On The Bus

Album: Joe's Garage
Joe's Garage is a Rock Opera. In order to better understand this song, we must first understand it's place in the story. The previous song is about a Wet T-Shirt contest in which this girl, Mary, enters and wins. Mary is also a crew slut, meaning she "pleases" all the guys while they tour around on their bus. "On The Bus" is primarily a guitar solo. I imagine the solo "narrates" the activities which Mary performs on the bus for all the guys in the crew. I love Zappa's ability to perform guitar solos which are completely unpredictable. He also shows a lot of patience while still managing to cram a ton of notes into a small amount of space. The rhythm section sits nicely in the background. I like the way they accent the 1 and the 4, providing a nice lift between measures. I don't know if "lift" is the best word to describe it. It's more of a stall. The 1 starts with a downhill rush, while the 4 brings us back up, resting at zero G's for a moment, only rush back downhill on the 1 again. At 2:40, theres a great little part in 9/8. Don't have much to say other than I love it, and quite catchy despite it's odd time signature. The last ten seconds of the song provide the intro into the next song. Amazing intro. It immediately shifts out of intense guitar into a much slower swing feel, proving a sort of laid-back buildup.