[.ca] Cosmik Debris: The Collected History and Improvisations ... (ISBN 0964815702)

DULL:
This book has its place. If you're looking for a very complete reference of Zappa recordings and band personnel changes here it is. But this is not much of a biography apart from a few key facts about schooling, kids' birthdates and such. There are no quotes, and only the most succinct and dry accounts of events. There's a great deal of shallow "sidebar" material on the order of "the single release was a 1:05 longer than the album". If that's what you're after, go to town, but look elsewhere for a serious (or humorous for that matter) Zappa biography.

Detailed and Heavy Reading:
I have, in the past, collected most if not all of the zappa books. I have read the Negative Dialetics, Electric Don, MOTHER! and a host of other semi famous books - not to exclude FZ's own book on himself... they all have good parts and not so good parts... but this particular book is pretty impressive. It has a detailed account of each release, the people that FZ ran into, most of the silly stories of encounters. And the best part, the author does not seem to have an opinion of the subject. This makes the reading easy to read... a lot of the books mentioned earlier, either tried to paint FZ as a communist or a socialist or this or that, and the agenda they had writing the book really disjointed the writing. So, if you are looking for a good book to read about frank and what he did music wise, entertainment wise, this is a very good place. However, I am not knocking the other books, they were, at the very least, entertaining. I enjoyed reading them. They are all worth the purchase price (Maybe not Negative Dialetcts Of Poodle Play). have fun!

An amazing read!:
Sometimes it makes me wonder what book people are reading when I look at other reviews. I have more than 20 books on Zappa and this is the most amazing collection of Zappa information ever compiled. Since more than half of the information in this book has not appeared elsewhere, it was certainly not cut and pasted from another book. It is, in fact, Neil Slaven's book which is rife with errors. This book, in a convincing fashion, proves Slaven wrong time after time with the documentation enclosed within. Why can't other books be put together like this one? If you want to learn about Zappa, this is the place to go after you purchase Frank's book. It should also be noted that the author of "Cosmik Debris" was also greatly involved with the Original Sound CD reissue of Frank's earliest recordings. No other FZ book author can claim this on their resume. I would suggest that all FZ fans buy the book now!