From playing a concert in a burning casino, to having tear gas grenades thrown at him, Frank Zappa has lived on in our hearts as a pioneer of rock music. Frank was born on December 21, 1940, in Maryland. His father's name was Francis, and his mother's name was Rose. He had 3 siblings (two brothers and a sister). He became heavily influenced by a composer named Edgard Varese. Frank originally wanted to be a drummer. His first band was called "The Ramblers", but Frank was kicked out because he was a terrible drummer. As a child, Frank's family moved a lot because of his fathers job, working with poisonous and potentially deadly chemicals. In high school Frank learned to play guitar. He originally practiced on his dad's old acoustic. In his last year of high school Frank met a like minded individual named Don Vliet, whom he began to jam with. Don Vliet later went on to become the infamous "Captain Beefheart". Frank Zappa's career was just beginning to start off. He started a band called "The Mothers Of Invention". The Mothers released their first album, entitled "Freak Out" in 1966. It became a cult classic among "Freaks", and soon The Mothers Of Invention began releasing album after astounding album. Their breakthrough album "We're Only In It For The Money", received incredibly good reviews. Around this time Frank began recording solo albums, with good results. The Mothers broke up after 5 albums, but Frank kept releasing Mothers material. Frank produced Captain Beefheart's third album, entitled "Trout Mask Replica". Frank has been in court on more than 1 occasion. One time, he had to pay 28,000 pounds because his music had inappropriate content. He also had to censor and re-write the lyrics for a few of his songs. One day while Frank was playing a concert is Switzerland, someone fired a flare gun into the ceiling, causing the whole place to go up in flames. Later, Deep Purple made a song about that incident, entitled "Smoke On The Water". Frank married Gail Sloatman, and had 4 children with her. Their names are Moon Unit, Dweezil, Ahmet, and Diva. In all, Frank created 75 albums. He died of prostate cancer at the age of 52 on December 4, 1993. I hope that from reading this essay your interests have at least been piqued, and that you listen to maybe 3 songs by him. I assure you, you won't be disappointed
