Murray Roman's TV Show, February 15, 1970

Interview, Part #1

[16:34-20:36]

Murray Roman:

Hello, all you folks out there watching the plastic tube. It is good to see you. I'm sitting here in talking with a gentleman of my acquaintance, one Frank Zappa. A leader in music, a leader in thought, and a leader in other things which should got other people in trouble.

A lot of people have said that Frank is really Ruben, but those of us who know him better know that that's not true. He is a resurrection of an earlier [art form] and he was—that's true, a lot of people don't know that Frank was really Cardenal Richelieu, and he really fooled around in France a lot, I mean, let me tell you.

Now, Frank recently came back from uh—or just like three days ago, or just a little bit ago—came back from a town near Brussels where they had a kind of a European pop festival. What was that, uh—?

FZ:

Oh, this is a little town called Amougies—

Murray Roman:

What?

FZ:

Amougies. A-M-O-U-G-I-E-S.

Murray Roman:

And what you told me the town is known for?

FZ:

Turnips.

Murray Roman:

Turnips. How did a town that, you know, like its major industry is turnips get to like have a pop festival?

FZ:

I'm glad you asked, Murray.

Murray Roman:

Hah hah hah . . . Yeah, it's gonna be a good show.

FZ:

It seems that the French government is really stupid. And they had an opportunity to hold a pop festival just outside of Paris. And this festival was being promoted by a French record company called Byg. B-Y-G. And originally they had permission to hold the festival just outside of Paris, but then the government began to panic about large numbers of young people getting together and so they said, "You can't have it outside of Paris." So they started looking for other places in France to hold it. And they kept getting the runaround from various officials in different parts of France. And finally they said, "Forget it, we'll go to Belgium."

So, they went to Belgium and uh, the people there gave 'em a bunch of static. They were gonna hold it outside of Brussels. Finally it wound up in this turnip patch, which is two hours outside of Brussels. And the conditions under which the festival were held were so ridiculous—like the temperature was 20 or 30°. It was foggy. It was damp. It was in the middle of a cow pasture, and they set up this tent that held 15,000 people. A generator in the back, which was providing enough power to operate the P.A. system, a whole set of stage lights like you have here, and all the juice for all the groups. And they did it, they put the thing together in five days.

Murray Roman:

Sounds like something Humble Harve put on. [It's really worth of it.] How did you communicate with these kids? I mean, it's true they know your records and they know your music and they know the sound and feeling of the kind of things you do, but how were you able to communicate with kids, you know, who speak Walloon, who speak Flemish, who speak sort of a dialect of French? What did you do?

FZ:

I only talked to them once.

Murray Roman:

What did you say?

FZ:

I said, "I'm really glad that you guys had a pop festival in spite of the French government."

Murray Roman:

Why do you think the French government is so uptight with a lot of young people? I mean—certainly if France is known for anything is known for its uh—you know, its heavy weight sex films and it's known for—

FZ:

Yeah, but that's not the way France is. I don't know when was the last time you were there, but it's really very square. It's really depressing, you know. To think what Paris used to be famous for [BLEEP].

Murray Roman:

Oh . . .

FZ:

Go ahead, bleep it.

Murray Roman:

Oh, Frank . . . Oh . . .

FZ:

Well, in the past Paris was famous for its [BLEEP], but now [BLEEP].

Murray Roman:

Frank, you're gonna kill the tourist business as far as the French are concerned!

FZ:

I hope so! France— France oughta get [BLEEP].

Murray Roman:

Let me, let me, let me— There, there are—

Interview, Part #2

[28:33-29:03]

Murray Roman:

[...], Frank, you know, you saw the Moon landing.

FZ:

Yeah. It was really dull.

Murray Roman:

I know! Didn't you expect something to happen? Didn't you expect, "My g— Aaargh . . ."

FZ:

No, no. It was the dialog that was really bad. 'Cause I imagine that they had this screening thing for the guys that went up before they went up. A screening to make sure there was no sense of humor whatsoever in those cats. You may not do anything cute when you get up there. Just collect the rocks and come home. Leave the funny stuff to Nixon when he gets his show on air.

FBI Crime Report Sketch

[29:03-29:53]

FZ:

This is your FBI Crime Report. And I have some really important news for ya.

Rape is up 6%.

Chorus:

YEAH.

FZ:

Robbery is down 10%.

Chorus:

BOOOH.

FZ:

And homicide has taken a 15% jump.

Chorus:

[Claps]

FZ:

And here's a cutie for ya. Based upon its firing record, the South-Vietnamese army is the first army in the history of the world that's entitled to the Nobel Peace Prize.

Original transcription by Román.


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This page updated: 2022-09-08