The story of Frank Zappa and Pink Floyd performing together (Actuel Rock Festival 1969)

Today, after all these years, the 1969 Actuel Rock festival recording raises a number of sensitive questions among rock music fans... And the thing is that this recording shows Pink Floyd playing on the same stage with... Frank Zappa! Yes, nowadays it really seems strange, because their creative paths practically never crossed. In the video, Zappa plays lead guitar during a 20-minute performance of Interstellar Overdrive, one of Syd Barrett's most memorable contributions to the Pink Floyd catalogue... It happened in October 1969, at the Actuel Rock outdoor festival. The performers included Pink Floyd, Yes, Ten Years After, Pretty Things, Keith Relf's Renaissance, Captain Beefheart and a host of bands few people would remember today... But the oddity of the event was that the MC was... Frank Zappa himself. He later recalled:

"It was after The Mothers of Invention broke up, and you know, I had some free time," Zappa said a few years later. "These people contacted me. They offered me $10,000 to be a presenter at the festival. All expenses were paid, and I said: 'OK.' So, I got there and they didn't tell me nobody spoke English..."

But how did it happen? And where, exactly, did it all begin? Strangely enough, even though the video shows Zappa on stage with Roger Waters, David Gilmour and the rest of Pink Floyd, Zappa himself didn't remember the jam session. It must have been one hell of a music festival.....

Where did it all start? Prerequisites

Legends in their own right, Frank Zappa and Pink Floyd have rightfully held the status of idols not only among their fans, but also among the music world at large. They worked tirelessly to create unique and triumphant music... But above all - they were all individuals. With this in mind, it seems fitting that two such defiantly unique artists (Zappa and Floyd) could come together to jam at one of the first ever French rock festivals, The Actuel Rock Festival in 1969, and create such harmonious music... But it's not that simple.

Sponsored by the Parisian fashion magazine Actuel as well as the record company BYG, the festival was heralded as the European Woodstock! But because the police were still reeling from the riots in the capital in May that year, the festival was moved to Belgium... The event took place at the end of October 1969. The audience totalled almost 20,000 people, who were "treated" to performances by Pink Floyd, Ten Years After, Colosseum, Aynsley Dunbar, Caravan, Blossom Toes, Archie Shepp, Yes, The Pretty Things, Pharoah Sanders, The Soft Machine, Captain Beefheart and many others.... Zappa was there primarily as MC and also as tour manager for Captain Beefheart, but as his first role was hampered by his inability to speak French, Zappa gave it up and instead became an occasional guitarist for anyone who wanted him, including Pink Floyd!

"I was supposed to be a presenter at the first big rock festival in France, but at the last minute this festival was moved from France to Belgium, just across the border, in a field... They built a tent that was held up by these huge beams: basically they had 20,000 people in a big circus!"

Inspired by his story, Zappa continues: "I think it was in November. The weather really wasn't very good, cold and wet, and it was in the middle of a field... All the acts, and all the people who wanted to see these acts, were persuaded to find this place in a turnip field and turn up for this festival. They hired me as the host and also the manager Captain Beefheart, and it was a nightmare because nobody could speak English and I couldn't speak French or any other language..."

"So, my function was really quite limited. I felt a little bit like Linda McCartney," the musician joked. "I sat with a few bands during the three days of the festival, but it was so awful because all these European hippies brought their sleeping bags that they spread out on the ground in this tent, and they basically slept through the whole festival, which was 24 hours a day!"

Magic on stage

This harmonious bond between them, their undeniable chemistry and their strange symbiotic effect that is truly remarkable in its strangeness - Zappa and Floyd's performance is truly magical... In a 1973 interview, Nick Mason said the following about Zappa:

"Frank Zappa is really one of those rare musicians who can play with us. The little bit he did in the Amougies was terribly right. But he's the exception. Our music and the way we behave on stage makes it difficult to improvise with us..."

That said, Zappa himself later claimed he had no recollection of the performance, stating that he "never performed with Pink Floyd".