History Music / JoesGarage

* UncommonTime: Despite the outlandish "everything" on the album, there exist several showcase pieces throughout, both for Zappa's fantastic guitar solos, as well as the band's virtuosic performances. "Wet T-Shirt Nite" bravely showcases a complex musical passage between its verses, while "Keep It Greasy" goes through a full multitude of time signature changes. In the finale, Zappa gets drummer Vinnie Colaiuta to play two bars of a 5/8 beat in the same space as a 4/4 bar. It's impressive that he manages to keep it up for a full minute.

'''''Joe's Garage''''' is a 1979 RockOpera by Music/FrankZappa that follows the trials and tribulations of Joe, a guitarist in a world where music has been made illegal. It is told through the eyes of the Central Scrutinizer, who reminds us throughout how music can mess you up. Originally, it was released as two albums: ''Joe's Garage (Act I)'' (a single album) and ''Joe's Garage (Acts II & III)'' (a double album). On CD, the first disc consists of Part I and the first half of Part II, while the second disc contains the rest of the album.

* NewJobAsThePlotDemands: Father Riley goes from being a Catholic priest at the start of the story ("Catholic Girls") to an MC at a BikiniBar ("Wet T-Shirt Nite") to being the chaplain at the prison Joe is sent to ("Dong Work For Yuda").

* RealLifeWritesThePlot:
** Zappa too was once jailed for "conspiracy to make pornography" (just a tape full of sex noises) and spent much of his prison time imagining guitar solos in his cell.
** Zappa regularly traveled by plane and while waiting in the lobbies of many American airports he would hear the announcement "The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone!" over and over again. (For non-American readers: this phrase informs passengers and travellers that they can load or unload luggage in the white curb of the airport.) One can imagine how tedious listening to the mind numbing pointless phrase could get. Zappa included it during many songs on this album.
** The plot of this ConceptAlbum about a society where music is made illegal was directly inspired by the 1979 coup in UsefulNotes/{{Iran}} by ayatollah Khomeini. During a radio broadcast aired on July 23rd, 1979, Khomeini called for a ban on any form of music, however no specific law was edicted at the time. Khomeini said: "Music should not be broadcast over the radio and television. Music is something that everybody is attracted to naturally, but it takes them out of reality to a futile and lowly livelihood. Like opium, music also stupefies persons listening to it and makes their brain inactive and frivolous." It was only some months later that the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran, adopted by referendum, granted the Leader full power to appoint and dismiss the head of the Radio and Television (Chapter XII [Article 175]). Zappa even mentions this fact in the liner notes of the album.
** "Dong Work For Yuda" is full of inside jokes and anecdotes regarding Frank's then bodyguard John Smothers and his strange way of talking. His wife Freckles is referenced too. In a 1990 interview with Zappa named "They're Doing the Interview of the Century, Part 3" he explained:
--> ''Once upon a time, on his first trip to Copenhagen, we were playing at a place called the Falkoner Center (...) and we didn't have a limousine. I had to take a cab to the place. We get in the car. It's just this little tiny car, (laughter) not a Fiat, but maybe, slightly larger than a Fiat. You know how big John is (...) and it's a cab, and the driver is Danish, [[LanguageBarrier and he doesn't speak English]]. I get in the back, and John gets in the front, and the cab driver is just sittin' there, 'cause he doesn't know where to go, and John finally realizes that he must tell the driver where to go, so, he just turns to him, and goes, "FALCUM." (laughter), and the guy looks at him, y'know, kinda lookin' up like this, and John goes, "FALCUM." (...) and the guy DOESN'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON! And then, John gets vehement. He goes, "TAKE ME TO THE FALCUM!''.

->''"Hello. This is the Central Scrutinizer."''

* WhyDoYouKeepChangingJobs: Father Riley goes from being a Catholic priest at the start of the story ("Catholic Girls") to an MC at a BikiniBar ("Wet T-Shirt Nite") to being the chaplain at the prison Joe is sent to ("Dong Work For Yuda").

** Appliantology, which is not even a good pun on Scientology.

* AllMenArePerverts: They gangbang groupies, organize wet t-shirt contests, have sex with robots and rape fellow prisoners.

** The lines "The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload, go to the White Zone" are heard all throughout the album, during "The Central Scrutinizer", "Joe's Garage", "A Token of My Extreme" and "He Used to Cut the Grass".

** In "Sy Borg" the robot sings he'll go "aaaaalll the waaaaay!" This is a reference to Music/FrankSinatra's song "All The Way". In the same song he also claims Joe is "pushin' too hard, pushin' too hard on me", which is a reference to "Pushin' Too Hard" by The Seeds.

"Joe's Garage" is a bit of a BrokenBase among fans, with some claiming it's his last "great work" before a long period of lesser albums in the 1980s began. Others point to ''Music/SheikYerbouti'' as his final great record and say that "Joe's Garage" actually ''started'' a decline in quality, with more obnoxious voices, bawdy comedy, sparse musical instrumentation and topical ProtestSong material that nowadays is heavily dated. Nevertheless, "Joe's Garage" has some popular fan favorites, including the title track, "Catholic Girls", "Crew Slut" and "Watermelon In Easter Hay".

