A Conversation With Project/Object

Story by Bill Kopp

Composer/bandleader Frank Zappa died in 1993, but fortunately many musicians remain committed to keeping his music alive. Shortly before his death, Zappa instructed his friend and bandmate Ike Willis to “Play my music.” Guitarist André Cholmondeley (sorta pronounced “chumley”) put together the band Project/Object as a vehicle to perform the music of Frank Zappa. For nearly a decade and a half, André and Ike have been performing Frank’s music together. During soundcheck prior to a recent show, I spent a few minutes with them. — bk

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Bill Kopp: I first saw Project/Object right here in Asheville at Stella Blue nearly ten years ago. And I was absolutely floored. André, when did you first develop the idea for the band? And why exactly?

André Cholmondeley: Frank was the inspiration, of course. I was a big Zappa fan, starting about 1981. From 1987 to about 1991 I had a band called Zen Pajamas. Mostly originals, a few covers. We did a few Zappa tunes; we actually did a Steve Vai tune, too. Just for kicks, then a Zappa tune became two, or three. And then I had those Zappa parties in my house, right around 1989-90. At the third one, around ’91, I said, “Wait a minute: let’s have my band play.” We knew four Zappa songs, so we learned four more. And we played for about forty minutes. It was the highlight of the party; we had fun. So I said, “Next year!”

So the next year, I got a keyboard player involved, and other people. It became much more fleshed out. And we did an hour and a half or two hours of music. And right around that time I had the idea, “Wow. This is a working band. I can actually go out and do music with this.” And that’s right about when we started playing out live. Our first time in a club was 1991, maybe 1992.

BK: Ike, I know you play with a few different acts that perform Frank’s music. How did you first get involved with Project/Object?

Ike Willis: André and I, we go way back. Actually André and I are just celebrating our…twenty-sixth or twenty-seventh year together. I met André when he was a student at Rutgers. This was during the ’84 Zappa tour. We were at Jones Beach in New York, and André came over to see the show. He was walking around outside. So he and I started talking, and I took him backstage with me; I introduced him to Frank and everybody else in the band. We stayed in touch after that.

And it turned out that one of his buddies that he went to high school with was living out in Portland Oregon. That’s where I was living at the time. And this guy became my bass player in my band. One day, he asked me, “Do you remember André?” I said yeah, and he told me they went to high school together. And I said, “Oh, that’s cool!”

All the time that André was at Rutgers, every year on Frank’s birthday, they’d have that party in his apartment’s basement, and they’d play Frank’s music. And everybody started telling André, “You guys should be a band!” People really dug it, and the musicians were really great.

Fast forward to ’97. I had just gotten back from Israel, doing a thing [Banned From Utopia] with Joel Thome, the composer, who was doing Frank’s orchestra stuff. I had done a few gigs with him in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. And the day I got back – I had literally just gotten off the plane – I walked into my house, and my wife said, “André’s on the phone.”

André said, “Look: I’m out of school. I put a band together; I finally got a band together. We’re playing Frank’s music and stuff like that. We’re wondering if you’d be interested in checking us out, and actually taking us out, touring with us.” I said, “Send me some cassettes so I can hear what you guys sound like live.” I got them and listened, and went, “Aha! Well! Well now! This will work.” So that’s how André and I got reunited in 1997. And I’ve been in Project/Object ever since.

André’s my manager now; he’s like the little brother I never had. He’s a genius; he’s the best guy on Earth. He’s consistent as the day is long; André is the guy, man.

BK: One of the things that impressed me about you when I first heard you on Frank’s albums was how you brought a sort of organic and playful sensibility — I certainly wouldn’t call it loose, but maybe relaxed…

IW: Well, define “loose.” For Frank, that was about as loose as you could get.

BK: …to music that was (in those years) growing increasingly technical. Do you see your style of singing and playing as bridging those two approaches?

IW: Sure, of course. But that’s just the way I came up. My mom was a jazz singer. She was kids with Lou Rawls and Miles Davis. That’s who she grew up with: literally grew up with. She was born in Chicago, and she and Lou Rawls were in the church choir together. And in her teens, she went to St. Louis. Miles is from Alton, Illinois, which is right across the Mississippi from St. Louis. They all grew up together, ran around together. So that’s the home I grew up in. I used to go to rehearsals with my mom since I was “that big.” I’d watch her rehearse at gigs. And I started playing guitar when I was eight, after seeing the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show: “Mom, Dad, I want one of those!”

