We're Only in It for the Money

We're Only in It for the Money
original issue cover
Studio album by the Mothers of Invention
Released	March 4, 1968 (1968-03-04)
Recorded	March 6, 1967 July – October 8, 1967[1]
Studio	TTG (Hollywood) Capitol (Hollywood) Mayfair (New York) Apostolic (New York)
Genre	Avant-garde[2] psychedelic rock[3] acid rock[4]
Length	39:15
Label	Verve
Producer	Frank Zappa
Frank Zappa chronology
Lumpy Gravy (1967) We're Only in It for the Money (1968) Lumpy Gravy (1968)
The Mothers of Invention chronology
Absolutely Free (1967) We're Only in It for the Money (1968) Cruising with Ruben & the Jets (1968)
Singles from We're Only in It for the Money
"Lonely Little Girl (b/w Mother People)" Released: 1967 (non-LP version)

We're Only in It for the Money is the third album by American rock band the Mothers of Invention, released on March 4, 1968, by Verve Records. As with the band's first two efforts, it is a concept album, and satirizes left- and right-wing politics, particularly the hippie subculture, as well as the Beatles' album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. It was conceived as part of a project called No Commercial Potential, which produced three other albums: Lumpy Gravy, Cruising with Ruben & the Jets, and Uncle Meat.

We're Only in It for the Money encompasses rock, experimental music, and psychedelic rock, with orchestral segments deriving from the recording sessions for Lumpy Gravy, which was previously issued by Capitol Records as a solo instrumental album by bandleader/guitarist Frank Zappa and was subsequently reedited by Zappa and released by Verve; the reedited Lumpy Gravy was produced simultaneously with We're Only in It for the Money. We're Only in It for the Money is the first "phase" of a conceptual continuity, which continued with the reedited Lumpy Gravy and concluded with Zappa's final album Civilization Phaze III (1994). In 2005, We're Only in It for the Money was selected for preservation in the National Recording Registry by the United States' Library of Congress, who deemed it "culturally, historically, and aesthetically significant" and "a scathing satire on hippiedom and America's reactions to it".