Where Is Our Zappa? Pt. 2

This is Part 2 of GameCore's column "Where Is Our Zappa?" For Part 1, click here.

You feel very strongly about your position, and I understand that. You are very articulate and forceful.

But occasionally you give the impression that you think parents are just silly to be concerned at all.

FZ: No; that is not an accurate impression.

Gore: Well, please clarify it, then.

FZ: First of all, I think it is the parents' concern; it is not the government's concern.

Gore: The PMRC agrees with you on that.

FZ: Well, that does not come across in the way they have been speaking. The whole drift that I have gotten, based upon the media blitz that has attended the PMRC and its rise to infamy, is that they have a special plan, and it has smelled like legislation up until now.

There are too many things that look like hidden agendas involved with this. And I am a parent. I have got four children. Two of them are here. I want them to grow up in a country where they can think what they want to think, be what they want to be, and not what somebody's wife or somebody in Government makes them be.

I do not want to have that and I do not think you do either.

Gore: OK. But now you are back on the issue of government involvement. Let me say briefly on this point that the PMRC says repeatedly no legislation, no regulation, no government action. It certainly sounded clear to me.

And as far as a hidden agenda, I do not see one, hear one, or know of one.

FZ: OK, let me tell you why I have drawn these conclusions. First of all, they may say, we are not interested in legislation. But there are others who are, and because of their project bad things have happened in this country in the industry.

I believe there is actually some liability. Look at this. You have a situation where, even if you go for the lyric printed thing in the record, because of the tendency among Americans to be copycats -- one guy commits a murder, you get a copycat murder-now you've got copycat censors.

You get a very bad situation in San Antonio, TX, right now where they are trying to pass PMRC-type individual ratings and attach them to live concerts, with the mayor down there trying to make a national reputation by putting San Antonio on the map as the first city in the United States to have these regulations, against the suggestion of the city attorney, who says, I do not think this is constitutional.

But you know, there is this fervor to get in and do even more and even more.

And the other thing, the PMRC starts off talking about lyrics, but when they take it over into other realms they start talking about the videos. In fact, you misspoke yourself at the beginning in your introduction when you were talking about the music does this, the music does that. There is a distinct difference between those notes and chords and the baseline [sic - error in Congressional report] and the rhythm that support the words and the lyrics.

I do not know whether you really are talking about controlling the type of music.

Chairman: The lyrics.

FZ: So specifically we are talking about lyrics. It began with lyrics. But even looking at the PMRC fundraising letter, in the last paragraph at the bottom of the page it starts looking like it is branching into other areas, when it says: "We realize that this material has pervaded other aspects of society." And it is like what, you are going to fix it all for me?

Gore: No. I think the PMRC's acknowledging some of the statements by some of their critics who say: "Well, why single out the music industry?"

Do I understand that you do believe that there is a legitimate concern here?

FZ: But the legitimate concern is a matter of taste for the individual parent and how much sexual information that parent wants to give their child, at what age, at what time, in what quantity, OK. And I think that, because there is a tendency in the United States to hide sex, which I think is an unhealthy thing to do. And many parents do not give their children good sexual education, in spite of the fact that little books for kids are available, and other parents demand that sexual education be taken out of school, it makes the child vulnerable, because if you do not have something rational to compare it to when you see or hear about something that is aberrated you do not perceive it as an aberration.

Gore: OK, I have run out of time.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman: Senator Rockefeller.

Senator Rockefeller: No questions, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman: Senator Gorton.

Senator Gorton: Mr. Zappa, I am astounded at the courtesy and soft-voiced nature of the comments of my friend, the Senator from Tennessee. I can only say that I found your statement to be boorish, incredibly and insensitively insulting to the people that were here previously; that you could manage to give the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States a bad name, if I felt that you had the slightest understanding of it, which I do not.

You do not have the slightest understanding of the difference between government action and private action, and you have certainly destroyed any case you might otherwise have had with this Senator.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

FZ: Is this private action?

