The first release on the relaunched Frank Zappa archival label Vaulternative Records is coming up soon. In a new video, one of the foremost authorities on Zappa unpacks the album’s significance.

Earlier this month Zappa’s estate announced the return of Vaulternative and the impending release of Zappa ’66 Vol. 1: Live at TTG Studios, a new album documenting a pivotal 1966 recording session. They also premiered the first episode of a new Vaulternative video series, which reintroduced the label. In Episode #2, out now, Zappa Vaultmeister Joe Travers takes fans behind the scenes of Zappa ’66 Vol. 1: Live At TTG Studios.

In the video, Travers details the context of the Live At TTG Studios recordings. “It’s in conjunction with the 60th anniversary of Freak Out!” Travers says, referring to the 1966 album. “Freak Out! was released in the summer of 1966, and by October, Los Angeles was in a full-fledged freakout. Literally freakouts were happening all over the place,” Travers says as posters for Mothers of Invention events scroll past.

“It was the harmonic convergence of the Mothers and the freak scene of L.A.,” Travers continues. “The freak scene, of course, was the scene that was happening before Monterey Pop, before Woodstock, before the Flower Power movement. This was a band of people that were coming together and dancing their expressive styles to bands like the Byrds and Love happening on Sunset Strip and otherwise in Los Angeles at that time when rock music was blowing up here in town.”

The Mothers of Invention, first known as simply the Mothers, entered into the freak scene and became fast favorites. But as their popularity expanded worldwide, a documentary crew came to Hollywood’s TTG Studios to film one of the freakout events, “complete with smoke and lights and the Mothers in full action,” as Travers describes it. The event was recorded on Zappa’s reel-to-reel tape player, providing the basis for the new Live At TTG Studios LP.

The band captured on the recording is an expanded version of the Freak Out! lineup, with Zappa backed by Billy Mundi on drums, Don Preston on keyboards, and session guitarist Del Casher of the Wrecking Crew. Per Travers, Zappa went on to use segments from the historic recording in a number of collages.

Zappa ’66: Vol. 1: Live at TTG Studios will be available on a 2LP set on red translucent vinyl, on CD, and as a digital download. The release is remastered from the original ¼-inch analog tapes. All formats include liner notes, photos by Earl Leaf, film stills by Barry Feinstein, posters, and more.

Buy Frank Zappa’s Zappa ’66 Vol. 1: Live At TTG Studios here.