Zappa a biography by Barry Miles
Just
finished that Zappa book. I can't say Miles doesn't know how to
construct a biography, especially in light of the fact that so much of
his information is second/third hand. It's been my experience that
biographies that rely on this type of information either run the risk of
having many errors or appear as one long run-on sentence, or both.
Though there were some errors in the book certainly, Miles did a good
job of painting a picture of Zappa's professional life. It's what he did
with Zappa the man that I didn't care for. Throughout the book there was
a constant overtone of contempt for Zappa. As if Miles wanted everyone
to know the legend was a complete and total asshole. That he lacked
emotion, compassion and feelings. That he was a megalomaniacal, sex
obsessed jerk.
Throughout the book, whenever he went into any detail about Zappa's
compositions there was either some ending punctuation about Zappa the
person (asshole), or that he wasn't necessarily responsible for the
output -- thus leaving the reader to question his abilities.
It wasn't until the final Afterword where he pulled it all together and
framed the reasons why we all love Zappa and respect him for the genius
that he is. He relied less on sending constant reminders of what a
unfeeling jerk he might have been and spoke directly to why he was an
iconoclastic dude.
But then again this is a biography and Zappa likely falls under the
spell of genius by death. It is undeniable that his impact on popular
music, his song writing ability and his guitar playing doesn't earn him
the title of musical genius. To argue this is folly. Perhaps Miles just
wants to remind us that no man belongs on a pedestal?
StAlphonzo 11/03/07
