It was Zappa, in his role as the boss of Straight Records, Beefheart's label, who allowed him the freedom to make Trout Mask Replica. On his first European visit in 1969 he informed British immigration that he'd arrived from Mars. More accessible if less inspir-ational albums arrived in the Seventies, as Beefheart jousted with commerce, the music industry and disgruntled members of his backing group, the Magic Band. Harkelroad's stage name of Zoot Horn Rollo was typical of the offbeat soubriquets Beefheart bestowed upon his musicians. Free and instinctive both may be, but the relationship of a harmonica riff borrowed from a Forties Mississippi delta bluesman to a Nineties' canvas covered in semi-abstract animal shapes is always going to be questionable.
Some connections do remain.
Van Vliet makes certain that his own distance from humankind is considerable.