The Day When Frank Zappa Met Ike Willis

T'Mershi Duween, #54, October 1996

Q: How did you meet Zappa for the first time?


Ike Willis: It was back in 1977 when my wife and I were at college. He'd come to do a concert and I was on the local crew. I happened to meet him after the soundcheck. We started talking. We basically hit it off really well and he made me play and sing for him. He told me he liked the way I played and sang and he would like me to audition for his band.
Essentially after the 'Sheik Yerbouti' tour, he called me when I was still in college and told me he was going to fly me out for audition in the band. I flew out a week after that and made the band. The rest is history. The auditions were great. When I walked through the door, there was a line of about thirty or forty people. He'd already had everything set up for me, and he gave me a stack of words and told me to help him audition the other people. He said 'Let's get to work'; that was on Tuesday and I didn't get to do my audition until two days later and it only took about twenty seconds; then we went back to work auditioning other people and I was hired the next day.

 Ike Willis

Zappa's albums with Ike Willis:

Joe's Garage,
Tinseltown Rebellion,
Shut Up 'n Play Yer Guitar,
You Are What You Is,
Ship Arriving Too Late to Save a Drowning Witch,
The Man from Utopia,
Them or Us,
Thing-Fish,
Frank Zappa Meets the Mothers of Prevention,
Does Humor Belong in Music?,
 Guitar, You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore,Vol. 1,
Broadway the Hard Way,
You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 3,
The Best Band You Never Heard in Your Life,
You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 4,
Make a Jazz Noise Here,
You Can't Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 6,
The Lost Episodes, Have I Offended Someone?,
Halloween,
Trance-Fusion,
Buffalo,
One Shot Deal