You Are What You Is

You Are What You Is
Studio album by Frank Zappa
Released	September 23, 1981
Recorded	July - September, 1980 UMRK
Genre	Hard rock, comedy rock, progressive rock
Length	67:11
Label	Barking Pumpkin
Producer	Frank Zappa
Frank Zappa chronology
Joe's Garage Acts I, II & III (1979) You Are What You Is (1981) Ship Arriving Too Late to Save a Drowning Witch (1982)

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Allmusic

You Are What You Is is a double album by Frank Zappa. It was originally released as a two-record set in 1981 and later by Rykodisc as a 20-song CD.

Production

After the release of Joe's Garage, Frank Zappa set up his home studio, the Utility Muffin Research Kitchen, and planned to release a triple LP live album called Warts and All. As Warts and All reached completion, Zappa found the project to be "unwieldy" due to its length, and scrapped it, later conceiving Crush All Boxes. Crush All Boxes would have been a single LP containing the studio recordings "Doreen" and "Fine Girl", and "Easy Meat", a live recording with studio overdubs, on the first side, with the second side being occupied by a suite consisting of the songs "Society Pages", "I'm A Beautiful Guy", "Beauty Knows No Pain", "Charlie's Enormous Mouth", "Any Downers?" and "Conehead".

During the production of Crush All Boxes, Zappa decided to scrap the album and conceive a set of releases drawing from both Warts and All and Crush All Boxes, which would emphasize different aspects of his multiple talents, formatting the two albums into You Are What You Is, Tinseltown Rebellion and two series of live albums, Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar and You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore.

Music and lyrics

Much like a concept album, some of the tracks are bound together, although the album lacks an overall storyline.

The title track "You Are What You Is" is an up-tempo pop rock style song that was released as a music video in 1984. Although the film clip used advanced color graphics on normal dance and singing type footage, its circulation was restricted due to parts of it where an actor, who was made to look like Ronald Reagan, was sitting in what looked like an electric chair whilst applying hair creme and singing. The lyrics to the song also contains the sentence "I ain't no nigger no more", which likely also had an effect on its broadcast.^{[citation needed]}

Release history

The album was first issued on CD by EMI in the mid 1980s, albeit only in the UK and Japan. It received a worldwide release on both Ryko and Zappa Records CD in 1990, and was standardized under the Ryko banner in 1995. However, the digital master prepared for both the original Ryko/Zappa release and the later Ryko 1995 release suffered from several severe audio problems that appear to be caused by an overuse of digital techniques like compression and reverb, and also contained a shortened version of the track "Dumb All Over." In 1998, the problems of these previous CD issues were fixed in an unannounced reissue, including a near-complete restoration of the guitar solo from "Dumb All Over".

Track listing

Side one

1. "Teen-Age Wind" – 3:02
2. "Harder Than Your Husband" – 2:28
3. "Doreen" – 4:44
4. "Goblin Girl" – 4:07
5. "Theme from the 3rd Movement of Sinister Footwear" – 3:34

Side two

1. "Society Pages" – 2:27
2. "I'm a Beautiful Guy" – 1:56
3. "Beauty Knows No Pain" – 3:02
4. "Charlie's Enormous Mouth" – 3:36
5. "Any Downers?" – 2:08
6. "Conehead" – 4:24

Side three

1. "You Are What You Is" – 4:23
2. "Mudd Club" – 3:11
3. "The Meek Shall Inherit Nothing" – 3:10
4. "Dumb All Over" – 5:45

Side four

1. "Heavenly Bank Account" – 3:44
2. "Suicide Chump" – 2:49
3. "Jumbo Go Away" – 3:43
4. "If Only She Woulda" – 3:48
5. "Drafted Again" – 3:07

Personnel

Musicians

• Arthur Barrow – bass guitar
• Jimmy Carl Black – vocals
• Bob Harris – Boy Soprano, trumpet
• David Logeman – drums
• Ed Mann – percussion
• Tommy Mars – keyboards, vocals
• David Ocker – bass clarinet, clarinet
• Mark Pinske – vocals
• Motorhead Sherwood – tenor saxophone, vocals
• Craig "Twister" Stewart – harmonica
• Steve Vai – guitars
• Denny Walley – vocals, slide guitar
• Ray White – rhythm guitar, vocals
• Ike Willis – rhythm guitar, vocals
• Ahmet Zappa – vocals
• Frank Zappa – composer, arranger, vocals, guitar
• Moon Unit Zappa – vocals

Production staff

• Amy Bernstein – artwork
• George Douglas – assistant engineer
• Jo Hansch – mastering
• John Livzey – photography, cover photo
• Thomas Nordegg – engineer
• Mark Pinske – engineer
• Santi Rubio – ?
• Allen Sides – engineer
• Dennis Sager – digital engineer
• Bob Stone – remixing, digital remastering
• John Vince – artwork, graphic design
• Frank Zappa – producer

Charts

Album - Billboard (North America)

Year	Chart	Position
1981	Pop Albums	93