Cruising with Ruben & the Jets

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Cruising with Ruben & the Jets
Studio album by The Mothers of Invention

Publication
(s)

2nd December 1968

Label (s) LP:
The Verve Music Group
Barking Pumpkin Records
CD:
Zappa Records
Rykodisc
VideoArts Music

Format (s)

LP vinyl
CD

Genre (s)

Doo wop , pastiche

Title (number)

13

running time

40:34

production

Frank Zappa

Studio (s)

Apostolic Studios, New York City

chronology
Lumpy Gravy
(1968) 		Cruising with Ruben & the Jets Mothermania
(1969)

Cruising with Ruben & the Jets is a music album by Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention . It was released on the Verve label in 1968 and is attributed to Doo Wop , a music style that was popular in America in the 1950s and that Zappa held in high regard.

meaning

Cruising with Ruben & the Jets is the fourth album by the Mothers of Invention. Frank Zappa - born in 1940 and raised with doo-wop music of the 1950s - loved and collected records of this genre. Some of his first compositions, such as Memories of El Monte, were doo-wop songs. Cruising with Ruben & the Jets is a collection of this music, with Zappa composing almost all of the pieces. For inexperienced listeners, songs like Cheap Thrills , Deseri, and Jelly Roll Gum Drop sound like average doo-wop songs. Closer listening, on the other hand, reveals unusual chord progressions, Stravinsky quotations and the banal, comical texts - all of this wrapped up in four-part singing and linear three-way chords on the piano. Some tracks from the debut album Freak Out! were rearranged, but also old material from the time before the Mothers was prepared for the album. Pieces like Love of My Life and You Didn't Try to Call Me were often played live by Zappa later on.

reception

Cruising with Ruben & the Jets is a "unique recording in every respect", but it is not for the uninitiated listener, found the American critic John Alroy. The German rock journalist Volker Rebell, on the other hand, saw it as "a record project with which he [Zappa, note] looked at the hit parade listing". Reviewer François Couture warned newcomers to the Zappa oeuvre that this album was "definitely not the best place for it". Barry Miles pointed out that the “very authentic” sounding album irritated many Zappa fans who believed that Zappa wanted to make fun of doo-wop music. Miles: "But actually Cruising with Ruben & the Jets was ... a service of love."

Publications

The album Cruising with Ruben & the Jets has been released in several different versions. The following overview clarifies the main distinguishing features.

  • The original stereo LP was released on the US market in early December 1968 with a gatefold cover and a blue Verve label.
  • A single with the songs Deseri and Jelly Roll Gum Drop was released by Verve in late December 1968.
  • In February 1969 the album was released in Great Britain, sometimes with a blue, sometimes with a white label. He lacked the gatefold cover as well as the mono versions, which were released simultaneously in the USA and Great Britain, and the Australian and Brazilian stereo versions. The German and French editions lacked the piece Deseri - although it was mentioned on the cover .
  • In Great Britain - this time with a gatefold cover - the first re-release was brought out in June 1973.
  • The demand for the album, which was barely available on the market in the mid-1970s, prompted Schwarzkopierer to publish a “facsimile bootleg” of the album. These bootlegs differ from the original LP in that they have a slightly poorer sound quality and the slightly more blurred print of the cover.
  • Another LP re-release was found in the 1985 compilation by Barking Pumpkin Records The Old Masters Box One . Zappa had re-recorded the bass and drum tracks for this remix edition by Arthur Barrow (electric bass), Jay Anderson (double bass) and Chad Wackerman .
  • The remix version of the album was released for the first time on CD at the end of 1987 on Rykodisc (USA and Australia), Zappa Records (Europe) and VACK (Japan). Further CD re-releases were made in 1995 on Rykodisc and VACK.
  • In 2001 VACK in Japan released a small edition CD version in a cardboard sleeve with a sticker and miniature reproductions of the original cover.
  • In 2010 Zappa Records released a CD with the "Original 1968 Vinyl Stereo Mix" and 8 bonus tracks under the title Greasy Love Songs .

successes

Chart positions
Explanation of the data
Albums
Cruising with Ruben & the Jets
  US 110 02/01/1969 (12 weeks)

Unlike the previously released albums by Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention, pieces by Cruising with Ruben & the Jets were often played by US radio stations. The disc jockeys may have thought it was a record from the group "Ruben and the Jets"; possibly they had overlooked the only information in a speech bubble on the album cover about the actual performers. There the question is asked: “Is this the Mothers of Invention recording under a different name in a last ditch attempt to get their cruddy music on the radio?” (“Is this a last desperate attempt by the Mothers of Invention, through a record under another name to get their crude music played on the radio? ”) The album narrowly missed the top 100 of the US charts.

staff

The Mothers of Invention

as well as on Zappa's remix of the 1984 album

production

  • Producer: Frank Zappa
  • Sound engineer: Dick Kunc
  • Cover design: Cal Schenkel

content

Track list

Most of the compositions are by Frank Zappa. Exceptions are mentioned with (*) in the title description.

