Thing-Fish is an album by American musician Frank Zappa, originally released as a triple album box set on Barking Pumpkin Records in 1984. It was billed as a cast recording for a proposed musical of the same name, which was ultimately not produced by Zappa, but later performed partially in 2003, ten years after his death.
The album's storyline is inspired by Broadway theatre, AIDS, eugenics, conspiracy theories, feminism, homosexuality and African American culture. It involves an evil, racist prince/theater critic who creates a disease intended to eradicate African Americans and homosexuals. The disease is tested on prisoners who are turned into "Mammy Nuns" led by the story's narrator, Thing-Fish. The story within a story is a satire of a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant couple, Harry and Rhonda (actually played by Italian-Americans), who attend a play performed by the "Mammy Nuns", and find themselves confronted with their pasts: Harry presented as a homosexual boy, Rhonda presented as a sex doll brought to life.
The story was constructed during the recording sessions, which included producing new overdubs for recordings which previously appeared on Zappa's albums Zoot Allures (1976), Tinsel Town Rebellion, You Are What You Is (both 1981) and Ship Arriving Too Late to Save a Drowning Witch (1982). The release of the album was delayed when Barking Pumpkin Records' previous distributor, MCA, refused to distribute the album. It was instead released by Capitol Records in the United States, accompanied by a "Warning/Guarantee" written by Zappa himself. Thing-Fish was initially received poorly by critics, who criticized the use of previously recorded material, but has since been reappraised for its highly satirical content.
Background
Before leaving for London to record with the London Symphony Orchestra, Frank Zappa was home during Christmas season in 1982, and kept busy by writing, producing treatments for three films and a Broadway musical called Thing-Fish. Between 1981 and 1982, Broadway theatre had shifted from conservative musicals to experimental plays that were viewed as either being pretentious or vulgar. Thing-Fish satirized statements made by theater critics at the time, as well as arguing against the "dumbing down" of American culture. The sequence was 28 pages long. While the album was released, Zappa was unable to raise the $5 million budget required to stage the production, and shelved the project. The album was adapted for a limited stage production that took place in England in 2003. Many elaborate details were changed due to the small scale of the production.
Style and influences
Lyrics and story themes
Thing-Fish was poorly received by critics upon initial release; a common thread of criticism was that many of the songs on this album derived from previously released recordings, and some detractors considered it to be nothing more than a compilation album. In Frank Zappa and musical theatre: ugly ugly o'phan Annie and really deep, intense, thought-provoking Broadway symbolism, Thing-Fish is described as "an extraordinary example of bricolage". As reviewed by François Couture for the website AllMusic, Couture described Thing-Fish as Zappa's "most controversial, misunderstood, overlooked album", stating that it was not a masterpiece, but "more than rehashed material".