Frank Zappa Quotes

He took a dog-doo snow cone and stuffed it in my right eye. He took a dog-doo snow cone and stuffed it in my other eye. ~ Frank Zappa

Shut Up and Play your Guitar. ~ Frank Zappa

I'm not black, but there's a whole lot of times I wish I could say I'm not white. ~ Frank Zappa

The bassoon is one of my favorite instruments. It has a medieval aroma, like the days when everything used to sound like that. Some people crave baseball ... I find this unfathomable, but I can easily understand why a person could get excited about playing the bassoon. ~ Frank Zappa

There is no hell. There is only France. ~ Frank Zappa

Anybody hear the great news, today? Jimmy Swaggart under investigation! Oh Ja-eezus! One day every one of those cocksuckers will get caught! I understand in the case of Mr. Swaggart, that he claims that it was not multiple encounters with many prostitutes - apparently, only one sweet young thing. And he did tell Cal Thomas of the Moral Majority that the sex act itself was not fully consumated. However he did admit to doing something por-no-graphic with the girl. Let's use our imaginations, ladies and gentlemen. ~ Frank Zappa

She is an office girl, her name is Betty. Her favorite group is Helen Reddy. ~ Frank Zappa

There was a lot of camaraderie among the bands. I remember a lot of times when I'd be driving up Laurel Canyon and pass by the house where Frank Zappa was living and I'd just see people out on the porch playing guitars. ~ June Millington

Children are naive-they trust everyone. School is bad enough, but, if you put a child anywhere in the vicinity of a church, you're asking for trouble. ~ Frank Zappa

I think that if a person doesn't feel cynical then they're out of phase with the 20th century. Being cynical is the only way to deal with modern civilization - you can't just swallow it whole. ~ Frank Zappa

Michael is Janet and Janet is Michael. ~ Frank Zappa

Alright. Let's get realistic now. You know and I know that the function of that number was just to provide some sort of warm-up trash before we do something HEAVY. Something a little bit harder to listen to, but which is probably better for you in the LONG RUN. The item in this instance, which will be better for you in the LONG RUN, and if we only had a little more space up here we could make it visual for you, is "Some Ballet Music," which we've played at most of our concert series in Europe. Generally in halls where we had a little bit more space and Motorhead and Kansas could actually fling themselves across the stage, and give you their teenage interpretation of the art of The Ballet. I don't think it's too safe to do it here, maybe they can just hug each other a little bit and do some calisthenics in the middle of the stage. ~ Frank Zappa

On a personal level, Freaking Out is a process whereby an individual casts off outmoded and restricting standards of thinking, dress, and social etiquette in order to express creatively his relationship to his immediate environment and the social structure as a whole. ~ Frank Zappa

Don't forget to vote. ~ Frank Zappa

The more you can escape from how horrible things really are, the less it's going to bother you ... and then, the worse things get. ~ Frank Zappa

She lives in Mojave in a Winnebago. His name is Bobby, he looks like a potato. ~ Frank Zappa

I was his "little girl with the William Burroughs mind," his "secret fairy," "female Frank Zappa" and "window onto a magical world." He said I fell to earth, leaving wing-marks on the ceilings of our dreams. ~ Jalina Mhyana

Take the Kama Sutra. How many people died from the Kama Sutra as opposed to the Bible? Who wins? ~ Frank Zappa

Nothing I've ever written has been motivated by trying to impact or influence anybody. ~ Frank Zappa

The bigger the cushion, the better the pushin'. ~ Frank Zappa

Brown shoes don't make it. ~ Frank Zappa

Beauty is a pair of shoes that makes you wanna die. ~ Frank Zappa

Some people ... SOME PEOPLE like cupcakes better (but) I for one, could care LESS for them! ~ Frank Zappa

The price of meat has just gone up and your old lady has just gone down. ~ Frank Zappa

If we can't be free at least we can be cheap. ~ Frank Zappa

Bad facts make bad law, and people who write bad laws are in my opinion more dangerous than songwriters who celebrate sexuality. Freedom of speech, freedom of religious thought, and the right to due process for composers, performers and retailers are imperiled if the PMRC and the major labels consummate this nasty bargain. ~ Frank Zappa

Call any vegetable,
call it by name,
and the chances are good
that the vegetable will respond to you ~ Frank Zappa

Fact of the matter is, there is no hip world, there is no straight world. There's a world, you see which has people in it who believe a variety of different things. ~ Frank Zappa

You can't be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline - it helps if you have some kind of football team, or some nuclear weapons, but in the very least you need a beer. ~ Frank Zappa

What something is depends more on when it is than anything else. ~ Frank Zappa

Sometimes a radio station will get ONE phone call from ONE person who screams that he is going to complain to the FCC. Instead of the guy at the stating thinking about how many listeners love the song, want to hear it again, and will support the station for playing it, usually the guy panics
and takes my records off the air. I object that.
It has never mattered to me that thirty million people might think 'I'm wrong.' The number of people who thought Hitler was 'right' did not make him 'right.' The same principle should be applied to anyone who has an individualistic attitude. Why do you necessarily have to be wrong just because a few million people think you are? ~ Frank Zappa

who are the brain police? ~ Frank Zappa

Believe it or not, there are places in the world where music is important. There are places in the world where all the arts are a matter of national pride. ~ Frank Zappa

