“Rock journalism is people who can’t write interviewing people who can’t talk for people who can’t read” Frank Zappa

I guess that when Zappa said that it was a critique of how people don’t look outside the box and the miss communication because of it. The information that the interviewee gives won’t find the reader as the meaning is distorted on the way.

The people that can’t talk, the artists, can express themselves but not necessarily in ways that other will understand. The way their minds assimilate things and how they express it verbally in a conversation can differ.

Then the people that can’t write understand it their own way, and need to write for people that can’t read. People who can’t read means that people will interpret the written article differently from what the people who can’t write wrote.

There will be 3 versions of the same conversation, almost like a broken telephone. Therefore Rock journalism is people who can’t write interviewing people who can’t talk for people who can’t read.