by Steve Moore
Munich, Germany
March 25, 2003
Interviews One and Two To Zappa Pages Jimmy's On Line Store
Hi Jimmy Carl. Glad things are still busy for you. The interviews we did in 2000 have been visited a few thousand times, so someone read them. How did the 2000 US tour with the Grandmothers go? Did you see old friends and meet new fans? Was it successful? What was the best and worst shows?
The 2000-year tour with the Grandmothers
was -- to put it bluntly --a trip that I hope I never have to do again as a
touring musician. I have never been on a tour that long at one time. It was
66 days long with 6 or 7 days off. We did 42 states in a Winnebago with 7 people
on board. Six musicians and a woman driver that also did our merchandising.
Everyone except Don quit the band at least once along the way and some quit
more than once. We saw Cal Schenkel in Philly; Adrian Belew in Nashville; Denny
Walley in Nashville; Ike Willis and Project Object and Banned From Utopia in
Ill.; Roy Estrada and Tom Leavey in LA; Motorhead Sherwood in SF; Billy Mundi
in northern California, and Jeff Simmons in Seattle. We did meet a lot of old
and made a lot of new FANS along the way. It was a very successful tour, except
financially, with all the fans. There were a lot of best shows and hardly any
worst shows.
Don Preston told me that the tour bus broke down at some point.
The bus did take a dump between Portland and Seattle on the last leg of the tour.
How are Don Preston and Bunk Gardner doing? Any news? Upcoming shows?
I guess they are doing OK. I haven’t seen them since the Zappanalle last year. I should say that I am NOT playing with the Grandmothers anymore. I don´t know if they have any shows in the near future. I play with The Muffin Men and have been for the last eight years.
What were Jeff Simmons and Billy Mundi up to when you saw them?
Jeff Simmons was doing pretty well the last time I saw him in 2000 when the Grannies were on tour. I think he is still writing music and possibly recording but I haven't heard anything of it yet. As for Billy Mundi: He has some pretty serious medical problems now. He is and has been a diabetic for a long time now and about three months ago, while playing the drums a lot, he developed a sore on his foot. The sore wouldn't go away and started spreading up his leg and he has had to have his leg amputated just below the knee. He is recuperating now and is going to have a new leg that he and the doctors are designing so he can continue to play the drums. He's got a lot of guts and is going to whip this thing and start playing again I hope.
I
see that you and Roy Estrada recorded a new CD, "Hamburger Midnight."
Is this the first time the original Mothers of Invention rhythm section has
gone back in the studio since the band broke up? How did it turn out? And how
is Roy these days?
Yes, this is the first recording that the original rhythm section has done since "Weasels Ripped My Flesh". The CD is very good and I hope that people over in the states will buy it. It is on my small label; Inkanish Records; so there is not much promotion on it since I don´t have the money to do it the way it should be done. I don´t even have much distribution on it in the states at present but you can order it from me here in Germany. It´s worth it because it is good. Roy is Roy and I don´t know what more I can say. He is still the best bass player I have ever played with in my 46 years career as a professional musician and one of the best friends I ever had.
What are your spring/summer touring/recording plans? Any chance you'll return to the states?
I leave on the 22nd of April until the 5th of June for the spring tour of England,
Scotland and Ireland with my beloved Muffin Men. When I get back to Germany
I have a small reunion tour with The Farrell/Black Band. About the third week
of June, I will start my tour with "The Jack and Jim Show" (Eugene
Chadbourne and Jimmy Carl Black) in Germany, Holland, Denmark, Sweden and Norway.
I am releasing a new CD on Inkanish Records of my sons from Texas. The band
is called "Geronimo Black" because that is my youngest sons name.
The original Geronimo Black of the early ´70´s was named after him
when he was only 2 years old and so he said to me; Dad, I want my name back
for the new band he has with my 43 year old son, James D. Black, who is the
drummer. They have been sending me some of the songs in rough mix from the studio
and I think the boys are HOT!!! They have a chance to make it if I have anything
to do with it. And I Do. I won´t be coming back to the states until Bush
is OUT OF OFFICE.
You played Cavern club with the Muffin Men a few times last year. What's the Cavern club like today?
The Cavern Club is a wonderful venue and we are playing there again on the 4th of June. In the afternoon before the gig, they are putting a brick with my name on it on THE WALL OF FAME, which is outside of the club. It is quite an honor to be there along with The Beatles and a host of greats from England. I may not have made The Hall of Fame but I made The Wall of Fame. It´s an accomplishment for my career.
How's your wife doing?
My little sweet wife, Frau Black, is doing fine as always. She is the best thing that’s ever happened to me in my life so far. She is "The Love Of My Life" and a big Mothers fan and has been fro the last 30 years. That´s how I met her. She had been looking at my picture on album covers for over 20 years and I played in the town we live in 1997 and she grabbed me off the stage and 11 months later we got married.
Is
the big Zappa festival going to happen again this summer? Are you going to be
there? How did the German Zappanale 2002 event turn out?
Yes, it starts on the 25-27th of July. I will be playing with The Muffin Men and with The Jack and Jim Show. The 2002 Zappanalle was a blast. I think this one will be great as well. I´m excited for it this year because I will play with the Muffins and with Chadbourne who I always have a total blast with. He´s one of the unsung heroes of the USA and most don´t even know it.
When did Frank's younger sister, Candy, start singing? What is she like as a person?
She started singing when she
was 10 or 12 years old. Candy is one of my wife, Moni and my best friend. She
is MUCHO fun to be around and she is extremely talented. She has a new book
out called
My Brother Was a Mother: A Zappa Family Album that she is promoting at the
moment. She does a lot of stuff with Nigey Lennon around the New York area although
she lives in California.
