Being Frank

Barry Miles' biography of Frank Zappa is pretty good, especially on the early years. Miles goes deeper into the pre-famous Zappa than any other biographer. But the odd thing is once Zappa starts making it, Miles seems to keep him at arm's length.

Miles likes the tunes, but over and over spanks Zappa for his sleazy words, especially as his career progresses. Miles is allowed his opinion, but it's odd for a biographer to be so regularly and particularly at odds with his subject.

Miles, who's British, also has many received opinions about American politics which he feels he may safely assume. He mayn't. Worse, he sometimes takes Zappa to task for not sharing his own politics. (It's also weird to see British spelling. No one should write about American car culture and spell it "tyre." He also makes a few mistakes here and there, such as spelling Canter's, the famous LA all-night deli, Cantor's.)

Ultimately, it's hard to say if Miles likes Zappa the person. He paints him as a controlling man who didn't care about others and couldn't relate to them emotionally. That may be true, but I guess fans don't have to worry about that. We don't ask brilliant composers be nice. That's for their friends and family to worry about.