It is always advisable to be a loser if you cannot become a winner ~ Frank Zappa

Frank [Zappa] always wanted to do a sound library - he sampled so many great musicians. For piano, for example, he sampled every octave, not just one (that you could just transpose electronically), and he did all different types of attack, with and without pedals, all that kind of stuff. ~ Gail Zappa

It's a despicable thing to share your personal inner torment for money. ~ Frank Zappa

Frank [Zappa] was not a big fan of having lyrics, but sometimes he had things to say that lent themselves to lyrics. ~ Gail Zappa

The only difference between a cult and a religion is the amount of real estate they own. ~ Frank Zappa

Frank [Zappa]'s music was never for the mass audience. His music contains specific kinds of information that you won't find elsewhere in rock and roll. ~ Gail Zappa

Cocaine decisions that you make today, will mean nothing later on when you get nose decay. ~ Frank Zappa

All that we got here is American made. It's a little bit cheesy, but it's nicely displayed. ~ Frank Zappa

The devil, he's about this big. He had a red suit on and a widow's peak, and then a pointed tail, and like a sulfur reek. Yes, it was him alright, I swear. ~ Frank Zappa

I think you should leave it up to the parent, because not all parents want to keep their children totally ignorant. ~ Frank Zappa

Nowadays I just don't care; I've taken the Frank Zappa stance. I am who I am! Some love me, some loathe me, some respect me and some despise me. But after all that's been, I still love the insane! As they're exciting, dangerous and highly explosive! For me mad dogs are gentlemen. ~ Stephen Richards

What kind of man can name a child Moon Unit? ~ Frank Zappa

There are only two things to remember. Number one ... Don't Stop, and number two ... Keep Going! ~ Frank Zappa

The kerosene record player is not a very efficient device. ~ Frank Zappa

Anything Anytime Anyplace For No Reason At All (or AAAFNRAA) ~ Frank Zappa

People like to own things. ~ Frank Zappa

Ram it up your poop chute. ~ Frank Zappa

You can grow up being a troublemaker and then before you know it the next thing you're doing is listening to Frank Zappa whilst chilling out ... now that's the intelligent way out. What would a psychiatrist say about that? ~ Stephen Richards

Disco boy, no one understands, but thank the lord you still got hands. ~ Frank Zappa

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents - because they have a tame child-creature in their house. ~ Frank Zappa

The whole music business in the United States is based on numbers, based on unit sales and not on quality. It's not based on beauty, it's based on hype and it's based on cocaine. It's based on giving presents of large packages of dollars to play records on the air. ~ Frank Zappa

A true Zen saying: "Nothing is what I want. ~ Frank Zappa

The plumber he says, never flush a tampon. This is great information, cost me half a weeks pay. ~ Frank Zappa

Without deviation progress is not possible. ~ Frank Zappa

I think that if you use the so-called "strong words" you'll get your point across faster and you can save a lot of beating around the bush. Why are people afraid of words? Sometimes the dumbest thing that gets said makes the point for you. ~ Frank Zappa

Music is the only religion that delivers the goods. ~ Frank Zappa

I think the anti-smoking business is a yuppie invention-an extension of the concept that we'll always be young, rich, and healthy. ~ Frank Zappa

It seems that the problem with government as an institution is uniformly bad, worldwide. It may be the ONLY thing that binds all nations together - the incompetence of all of their governments ... The unions are the mafia, which is the CIA, which is the Catholic Church, which is the government, which is what's the difference? It's corrupt! It's the same guys pulling these strings, you know? One day he pulls the string and this lamp comes out, the next say he pulls the string and there's a missile coming out. ~ Frank Zappa

The hardest and worst interview that I have ever done was with Frank Zappa. ~ Nina Blackwood

It's two o'clock in the morning, they're not going to get any nooky anyway, so this one guy and the guy with the t-shirt guy started sniffing the girls panties. ~ Frank Zappa

Without "Louie Louie" a symphony is not quite so grand. ~ Frank Zappa

Everybody believes in something and everybody, by virtue of the fact that they believe in something, uses that something to support their own existence. ~ Frank Zappa

The United States is a nation of laws, badly written and randomly enforced. ~ Frank Zappa

Our criminal institutions are full of creeps like you who do wrong things, and many of them were driven to these crimes by the horrible force called music. ~ Frank Zappa

It would be easier to pay off the national debt overnight than to neutralise the long-range effects of our national stupidity ~ Frank Zappa

Anybody who wants religion is welcome to it, as far as I'm concerned
I support your right to enjoy it. However, I would appreciate it if you exhibited more respect for the rights of those people who do not wish to share your dogma, rapture, or necrodestination. ~ Frank Zappa

It's amazing that schools still offer courses in musical composition. What a useless thing to spend money on -- to take a course in college to learn how to be a modern composer! No matter how good the course is, when you get out, what the fuck will you do for a living? (The easiest thing to do is become a composition teacher yourself, spreading 'the disease' to the next generation.)

