News

September 11, 2008

Hello again all! Well after several months of work I have completed work on THE ZAPPA SUPPLEMENT ONE: A BOX OF HISTORY AND THE MUD SHARK SAGA, which tells the story of the unreleased 1969 12-LP Zappa historical retrospective box set The History And Collected Improvisations Of The Mothers Of Invention (greatly expanded from it's brief overview in Hungry Freaks Daddy) and the full-uncensored story of the all-FZ Mud Shark bootleg label which operated between 1979 and 1981. In compiling this history I have been greatly assisted by the contributions of Mud Shark mastermind Studebacher Hoch and former FZ-zine supreme Mother People editor Rob Cerreta, who have given us a no-holds barred, inside look into the classic era of Zappa bootlegging. This is not necessarily a book for EVERYONE, but it is my hope that you will like it.

Speaking of R.C, he is responsible for the excellent, non-utilitarian look of the new SPB website. You can contact Rob at www.webs.wolfdreams.org and www.motherpeople.com, where you can also (soon or at least eventually) purchase back issues of the legendary Mother People magazine, in my opinion the finest of all Zappa fanzines.

For those of you wondering about Volume 3, the book is being worked on even now! It's called Blessed Relief, and will cover the period between 1972 and mid-1973 of Zappa history (the Wazoo projects through the end of the Ponty band). Look for that around the end of the year.

As always THANK YOU for all your support, kindness and encouragement. I guess Music REALLY IS the best, huh?

--SP

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July 3, 2007

Howdy hi Shindiggers!!

Well it's been a bit..VERY busy over here, creating more books and writing Volume 2 of the FZ book series. I'm hoping to have it out for November. It's called STRICTLY GENTEEL, and will cover the Flo &
Eddie period of the band, 1970-1971. More details (and a sample) soon!!

The first printing of HFD is SOLD OUT...Thank you to all who supported the project!! A second printing is now available, though I am not sure how long I will make the book available in the original format for. No
doubt I will no longer have the book available through me after Volume 2 comes out however as the work load involved is just too much!!

HFD is now available through the legendary Ultimate Purveyor OF All Things FZ, G and S Music. Quite an honor to be carried there!! Check 'em out at www.gandsmusic.com.

Meanwhile, there have been lots of questions on assorted things coming in. I have created an FAQ to answer them.

Keep watch on the site--I'm a little bit slow at updating but good things are happenin'!!

SP

April, 11, 2007

Hi all,

Just a quick note to let you know what's been happening.

HUNGRY FREAKS, DADDY was released officially on March 31st. The response has been TREMENDOUS--far exceeding expectations!! We fully intend to have some reviews up for you once we have the chance
to collect them all but we have two up at the website now just so you can have a quick look. The first printing of the limited color version (numbered and signed by SP) is selling out quickly, and will most likely
be gone by April. SP is considering another print run of the book in color but more likely he will be sitting down to continue working on Vol. 2, which we would like to have available by years' end.

Meanwhile, the Booksurge/Amazon version of the book has been pushed back to May to allow time for additions and corrections to be incorporated. For those of you not wanting to purchase ANOTHER
copy of the book (one can hardly blame you), we will post corrections and additions here in some form.

In non-Zappa news, it is possible that another book will be issued to fill the gap between the Zappa volumes. Likely this will be the aforementioned Genesis book, though this has yet to be absolutely determined.

Meanwhile folks, THANK YOU ALL from the bottoms of our collective hearts for all your support.

Music is THE BEST!!

The folks at Scott Parker Books

March 19, 2007

(posted on Zappateers.com)

Sorry it's taken a little bit to post an update--been drowining in books!!

In all seriousness, having done it (and ahead of schedule--I didn't think books would be shipping until the end of the month), I would suggest that anyone seeking to print and publish their own book should first
seek therapy!! :-)

Having said that though--THE FIRST SET OF BOOKS IS ON DA WAY!! The books are bound, covered, packaged in bubble mailers and sent out today. There will be more sent out tomorrow, and more on Friday.
That should take care of the books paid for prior to last Friday.

Now, here's an interesting point--several people had asked about the way I should value the books, I guess that in some European countries you fine folks have to pay taxes on these things! Here's what I've done.
I've listed the books as gifts, with a value of $10 which seems to make everyone I've talked to happy. If anyone has any thoughts on this, please let me know!!

And now THE BIG NEWS:

I've decided to limit the first printing (the one I'm doing here) to 100 copies. The reason? I've decided to do a deal with Booksurge (the publishing arm of Amazon.com) that will allow the books to be printed in a more professional manner and allow me to do what I should be doing soon, which is writing Vol. 2!! This also gives more visibility to the book (and who knows? Maybe some royalties!).

For those of you who are wondering "why on earth did I buy that cheezy self-printed version?" the differences will be as follows:

1. The Booksurge version will be slightly smaller in size, so I have to redesign the thing :-)
2. Inevitably, it won't be signed or numbered.
3. THE BIG ONE: It will be in B&W only. Sadly, this is their requirement.
The homemade version is lesser in print quality, but is probably closer to what I had originally intended. I have worked hard to make the print quality of the first version decent, and for the most part I think they are,
but I just don't have the ability to do professional-looking print--some of the scans were crappy or the print came out crappy and I couldn't fix it. I don't think this is too distracting though--the book would have been
far pricier to have done it "properly".

The Amazon/Booksurge will be available sometime in April.

One more thing: the promised "free thing" to come with the books STILL isn't ready--I will fix that and hook you all up with it soon I promise!!

There are a few copies left of the first set I've done, so if you want one and didn't get one please let me know and I will get you one. But I am going to cap the first printing at 100 copies--you can't imagine how long
it takes to print even 50 books!! :-)

Anyway--THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!! Sometimes I start to feel like a real author!! :-)

SP

March 16, 2007

Howdy folks!! It's been a week since the first copies of HFD were made available. Things are going well -- the first set of copies should be available for pick-up from the company who are covering and binding the books today. The first copies therefore should be in the mail somewhere around Monday.

A big THANK YOU to all who have purchased the book already!!
We'll be putting up some reviews of the book as they filter in of course.
The book was really a labor of love and I certainly hope this comes across.

For today, two pieces of info for you:

The first is that there will be a second edition of the book released soon. This will allow the book to be more widely available, but the books will be in black and white as opposed to the current edition which has lovely color pictures. Oh, and the new version will be reduced in size too. Otherwise -- the text is all the same :-)

I will have more information about the new version of the book in the near   future. I have now decided to limit the first edition to 500 numbered copies,   printed and signed by the author (that's me).

The second piece of info concerns my second book. I have said that I intend   to publish another book in 2007 -- and i do intend to, though just what that   book will be is still speculative. Some of you know that I began a book about the band Genesis in 2002 -- and for a variety of reasons never finished it.

At the moment I am reviewing all of the existing written material for the Genesis   book with an eye towards completing it for release in 2007. Of course I do have another Zappa book to write as well :-)

In the meanwhile, THANK YOU ALL again for supporting my humble little tome!!

SP