The Mothers 1970 is a 4-CD box set celebrating the 50th anniversary of the short-lived 1970 line-up of The Mothers. It compiles 70 unreleased tracks recorded during this era of the band.[1]
The album contains three discs of previously unreleased material, The first disc features studio recordings from Trident Studios that would adventually evolve into Chunga's Revenge. These studio recordings were engineered by a then-unknown Roy Thomas Baker who would go on to be the producer for many bands such as Queen, The Cars, and Alice Cooper. The remaining three discs contain live concerts from this era, The first two discs contain the first official release of the bootlegged "Piknik" live broadcast as well as live concerts in Santa Monica, California, and Spokane, Washington. Due to not being entirely recorded, these concerts were put together in a hybrid concert. The third disc consists of live highlights that were recorded throughout the US occasionally broken up with candid moments recorded in dressing rooms, motel lobbies, and on stage. These were recorded by Frank Zappa who took his UHER recorder everywhere. All of these recordings were sourced from their original vault tapes and digitally compiled and transferred by Joe Travers in 2020.[2][1][3]
Writing for Loudersound, Hugh Fielder liked the album. He states that the first disc is "somewhat tentative" and states how the live discs show that this band line-up is far better than the album Chunga's Revenge's performances. He also states that the live concerts show the band moving towards what would eventually become 200 Motels.[4]
