LOS ANGELES, June 18 — For Dweezil Zappa, one name change was not enough.
In April, Zappa, a guitarist and one of the four children of the rock composer Frank Zappa, changed the name of his project Zappa Plays Zappa — a tribute to his father’s music — to Dweezil Zappa Plays Frank Zappa. Clunky, perhaps, but he said it was necessary to avoid legal conflict with his brother, Ahmet, who controls the Zappa intellectual property through a family trust.
Now, after yet another legal tussle between the brothers, Dweezil is re-christening the show again. His next tour, starting July 1 in El Prado, New Mexico, will be called 50 Years of Frank: Dweezil Zappa Plays Whatever the Heck He Wants — The Cease and Desist Tour. (Instead of “heck,” the tour uses a vulgarity.)
“We are incorporating the absurdity,” Zappa said in an interview.
The 50 years refers to the anniversary of Freak Out!, the debut album from his father’s band, the Mothers of Invention.
The Zappa brothers, once musical partners, have clashed since the death of their mother, Gail, last year. The Zappa Family Trust now has two trustees, Ahmet and Diva Zappa; Dweezil and his sister Moon are beneficiaries. Frank Zappa died in 1993.
After Dweezil revealed the first name change in April in an interview with The New York Times, Ahmet Zappa told his brother in an open letter that he could use the name Zappa Plays Zappa (a registered trademark) if he paid a nominal fee of US$1 (RM4) a year.
Dweezil responded with a long open letter of his own and in a statement said that he could not accept that offer because the trust owes him US$2.5 million in merchandise sales.
This week, a lawyer for the trust informed Dweezil’s lawyer that the name Dweezil Zappa Plays Frank Zappa infringed on the trust’s trademarks of the terms “Zappa” and “Frank Zappa.” Dweezil’s lawyer responded that they qualified as fair use (“the use of ‘Frank Zappa’ merely serves to accurately describe the nature of the show and is in no way misleading or defamatory”), but that the tour was being renamed again to avoid further problems.
“I’m not changing the name because I’ve done anything wrong,” Dweezil said. “I’m changing it because I don’t want to keep having to pay US$30,000 every time they write me a letter,” he said, referring to his legal expenses.
Ahmet Zappa could not be reached for comment. — The New York Times