Chairman: Senator Exon.

Senator Exon: Mr. Chairman, thank you very much.

Mr. Zappa, let me say that I was surprised that Senator Gore knew and liked your music. I must confess that I have never heard any of your music, to my knowledge.

FZ: I would be more than happy to recite my lyrics to you.

Exon: Can we forgo that?

Senator Gore: You have probably never heard of the Mothers of Invention.

Exon: I have heard of Glen Miller and Mitch Miller. Did you ever perform with them?

FZ: As a matter of fact, I took music lessons in grade school from Mitch Miller's brother.

Exon: That is the first sign of hope we have had in this hearing.

Let us try and get down to a fundamental question here that I would like to ask you, Mr. Zappa. Do you believe that parents have the right and the obligation to mold the psychological development of their children?

FZ: Yes, I think they have that right, and I also think they have that obligation.

Exon: Do you see any extreme difficulty in carrying out those obligations for a parent by material falling into the hands of their children over which they have little or no control?

FZ: Well, one of the things that has been brought up before is talking about very young children getting access to the material that they have been showing here today. And what I have said to that in the past is a teenager may go into a record store unescorted with $8.98 in his pocket, but very young children do not.

If they go into a record store, the $8.98 is in mom or dad's pocket, and they can always say, Johnny, buy a book. They can say, Johnny, buy instrumental music; there is some nice classical music for you here; why do you not listen to that.

The parent can ask or guide the child in another direction, away from Sheena Easton, Prince, or whoever else you have been complaining about. There is always that possibility.

Exon: As I understand it from your testimony--and once again, I want to emphasize that I see nothing wrong whatsoever; in fact, I salute the ladies for bringing this to the attention of the public as best they see fit. I think you could tell from my testimony that I tend to agree with them.

I want to be very careful that we do not overstep our bounds and try and--and I emphasize once again--tell somebody else what they should see. I am primarily worried about children.

It seems to me from your statement that you have no obligation--or no objection whatsoever to printing lyrics, if that would be legally possible, or from a standpoint of having the room to do that, on records or tapes. Is that not what you said?

FZ: I think it would be advisable for two reasons. One, it gives people one of the things that they have been asking for. It gives them that type of consumer protection because, if you can read the English language and you can see the lyrics on the back, you have no excuse for complaining if you take the record out of the store.

And also, I think that the record industry has been damaged and it has been given a very bad rap by this whole situation because it has been indicated, or people have attempted to indicate, that there is so much of this kind of material that people object to in the industry, that that is what the industry is.

It is not bad at all. Some of the albums that have been selected for abuse here are obscure. Some of them are already several years old. And I think that a lot of deep digging was done in order to come up with the song about anal vapors or whatever it was that they were talking about before.

Exon: If I understand you, you would be in support of printing the lyrics, but you are adamantly opposed to any kind of a rating system?

FZ: I am opposed to the rating system because, as I said, if you put a rating on the record it goes directly to the character of the person who made the record, whereas if you rate a film, a guy who is in the film has been hired as an actor. He is pretending. You rate the film, whatever it is, it does not hurt him.

But whether you like what is on the record or not, the guy who made it, that is his art and to stigmatize him is unfair.

Exon: Well, likewise, if you are primarily concerned about the artists, is it not true that for many, many years, we have had ratings of movies with indications as to the sexual content of movies and that has been, as near as I can tell, a voluntary action on the part of the actors in the movies and the producers of the movies and the distributors?

That seems to have worked reasonably well. What is wrong with that?

FZ: Well, first of all, it replaced something that was far more restrictive, which was the Hayes Office. And as far as that being voluntary, there are people who wish they did not have to rate their films. They still object to rating their films, but the reason the ratings go on is because if they are not rated they will not get distributed or shown in theaters. So there is a little bit of pressure involved, but still there is no stigma.

Exon: The government does not require that. The point I am trying to make is - and while I think these hearings should not have been held if we are not considering legislation or regulations at this time, I emphasized earlier that they might follow.

