'It Just Shocked Me, How Anything Could Be So Beautiful...'

The Thousand Year Charm Offensive of Frank Zappa, Part III

Editor’s Note: Check out the ongoing discussions about music at GOTD and associate editor Mike Kilgore’s daily music series:

1. What's in your wallet... er... music library?

2. Who Is Generation X's Greatest Black Musician? Here's My Vote

3. Generation X's Greatest Black Musician? Rihanna, In My Humble Opinion.

4. Rihanna is an Xer-Leaning Millennial! Try Again, Mike!

5. I Didn't Do My Due Diligence, or How I Have to Pick a Favorite Black Gen X Musician For Real This Time.

6. Why Rap & Country Are So Challenging and Why I Much Prefer Tupac Shakur to Will Smith

7. Music. The GotD Frontier

8. As a Gen-Xer, the 1980s is My Favorite Musical Decade

9. These 2 Hypnotic Sitar Albums Saved Me Last Night as the PTSD Demons Struck Back

10. The Thousand Year Charm Offensive of Frank Zappa

11. 6 Songs That Give Me a Burst of Great Memories

12. Take a Bite Out of 'Burnt Weeny Sandwich'

13. 6 More Songs Filled with Good Memories

Check out “Mike’s Music Morning,” born from these debates.

1. The Inaugural "Mike's Music Morning" post

2. How Many Licks Does it Take to Get to the Center of My Music Collection?

3. Welcome back, my friends, to the show that never ends.

4. What music evokes an emotional response for you? What song really twangs your heartstrangs?

5. What Reminds You of Mardi Gras? For Me, it's Always Music and Food

6. Would you like a little slink with your Wednesday?

7. Who Is Your Favorite Film Composer? Here are 6 of My Favorites

8. How Could I Have Forgotten Ennio Morricone's Greatness? My 7 Favorites from the Italian Master

9. Which is Better? David Lee Roth "Van Halen" or "Van Hagar"??? I want an "Eruption" of comments here, people.

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Probably the sweetest description of the song “Oh No” comes from Zappa band member Ruth Underwood. She saw the Mothers of Invention for the first time in 1967 at the Garrick Theatre in New York’s East Village. She stood in wonder, pummeled by electric dissonance and various musical explosions and unnatural cries from the band members. Here’s Ruth in her own words from a 2021 article by Ingrid Marie Jensen.

I remember droning music going on for ages and then in the middle of all of that, the song that then became ‘Oh No, I Don’t Believe It,’ sort of breaking through the clouds, and it just shocked me, how anything could be so beautiful, and how such beautiful music could come out of such bizarre looking people.

Ruth said her life had been changed that night. Lovingly runover by Zappa’s music, she left the academic/university/concert percussionist life for the Mothers of Invention. She really didn’t want the orchestral life that meant waiting ten minutes before hitting some little triangle.

Ruth performed in Frank Zappa’s band from 1968 to 1977 and can be heard on over thirty recordings. I saw her several times in concert and she was beautiful and talented and always smiling. She glowed, and seemed to never stop moving and playing.

From a 1993 interview, Ruth talked of another great shock within months of Zappa’s death:

A couple of years ago, when I heard that Frank was ill, I called him up. For 14 years we had no contact at all. He invited me to the house and we enjoyed some really nice visits with each other. Last June ('93) he called and asked if he could sample some of my stuff. I was shocked because I hadn't touched a pair of mallets since March of '77. I ended up practicing for 14 hours, which was all the time I could get together in the context of my life now. I spent four days at Frank's house sampling. This was really a miracle for me – that I could be reunited with him and still have something to offer.

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