And were they necessary! The photographs below were at their first Amsterdam concert on their first European tour. Before they arrived, supposedly oh-so-hip and with-it Hitweek magazine, in a typical act of stupidity had published that picture of Zappa (who hated it) sitting on a toilet. As the Concertgebouw was still very stylishly upper class in those 1966 days, impresario Paul Acket's staff worried that the management would see it and cancel the performance.
Really! Boy, were they necessities...
Anyway, same management never lowered itself to reading a rag like Hitweek. Shows you where it's at.



Like Zappa himself, I thought it smarter to work with the Establishment, changing the show from the inside
but Willem de Ridder and the rest of the Hitweek staff thought this not anarchistic enough. They just adored Mao... need I say more?

some background
This was the first show after London, where Zappa had gone out and bought an all-new set of Marshall equipment right after they'd been paid (no credit for weirdos — cash only). There was a lot of testing-out going on, always so much more interesting than the concert, to me. Very enjoyable afternoon...
They knew the score: First thing they asked us upon arrival in the Concertgebouw was Where's the Vondelpark? so they could go score some dope, as easy there as in San Francisco. Luckily, that was only two or three blocks away.

Times were changing
I took the photographs for Paul Acket's Tiq magazine, that later published my work with Yayoi Kusama. But just like those of the Kinks they were way too far out for his taste, even for Tiq! Hard to imagine now, I agree. So below I show you the photograph by Rob Bosboom he did publish, so we both know what I'm talking about.

It went so fast that, one year later, Acket thought mine good enough for Muziek Expres, much squarer and more commercial. Now, I don't know what Robbie got paid for that photograph, but I do know the following: They thought my photographs were underexposed; just a whim. So they asked me to take the originals (Ektachrome EHB, Contaflex) to some lab and have lighter dupes made. Insane in the first place. Then, they told me I'd get that money back (never mind my work in hassling with the lab). The lab charged more per dupe than they were paying me. After all that toil and trouble, the printer took one look at those dupes and preferred to work from the originals.

Like I always say:
there's no future in being ahead of your times







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