Frank Zappa - The Wiki

[Kill Ugly Radio]

Welcome to the "Frank Zappa Wiki" discussion board.

For more information on how this forum came to be, please read this thread first.
In short, there had been some talk about the "ultimate" online Frank Zappa resource. The main argument for such a thing was that, although there is a wealth of information on FZ available on the net, it is scattered, fragmented, at times hard to track down, sometimes outdated. What if we could somehow centralize all this information?

Enter the wiki.

The setup is similar to wikipedia. The wiki-format allows for anyone to add/edit information, with moderators keeping an overview of added information.

At this time of writing, the wiki is still in an embryonic state. Before we plunge into adding stuff, we need discussion with regard to the strucure of the wiki. For now, that type of discussion can take place here. In a later stadium, this will be the place to discuss specific pages of the wiki.

With your help, we can make the Frank Zappa Wiki into a thing of excellence. Feel free to join in on the discussion. Your remarks, criticism, suggestions are highly appreciated.

Help build the greatest available online FZ resource!

[Bálint]

Hey, it seems that it will start!

The main thing is to decide the main cathegories first - and to me the musical evaluation would be the most interesting. If it would be Center For Everything, it doesnt mean to copy whole homepages - right? So some of the categories should be just pure links, the way I see it now.

So I think:

1. biographical section
Its now on Wikipedia, it could be added and corrected.

2. movies/television
3. discography
4. song by song section (releases, coverversions, sheetmusic, analysis)
These are on FzLyrics, very much detailed, and the best I know.
Some analysis would be necessary! But would it be separate from the "music" section? I'm not sure in this.

5. tour/concert guide
This is FZshows 6.0.

6. zappa the composer
Now that would be exciting! The way he took his material, The music itself, the way he worked, etc...

7. zappa the producer
I dont really know what it would mean.

8. musicians section
What should it be? Like at United Mutations (but in nicer colors? :-) Or like at FzLyrics?)

9. conceptual continuity section (threads or trees of characters, musical quotes etc.)

10. bibliography (books on zappa)

11. Links

*

Uh, I'm sleepy, I cant think anymore...

B

[emdebe]

It's my experience that each and every FZ fan has his/her own reason(s) for appreciating the man and the music, and more often than not, they differ greatly.

There are ze facts and ze interpretations. The book could be a mix of both...

By the way, I'm a lot crazier than you might have guessed: I'm thinking of 3 (!) volumes...

Frank Vincent Zappa was - like any other human being - born, and - although he was considered some sort of a God by some (anyway, to me he was more of a God than, say, Eric Clapton), he died as well. In chronological order, things happened on December 21, 1940 and December 4, 1993. In between, many more things happened… and that's precisely what Volume 1 should be all about.

Ever since the Grand Wazoo has left us, people have been trying to fill the immense void - which, of course, is an impossible thing to do, because the late great FZ was one of the foremost legendary composers / performers of the 20th Century. Some are in it for the fun, others are only in it for the money, and some are in it for no reason at all... Volume 2 should take a closer look at all the look-alikes, sound-alikes, and Ersatz Celebrity...

Finally, Volume 3 should be a detailed annotated index, sort of. A real ENCYCLOPEDIUM of useless information and stupid facts, gathered from obscure sources and given away to anyone subterranean enough to understand it... From Anusol to Zircon and beyond...

Just a reminder.

[emdebe]

Let's not take the notion of a book (as in "Another Real Frank Zappa Book") to strict, let's think more "encyclopaedia"-wise (like Barry suggested). Let's jot down data, information, knowledge, and - perhaps - some wisdom, to the lowest detail possible. After that, many books can be written with the same pieces of text, according to one's taste... ;-)

Just another reminder.

[Bálint]

Just a question - I might not understand the whole thing well, but maybe your answers will help.