'''Disc One'''

'''Disc Two'''
#"Dong Work For Yuda" (5:04)
#"Keep It Greasey" (8:22)
#"Outside Now" (5:49)
#"He Used To Cut The Grass" (8:35)
#"Packard Goose" (11:31)
#"Watermelon In Easter Hay" (9:05)
#"A Little Green Rosetta" (8:15)

!!The White Zone is for troping and un-troping only. If you have to trope, go to the White Zone. You'll love it. It's a way of life.
* AlbumFiller: This double album is a RockOpera and a BrokenBase among fans. Some people adore it, others feel there is a lot of padding. The plot often goes nowhere and focuses to much on bawdy comedy that doesn't drive the story forward. The long guitar solos on CD 2 have also divided audiences. Some like them, others claim they it's just noodling for the sake of noodling. Zappa's interludes as the Central Scrutinizer also irk some listeners, because when you play the tracks it's always the first thing you have to endure before you get to the music. In the otherwise beautiful "Watermelon in Easter Hay" Zappa's jabbering takes up more than a minute and he even talks over the guitar intro! And then there is the final track, "A Little Green Rosetta", which has nothing to do with the rest of the plot and just seems to be there to go out on a less depressive note.
* AlbumTitleDrop:
--> ''We could jam at Joe's Garage''

--> ''If the plot of the story seems just a little bit preposterous, and if the idea of "The Central Scrutinizer" enforcing laws that haven't been passed yet makes you giggle, just be glad you don't live in one of the cheerful little countries where, at this very moment, music is either severely restricted . . . or, as it is in Iran, totally illegal.''[[note]]While all music – Iranian or otherwise was banned in the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979, it only served to foster a fierce underground community of Iranian musicians from every genre imaginable. The legality of music is still brought into question every so often within the country.[[/note]]

* ArmouredClosetGay: Subverted, Joe is told to get ''into the closet'' to have sex with a ''plooking'' robot.

-->'''from "Packard Goose":''' "If you're in the audience and like what we do / Well, we want you to know that we like you all too"
-->'''from "A Little Green Rosetta"''': "And if this doesn't convince you that MUSIC causes BIG TROUBLE . . . then maybe I should turn off my plastic megaphone and sing the last song on the album in my regular voice . . ." \\

--> "And we've flown in, at great expense, (triple scale, no less, ladies and gentlemen), Steve Gadd's clone to play the out-chorus on this song . . . he's really outasite, in spite of the fact that the click track is totally irrelevant to what he's doing right now. I'm listening to the click, yes I'm suffering with the click track right now . . . this guy is totally out of sync with it, but what the fuck."

-->'''from "Joe's Garage":''' And the same old chords goin' over 'n' over
-->Became a symphony
-->We would play it again 'n' again 'n' again
-->'Cause it sounded good to me
-->ONE MORE TIME!
-->We could jam in Joe's Garage
-->His mama was screamin' "TURN IT DOWN!"
-->We was playing' the same old song
-->In the afternoon 'n' sometimes we would
-->Play it all night long
-->It was all we knew, and easy too
-->So we wouldn't get it wrong
-->Even if you played it on a saxophone

*** "Sy Borg": "This is exciting, I never plooked a tiny chrome-plated machine..."

** "Leather", mentioned during "Crew Slut" ("I'm into leather...") and "Sy Borg" ("Little leather cap and trousers") is a conceptual continuity example mentioned earlier in Zappa's work, during ''Carolina Hard-Core Ecstasy'' (''Plastic leather 14 triple D.'') from ''Music/BongoFury'' (1975) and ''Broken Hearts Are For Assholes'' and ''We Gotta Get Into Something Real'' from ''Music/SheikYerbouti'' (1979).

* ConceptAlbum

* GainaxEnding: "A Little Green Rosetta".

* GriefSong: "Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up"; "Watermelon In Easter Hay".

* HumiliationConga: In a way, the [[UpToEleven whole ''album'']] is this for Joe.
* [[{{Pun}} Incredibly Lame Pun]]:

** "A Token of My Extreme": "Don't you be tarot-fied..."

* {{Lampshading}}: "A Little Green Rosetta". "Because this is a stupid song AND THAT'S THE WAY I LIKE IT"

* MundaneMadeAwesome: Wet t-shirt contests ("Wet T-Shirt Nite") and working in a muffin factory ("A Little Green Rosetta") are actually pretty catchy songs.

-->''' "Poor Joe, he’s getting tired of bending over. But we tried to warn him ... didn't we?"

* [[ThePowerOfRock The Power Of Music]]: "Information is not knowledge, knowledge is not wisdom, wisdom is not truth, truth is not beauty, beauty is not love, love is not music, music is the best!"

* ProductPlacement: A Dodge car, Fender Stratocaster and Beatle Boots are mentioned during the title track. Ronald Mcdonald from McDonalds is mentioned during "Packard Goose".

--> ''Once upon a time, on his first trip to Copenhagen, we were playing at a place called the Falkoner Center (...) and we didn't have a limousine. I had to take a cab to the place. We get in the car. It's just this little tiny car, (laughter) not a Fiat, but maybe, slightly larger than a Fiat. You know how big John is ...(...)and it's a cab, and the driver is Danish, and he doesn't speak English. I get in the back, and John gets in the front, and the cab driver is just sittin' there, 'cause he doesn't know where to go, and John finally realizes that he must tell the driver where to go, so, he just turns to him, and goes, "FALCUM." (laughter), and the guy looks at him, y'know, kinda lookin' up like this, and John goes, "FALCUM." (...) and the guy DOESN'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON. And then, John gets vehement. He goes, "TAKE ME TO THE FALCUM!''.

