In a news statement that no Zappa fan saw coming, the Zappa Family Trust have announced a hologram tour with the late, iconic guitarist.
Pairing with Eyellusion, the company that was in charge of Ronnie James Dio’s recent hologram tour, the hologram will “go back out on tour playing his most well-known music as well as some rare and unheard material,” according to Zappa’s son, Ahmet.
With tour dates to be announced in 2018, the shows will reportedly see help from a number of notable musicians, including ex-Mothers Of Invention members Ian Underwood, Denny Walley and Napoleon Murphy Brock, as well as other notable musicians including Steve Vai, Adrian Belew, Mike Keneally, and others.
In addition to the tour component, the company is producing a hologram version of Joe’s Garage: The Musical, originally developed in 2008 as an adaptation of Zappa’s 1979 set of albums.
With a long history of feuds and fighting in the Zappa family, there may be more to this than simply a tour.
Ahmet Zappa, co-trustee and often spokesperson for the Zappa Family Trust, will be joining the Eyellusion team as a global business developer.
Most recently, the Zappa Family Trust sent Dweezil Zappa a cease and desist for using the tour moniker “Zappa Plays Zappa” or selling merchandise with the name, forcing the guitarist to change his tour to “Dweezil Zappa Plays Whatever The F@%k He Wants – The Cease And Desist Tour.”
Dweezil was short on words, but long on snark in his twitter reply.
Which seems to be the general reaction, even with followers of the Official Frank Zappa Facebook Page where it was first announced, making frequent use of Facebook's "Angry" Like button and the top commenters have been priceless (and popular).
Whatever comes of this, it will certainly be interesting.
Watch video of the Ronnie James Dio hologram performance below.