I think the first thing would be to decide the structure - before all the other thing starts. And my main question is: can this project WANT IT ALL? I mean, we do have a discography better than one could imagine (Fzlyrics), we do have a bootleg-page better than one could imagine (Zappa-patio), we do have a "comments on albums" page better than one could imagine (Kill Ugly Radio) - so will we copy-paste them? Is is worth? Won't that mean that the "mother-pages" or the new "result pages" (one of them) will die, and the other will survive? Why kill old, updated, goodworking, fine places? Or: why make new pages with lot of works, when (in another case) wont be succesful, because of their older, better, more wellknown brothers?
Or: why copy the Wiki's biography? Will there be two from now on? The new one updated, corrected, the old one forgotten, left there without any update and addition?

Dont misunderstand me, I'n not agains it, I just want to see clear in copying, doubleing things, or the real goal of this project. Or am I totally wrong?

*

So if it would be a central source, in most cases it would be enough (as it seems to me) a collection of external links, maybe with some notes added to it: clarifying, describing them to visitors.

Suggestion: a nice part of the project could be a "Where should I begin?" part, for the beginners. Its an old plan of ours at aout homepage, but there was no time for it yet.

So, what do you say? Did I misunderstood all?

B

[emdebe]

Did I misunderstood all?

It all depends... I see many words bouncing around: structure, content, file system, database, book, encyclopaedia, ... I guess we'll have to agree on what exactly all this means... If we want to go after a shared goal, we must agree on one, ... and we need a shared language... Am I right, or am I suffering from a hangover too much?

[Barry]

Well from where I stand, there is no point in creating a wiki if the objective of that wiki is not to be as complete as possible.

Yes, the FZlyrics-site is absolutely brilliant, yes Zappa Patio is absolutely brilliant, but once again these are sites that document FZ from one narrow angle (though excellently, I must add). The exact purpose of a wiki is to avoid that kind of narrow perspective, instead offering ALL perspectives. At least, that's how i envision the wiki.

Ambitious? Hell yes.
Impossible? Not at all...

As for structure, here's the proposition:

- Biography
- Geography
- Discography
 -- Album per Album
 -- Zappa Composer
 -- Zappa Producer
- Videography
- Songs
- People
 -- Musicians
 -- Freaks
 -- Influences
- Conceptual Continuity
- Bibliography
- Links

Any additions/corrections are welcome!

[emdebe]

My idea of a discography would be:

- Albums
- Singles
- Videos
- Interviews
- Bootlegs

The "Albums" section would be split-up in:

- Regular albums
- Official compilations
- Unofficial compilations
- The Old Masters
- Audiophile Variations
- Samplers & Record Company Promos
- Pre-Mothers
- Contributions (to other artists' albums - Producer / Arranger / Performer)
- Other

At least the "Regular albums" section would provide different views:

- Alphabetical
- Historical (based on release dates)
- Chronological (based on recording dates)
- "Logical" (Cucamonga, Early Mothers, Flo & Eddie, Jazz, Orchestral, ...)

[emdebe]

As for structure, here's the proposition...

Some quick and general remarks:

- The "Geography" stuff should be part of the "Biography" stuff...

- The "Biography" stuff should contain sections like "Pre-Cucamonga", "Cucamonga era", "Early Mothers", "Flo & Eddie era", ...

- Maybe we need a chapter called "Zappology", containing sections like "Influences", "The Big Note", "Project/Object", "Conceptual Continuity Clues", "FZ the composer", "FZ the guitarist", ...

- "Musicians" must be a separate chapter, also including an overview of the different bands...

- The "Bibliography" stuff could contain "Articles written by FZ", "Books written by FZ", "Interviews with FZ", "Articles about FZ", "Books about FZ", ...

- There must be a chapter on "Tributes & Cover Bands"...

[emdebe]

A small brainstorm on the notion ALBUM.

Album =  "Long Playing" (LP), "Compact Disc" (CD), or "Tape" (Cassette, 8-track, ...)...

Album = a collection of "tracks" (a better notion than "songs", which implies "singing", and of course, there are also "instrumentals")...

An album has several standard "attributes":

- Reference (record label + catalog code)

- Title

- Release date (sometimes multiple, depending on country)

- Act (or "Artist"): The Mothers Of Invention, The Mothers, Frank Zappa & The Mothers, Frank Zappa & The Mothers Of Invention, Frank Zappa, Frank Vincent Zappa, Zappa / Beefheart & The Mothers, Zappa, ...