* SexySoakedShirt: In the form of wet T-shirt contest: "Wet T-Shirt Nite", of course!

** In "A Little Green Rosetta," Zappa references both [[Music/ExodusAlbum "Jamming" by Bob Marley]] and "I'm The Japanese Sandman" by The Cellos. He also mentions Steve Gadd, at the time one of the highest paid session drummers of all time ("Hey! And we've flown in, at great expense - triple scale, no less, ladies and gentlemen. Steve Gadd's clone to play the out-chorus on this song. He’s really outa-site, in spite of the fact that the click track is totally irrelevant to what he's doing now. I’m listening to the click, yes I'm suffering with the click track right now. This guy is totally out of sync with it, but what the fuck! Ed Mann will call him up later, show him the sign.")

* TakeThatCritics: Zappa didn't have a high opinion of rock 'n roll critics. He famously said: "Rock journalism is people who can't write, interviewing people who can't talk, in order to provide articles for people who can't read." In his autobiography, ''Literature/TheRealFrankZappaBook", he also devoted a few lines about the inaneness of most critics and argued that somebody may like an album, even if someone gave it a bad review. Zappa himself was a good example, because he discovered his main musical inspiration Edgar Varèse thanks to a horrible review in a magazine and felt he had to check it out, just because of that. "Packard Goose" is a pointed attack on rock 'n' roll journalists.

* TooDumbToLive: Mary in "Crew Slut" has no idea what kind of "present" the boys in the crew have for her. In "Wet T-Shirt Nite", she's not particularly bright either. It's explained in the liner note that she's gone cross-eyed dumb from an extended period of time solely performing sexual favours for men.

** "Plooking". Especially in the first lyric of "Outside Now": "These executives have plooked the fuck out of me."
** "It looks just like a Telefunken U-47".
* UrineTrouble: "Why Does It Hurt When I Pee?"

* WhatsAnXLikeYouDoingInAYLikeThis?: Phrase heard during "Flower Punk".

"Joe's Garage" is a bit of a BrokenBase among fans, with some claiming it's his last "great work" before a long period of lesser albums in the 1980s began. Other point to ''Music/SheikYerbouti'' as his final great record and say that "Joe's Garage" actually ''started'' a decline in quality, with more obnoxious voices, bawdy comedy, sparse musical instrumentation and topical ProtestSong material that nowadays is heavily dated. Nevertheless, "Joe's Garage" has some popular fan favorites, including the title track, "Catholic Girls", "Crew Slut" and "Watermelon In Easter Hay".

The story starts with the Central Scrutinizer introducing the premise of the tale: this is a government-sponsored album about how music can mess you up. It tells the tale of Joe, who started a rock band as the government was planning to outlaw music, and shows what happened after he got arrested for disturbing the peace. Soon enough, his girlfriend Mary leaves him and turns into a "crew slut" for a band named Toad-O; his priest becomes an MC at a Florida bar; and he contracts an STD from a girl he met named Lucille. With nowhere to go, he eventually turns to the [[ChurchOfHappyology Church of Appliantology]] and pays them 50 dollars to learn that he is apparently a [[{{Robosexual}} latent appliance fetishist]]. This in mind, he learns German and dresses up as a housewife before going into a bar called "The Closet" that apparently caters to appliances. After picking one up, he takes it home and ends up breaking it from [[UnusualEuphemism plooking]] it too hard. For this, he is arrested and taken to jail. Specifically, he is put in a special jail for people in the music business, as the government has just enacted a law banning music – a parallel to the real-life banning of music that occured in Iran during the Iranian Revolution, just months before.

--> "We could jam at Joe's Garage"

--> "If the plot of the story seems just a little bit preposterous, and if the idea of "The Central Scrutinizer" enforcing laws that haven't been passed yet makes you giggle, just be glad you don't live in one of the cheerful little countries where, at this very moment, music is either severely restricted . . . or, as it is in Iran, totally illegal."[[note]]While all music – Iranian or otherwise was banned in the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979, it only served to foster a fierce underground community of Iranian musicians from every genre imaginable. The legality of music is still brought into question every so often within the country.[[/note]]
* AllWomenAreLustful: "And Mary is the kind of red-blooded American girl who'll do anything... I said anything!... for fifty bucks."

* ArcWords: "The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you have to load, go to the White Zone. You'll love it. It's a way of life."

** The entire monologue from the end of "Dancin' Fool" from ''Music/SheikYerbouti'' (1979) is repeated again near the end of "Stick It Out". The phrase "What's a girl like you doing in a place like this?" was used earlier during "Flower Punk" on ''Music/WereOnlyInItForTheMoney'' (1968) and "What Kind of Girl Do You Think We Are?" from ''Music/FillmoreEast1971'' (1971).

