By 1959 Zappa had gained the companionship of
English professor Don Cerveris, who had put together an absurd low-cost cowboy
movie connected with an awful ranch woman, a nympho cowgirl, a hunchback
handyman and sexual union beside a rotting donkey.
It was named Run Home Slow, for which Zappa
was commissioned to record a soundtrack. He finished it, but the project was
put off for quite a while, it finally went into production in 1963 (and was
launched in 1965). So, this was Zappa's first recording experience with an
orchestra(engineered by Paul Buff, at Art Laboe's Original Sound in Hollywood).
The primary title theme is very rhythmical
with a slow dissonant melody on brass musical instruments. It shares certain
similarities with the starting theme from Lumpy Gravy and already indicates the
composer's fondness for mallet percussion and unusual time signatures.
 |
| Franks first orchestra experience |
The original recording of this piece and
short orchestral cues used in the movie were introduced in 1996 on The Lost Episodes. "Run Home Slow" and a second excerpt from the score titled
"The Little March" were sometimes performed by the early Mothers of
Invention. A recording of both from 1969 are available on You Can't Do That onStage Anymore, Vol. 5. Arranged for a rock group and presented at a quicker
tempo.
Soundtrack has also appeared on:
Strictly Genteel
The Old Masters Box One Mystery Disc
Frank Zappa & The Mothers Of Invention
(Transparency)
The Lumpy Money Project/Object (2009)
Soundtrack: Run Home Slow
Reviewed by
frank zappa newspaper
on
03:49
Rating:
Reviewed by
frank zappa newspaper
on
03:49
Rating:
The picture could have had a grittier end. Nell and clan kill the guy who had their dad lynched and his son on Nell's order but their horses are killed and Ritt is wounded. They head into the desert,dodging the sheriff's posse. Whiny but cute Julie-Ann wanted to give up but she's bolstered when they find a bag of money. After a despairing desert home, they find an abandoned farmhouse and bury the money,and Nell tries to heal Ritt. Time passes and fickle Julie-Ann seduces Kirby near an animal corpse since Nell has banished them to the barn. Nell is suspicious but she needs Julie-Ann to bear children since they are the last of the Hagens. But Julie-Ann gets bored and longs for excitement and glamour and tries to get wishy-washy Kirby to run away with her. When he isn't sure, Nell catches her digging up her share of the money and Julie-Ann defiantly says she's leaving. Nell doesn't stop her, but send sobbing sap Kirby after her with an axe.Ritt gets on his feet and calls Nell evil and says she just wants to preserve the Hagen name.Nell replies that Ritt and Kirby have done all the killing. Ritt sends her to stop Kirby,but it's too late. Kirby finds Julie-Ann and she desperately tries to sweet talk him into sparing her. Kirby is unable to axe her at first but when he realizes she is a two-faced selfish liar, he strangles her to death and carries her back. Nell goes to tell Ritt and sees he's hung himself and she goes outside in despair and finds Kirby dead next to Julie-Ann's body. Apparently he's killed himself too. Nell can't move the tree bark to get the money so she staggers off into the desert half-crazed,the last of the Hagens,despite her best efforts. About as weird as you'd expect from a movie scored by Frank Zappa.
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