The Composer: New York City (’66 – ’68)

With each album Zappa was able to get increasingly creative. For example, on the third, Lumpy Gravy, Zappa used a fifty-piece group of musicians. However, his record label always seemed to be slowing him down. No matter how professional and original his ideas were, they often encountered budget restrictions and censorship. With Lumpy Gravy, the problem was that Zappa recorded it at Capitol’s studios and was quickly litigated by MGM with whom he still had a contract. The recording had taken place in ’67, but before the dispute was settled it became ’68, and Zappa chose to drastically alter the album. He added vocals and made countless changes before its final release in May of ’68. He loved recording conversations of which he would use snippets for his albums and he invited people to improvise on topics which he suggested and used many on the third album, and on later albums. For example, he got Eric Clapton to say “God, it’s God. I see God.” A commentary on all of the ‘Clapton is God’ graffiti, which could be found on the streets.

In August of that year he recorded We’re Only in It for the Money, also in New York. The album is a serious one and “Zappa’s view is bleak and foreboding [...] Lyrics about lonely, unloved children, fascist trigger-happy cops, materialistic parents who are too busy consuming to notice
their children are sad.” [Miles p. 162.]

Once again, his music was pointing a finger at society and all of its faults and MGM could no longer take it. They obscured words to their liking and issued the album without waiting for Zappa to approve it. Then they decided they had had enough and were not going to renew their contract.