** A frenzy is mentioned at the start of "Watermelon in Easter Hay". Frenzies were referenced earlier on the albums ''Music/OverNiteSensation'' (1973) (during "Dirty Love"), ''Music/{{Apostrophe}}'' (1974) (during "Father O' Blivion"), ''Zappa in New York'' (1978) (during "Honey Don't You Want a Man Like Me?") and ''You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore, Volume 4'' (1991) ((during "Smell My Beard")

** "Sounds like an elegant gypsy" in "Packard Goose" refers to gypsy imagery that appeared earlier in Zappa's work, like "Who Needs The Peace Corps?" from ''Music/WereOnlyInItForTheMoney'' (1968) and "Gypsy Mutant Vacuum Cleaner" from ''Chunga's Revenge'' (1970).

--> "Poor Joe, he’s getting tired of bending over. But we tried to warn him... didn't we?"

* HumansAreBastards

** From "Wet T-Shirt Nite": "Here at the Brasserie... home of the tits, huh-huh!"

** From "A Token of My Extreme": "Don't you be tarot-fied..."

** From "Packard Goose": "Beauty is a French phonetic corruption of a short cloth neck ornament currently in resurgence . . ." (Note: a pun on "bow-tie").

-->"But I can't pay\\

Two songs ago..."

--> "Because this is a stupid song AND THAT'S THE WAY I LIKE IT"

--> "Once upon a time, on his first trip to Copenhagen, we were playing at a place called the Falkoner Center (...) and we didn't have a limousine. I had to take a cab to the place. We get in the car. It's just this little tiny car, (laughter) not a Fiat, but maybe, slightly larger than a Fiat. You know how big John is ...(...)and it's a cab, and the driver is Danish, and he doesn't speak English. I get in the back, and John gets in the front, and the cab driver is just sittin' there, 'cause he doesn't know where to go, and John finally realizes that he must tell the driver where to go, so, he just turns to him, and goes, "FALCUM." (laughter), and the guy looks at him, y'know, kinda lookin' up like this, and John goes, "FALCUM." (...) and the guy DOESN'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON. And then, John gets vehement. He goes, "TAKE ME TO THE FALCUM!".

-->"They're pretty good musicians\\

AND THAT'S THE WAY I LIKE IT"

--> "Our big prize tonite is fifty American Dollars to the girl with the most exciting ''mammalian protruberances'' . . . as viewed through a thoroughly soaked, stupid looking white sort of male person's conservative kind of middle-of-the-road COTTON UNDERGARMENT! Whoopee! And here comes THE WATER!"

--> Well, fuck all them people, I don't need no excuse
--> For being what I am
--> Do you hear me, then?
--> All them rock 'n' roll writers is the worst kind of sleaze
--> Selling punk like some new kind of English disease
--> Is that the wave of the future? Aw, spare me please!
--> Oh no, you gotta go
--> Who do you write for, I wanna know?
--> I believe you is the government's whore
--> And keeping peoples dumb (I'm really dumb)
--> Is where you're coming from
--> And keeping peoples dumb (I'm really dumb)
--> Is where you're coming from
--> Fuck all them writers with the pen in their hand
--> I will be more specific so they might understand
--> They can all kiss my ass but because it's so grand
--> They best just stay away

** "Leather", mentioned during "Crew Slut" ("I'm into leather...") and "Sy Borg" ("Little leather cap and trousers") is a conceptual continuity example mentioned earlier in Zappa's work, during ''Carolina Hard-Core Ecstasy'' (''Plastic leather 14 triple D.'') from ''Bongo Fury'' (1975) and ''Broken Hearts Are For Assholes'' and ''We Gotta Get Into Something Real'' from ''Music/SheikYerbouti'' (1979).

** The lines "Hear the steam, See the steam, Hear the steaming hot black screaming, Iridescent naugahyde python gleaming steam roller") from "Stick It Out" are a throwback to "Latex Solar Beef" from Zappa's ''Fillmore East, June 1971''.

** The entire monologue from the end of "Dancin' Fool" from ''Music/SheikYerbouti'' (1979) is repeated again near the end of "Stick It Out". The phrase "What's a girl like you doing in a place like this?" was used earlier during "What Kind of Girl Do You Think We Are?" from ''Fillmore East, 1971'' (1971).

** In "Sy Borg" the robot sings he'll go "aaaaalll the waaaaay!" This is a reference to Creator/FrankSinatra's song "All The Way". In the same song he also claims Joe is "pushin' too hard, pushin' too hard on me", which is a reference to "Pushin' Too Hard" by The Seeds.

* TakeThatCritics: Zappa didn't have a high opinion of rock 'n roll critics. He famously said: "Rock journalism is people who can't write, interviewing people who can't talk, in order to provide articles for people who can't read." In his autobiography,"The Real Frank Zappa Book", he also devoted a few lines about the inaneness of most critics and argued that somebody may like an album, even if someone gave it a bad review. Zappa himself was a good example, because he discovered his main musical inspiration Edgar Varèse thanks to a horrible review in a magazine and felt he had to check it out, just because of that. "Packard Goose" is a pointed attack on rock 'n' roll journalists.

* AlbumFiller: Somewhat of a BrokenBase among fans. Some feel that a lot of the plot has many bizarre plot twists that just drag on or don't go anywhere. Others find the long guitar solo's on ''Act III'' tedious after a while. Even Zappa's interludes as the Central Scrutinizer can get on one's nerves, because they cannot be skipped when listening to the songs separately. Even the closing track ''A Little Green Rosetta'' has nothing to do with the rest of the plot and just seems to be there to go out on a less depressing note.

