The Story of “Don’t Eat the Yellow Snow / St. Alphonzo’s Pancake Breakfast” Songtext
von Frank Zappa

Is it likely that you′ll be doing any more comedy routine stuff as...

Well, we have one thing that you might qualify as a comedy routine
That's built into the show right now. It′s a new piece that hasn't been released yet
It's a combination of two songs
One of them is called "Don′t Eat The Yellow Snow"

It′s about an Eskimo and his seal and an evil fur trapper and that...
And then the evil fur trapper has something terrible happen to him
And then he has to get repaired, and in order to get repaired he seeks out
Well, he has to trudge across the tundra
So that he can get to St. Alfonzo's parish at the juncture of the Columbia River delta
And he has to seek out the representative of St. Alfonzo
Who is the patron saint of the smelt fishermen of Portuguese extraction
And uh, he has to find St. Alfonzo′s only authorized representative here on Earth
Father Vivian O'Blivion, man of the cloth, dunt-dun-dun
And then uh, the two songs are "Don′t Eat The Yellow Snow" and "St. Alfonzo's Pancake Breakfast"


I watch television every once in a while and uh, some things that I′ve seen on television have enthused me to the point of writing songs about them
"St. Alfonzo's Pancake Breakfast" has some
Is derived from a television commercial in the United States
I'll tell you about it

There′s a margarine in the United States called Imperial Margarine
And they have this commercial that is in such a bad taste it makes you wanna die every time it comes on

There′s a young black gentleman sitting in a bed, and he's just woken up
And he′s got his covers up like this
And then his young girlfriend comes trudging into the room
She's carrying a tray, she walks in, and he goes
"Oh, boy, pancakes and butter"
And she says, "Good morning, your highness
No, it′s not butter"
And as soon as she says "Your highness" this crown appears on his head
It goes "ding", like that
And he takes a big mouthful of these pancakes and starts shoveling it in and goes "Mmm, this really tastes better than butter", you know
God, it's horrible
It′s just...

We used to see that two or three times a night watching science-fiction movies and that would come on
And I would just roll all over the couch, you know
Just loathsome
So it turned into a song