I simply want to say to you that I suspect that, unless the industry "clears up their act" - and I use that in quotes again - there is likely to be legislation. And it seems to me that it would not be too far removed from reality or too offensive to anyone if you could follow the general guidelines, right, wrong, or indifferent, that are now in place with regard to the movie industry.

FZ: Well, I would object to that. I think first of all, I believe it was you who asked the question of Mrs. Gore whether there was any other indication on the album as to the contents. And I would say that a buzz saw blade between a guy's legs on the album cover is a good indication that it is not for little Johnny.

Exon: I do not believe I asked her that question, but the point you made is a good one, because if that should not go to little minds I think there should be at least some minimal activity or attempt on the part of the producers and distributors, and indeed possibly the performers, to see that that does not get to that little mind.

Mr. Chairman, thank you very much.

Chairman: Senator Hollings.

Senator Hollings: Mr. Zappa, I apologize for coming back in late, but I am just hearing the latter part of it. I hear that you say that perhaps we could print the words, and I think that is a good suggestion, but it is unfair to have albums rated.

Now, it is not considered unfair in the movie industry, and I want you to elaborate. I do not want to belabor you, but why is it unfair? I mean, it is accurate, is it not?

FZ: Well, I do not know whether it is accurate, because sometimes they have trouble deciding how a film gets to be an X or an R or whatever. And you have two problems. One is the quantity of material, 325 films per year versus 25,000 4-minute songs per year, OK.

You also have a problem that an album is a compilation of different types of cuts. If one song on the album is sexually explicit and all the rest of it sounds like Pat Boone, what do you get on the album? How are you going to rate it?

There are little technical difficulties here, and you have the problem of having somebody in the position of deciding what's good, what's bad, what's talking about the devil, what is too violent, and the rest of that stuff.

But the point I made before is that when you rate the album you are rating the individual, because he takes personal responsibility for the music; and in the movies, the actors who are performing in the movie, it does not hurt them.

Hollings: Well, very good. I think the actual printing of the content itself is perhaps even better than the rating. Let everyone else decide.

FZ: I think you should leave it up to the parents, because not all parents want to keep their children totally ignorant.

Hollings: Well, you and I would differ on what is ignorance and education, I can see that. But if it was there, they could see what they were buying and I think that is a step in the right direction.

As Senator Exon has pointed out, the primary movers in this particular regard are not looking for legislation or regulations, which is our function. To be perfectly candid with you, I would look for regulations or some kind of legislation, if it could be constitutionally accomplished, unless of course we have these initiatives from the industry itself.

I think your suggestion is a good one. If you print those words, that would go a long way toward satisfying everyone's objections.

FZ: All we have to do is find out how it is going to be paid for.

Hollings: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman: Senator Hawkins.

Senator Hawkins: Mr. Zappa, you say you have four children?

FZ: Yes, four children.

Hawkins: Have you ever purchased toys for those children?

FZ: No; my wife does.

Hawkins: Well, I might tell you that if you were to go in a toy store, which is very educational for fathers, by the way; it is not a maternal responsibility to buy toys for children - that you may look on the box and the box says, this is suitable for 5 to 7 years of age, or 8 to 15, or 15 and above, to give you some guidance for a toy for a child.

Do you object to that?

FZ: In a way I do, because that means that somebody in an office someplace is making a decision about how smart my child is.

Hawkins: I would be interested to see what toys your kids ever had.

FZ: Why would you be interested?

Hawkins: Just as a point of interest.

FZ: Well, come on over to the house. I will show them to you.

Hawkins: I might do that.

Do you make a profit from sales of rock records?

FZ: Yes.

Hawkins: So you do make a profit from the sales of rock records?

FZ: Yes.

Hawkins: Thank you. I think that statement tells the story to this committee. Thank you.

Chairman: Mr. Zappa, thank you very much for your testimony.

FZ: Thank you.
By William Vitka