--> "If the plot of the story seems just a little bit preposterous, and if the idea of ''The Central Scrutinizer'' enforcing laws that haven't been passed yet makes you giggle, just be glad you don't live in one of the cheerful little countries where, at this very moment, music is either severely restricted . . . or, as it is in Iran, totally illegal."[[note]]While all music – Iranian or otherwise was banned in the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979, it only served to foster a fierce underground community of Iranian musicians from every genre imaginable. The legality of music is still brought into question every so often within the country.[[/note]]

** Sex dolls appear in ''Stick It Out'' and ''Sy Borg'', a subject Zappa touched before with ''Ms. Pinky'' on ''Music/ZootAllures'' (1976) and would use again with ''Artificial Rhonda'' on ''Thing-Fish'' (1985). An inflatable sex doll is also used in his film ''Film/BabySnakes'' (1979).

** Joe is locked up in prison, imagery that appeared before in Zappa's work on "Concentration Moon" and "The Chrome Plated Megaphone Of Destiny" from ''Music/WereOnlyInItForTheMoney'' (1968) and with the prisoners in "The Torture Never Stops" from Music/ZootAllures'' (1976).

** L. Ron ''Hoover'' and his Church of ''Appliantology'' reference L. Ron Hubbard, founder of Scientology.

-->'''from "Keep It Greasey":''' "Poor Joe, he’s getting tired of bending over. But we tried to warn him ... didn't we?"

** "Dong Work For Yuda" is full of inside jokes and anecdotes regarding Frank's then bodyguard John Smothers and his strange way of talking. His wife Freckles is referenced too. In a 1990 interview with Zappa named "They're Doing the Interview of the Century, Part 3" he explained: "Once upon a time, on his first trip to Copenhagen, we were playing at a place called the Falkoner Center (...) and we didn't have a limousine. I had to take a cab to the place. We get in the car. It's just this little tiny car, (laughter) not a Fiat, but maybe, slightly larger than a Fiat. You know how big John is ...(...)and it's a cab, and the driver is Danish, and he doesn't speak English. I get in the back, and John gets in the front, and the cab driver is just sittin' there, 'cause he doesn't know where to go, and John finally realizes that he must tell the driver where to go, so, he just turns to him, and goes, "FALCUM." (laughter), and the guy looks at him, y'know, kinda lookin' up like this, and John goes, "FALCUM." (...) and the guy DOESN'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON. And then, John gets vehement. He goes, "TAKE ME TO THE FALCUM!".

** In "A Little Green Rosetta," Zappa references both "Jamming" by Music/BobMarley and "I'm The Japanese Sandman" by The Cellos. He also mentions Steve Gadd, at the time one of the highest paid session drummers of all time ("Hey! And we've flown in, at great expense - triple scale, no less, ladies and gentlemen. Steve Gadd's clone to play the out-chorus on this song. He’s really outa-site, in spite of the fact that the click track is totally irrelevant to what he's doing now. I’m listening to the click, yes I'm suffering with the click track right now. This guy is totally out of sync with it, but what the fuck! Ed Mann will call him up later, show him the sign.")

* TakeThatCritics: Zappa didn't have a high opinion of rock 'n roll critics. He famously said: "Rock journalism is people who can't write, interviewing people who can't talk, in order to provide articles for people who can't read." In his autobiography,"The Real Frank Zappa Book", he also devoted a few lines about the inaneness of most critics and argued that somebody may like an album, even if someone gave it a bad review. Zappa himself was a good example, because he discovered his main musical inspiration Edgar Varèse thanks to a horrible review in a magazine and felt he had to check it out, just because of that. ''Packard Goose'' on Music/JoesGarage is a pointed attack on rock 'n' roll journalists.

* UncommonTime: Despite the outlandish ''everything'' on the album, there exist several showcase pieces throughout, both for Zappa's fantastic guitar solos, as well as the band's virtuosic performances. "Wet T-Shirt Nite" bravely showcases a complex musical passage between its verses, while "Keep It Greasy" goes through a full multitude of time signature changes. In the finale, Zappa gets drummer Vinnie Colaiuta to play two bars of a 5/8 beat in the same space as a 4/4 bar. It's impressive that he manages to keep it up for a full minute.

** ''Plooking''. Especially in the first lyric of "Outside Now": "These executives have plooked the fuck out of me."

* UrineTrouble: ''Why Does It Hurt When I Pee?''

* Joe is locked up in prison, imagery that appeared before in Zappa's work on "Concentration Moon" and "The Chrome Plated Megaphone Of Destiny" from ''Music/WereOnlyInItForTheMoney'' (1968) and with the prisoners in "The Torture Never Stops" from Music/ZootAllures'' (1976).

** The Utility Muffin Research Kitchen in "A Little Green Rosetta" is a throwback to "Muffin Man" from "Bongo Fury".

** "Make way for the iron sausage" in "Dong Work for Yuda", references the "night of the iron sausage" in "The Torture Never Stops" from Zappa's ''Zoot Allures'' (1976). Sausage imagery also appeared during "St. Alphonso's Pancake Breakfast" on ''Music/{{Apostrophe}}'' (1974).

-->'''from "A Little Green Rosetta"''': "And if this doesn't convince you that MUSIC causes BIG TROUBLE . . . then maybe I should turn off my plastic megaphone and sing the last song on the album in my regular voice . . ."

