Stumbled into interesting, and at times surreal, footage of Frank Zappa on CNN Crossfire where he debates free speech & censorship as it applies to music lyrics.
Wikipedia has more to say on the subject, indicating that these appearances were part of a larger debate started by the Parents Music Resource Center in their campaign to create a rating system for music similar to that used by the MPAA. The result was a little different than they hoped, but now CDs with explicit lyrics do carry a relevant generic label we’ve all seen.
Check the two appearances out below – well worth watching if only for Zappa’s arguments:
Comments
3 responses to “Frank Zappa on CNN Crossfire in 1986”
I wonder where you found that 🙂
Gots to love the Zap! Nice find, thanks for posting the videos.
saw the crossfire thing before. didn’t see the cnn.
the fascist theocracy stuff seems especially pertinent.
thanks for the post