  1. Cheap Thrills (2:20) offers a cheap spectacle in a brisk shuffle rhythm with doo-wop vocal harmonies and "one of the worst lyrics to be found in Zappa songs".
  2. Love of My Life (3:17) is a song full of piano triads and vocal harmonies about the one great love in life.
  3. How Could I Be Such a Fool (3:33) deals with a man who has had a painful relationship.
  4. Deseri (2:04, * Ray Collins / Paul Buff ) is "clean 1960s teenage entertainment."
  5. I'm Not Satisfied (3:59) mutates from the driving rock song, which the track on the album Freak Out! was to a sentimental doo-wop ballad on this album.
  6. Jelly Roll Gum Drop (2:17) leaves the question unanswered as to whether hair fashion popular in the mid-1950s ( John Travolta wore the “Jelly Roll Gum Drop” hairstyle in the film Grease ) or a person of the same name is sung .
  7. Anything (3:00, * Ray Collins) is another typical doo-wop ballad with lyrics that are familiar from love songs.
  8. Later That Night (3:04) is a "not" love song. Unlike Go Cry on Somebody Else's Shoulder from the album Freak Out! here it is the man who is rejected by his wife.
  9. You Didn't Try to Call Me (3:53) reported like on Freak Out! of pubescent self-pity, this time in the form of a doo-wop ballad.
  10. Fountain of Love (2:57, * Frank Zappa / Ray Collins) offers musically "the whole doo-wop package" and with the quote from Igor Stravinsky's Le sacre du printemps in the fade-out an example of typical Zappa humor.
  11. No. No. No. (2:27) is another doo-wop song that revealed its musical content after four bars.
  12. Anyway the Wind Blows (2:56) tells in the style of a 1950s love song like on the album Freak Out! by a man who reveals to his girlfriend that he has found someone better. At the end Frank Zappa plays - which he rarely did - on an acoustic guitar.
  13. Stuff Up the Cracks (4:29) tells of a broken love and leads to a "hilarious refrain" at the end: "Stuff up the cracks, turn on the gas, I'm gonna take my life - sss ... stuff it!" ("Plug the cracks, turn on the gas, I'll take my life now - shh ... stop it!").

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Cruising with Ruben & the Jets Review (March 2007)
  2. ↑ Review by John Alroy (March 2007)
  3. ↑ Volker Rebell: Frank Zappa - freak genius with tailcoat habit . In: Rocksession 1 . Rororo non-fiction book, 1977, ISBN 3-499-17086-8 , p. 261.
  4. ^ François Couture review (March 2007)
  5. ↑ Barry Miles: Zappa . German edition. Rogner & Bernhard at Zweiausendeins, 2005, ISBN 3-8077-1010-8 , pp. 204f.
  6. ↑ Single release (as of March 2007)
  7. ↑ Album versions (as of March 2007)
  8. ↑ Greasy Love Songs ( Memento of the original from June 5, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on zappa.com  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.zappa.com
  9. ↑ Charts US
  10. ↑ Cheap Thrills Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  11. ↑ Love of My Life Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  12. ↑ How Could I Be Such a Fool Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  13. ↑ Deseri Allmusic, review (March 2007)
  14. ↑ I'm Not Satisfied Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  15. ↑ Jelly Roll Gum Drop Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  16. ↑ Anything Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  17. ↑ Later That Night Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  18. ↑ You Didn't Try To Call Me Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  19. ↑ Fountain of Love Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  20. ↑ No. No. No. Allmusic, review (March 2007)
  21. ↑ Anyway the Wind Blows Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  22. ↑ Stuff Up the Cracks Allmusic, Review (March 2007)
  23. ^ Frank Zappa; Carl Weissner (transl.): Plastic People - Songbook, Corrected Copy . Zweiausendeins, Frankfurt 1978, p. 150f.