21 Sep Frank Zappa

Sometime in 1967, I went to the Garrick Theatre in New York City to see Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention perform a sparsely attended show.

It was a rainy day and Frank wore a rain hat which brought a few streams of sweat rolling down his face.

After the show, I went backstage to meet Frank. My sole question was: “What do you look like without that prophylactic hat?” To which Frank responded: “Like a real man.”

Frank was a real piece of work; not one of infinite copies or an overpriced fake.

The following year, Frank produced a song, some of whose lyrics have ever since resonated with me as funny and profound:

“What is the ugliest part of your body?

Some say your nose

Some say your toes

But I think it’s your mind.”

Nothing to the eye is inherently ugly or beautiful. However, the mind, by comparing things, deems some things uglier or prettier than other things. The mind is the ugliest part of the body, for it’s the only part that makes things ugly.