* TooDumbToLive: Mary in "Crew Slut" has no idea what kind of "present" the boys in the crew have for her. In "Wet T-Shirt Nite", she's not particularly bright either. It's explained in the liner note that she's gone cross-eyed dumb from an extended period of time solely performing sexual favours for men.

-->'''Opening lines of the album'''

'''''Joe's Garage''''' is a 1979 RockOpera by Music/FrankZappa that follows the trials and tribulations of Joe, a guitarist in a world where music has been made illegal. It is told through the eyes of the Central Scrutinizer, who reminds us throughout how music can mess you up. Originally, it was released as two albums: ''Joe's Garage Part I'' (a single album) and ''Joe's Garage Parts II and III'' (a double album). On CD, the first disc consists of Part I and the first half of Part II and the second disc contains the rest of the album.

The story starts with the Central Scrutinizer introducing the premise of the tale: this is a government-sponsored album about how music can mess you up. It then moves on to tell the tale of Joe, who started a rock band as the government was planning to outlaw music, and what happened after he got arrested for disturbing the peace. Soon enough, his girlfriend Mary leaves him and turns into a slut, his priest becomes an MC at a Florida bar, and he contracts an STD from a girl he met named Lucille. With nowhere to go, he eventually turns to the [[ChurchOfHappyology Church of Appliantology]] and pays them 50 dollars to learn that he is apparently a [[{{Robosexual}} latent appliance fetishist]]. This in mind, he learns German and dresses up as a housewife before going into a bar called "The Closet" that apparently caters to appliances. After picking one up, he takes it home and ends up breaking it. For this, he is arrested and taken to jail. Specifically, he is put in a special jail for people in the music business, as the government has just enacted a law banning music.

While in prison, he is [[PrisonRape raped]] many times, and when he eventually gets out, has gone somewhat insane, a condition not helped by the fact that music is illegal and he so has nothing to do. Instead, he becomes sullen and withdrawn, and decides to "dwindle off into the twilight realm of my own secret thoughts", wherein he dreams of imaginary guitar notes that he knows would irritate all the music executives that tortured him. [[spoiler:He continues to wander around town, dreaming of guitar notes, until eventually he realizes that the notes only exist in his mind. As such, he goes into his room, plays one last imaginary guitar solo (Watermelon in Easter Hay), and then hocks his guitar in order to get a job at the Utility Muffin Research Kitchen.]] The album closes with the Central Scrutinizer pointing out once again that yes, music can really mess you up, and singing the last song on the album in order to prove it.

!!!The White Zone is for troping and un-troping only. If you have to trope, go to the White Zone. You'll love it. It's a way of life.
* AllMenArePerverts: They gangbang groupies, organize wet t-shirt contests, have sex with robots or rape fellow prisoners.

---> "If the plot of the story seems just a little bit preposterous, and if the idea of ''The Central Scrutinizer'' enforcing laws that haven't been passed yet makes you giggle, just be glad you don't live in one of the cheerful little countries where, at this very moment, music is either severely restricted . . . or, as it is in Iran, totally illegal."[[note]]While all music – Iranian or otherwise was banned in the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979, it only served to foster a fierce underground community of Iranian musicians from every genre imaginable. The legality of music is still brought into question every so often within the country.[[/note]]
* AllWomenAreLustful: "And Mary is the kind of red-blooded American girl who'll do anything... [I said anything!]... for fifty bucks."

* AudienceParticipation: The presenter of the wet t-shirt nite interacts with the lustful audience.

* BawdySong: "Catholic Girls", "Crew Slut", "On The Bus", "Wet T-Shirt Nite", "Stick It Out", "Cy Borg", "Bald Headed John" and "Keep It Greasy".
* BeliefMakesYouStupid: In ''A Token Of My Extreme'' Joe joins the cult Appliantology where he gets worthless advice, but still has to pay a huge sum for it.
* BigBad: From the listener's perspective, it's the Central Scrutinizer. However, in-universe, music (and to a lesser extent Joe) is the big bad of the story.

--> ''If you're in the audience and like what we do
--> ''Well, we want you to know that we like you all too'' - "Packard Goose".
--> Zappa breaks the entire mood during the last song ''A Little Green Rosetta'' by saying ''Maybe I should just turn off my plastic megaphone voice''.

--> And the same old chords goin' over 'n' over

* ButtMonkey: Joe. Literally too in ''Dong Work For Yuda''.

** The lines "The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone" are heard all throughout the album, during "The Central Scrutinizer", "Joe's Garage", "A Token Of My Extreme" and "He Used To Cut The Grass".
** Mrs. Crabgrass can be heard near the end of the song "Joe's Garage" and "He Used To Cut The Grass".

** The lines "Hear the steam, See the steam, Hear the steaming hot black screaming, Iridescent naugahyde python gleaming steam roller") from "Stick It Out" are a throwback to "Latex Solar Beef" from Zappa's "Fillmore East, June 1971" (1971).

** A ''magical pig'', named Squat, is mentioned during ''Stick It Out'' and ''Sy Borg''.

** The robot with whom Joe has intercourse ''looks like a cross between a vacuum cleaner and a chrome piggy bank''. Vacuum cleaner imagery appeared earlier on albums like ''Music/HotRats'' (1969), ''Chunga's Revenge'' (1970), ''Film/TwoHundredMotels'' (1971) and ''Music/OneSizeFitsAll'' (1975).

