200 Motels

Here’s something to set you TiVo to – the Sundance channel is showing Frank Zappa’s „200 Motels“ this month. Not exactly at convenient times -Tuesday 02.07.06 at 06:00 AM, Thursday 02.16.06 at 12:00 PM and Wednesday 02.22.06 at 02:30 PM.

This is what the Sundance Channel says about the film: "Considered by some the progenitor of the music video, this wide-ranging experimental exercise in filmmaking by Frank Zappa and co-director Tony Palmer is a different kind of magical mystery tour, following the Mothers of Invention on the road. Paralleling Zappa’s famed musical experimentation, 200 Motels played with visual ideas revolutionary in 1971, most notably earning its place in cinema history as the first theatrical feature shot and edited on video and then transferred to film. With cameos from Keith Moon and Ringo Starr."

And since we’re already at it – there’s some far out 1976 SNL performances of Zappa and his orchestra. Zappa found a soulmate in John Belushi, who joined him for some radical soloing. And then there's the legendary claymation video from 1979...

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Watch the trailer for „200 Motels“.

Watch the claymation video for Zappa’s „City of Tiny Lights“.

Watch Frank Zappa and John Belushi perform "St. Alphonzo Street".

Watch Zappa play it straight with a cover of the Allman Brothers’ "Whipping Post".