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This week I’m choosing We’re Only In It For The Money by The Mothers Of Invention as my staff pick. I’ll usually go a while without listening to this, but once I do, it’s on repeat for at least a week. Frank Zappa can sometimes be fairly polarizing to music fans and I can totally understand why. His music can go to levels of technical and goofy that can be off-putting, but there’s usually a strong message in the words, like in this album.
It feels cliche to say but, anytime I listen to this record, it feels almost ahead of its time. I can’t help but notice how relevant and poignant the critiques are of American society at the time, and that I can see some of that relevance today. The cynical but realistic premonitions of authoritarian rule, the relentless ridicule of hippies and squares alike delivered with a type of humor that doesn’t get old for me. On top of that, the track “Take Your Clothes Off When You Dance” seems to be a song promoting body positivity, which I can’t imagine a whole lot of that going on at the time.
Meanwhile, all of these thoughts are set to some catchy psychedelic pop tunes like a creepy Sgt. Peppers. Maybe that’s what they were going for, since the back cover of We’re Only In It For The Money is a spoof of the Beatles record. All of this for me makes for a solid record and I would recommend it to any music fan even if you hate Frank Zappa. Thanks for reading!