- Track list

- Singles list

- Musicians list

- Artwork artist(s) / Photographer(s)

- ...

A lot of things can be said about an album:

- the history/context of making it
- liner/sleeve notes
- a general description of what it is all about
- a description of the artwork
- its place in the "chronology"
- conceptual continuity clues
- an objective appreciation ("the good, the bad and the ugly")
- what the press said about it
- ...

[emdebe]

A small brainstorm on the notion TRACK.

Track = song or instrumental...

Track = belongs to one or more albums (or is unreleased?)...

A track has several standard "attributes":

- Track title (as mentioned on the album, e.g. "Pink Napkins")
- Track index (original title, e.g. "Black Napkins")
- Composer(s)
- Duration
- Recording date
- Recording location
- Sequence number (place on an album)
- Act (or "Artist")
- Producer(s)
- Engineer(s)
- Musicians list
- Release date (sometimes multiple, depending on country)
- Lyrics (if not instrumental)
- ...


A lot of things can be said about a track:

- the history/context of making it
- liner/sleeve notes
- a general description of what it is all about
- conceptual continuity clues
- an objective appreciation ("the good, the bad and the ugly")
- what the press said about it
- track history (albums on which it appears)
- ...

[Chris]

One thing at a time, chief. I like Barry's suggestions regarding the general structure; we need to start in a more generalized manner, and see how things are getting filled out before we go into such picky nesting. I'm assuming it will be up to contributors where they find it most appropriate to stick their prose, so we'll have to wait until a very basic framework begins to get fleshed out before we can acknowledge which subject headings are being used and which can be omitted.

Presenting too many rules, guidelines, abbreviation legends, etc. right from the get-go will discourage writers from contributing. Any "Zappology" section would be redundant, since the same observations would theoretically go under more easily understood headings like "Album," "Track," etc. A framework as general as possible is the only thing that would avoid confusion (and subjects bleeding into each other to a ridiculously repetitious degree) from this early stage. References to conceptual continuity, for instance, would probably already be placed in the "Song by Song" section.

Things can be narrowed down later, depending on, again, where people seem to be putting their text. If we get too narrow too quickly, we'll just have a mess, due to the...enforcemental and interpretational problems inherent in the subject names.

Whaddya think:

- Biography
- Discography
----Album by Album
--------Song by Song
- Videography
- People
---Musicians
------Supporting Cast
----------Influences
- Tours
- Bibliography
- Links

[Barry]

Presenting too many rules, guidelines, abbreviation legends, etc. right from the get-go will discourage writers from contributing.

I wholeheartedly agree with this. At this point setting too many guidelines, or too much focus on "terms" and substructure will lead us to lose focus on the bigger picture -- and scare off potential contributors as well.

Things can be narrowed down later, depending on, again, where people seem to be putting their text. If we get too narrow too quickly, we'll just have a mess, due to the...enforcemental and interpretational problems inherent in the subject names.

Again: my thoughts exactly.

Whaddya think:

- Biography
- Discography
----Album by Album
--------Song by Song
- Videography
- People
---Musicians
------Supporting Cast
----------Influences
- Tours
- Bibliography
- Links

This structure is more refined than my proposal was - good thinking Chris.
I'll alter the wiki to reflect this.

[Chris]

I'm glad you find that structure feasible (not because of egotistical reasons, but rather because we both remember how easily a website can become convoluted).  

I hope this doesn't complicate your restructuring -- I've added one "Discussion," providing some facts in general about Freak Out!. This was merely meant to test the water, and to see if it's agreed that I've picked the appropriate place for such prose, or if I've totally missed the mark, etc. If it's easier on you to just delete that text for now, feel free; it was only meant as a test (although it's real stuff, of course).

[Barry]

One thing with regard to structure.

Chris' proposal is:

Whaddya think:
- Biography
- Discography
----Album by Album
--------Song by Song
- Videography
- People
---Musicians
------Supporting Cast
----------Influences
- Tours
- Bibliography

Under People, shouldn't that be more like

Whaddya think:
- Biography
- Discography
----Album by Album
--------Song by Song
- Videography
- People
---Musicians
---Supporting Cast
---Influences
- Tours
- Bibliography