You need to listen to The Yellow Shark, Jazz Form Hell and Uncle Meat all the way through. Zappa will be remembered as the one of the greatest composers of the 20th century and he was just getting started when he died of prostate cancer. probably would not have lasted long anyway as he smoked 3 packs per day. He was extremely drug adverse but apparently he did not categorize nicotine as a drug. The only drugs you were allowed to use in a Zappa band were alcohol and nicotine. Zappa was a realist, he made fun of the truth. He said he started to resort to controversial rhetoric to get people to listen to his music and to help pay the bills. The influence of Flo and Eddie did not help either.
Zappa was a hero in the music business. He gave many new artists there big break. He also discovered lots of new talent and sent off numerous musicians to successful careers like Lowell George, Jean Luc Ponty, George Duke, Terri Bozio, Chad Wakermann and many others.
Most people do not know this story. In 1971 at the Rainbow theater in London a person managed to get on the stage, run over and push Zappa off the stage into the orchestra pit 10 feet below. He fracture his left leg and trachea. The next time he recorded which would be Apostrophe, I think, his voice had dropped at least an octave. Frank recorded EVERYTHING. The entire concert at the Rainbow was just released and at the end you hear Frank's landing.