The Mothers of Invention: Weasels Ripped My Flesh (Reprise/Bizarre 2028)
Nick Tosches, Fusion, 2 October 1970
THIS ALBUM should be had for the cover art alone. Cal Schenkel's art direction has gone itself one better this time with Neon Park's acrylic painting of a secret nightmare based on a halftone from a 1952 Italian Norelco advertisement. Zappa's house organ, Nifty, Tough & Bitchen, in the past creators of the best record jacket cover art to be turned down by Graphis (we speak here of all Reprise/Bizarre Mothers albums beginning with Cruising with Ruben and The Jets), has, with Weasels Ripped My Flesh, given us the most indigenous example yet of the still-gestating Scumbag School, even though the back cover sucks.
Total word count of piece: 603