Jeff Simmons - Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up

Straight Records

As a soon-to-be-flunky of Frank Zappa's The Mothers of Invention, you can bet that Jeff Simmons' debut solo album "Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up" takes far too much inspiration from the man himself. This album is mostly an uninspired attempt at effective Californian psychedelic rock (as that was Zappa's brand of music) with a splash of some cheap satire, so this will be brief. 

The best songs on the album, from best to worst, are the title track, "Raye", and "Madame du Barry". The title song includes a nice attempt at some old '50s style crooning, as does "Raye", though throughout "Lucille", Simmons sounds like he's trying his best not to laugh. A bit too cheerful for this style of music. "Raye" builds off the bloozey precedent set by the previous instrumentation with weighty drums, sputtering bass, bittersweet piano, and a swaying, depressed, warbly guitar. There are some pop stylings thrown in for flavor and occasional meter changes, but it's primarily true to form. Simmons is very good at the blooze, a shame he never did more of the stuff.

"Madame du Barry" is a slow tune with a touch of Victorian aesthete romanticism that almost makes it a love song. The organ is a nice touch but wasn't mixed well so it's barely audible, and the ending wisps of weirdness are thrown in for credibility's sake, I suppose, despite the fact the song was barely commercial anyways. The crooner tones in the vocal performance remain in this song, and while an over all pleasant song, it isn't the best on the record. It certainly is better then most of the other choices, though. 

The rest of the album is divided between a couple of poor attempts at psychedelia and hard rock. "Appian Way" is about as standard as it gets, with the guitar overshadowing Simmons' thick voice (the result of more poor mixing, I'm sure). "Zondo Zondo" includes some creative use of percussion and more mixing problems, with the rhythm guitar overpowering the lead during the solo. It comes across as not making sense for the sake of it as opposed to a true appreciation for freak scene music, as does most of this album. 

"I'm In The Music Business" is an attempt at the same music industry satire Zappa was known for, but the attempt falls flat on its face. The only interesting thing about it are the lines "Said I gotta take my clothes off/tryna play some bebop" and "Forty dollars for a crotch shot", turning the mope piece into an exploitation show. "Wonderful Wino" isn't interesting at all, and neither is a more psychedelic piece, "Tigres". 

"Aqueous Humore" is an onanistic vocal performance, something about being a fish person told through talk-singing overlayed on fuzzy, foggy guitar and accordion. "Conversations with a Recluse", while the most psychedelic song on the record, still feels too self-contained for true psychedelia to be achieved. 

Seeing as this man did work with Frank Zappa, I'm not entirely surprised this album turned out to be so dull and devoid of sincerity. This was probably one of the most boring things released on Straight Records. 

Rating: 3/5