So you’ve got to bridge that gap. The thing you’ve got to remember is, back in the sixties, it was The Music Business. So I was in there before it turned into The Music Industry. Back in the sixties, you could be like, “Hey! Let’s start a band!” “I own a bass.” “Okay, you’re our bass player.” “I own some drums.” “You’re our drummer, then!”

BK: The Joe’s Garage story, pretty much…

IW: That’s exactly what it is. It’s not like that any more. Now there’s Berklee, and people go to school, and can read music…things like that.

BK: I’ve read a number of accounts that describe Frank as an incredibly demanding bandleader. Yet onstage — I saw him twice — the bands always seemed to be having a lot of fun. And of course it’s pretty much a cliché by this point, the saying that having played with Frank is the best thing one could have on their résumé. Other than the obvious lack of Frank himself, how would you characterize the difference between playing with Zappa and playing with Project/Object?

IW: The lack of Frank; that’s it. Let me put it this way: before he died, Frank asked me, “Try to continue to play my stuff. Try to keep it alive as much as you can. Put a band together, and get guys that can play this stuff. As long as you do it the way I taught you.”

That’s the thing about Project/Object. We have a lot of fun, and that’s the key to the whole Frank thing. I mean, if you’re not having a good time doing this, then…you’re doing it wrong.

BK: Otherwise, it’s just math…

IW: Yeah, then it boils down to just math. And for all of my Zappa bands, that’s one of the requirements that I demand, and it’s the same thing he demanded of me. Because [with Frank] things got progressively more technical, but at the same time, we were laughing our asses off the whole time. And that’s very important. Because you can’t take yourself so seriously: “Oh no! We’re hot shit!” Can’t have that.

That’s why – André and these guys — this is my number one Zappa tribute band. Besides my personal bias for André, he gets it. They get it. It’s really important to me that whoever I play with, perform Frank’s music with, that they get it. Because if they don’t get it, then I don’t take ‘em out.

BK: The lineup of players in Project/Object has changed a lot. For some bands this could be a problem, but I almost get the sense that this fluidity might have even been part of your original concept. Was it, or was the original idea based on a consistent lineup?

AC: Absolutely. When I looked at the actual Zappa bands, I was inspired, because that’s exactly what he did. Every year or two, sometimes three times in a year. Sometimes because of them: someone got a better deal, or they just thought they’d get famous (as Frank said). That happened with [Terry] Bozzio.

BK: And Jeff Simmons!

AC: Yeah, there are a lot of jokes around that. But Frank would say, “You need to move on. I don’t want a violin player.” Or a trumpet player, or whatever. “Go start your own band.”

BK: He told that to Lowell George [Little Feat]…

AC: In my case, it’s a low-budget gig. It’s definitely a labor of love. No one’s making a lot of money doing hit music these days; Christina Aguilera has to cancel tours, y’know. It’s tough out there.

And it’s tough to get people who can take two, three, six weeks off from work, and come out and do what we’re doing. And being able to play this stuff; that’s step one. But step two is being able to take a chunk of time off. So that’s a couple reasons why we’ve changed lineups through the years.

Bill Kopp: Ike, do you get any grief from…

Ike Willis: [anticipatory laughter]

BK: …from the Zappa estate for playing with André and the other groups? Does your doing so get you black-listed from ever appearing with Zappa Plays Zappa, for instance?

IW: Yes. And yes. Of course. The thing is, I’ve been getting grief from Gail Zappa from the day I walked in Frank’s door when I was twenty years old. So that really doesn’t bother me. And of course I’m blacklisted from playing…look, Dweezil [Zappa] and I, we talked about two, two and a half years ago. We talked about [me] trying to do some gigs with ZPZ. That’s when Ray [White] had first gotten into the band, and Ray said to Dweezil, “Come on; we have to do this together.” So I talked to Dweezil about it; we set it up. He wanted to do it, I wanted to do it. Basically, it’s for the fans.

But anything we wanted to do would have to be approved by Gail. Which, of course, I knew would never happen. And of course, once I got on the phone with Gail, she cursed me out for five minutes and slammed the phone in my ear. So, basically, nothing has changed in the last thirty-odd years.

I don’t worry about it. I am following Frank’s instructions, which is why — as you’ll notice — there are no lawsuits or anything having to do with any of my Zappa bands. Because Frank instructed me as to how to go about it, so that there would be no lawsuits from the Zappa Family Trust. Et cetera, et cetera. Those were part of my final instructions from him.

BK: André, I’ve read varying reports that Gail Zappa has, shall we say, made life difficult for Project/Object. Can you comment on that? I honestly don’t understand why she would want to stop anyone from bringing Frank’s music to the world, so long as it doesn’t negatively affect her wallet.

