Zappa always spoke his mind on several subjects. Songs in his album Freak Out! such as 'Hungry Freaks, Daddy' and 'I Ain't Got No Heart' express his feelings towards America's society empty culture values.
One subject in particular that put him in the spotlight was his aversion to drugs of all types. He disliked drugs and people who did them. He was quoted saying that "taking drugs is a license to be an asshole" and he felt the same about alcohol. He always thought that drugs had to be legalized and taxed in order to have more controls over what type of drugs were out there, and to take the romance out of doing them. His songs 'Who Needs The Peace Corps' and 'Cocaine Decisions' talk about drugs and the consecuences of taking them. He was so against them that his band members were not allowed to take drugs while on tour and if they did Frank wouldn't hesitate on firing any of them. To take precautions, Frank would even stay at a different hotel than the band, as he did not want to be caught involved any illegal activities. The incident he had with the police when he was young which landed him 10 days in jail was enough to scar him for life. Frank was always a control freak and the fact that drugs made people's personalities mutate, and change their value systems, did not appeal to Frank at all.
One subject in particular that put him in the spotlight was his aversion to drugs of all types. He disliked drugs and people who did them. He was quoted saying that "taking drugs is a license to be an asshole" and he felt the same about alcohol. He always thought that drugs had to be legalized and taxed in order to have more controls over what type of drugs were out there, and to take the romance out of doing them. His songs 'Who Needs The Peace Corps' and 'Cocaine Decisions' talk about drugs and the consecuences of taking them. He was so against them that his band members were not allowed to take drugs while on tour and if they did Frank wouldn't hesitate on firing any of them. To take precautions, Frank would even stay at a different hotel than the band, as he did not want to be caught involved any illegal activities. The incident he had with the police when he was young which landed him 10 days in jail was enough to scar him for life. Frank was always a control freak and the fact that drugs made people's personalities mutate, and change their value systems, did not appeal to Frank at all.
He criticized the Psychedelic Movement and its instigators, and had no respect for people who did drugs, even soft ones.
Other views of Frank included the thought that churches should be taxed, and that the educational system had nothing to offer to society.
He always said that people were asleep in America and they needed to wake up! His song 'Whats The Ugliest Part Of Your Body' was written with the purpose of making young people stand up to the older who wanted to contain them in "boxes". He encouraged young people to be free and speak their minds without following the status quo, to freak out! Absolutely Free was an album completely anti-drug, anti flower power movement, full of references to "purple jello", LSD, and other drugs. He wanted individuals not to follow these social movements.
On the sleve of his album Freak Out! he included what 'freaking out' meant: "On a personal level, Freaking Out is a process whereby an individual casts off outmoded and restricting standards of thinking, dress and social etiquette in order to express CREATIVELY his relationship to his immediate environment and the social structure as a whole. Less perceptive individuals have referred to us who have chosen this way of FEELING as “Freaks,” hence the term: Freaking Out. On a collective level, when any number of “Freaks” gather and express themselves creatively through music or dance, for example, it is generally referred to as a FREAK OUT. The participants, already emancipated from our national social slavery, dressed in their most inspired apparel, realize as a group whatever potential they possess for free expression. We would like everyone who HEARS this music to join us... become a member of the United Mutations...Freak Out!
On the sleve of his album Freak Out! he included what 'freaking out' meant: "On a personal level, Freaking Out is a process whereby an individual casts off outmoded and restricting standards of thinking, dress and social etiquette in order to express CREATIVELY his relationship to his immediate environment and the social structure as a whole. Less perceptive individuals have referred to us who have chosen this way of FEELING as “Freaks,” hence the term: Freaking Out. On a collective level, when any number of “Freaks” gather and express themselves creatively through music or dance, for example, it is generally referred to as a FREAK OUT. The participants, already emancipated from our national social slavery, dressed in their most inspired apparel, realize as a group whatever potential they possess for free expression. We would like everyone who HEARS this music to join us... become a member of the United Mutations...Freak Out!
His songs always had a statement to make either social or political, however, after an incident in Berlin where people saw him as "the next movement to follow", Zappa stopped adding political and ideological ideas in his lyrics, perhaps because he feared they would be misinterpreted.
In an interview of a show called Crossfire which aired on CNN, Zappa states the problems of "when you have a government that prefers a certain moral code, derived from a certain religion, and that moral code turns into legislation to suit a certain religious point of view, and if that code happens to be very very right wing[...]" [here he is called an anarchist by the interviewer, who also says that every form of government is based on a type of morality]... to which Frank answers: "morality in terms of behavior not in terms of theology".
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