Zappa’s onstage caricature of Nico originated ‘Call Any Vegetable’.

Evidence

In between sets, Frank Zappa got up from his seat and walked up on the stage and sat behind the keyboard of Nico’s B-3 organ. He proceeded to place his hands indiscriminately on the keyboard in a total, atonal fashion and screamed at the top of his lungs, doing a caricature of Nico’s set, the one he had just seen. The words to his impromptu song were the names of vegetables like broccoli, cabbage, asparagus … This “song” kept going for about a minute or so and then suddenly stopped. It later became ‘Call Any Vegetable’ off the Absolutely Free LP. He walked off the stage and the show moved on. It was one of the greatest pieces of rock ‘n’ roll theater that I have ever seen. — J. Hoberman, Everything Is Now, 1964

Categorization

• CANDY: Zappa screaming vegetable names as an atonal put-down of Nico is exactly the kind of light, memorable anecdote worth sharing.