André Cholmondeley: Hmm…how do you encapsulate her whole thing? Look: I don’t feel too bad about it, because she goes after people all around the world. She spent a lot of money in Germany, and all over the United States. She’s gone after a lot of people.

I’m at the top of her list, because I’ve got Ike Willis, who she really doesn’t like. And I’ve worked with more Zappa alumni than anyone. I’m not bragging; that’s just what I’ve done. Because I started very early on. I’ve had at least fifteen alumni onstage, sometimes only for one night. You know the list. Guys from the early Mothers all the way up to the ’88 band. So I really just barrel forward, and I don’t pay much attention to her requests for permission and stuff like that.

She has made threats; she’s threatened clubs. I’ve got a stack full of legal threats in my basement, none of which have ever gone anywhere. Because the bottom line is – just like a band doing AC/DC or Led Zeppelin or Rush covers – the United States law…she loves to bring up the Constitution, which is funny, because the Constitution has nothing to do with music publishing…but U.S. law does say that you can play the music of other composers as long as a few conditions are met. You’re playing in a club that has ASCAP [or BMI] dues paid; you’re playing in a club that’s not recording or broadcasting it or putting it on the web…there’s a few rules. Also, we can’t record or videotape something and then sell it.…Well, actually, you could, but you’d have to pay mechanical royalties.

So she’s tried and tried and tried, and mainly it’s a nuisance. And y’know, out of the hundreds of gigs we’ve done, she maybe got two cancelled. And that was because we were in a club that didn’t have their ASCAP license…

BK: They were asking for trouble…

AC: Yeah, they were asking for it. In another case, it was just at the beginning of LiveNation. They were going from Clear Channel to LiveNation, and we were at a club that had just become [connected with] LiveNation. And they were just about to start doing business with [Gail] and ZPZ. And they literally said, “Look, our lawyers say we shouldn’t do this.” So we got the phone call that they were getting ready to do a million dollars’ business with this woman, and they didn’t need this little gig in one of their small clubs up in Portland.

So that’s my thing on her. I say, “You do your thing, and I’ll do mine.” Frank Zappa is really not any more special than The Kinks or The Who or Led Zeppelin on some level; he’s not any more important. As far as “can you play his music,” he doesn’t get any special rights.

BK: Frank’s music went through so many sorts of phases. André, is there one era or style of his music that you personally favor?

AC: I like all the eras, yeah. But my favorites would be three eras. Roxy and Elsewhere. And the period ’80 through ’82 is amazing, with so many sight readers in the band, doing stuff like “Sinister Footwear.” Some really difficult tunes came out of that era. And three great drummers.

And the ’88 band. I saw that band several times. Year after year, that ages very well. But I love 20^th century orchestral music, so I loved when he did that. I love The Yellow Shark; that’s fantastic. Jazz From Hell. So I love the stuff that has nothing to do with a band, too.

BK: Ike, what’s your favorite Zappa song to perform?

IW: [shakes head slowly] There’s too many songs. Too many to have a favorite one. And there’s too many versions, arrangements of each song. So, no. It’s impossible for me.

BK: How do you rehearse this music?

AC: It’s difficult these days. Because I live here, our drummer lives in Philly. Our keyboard player lives in Wilmington, the bassist is in Brooklyn. The Zappa guys fly out from L.A. or Detroit. What we do, though, is through the beauty of technology. We make sure we come up with specific set lists; I come up with those, and there’s feedback: people say, “I’d like to do this song.” So I put together the list, and we put together which particular version of the songs, and we make sure people have copies of everything.

We do a lot of homework. More than you might do in some other bands. And then we get together right before the tour. Two, three, four rehearsals; that’s it! Very long rehearsals; it might be like ten- or twelve-hour days. We’ve been upping that a bit lately; we’ll do that and see what things need working on, and then a couple days before the tour, we’ll do it again.

BK: Ike, in your opinion, what is the biggest difference between Frank the man and Frank the image that has been perpetuated in popular culture?

IW: Oh, god. The image of Frank is that he’s got horns in his head; he’s this evil guy. Yes, he’s demanding; he’s very, very demanding. He cracks the whip mercilessly, which is fine. But really, what a sweetheart of a guy. He was a really nice guy, as well as – of course — the most intelligent human being I’ve ever known. But all of that aside, he was really, really, really generous. And a sentimental slob teddy bear of a guy. I can’t stress that enough. Really generous and a really nice guy. I know; I was with him for almost seventeen years.

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