Drum Blog

In September 1973, we were about a week away from the release of the LP Over-Nite Sensation. After such a concert focused on instrumental pieces, I did not expect an album made entirely of songs, with a commercial potential much higher than the previous ones. And just as I had enjoyed the more jazz-influenced albums released earlier, like Waka/Jawaka or The Grand Wazoo, I immediately liked this one as well, from the very first listen.

In October 1973, the Mothers’ lineup changed, with Jean-Luc Ponty and Ian Underwood leaving, and Napoleon Murphy Brock joining. Ralph Humphrey told me that one day, arriving at a rehearsal, he discovered the presence of a second drummer: Chester Thompson.

It is this new lineup that played at the Roxy in Los Angeles in December, which I would not discover until a year later, on the album Roxy & Elsewhere, released in September 1974.

In March 1974, Apostrophe was released, quickly becoming one of Frank Zappa’s most popular albums. Most of the first side was recorded in the studio in December 1973, just after the Roxy concerts, with Ralph as the sole drummer. The side ends with Cosmik Debris, a track recorded in May 1973, in which Ponty is still present.

The second side features previously unreleased but older tracks. I was first surprised to hear bassist Jack Bruce, whom I had been listening to since 1969 with Cream, and with whom I also share the fact of having studied the cello.

On the drummers’ side, there are Jim Gordon, Aynsley Dunbar from the Mothers 1970–71, and John Guerin, whose playing I already appreciated on Hot Rats and with Joni Mitchell.

In the summer of 1974, I went to Montreux for the first time, this time not for the Montreux Pop concerts but for the jazz festival. I went with a friend: we had been lent a sailboat, moored at a small port before Montreux, and we bought a full festival pass. We spent the nights at concerts and the days lounging in the sun on the boat and swimming.

I had already seen Billy Cobham live with the Mahavishnu Orchestra in 1972, and now he was playing with his own group, which included Michael and Randy Brecker. It was also at this festival that I saw Ponty again with the second Mahavishnu lineup, including Narada Michael Walden on drums. Among many other concerts, this is also where I discovered Allan Holdsworth, playing with Soft Machine, and Milton Nascimento, with Airto Moreira and Flora Purim.

In September 1974, Roxy & Elsewhere was released, a brilliant double album that I listened to on repeat for weeks. Most tracks were recorded live at the famous Roxy in Hollywood, over three filmed concerts. A technical issue prevented the film from being edited for decades, but with technical advances, it finally came out on DVD in 2015.

By that time, I already had most of Zappa’s albums, but I also managed to get some rarer records, like Lumpy Gravy, and King Kong by Jean-Luc Ponty, produced by Zappa.

For a long time, I was the only person I knew who owned all of Zappa’s records, some of which quickly became impossible to find until their CD release many years later — sometimes with questionable mixes and sound.

One month after the release of Roxy & Elsewhere, Zappa and the Mothers played in Basel at the Festhalle Mustermesse. It was a weekday, with two concerts, and we attended the second, the late show. Basel was over four hours from Geneva, and it was a friend’s mother who drove us there. She waited for us in town during the concert, and we returned in the night.

I remember a medium-sized hall, in the style of a community hall. We were relatively close to the stage, sitting on chairs. Compared to the Roxy & Elsewhere album, the lineup was slightly smaller: there was only one drummer, Ralph Humphrey having left the group in May. He later told me that his collaboration with Zappa ended by mutual agreement, without any disputes.

The concert started joyfully with Tush Tush Tush, a riff played first as the opener, repeated to signal the end of the concert, then played a third time during the encore to mark the final conclusion. This riff would later be recycled by Zappa in 1979 on the album Joe’s Garage, for the song A Token from His Extreme.

They then played Stinkfoot and RDNZL, the latter still unreleased at the time.

As usual, there were long improvisations, as well as songs and instrumentals, but this time, most were already familiar to me. Compared to the 1973 band, Napoleon Murphy Brock brought his voice, humor, and energy, but as a soloist on saxophone and flute, he did not have the sophistication of Jean-Luc Ponty.

It was the second of two concerts in the same day, which required a lot of energy from touring musicians. After listening to Roxy & Elsewhere on repeat for a month, it was a good concert, but not as much a concentration of great moments as the album. It was the penultimate concert of this tour, and the group would still tour for another month in the United States.

In August 1974, Zappa recorded a concert for the KCET television station in Los Angeles. One month after the Basel concert, I was able to watch this film twice, living in a region where only the two channels that decided to broadcast it could be received.

It was obviously not possible to record the video in 1974, but I had added an audio output to the home TV to record the sound. This film was eventually released on DVD in 2013 under the title A Token from His Extreme.

In June 1974, another film was also recorded, but it remained unreleased for many years due to synchronization issues. It was finally published in 2025 under the title Cheaper Than Cheap.

Released in June 1975, I see One Size Fits All as a sort of conclusion to this extremely creative period of Zappa’s career. It features the finished version of Inca Roads, already played in 1973, as well as Sofa, performed as early as 1971 in Montreux. It is this creative abundance and diversity that has always fascinated me in his work.

The 50th-anniversary editions of some albums from this period, containing many previously unreleased recordings, shed further light on his work. This is particularly interesting to me as a musician, even if they are not always recordings Frank Zappa would necessarily have wished to release.

Copyright © 2026 Alain Rieder - all rights reserved

At the end of summer 1974, after singing for two years in the choir of the Collège de Genève, I was hired by the Grand Théâtre de Genève as a chorister for Hector Berlioz’s Les Troyens.

As I write this account in January 2026, I learn that the Grand Théâtre will present 200 Motels in June 2026. I hope to find photos from 1974 showing me on stage.

200 Motels at the Grand Théâtre de Genève

• Read my account of Frank Zappa – Montreux 1971
• Read my account of Frank Zappa – Zurich 1973 (Wetzikon)