Cucamonga (Frank's Wild Years)

"Cucamonga" was first released Feb 24 1998 on and subtitled "Frank's Wild Years" via the tray insert (viewable at front spine of jewel case). The work contains tracks created at the in Cucamonga with innovative recording engineer and musician Paul Buff. With artists such as Ray Collins,, Bob Guy and Ronnie Williams (opens in a new tab), Zappa spent considerable time in the studio - where much of his craft, editing skills and future direction was formulated. Zappa eventually purchased the studio from Buff in August 1964 and renamed it Studio Z (opens in a new tab). Buff, who's work features strongly in the recordings, became Art Laboe's engineer at (hence the inlay credit for some tracks to Original Sound Entertainment).
After acquired the work was reissued in 2004 with 3 additional tracks to the original 14, also from the Cucamonga era: "Memories Of El Monte", "Tijuana Surf" and "Grunion Run" - the latter two reflecting the typical California surf-sound that Buff had brought to the success of The Surfaris (opens in a new tab) and The Chantays (opens in a new tab) from an obscure studio in the dusty desert town of Cucamonga.