Elliot Ingber
Alias Winged Eel Fingerling BORN 1941
ELLIOT INGBER, a vital part of Captain Beefheart’s Magic Band between 1970 and 1975, looked the part. Impenetrable behind shades, wild hair and a deep beard, he twitched to the music’s loopy notes and angular rhythms. Off-stage, his Hollywood apartment had a bed, a card table for meals and thousands of records, mostly post-war blues. Kicked out of Zappa’s Mothers Of Invention for tripping on-stage, and prone to taking long sabbaticals from The Magic Band, Ingber preferred obscurity. “Elliot was very much like Don in a way,” reckoned fellow Magic Band guitarist Bill Harkleroad, alias Zoot Horn Rollo.
Ingber liked novelty. He’d been part of The Gamblers, whose 1960 surf instrumental, Moon Dawg, featured dog sounds by producer Nick Venet. After a stint in the US army, he joined Zappa’s Mothers for Freak Out! – Elliot’s the square-looking one, cover, left – and recorded a Kim Fowley-produced single featuring LA scenester Vito Paulekas and his dancers.
Ingber came closest to success in 1969 when Don’t Bogart Me (alias Don’t Bogart That Joint), a co-write recorded by his blues-psych band The Fraternity Of Man, featured on the Easy Rider soundtrack. But with Ingber “indulging [and] talking to my amplifier”, the band folded and he retreated to Zappa’s house, where he jammed with Beefheart. He joined Beefheart’s Magic Band late in 1970.