*** During "A Token Of My Extreme": "That looks like it's a cross between an industrial vacuum cleaner and a chrome piggy bank with marital aids stuck all over its body..."

** ''Leather'', mentioned during '''Crew Slut'' (''I'm into leather...'') and ''Sy Borg'' (''Little leather cap and trousers'') is a conceptual continuity example mentioned earlier in Zappa's work, during ''Carolina Hard-Core Ecstasy'' (''Plastic leather 14 triple D.'') from ''Bongo Fury'' (1975) and ''Broken Hearts Are For Assholes'' and ''We Gotta Get Into Something Real'' from ''Music/SheikYerbouti'' (1979).
** The entire monologue from the end of ''Dancin' Fool'' from ''Music/SheikYerbouti'' (1979) is repeated again near the end of ''Stick It Out''. The phrase ''What's a girl like you doing in a place like this?'' was used earlier during ''What Kind Of Girl Do You Think We Are?'' from ''Fillmore East, 1971'' (1971).
** ''Make way for the iron sausage'' in ''Dong Work For Yuda'', references the ''night of the iron sausage'' in ''The Torture Never Stops'' from Zappa's ''Zoot Allures'' (1976). Sausage imagery also appeared during ''St. Alphonso's Pancake Breakfast'' on ''Music/{{Apostrophe}}'' (1974).
** ''On The Bus'' evokes tour bus imagery, as happened before on ''A Pound For A Brown On The Bus'' from ''Music/UncleMeat'' (1969) and ''Hah! Good God! Get off the bus!'' in ''St. Alphonso's Pancake Breakfast'' from ''Music/{{Apostrophe}}'' (1974).
** A frenzy is mentioned at the start of ''Watermelon in Easter Hay''. Frenzies were referenced earlier on the albums ''Music/OverNiteSensation'' (1973) (during ''Dirty Love''), ''Music/{{Apostrophe}}'' (1974) (during ''Father O' Blivion''), ''Zappa In New York'' (1978) (during ''Honey Don't You Want A Man Like Me?'') and ''You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore, Volume 4'' (1991) ((during ''Smell My Beard'')
** Joe sings "Oh No, I don't believe it!", a throwback to ''Oh No'' from ''Music/LumpyGravy'' (1968) and ''Music/WeaselsRippedMyFlesh'' (1969)

** ''"Sounds like an elegant gypsy"'' in ''Packard Goose'' refers to gypsy imagery that appeared earlier in Zappa's work, like ''Who Needs The Peace Corps?'' from ''Music/WereOnlyInItForTheMoney'' (1968) and "Gypsy Mutant Vacuum Cleaner" from ''Chunga's Revenge'' (1970).

* CrapsackWorld

* CorruptChurch: The First Church of Appliantology is basically demanding fees for giving pretty worthless advice. Father Riley B. Jones in "Dong Work For Yuda" also sings songs to the other prisoners, while some of them are gangraped by other men. And the Catholic Girls in ''Catholic Girls'' are apparently not that chaste.

* [[spoiler:DownerEnding: Joe gives up at the end, and simply retreats into his room so he can play one last imaginary guitar solo before he comes back to sanity and gets a job at the Utility Muffin Research Kitchen.]]

* EpicRocking: "Packard Goose" (11:34) is the longest example, but much of the album counts, including "Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up" (7:17), "Sy Borg" (8:56), "Keep It Greasey" (8:22), "He Used to Cut the Grass" (8:35), "Watermelon In Easter Hay" (9:09), and "A Little Green Rosetta" (8:15).

--> ''Poor Joe, he’s getting tired of bending over. But we tried to warn him... didn't we? ''
* FlatWhat: Happens in "A Token Of My Extreme".

* GriefSong: ''Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up'', ''Watermelon In Easter Hay''.
* GroupieBrigade: ''Crew Slut'', ''On The Bus'', ''Why Does It Hurt When I Pee?'' deals with groupies.

** "Here at the Brasserie... home of the tits, huh-huh!"
** "Don't you be tarot-fied..." - ''Token Of My Extreme''.
** "Beauty is a French phonetic corruption of a short cloth neck ornament currently in resurgence" (Note: a pun on "bow-tie").
** Appliantology, which is not even a good pun on Scientology!

* {{Lampshading}}: "Because this is a stupid song and that’s the way I like it" - ''A Little Green Rosetta''.

* MundaneMadeAwesome: Wet t-shirt contests (''Wet T-Shirt Nite'') and working in a muffin factory (''A Little Green Rosetta'') are actually pretty catchy songs.
--> "Because this is a stupid song and that’s the way I like it!"

** The group Toad-O is a thinly disguised jab at the rock band Toto, best known for ''Hold the Line'' (1979) and ''Africa'' (1983).
* ObligatoryBondageSong: ''Sy Borg'' has the line: "How's about some bondage and humilitation?".
* OneManSong: ''Joe's Garage''.
* OneWomanSong: ''Lucille (Has Messed My Mind Up)''.
* OverlyLongTitle: ''Watermelon in Easter Hay'' was originally titled: ''Playing A Guitar Solo With This Band Is Like Trying To Grow A Watermelon In Easter Hay'', thus said Zappa during his Star Special radio appearance on BBC Radio 1, 1980.

