Frank Zappa’s Last Album to Be Released in June
The last album Frank Zappa completed before his death from cancer on Dec. 4, 1993, will be released in June. According to JamBase, Dance Me This will be the late artist's 100th official release.
Buzz about the record first started making the rounds more than a decade ago. As JamBase notes, Dance Me This was "the last title FZ finished in 1993 along with Trance-Fusion; the last chapter in his Master Work, Civilization, Phase III; and of course, The Rage & The Fury, The Music of Edgard Varèse."
While no set date has been given for the album's release, it will most likely ship around June 1, according to pre-order info.
There's little detail on the official site, but JamBase points out that Zappa discussed the project with Guitarist Magazine in June 1993, just six months before his death. "What I'm working on right at the moment is a Synclavier album called Dance Me This, which is designed to be used by modern dance groups," he said at the time. "It's probably not going to come out until next year."
There's been nearly three dozen posthumous Zappa albums released by his estate over the past decade. Supposedly, promo cassettes for Dance Me This first surfaced in 2004, even though the record never made it to the public. Track titles include "Pachuco Gavotte," "Goat Polo" and five movements of "Wolf Harbor."
Like Zappa's latter-day work (who are we kidding? Like almost all of his work), Dance Me This includes some challenging pieces that were almost impossible to pull off onstage. Fans have been waiting a long time to hear these tracks (a few have surfaced over the years, but many have not), and to finally complete Zappa's long legacy.
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