Zappa was as much a businessman (and perhaps a rather shrewd one at that) as he was a creator. This is a guy that started out in the advertising business! He often referred to his work as 'product' and consequently released tons of it. He regarded his market as 'hostile territory'; somewhere between the world of rock n roll and serious music. Perhaps it was all product to him either way! It is this writer's view that so much of it was released in order to finance his real ambition - the one that began in the 50's as a teenager - to realise his modern orchestral works of avant garde music. In fact, he didn't write a rock n roll tune until his 20's; and he didn't pick up the guitar until he was 19 or so; the drums were his first instrument...and modern orchestral was his first love. Along the way, he fused it with rock n roll, blues, Jazz, Doo Wop and everything in between. When the synclavier came along, he snapped it up and used it to replace musicians on subsequent new recordings; musicians being the source of much disappointment and dismay from his own perspective. But putting the initial cost aside, a synclavier was much cheaper and a lot less bother than having to pay real musicians or expecting them to execute perfect renditions of his complex musicial ideas. This way he got the perfection he was after; at less than half the price! If only he had made it to the 21st century!
It is interesting to note the product list from the 60's to 1993, the year of his premature death from prostate cancer. In his lifetime, he released more than 60 albums through various daliances with the record industry, before setting up his own labels and taking complete control. He made a habit of taking a mobile recording truck out with him wherever he performed - everything was recorded and archived; to be used at some later date. He got into this kind of practice right from the late 60's. And use it he did - lifting solos and parts from archived recordings to create new...'product'. Perhaps a studio overdub here and another one there...to create a tapestry of disembodied recordings - a musical mish mash; but so skillfully woven together. It is true to say be became a master editor; working his magic with a splice block and razor in the studios late at night.
But it also made economic sense - it must have saved him a fortune in studio costs when it came to putting new product together - no need for musicians and no need to visit studios: he had his own by the early 80's. And when he wasn't cobbling bits and bobs together, he was creating stuff with the Synclavier. In fact, he became more reliant upon engineers and technicians than musicians in the later years; other than the tours, which became less frequent in the 80's. Indeed, the last tour was abandoned half way through; ostensibly because of internal frictions within the band. He effectively washed his hands of musicians. The fact that he always toured seperately from the musicians since the late 60's, is also rather telling.
And yet, this rather shrewd move of circumventing the need to pay musicians when it came to creating new product, by utilising archived live recordings, did create controversy with the legacy of musicians that had worked with him. Some took the issue further; people like Jimmy Carl Black, the first drummer with the Mothers of Invention, believing that he had a right to royalties. Perhaps Zappa felt that their payment for the tour was as far as it should go. Were all the contributing musicians entitled to royalties off the back of album sales? Complicated business! By the late 70's, Zappa was running his own ship with only distribution deals. Perhaps the idea of administering royalties to starving musicians was beyond his resources and manpower!
Unbelievably, since his demise, there has been tons more of product posthumously released to a market with an insatiable appetite for all things Zappa; courtesy of the Zappa Trust. One presumes there is still plenty of stuff in the archive to tap into. The product line continues...
