Random Thoughts

May 5, 2004

Kick Out the Jams

Here’s some good news for fans of that old time rock & roll: The MC5 are getting back together for a world tour this summer.
Those of you who grew up in the Detroit area and saw the band back in their late’’60s heyday may recall that the last tattered remnants of the MC5 broke up in 1972 when just two of the original members were still on board.

You may also recall that guitarist Fred “Sonic” Smith and singer Rob Tyner both died in the mid-’90s, while original bassist Michael Davis was kicked out of the band more than 30 years ago for abusing heroin. Today, Dennis Thompson, the original drummer, delivers the Chicago Reader, a free alternative newsweekly.
That leaves guitarist Wayne Kramer, 55 to carry the MC5’s torch, and he’s soldiering on with guest musicians, some of whom weren’t even born when the now legendary call to “Kick out the jams, motherfuckers” rang through Detroit’s Grande Ballroom and was immortalized on vinyl in October, 1968. The new DKT/MC5 gets its wings at the Metro club in Chicago on June 11 with guest artist performers such as Marshall Crenshaw, Evan Dando, Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist of the Hives, Mark Lanegan of the Screaming Trees, Mark Arm of Mudhoney, Deniz Tek of Radio Birdman and other past and present punk legends filling in on the reincarnated band’s world tour.
It’s an important story, because as an article in the Chicago Reader notes, a new documentary film on the band “makes a persuasive argument that the MC5 were the most exciting live band in rock history.” (No argument here on that score, by the way.)
The MC5 are the stuff of rock legend, arising from the greaser grit of downriver Detroit, a town that 1967‘s “Summer of Love“ bypassed. They were managed by Detroit‘s No. 1 Hippie, John Sinclair, who established them as the spokesmen for his loopy White Panther Party, which advocated “a total assault on the culture by any means necessary,“ including rock & roll, dope, and sex in the streets. The dope end of that formula led a plague of heroin addiction among musicians in the early ‘70s that killed the Detroit music scene -- one of the most robust explosions of sound the world has ever known -- talk about the needle and the damage done...
Although relatively few people actually ever saw the MC5 perform, their legend has grown to mythic proportions as the “godfathers of punk.” As an aside, Wayne Kramer recalls in the punk history book, “Please Kill Me,” that while he was serving time for armed robbery during his drug addict days in the ‘70s, he had to tear up magazine articles on the MC5’s creation of punk rock because being a “punk” in prisonspeak had an unfortunate sexual connotation that he didn’t want to get around the cellblock.
Today, the MC5 would likely be called the “grandfathers” of punk if Kramer hadn’t brought in some fresh blood. Although he’s held up release of the film, “MC5: A True Testimonial,” due to some artistic and contractual differences with the filmmakers, it seems likely that the proper application of a cash lubricant will grease its release someday, enabling us to sit in judgment of the legend.
In the meantime, the reincarnation trend seems to be happening with greater frequency in the music industry. Lynyrd Skynyrd, for instance, plans to carry on as a musical franchise for the rest of eternity with new players, even though most of the band got wiped out in a plane crash decades ago. Closer to home, TC guitarist Kenny Olson has secured the rights from the family of Jimi Hendrix to perform a concert of the master’s works. And someday, perhaps, we’ll see clones of The Beatles performing at the Cherry Festival rather than the perennial “1964” revue that stops around every year.
Checking the summer concert lineups on Pollstar.com, one quickly learns that the oldies are still the goodies at larger venues across America. At the DTE Energy Music Theatre in Clarkston, the lineup this summer includes revivified ancient acts such as Grand Funk, Peter Frampton, Chicago and Creedence Clearwater Revisited. The Eagles perform next week in Grand Rapids. Meanwhile, current artists such as Nickelback, John Mayer, Korn, Slipknot and blink 182 are being forced to perform with several other artists in order to draw enough fans to fill their shows.
Has music really become so mediocre that sixpacks of today’s artists can’t compete against solo acts of the musical giants who roamed the earth 30 years ago?
Well, fill in the blank, gentle readers. As for myself, I can only pray that the new MC5 will by some miracle work Northern Michigan into their tour plans.