Since we're at war with Iraq as I write this, and you are an ex-military guy, I have to ask what your take is on all of this?
I think that Bush is crazy and a very dangerous man. He stole the presidency and is doing nothing for the American economy and a host of other things. Europeans hate him and unfortunately don´t like Americans much anymore. He has ruined our image over the whole world. I hope everyone wakes up and won't reelect that guy because I think another four years of him and America might become a third world country. I hope this stupid WAR IS OVER WITH SOON. I am opposed to all wars as they don't do anything but kill innocent people that didn't start anything. What has happened to the free press in America?
If you don't mind some Zappa history questions, I want to pose a few. Immediately after the release of "Freak Out," the record company sent the Mothers off to do concerts in Washington, DC and Dallas, TX to promote the record. I'm wondering what places you played and what kind of audience/reception you got? Do you remember?
That is true. We also played in Windsor, Canada and Detroit, MI. besides Washington and Dallas. We played only TV shows on that little promo tour. The first TV show was in Washington, DC and we played “Who Are The Brain Police” and really freaked out the audience as Carl Franzoni was touring with us. Those kids didn't´t know what to think of us and I remember that the switchboard at the station lit up like a Christmas tree with heavy complaints from irate parents all over the stations viewing area.
That was a local Washington, DC teen show called "Wing Ding." Over the years I've heard that the Mothers were on that show. I remember seeing the Byrds play live on "Wing Ding" around that same time.
The next stop on the whirlwind tour was in Detroit and Windsor. The Detroit Free Press claimed that “If these Mothers move in next to you, your grass will die” and that about sums up how those people received us. The last stop was in Dallas and Frank was very nervous about that place since JFK had been killed there not too many years before we got there. I remember when we got off the plane and started walking down the corridor of the airport that people just parted in awe as we came toward them like we had the plague or something. I remember that MGM had booked us into a beautiful hotel and Frank was so paranoid that we deaden´t even stay the night there. We left Dallas right after we did the TV show. You have to remember that 1966 was a strange time in the USA as far as long hair and freaky clothes were concerned. The war (LIKE TODAY) was raging like a wild fire. All in all, it was an interesting little promo tour and was the first and last one that MGM sent us on.
Is
it true that
Motorhead Sherwood started going together with Joni Mitchell during the time
the Mothers played the Garrick Theatre? Do you remember Joni at that time, and,
if so, what do you think she really thought of the music back then?
Yeah, that is where we all met Joni. I didn't´t even know she was a musician. I just thought she was a little hippie girl from Canada. When we moved back to California from New York in 1968 she moved to Hollywood with Motor and they had a small house in Laurel Canyon. I think they were together for about a year and a half all total. To tell you the truth, I don´t know what she thought of the music the Mothers were doing as she never said. She either liked it a lot or she really liked Motor a lot because she was always there at the Garrick Theatre listening.
Did you get to know Lowell George very well when he played on Weasels Ripped My Flesh? Is it true that you named his later band, "Little Feat?"
I
actually got to know Lowell way before he joined the Mothers. He had a band
called “The Factory” and I used to go up to their house on Lookout
Mountain Road in Hollywood and trip out on LSD. We were already trippin´
pals before he joined the Mothers and in fact, he used to room with Roy Estrada
and myself. In the One Fifth Avenue hotel in New York in early 1969 we were
rooming together when he wrote most of “I’m Willin.´” It
has always been one of my favorite songs of his. I have even recorded it a couple
of times. The song is on a CD I did with The Jack and Jim Show called “The
Early Years” and recently on a CD called “Mercedes Benz” with
a band called JCB and the X-tra Combo. Both are available on my web sitewww.jimmycarlblack.com
Was 1980, and the You Are What You Is album the last time you recorded with Frank? "Harder Than Your Husband?" was the song, right? What was that like, and how did Frank treat you?
Yes,
that is the last studio recording I did with Frank. I actually am on 5 songs
from that CD. “Harder Than Your Husband; Teenage Wind; Goblin Girl; The
MUDD Club, and I Don´t Wanna Get Drafted”. I had a really good time
with Frank at that time and he really treated me GREAT. I even got paid.
How did Frank tell the Mothers that he was breaking up the group? I've read it was at a dinner.
No, we all just got a phone call from him stating that he had decided to break up the band and your salary has ended as of last week. That is pretty cold in my opinion. The rest of the guys in the band were very pissed off as can be expected as we had just finished a very successful tour. I think that Frank should have made an announcement to the press about stopping the band and done a last farewell tour and then broke up the band. Anyway, that´s the way I would have done it after all the loyalty we had given him through the years of starving for his music. <
For those of us who don't know him, what is Cal Schenkel like? How much thought and discussion went into the album cover art between Cal and Frank?
Cal
Schenkel is a great guy and a very talented artist. I am sure that there were
many discussions about the artwork for the album covers as they were almost
as important as the music was. Frank was very involved in all operations of
the band as is very evident in all those early albums.
I saw a Frank Zappa oli painting up for auction recently. It was done in 1962 and Frank gave it to a band member Did you see much of Frank's own art work?
I never saw Frank doing any paintings
but I know that he did. I saw some of his art work at his house. I wish he would
have given me one of them. It would probably be worth a lot of money now, not
that I would have ever sold it. My own art work now has been in designing CD
covers with the computer for my CDs. I am going to do some sculptures this summer
as I will be able to work outside. My sweet little wife doesn't like all the
dust that they create when I do them. I have about 70 pounds of soapstone in
my cellar just waiting and I have been thinking about doing some work. Most
all my sculptures are for sale. I just haven't had any interest in them as of
now. I did sell a bunch of them about 4 or 5 years ago but I haven't pursued
it much.
Thanks for the update and please keep us posted on all-things Jimmy Carl Black.
Steve Moore
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