a pretty messy version compared to some of the great live accounts, but it's such a wonderful song it works in any context.

Its biting cynicism about the vague aspirations of the love generation (as far as I understand it was written in response to The Beatles's All You Need Is Love) is a welcome reminder that songs can be intelligently truthful about the world to which we are condemned, rather than blearily, Pollyannaishly, aspirational, as seems to be the case with most 'pop' music these days.

How refreshing it is to be told: Oh no I don't believe it / You say you think you know the meaning of love / You say love is all we need / You say with your love you can change / All of the fools, all of the hate / I think you're probably out to lunch.

Anyone who sings this on American Idol will get my vote.