Token of His Extreme

Frank Zappa produced a television program aired by KCET in Los Angeles in 1974, featuring a sextet that included keyboardist George Duke and the zany saxophonist and singer Napoleon Murphy Brock. This bootleg opens with a blistering medley of "The Dog Breath Variations" and "Uncle Meat," followed by a rather overly long "Florentine Pogen." Zappa offhandedly ends "Stink-Foot" with the comment of "Oh, that's enough of that," before launching into one of his best pieces of the 1970s, "Inca Roads"; this version contains a particularly potent Zappa guitar solo and Duke's excellent keyboard work, too, but it is also contains a sudden fadeout near its conclusion. The rather obscure and very brief "Honey, Honey" is almost an afterthought as he wraps the program with two more brief songs. While the sound is mono, it is at least very clear and not plagued with the addition of outside noise. Because this TV program was only broadcast in Los Angeles and never commercially issued, it is a collectable. But since there are better versions of all the important songs that appeared on this bootleg on his legitimate recordings, this record is of interest primarily to the die-hard completist Zappa fan. ~ Ken Dryden