One of the things that determines the curriculum in music schools is: which of the current fashions in modern music gets the most grant money from the mysterious benefactors in Foundation-Land. For a while there, unless you were doing serial music (in which the pitches have numbers, the dynamics have numbers, the vertical densities have numbers, etc) -- if it didn't have a pedigree like that, it wasn't a good piece of music. Critics and academicians stood by, waiting to tell you what a piece of shit your opus was if your numbers didn't add up. (Forget what it sounded like, or whether it moved anybody, or what it was about. The most important thing was the numbers. ~ Frank Zappa

This here song might offend some, if it does it's because your dumb. ~ Frank Zappa

Most people wouldn't know music if it came up and bit them on the ass. ~ Frank Zappa

Catholic girls with tiny little mustaches. ~ Frank Zappa

Moving to Montana soon, gonna be a dental floss tycoon. ~ Frank Zappa

Sit and spin 'til you rot on the cosmic utensil. ~ Frank Zappa

When I was growing up, when I was 11 years old I was listening to The Mothers of Invention. You know, I mean I was a Frank Zappa fan in Arkansas. ~ Billy Bob Thornton

The computer can't tell you the emotional story. It can give you the exact mathematical design, but what's missing is the eyebrows. ~ Frank Zappa

Mr. Gorbachev has apparently stumbled onto one of the best-kept secrets in recent Soviet history: Communism doesn't work. ~ Frank Zappa

There's a long tradition - certainly with country, but in all kinds of genres of music - to have humorous lyrics. Certainly with Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention and, if you look at country, Roger Miller and Jim Stafford. ~ Rick Moranis

There are three things that smell of fish. One of them is fish. The other two are growing on you! ~ Frank Zappa

There is no such thing as a dirty word. Nor is there a word so powerful, that it's going to send the listener to the lake of fire upon hearing it. ~ Frank Zappa

Is this something new, having people stomp on you? Is it what I need to do for your pleasure? ~ Frank Zappa

Information is not knowledge.
Knowledge is not wisdom.
Wisdom is not truth.
Truth is not beauty.
Beauty is not love.
Love is not music.
Music is THE BEST. ~ Frank Zappa

The people of your century no longer require the service of composers. A composer is as useful to a person in a jogging suit as a dinsoaur turd in the middle of his runway. ~ Frank Zappa

So much gets lost in the translation. Even if you sat there listening to it with a microscope, there's no way you're gonna find out what it means. ~ Frank Zappa

They's making it worse, the labor movement got the mafia curse. ~ Frank Zappa

Americans like to talk about (or be told about) Democracy but, when put to the test, usually find it to be an 'inconvenience.' We have opted instead for an authoritarian system disguised as a Democracy. We pay through the nose for an enormous joke-of-a-government, let it push us around, and then wonder how all those assholes got in there. ~ Frank Zappa

Republicans stand for raw, unbridled evil and greed and ignorance smothered in balloons and ribbons. ~ Frank Zappa

I think the music of the Fifties is really good. I suspect it's much better musically than much of what's available now. Not in terms of production, but in terms of content. ~ Frank Zappa

I'm more interested in melodic things. I think the biggest challenge when you go to play a solo is trying to invent a melody on the spot. ~ Frank Zappa

Stupidity has a certain charm - ignorance does not. ~ Frank Zappa

Reality is what it is, not what you want it to be. ~ Frank Zappa

America was founded by the refuse of the religious fanatics of England, these undesirable elements that came over on the Mayflower. Ignorant, religious fanatics who land here and abuse the Indians. ~ Frank Zappa

Don't mind your make-up, you'd better make your mind up. ~ Frank Zappa

One of my favorite philosophical tenets is that people will agree with you only if they already agree with you. You do not change people's minds. ~ Frank Zappa

Listen honey, would I lie to you to get in your pants? ~ Frank Zappa

Look here brother, who you jivin' with that cosmik debris? ~ Frank Zappa

The Ultimate Rule ought to be: 'If it sounds GOOD to you, it's bitchin'; if it sounds BAD to YOU, it's shitty. The more your musical experience, the easier it is to define for yourself what you like and what you don't like. American radio listeners, raised on a diet of _____ (fill in the blank), have experienced a musical universe so small they cannot begin to know what they like. ~ Frank Zappa

Well right about that time, people,
A fur trapper
Who was strictly from commercial
(Strictly Commershil)
Had the unmedicated audacity to jump up from behind my igyaloo
(Peek-a-Boo Woo-ooo-ooo)
And he started in to whippin' on my fav'rite baby seal
With a lead-filled snow shoe ... ~ Frank Zappa

You know, people are basically shitty. It's when they prove it over and over again that it gets obnoxious. ~ Frank Zappa