Synopsis
Frank Zappa was one of music’s most fascinating and uncompromising personalities. A hugely influential composer and performer, his 30-year career encompassed satire, rock, jazz, and avant-garde music. Zappa, a symbol of anarchy and rebellion who constantly pushed the boundaries of good taste, was also a workaholic and a perfectionist. In this objective, accessible biography, Michael Gray traces the development of Zappa’s life and work from his childhood in Maryland to his move to California, the formation of his cult band The Mothers of Invention in the 1960s, and three further decades of controversy and experimentation which ended only with Zappa’s death from cancer in 1993. Packed with autobiographical details gleaned from the brutally articulate Zappa himself, Mother! is a timely reappraisal of one of the few truly innovative talents of post-war music — a brilliant iconoclast whose influence is felt even today.