--> ''Poor Joe, he’s getting tired of bending over. But we tried to warn him ... didn't we? ''

* [[ThePowerOfRock The Power Of Music]]: ''Information is not knowledge, knowledge is not wisdom, wisdom is not truth, truth is not beauty, beauty is not love, love is not music, music is the best!''

* ProductPlacement: A Dodge car, Fender Stratocaster and Beatle Boots are mentioned during the title track. Ronald Mcdonald from Mcdonalds is mentioned during ''Packard Goose''.

* PunBasedTitle: ''A Token Of My Extreme'' instead of "a token of my esteem".
* RagingStiffie: ''Stick It Out''.

** Zappa regularly traveled by plane and while waiting in the lobbies of many American airports he would hear the announcement ''The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone!'' over and over again. (For non-American readers: this phrase informs passengers and travellers that they can load or unload luggage in the white curb of the airport.) One can imagine how tedious listening to the mind numbing pointless phrase could get. Zappa included it during many songs on this album.
** The plot of this ConceptAlbum about a society where music is made illegal was directly inspired by the 1979 coup in UsefulNotes/{{Iran}} by ayatollah Khomeini. During a radio broadcast aired on July 23rd, 1979, Khomeini called for a ban on any form of music, however no specific law was edicted at the time. Khomeini said: ''Music should not be broadcast over the radio and television. Music is something that everybody is attracted to naturally, but it takes them out of reality to a futile and lowly livelihood. Like opium, music also stupefies persons listening to it and makes their brain inactive and frivolous"'' It was only some months later that the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran, adopted by referendum, granted the Leader full power to appoint and dismiss the head of the Radio and Television (Chapter XII [Article 175]). Zappa even mentions this fact in the liner notes of the album.
** "Dong Work For Yuda" is full of inside jokes and anecdotes regarding Frank's then bodyguard John Smothers and his strange way of talking. His wife Freckles is referenced too. In a 1990 interview with Zappa named "They're Doing the Interview of the Century, Part 3" he explained: ''"Once upon a time, on his first trip to Copenhagen, we were playing at a place called the Falkoner Center (...) and we didn't have a limousine. I had to take a cab to the place. We get in the car. It's just this little tiny car, (laughter) not a Fiat, but maybe, slightly larger than a Fiat. You know how big John is ...(...)and it's a cab, and the driver is Danish, and he doesn't speak English. I get in the back, and John gets in the front, and the cab driver is just sittin' there, 'cause he doesn't know where to go, and John finally realizes that he must tell the driver where to go, so, he just turns to him, and goes, "FALCUM." (laughter), and the guy looks at him, y'know, kinda lookin' up like this, and John goes, "FALCUM." (...) and the guy DOESN'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON. And then, John gets vehement. He goes, "TAKE ME TO THE FALCUM!"''.
* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech: ''Packard Goose'', a huge TakeThat aimed at rock journalists and critics.
* RepurposedPopSong: ''Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up'' was originally a song from a 1969 album by Jeff Simmons, produced by Zappa himself.

* SesquipedalianLoquaciousness: Joe is told to stick closer to "church-oriented social activities".

** "Catholic Girls" refers to "Catholic boys'' and namedrops Warren Cuccurullo and Vinnie Colaiuta, two Zappa band members.

** In the liner notes for ''Outside Now'' the following line can be read: ''"And sure enough JOE dreams up a few of those guitar notes that every executive despises: those low ones. Every exec knows it's only the records with the high squeally ones that get to be hits, except for Music/DuaneEddy."''

** ''Water Melon In Easter Hay'' is used over the end credits of ''Film/YTuMamaTambien'' (2001).
* SpokenWordInMusic: The Central Scrutinizer narrates. The shouting by Mrs. Borg and police officer Butzis are also spoken. Also the track ''Wet T-Shirt Nite'' is more or less a spoken word sketch, with some singing narration.

* SurprisinglyGentleSong: Between all the comedy songs about rock bands, male prison rape and sex with robots ''Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up'' is a quite sweet love song and ''Watermelon In Easter Hay'' is a moving tragic guitar solo.
* TakeThat: This album pokes fun at rock bands, heavy metal, glitter rock, disco, new wave, the music industry, catholic girls, groupies, Scientology (under the disguise of Appliantology), the government, the band Toto (referred to as ''Toad-O''), music censorship, rock critics and journalists, punk and Zappa's bodyguard John Smothers.
* ToiletHumour: ''Why Does It Hurt When I Pee?''
* TooDumbToLive: Mary in "Crew Slut" has no idea what kind of "present" the boys in the crew have for her. In "Wet T-Shirt Nite" she's not particularly bright either.

** ''It looks just like a Telefunken U-47''.

* WhatsAnXLikeYouDoingInAYLikeThis?: Phrase heard during ''Flower Punk''.
* WolfWhistle: Can be heard several times during "Wet T-Shirt Nite".
* WhyDoYouKeepChangingJobs: Father Riley goes from being a Catholic priest at the start of the story (''Catholic Girls'') to an MC at a BikiniBar (''Wet T-Shirt Nite'') to being the chaplain at the prison Joe is sent to (''Dong Work For Yuda'').

* BilingualBonus: "Stick It Out" is sang in GratuitousGerman.

** ''Plooking''