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By Max Conroy
There are several definitions of the word scrummage. It is synonymous to a rugby play called a ’scrum’, but also means ‘a general row or confused fight or struggle’. A scrum can also, according to the Brits, mean ‘a place or situation of confusion and racket; hubbub’, which seems like the closest definition to the venue in Detroit. Here is their mission statement from their site (do not click on this link if you have or might possibly have epilepsy): A psychedelic loft in Detroit’s Eastern Market district. We achieve maximum fun. We have giant parties with totally rad music encompassing all generas. We teach you here at our university that no one is too stuffy to party. This is the place where all your wildest dreams can come true. There is apparently a market in Detroit’s Eastern Market district, but there’s no evidence of it at night; in fact, there doesn’t seem to be anything besides a graveyard, bombed out buildings, and the occasional liquor store and gas station…and this place.
Scrummage University is a huge warehouse that must have been a toy factory at one time, based on the painted signage on the front of the building. I drove by it a few times before coming to the conclusion that this must be the place. There were several flyers that mentioned that it’s the large building that has ‘Toys’ painted on the front of it, but not the flyer that I had. The flyers also stated that the event was to begin at 9PM, which is when I arrived, but there was no one there, except for a few people running the show and the performers. Also, there is no mention of the Silver Apples playing at Scrummage on the venue’s site, so I’d seek other verification that a band will be there before driving through post-apocalyptic Detroit to get there.
The Scrummage gate is barely wide enough for a car to fit through and is situated next to an operational junk yard; I deduced that it was operational based on the five rabid dogs hurling themselves at the fence, attempting to kill hipsters. The parking lot is huge with weeds thriving in the cracks of the asphalt, an active train line in back, and several huge bonfire pits. I walked around for a bit, soaking up the scenery, snapping photos, as other guests arrived. After awhile, I noticed that everyone had 40s of beer, and asked the door guy Ian if it was cool to bring beer here: ‘Sure, man. You should pick me up something.’ He gave me some shoddy directions to a liquor store, but I ended up finding a different one that had all the choice malt liquor and grabbed a 40 of Olde English and Ian a 24oz of Cammo XXX High Gravity for the shitty directions; he was thrilled.
By this time they were throwing huge pieces of furniture into the fire pit and igniting them. When the fire would get low, they, presumably ‘official’ events organizers, would politely ask some people to get off of the wardrobe they were sitting on and then drag it into the fire. This place is the ultimate in blind pigs, anything goes.
You enter the warehouse through a defunct loading dock and enter into a wide open concrete room, piles of debris in the corners and outsider art everywhere. There is a working bathroom that isn’t the worst that I’ve ever seen. From what I gather, people live at Scrummage, so they probably rent the space, or maybe even squat there. The electric hair trimmer in the bathroom also made me think that people live there.
The opening act Benny Stoofy is kind of Scrummage’s house band. They are some talented musicians that blend the low fi aesthetic with competence, much like Dr. Dog. I dug a few songs and then went back to the bonfire with my 40 to chat up some people and enjoy the evening.
The Lotto Ball Show went on next. They’re a synth-driven postpunk outfit from Chicago. They seemed good, but the vocals were noexistent in the mix, so I again headed out to the fire after about two songs.
I went back inside after the music stopped to look at the unattended merch table and to watch people climb dangerously onto makeshift trapezes hanging from the ceiling. Simeon, a perfectly normal looking fellow in his mid-to-late 60s, dressed in a bright green turtleneck, strolled across the floor to his rig and began calibrating or whatever one has to do to a pile of oscillators and beat machines to prepare them for a performance.
The Silver Apples are Simeon now. He manipulates bass and melody sound oscillators over drum tracks, and sings: that’s the sound of The Silver Apples in 2008. After listening to some of their records recently, I’ve come to really appreciate the late Danny Taylor’s drumming. He lays down a hardcore breakbeat jazz style that really propels the monotonous vocals and bleeps and bloops. But the music is essentially electronic music and the last thirty years of music has proven that a drummer isn’t absolutely necessary. The lack of a drummer has actually transformed the Silver Apples sound into what it inspired: electronic dance music. It’s fitting to see one of the pioneers of electronic music performing this way to the city that basically took what he was doing eons ago and went crazy with it.
Simeon played for exactly an hour and politely declined an encore; this isn’t exactly encore-type music. He performed a lot of the ‘hits’ like Oscillations and I Don’t Care What the People Say and did a handful of new compositions. In the middle of the set, about twenty people got on stage a danced their freaky, uninhibited dances. I went back to the merch table and bought the only Apples vinyl available: a limited press of 1000 called Selections from the Early Sessions. I then went up to Simeon’s rig and snapped a picture of it just before he went up to it to tear it down. I said, “Thanks, man.” “It’s a pleasure,” said Simeon.
Click Below for information about the Selections record, some audio of the show, and pictures.
By Max Conroy
On Wednesday night, Donita Sparks and her band the Stellar Moments performed at the Magic Stick. They were great. Unfortunately, there had to have been less than fifty people there, even thought it was a featured event in most Detroit entertainment papers. It’s a bummer, but those are the breaks; hopefully the turnout in Detroit wasn’t indicative of the turnout for the entire tour.
Observing this band from a slight distance makes me like them all that much more. They all hung out in the bar before the show and seemed approachable and even goofy. I’ve been burning the candle at both ends lately and had a chest cold, in the middle of a heat wave, the night of the show, so I opted not to speak to anyone other than Cousin Justin, and I could hardly understand what he was saying half of the time. Most of the band also made it a point to watch the young opening acts, and were very supportive of them. This shows a lot of empathy and character because there is nothing more disrespectful or arrogant than not paying any attention to your opening acts. The Stellar Moments also tuned their own instruments and did the sound check; to save costs I’m sure, but the overall sound of the show only benefitted from this simple act.
They played a full hour set and did an encore. The set consisted of the entire Transmiticate album and three L7 tunes. Donita has still got it to be sure and was all over the stage shaking her ass, blonde hair a blur, gold tooth shining in the lights. Allan the Italian was a perfect lead accompaniment to Donita and Logan’s rhythm guitar. Dee Plakas created a driving train of sound while Dat No (probably spelled wrong) carried the rhythm. Donita declared that the crowd was tiny, but mighty. Everyone there loved it and was dancing instead of head banging, as Donita predicted in the interview that I did with her. Should have been there, man. You missed out on this one.
I’m posting a couple of tracks from the show. Again, a Digital Voice Recorder that has a built in mic was used, so this is hardly representative of what the show actually sounded like; the vocals were much more prevalent at the show.
Pretend We’re Dead:
Headcheck:
Above you see my sweet breakdancing album, Electric Breakdance on Dominion records. It came with that giant poster that teaches you breakdancing moves and also breakdancing talk. More on the talk later. I’m going to share with you some of the secrets printed on the poster.
First, put on some breakdancing music.
Most of this looks way too hard. Let’s start with something easy: Top-Rocking.
1) From a standing position, take a short hop forward on beat with the music to where both feet are even and slightly apart while at the same time crossing the arms in front of the body.
2-3) On the next musical beat, jump forward on right leg with left leg bent back, while arms pulled back, the body slightly to the left.
4) On the next beat, return to first position facing forward, feet apart and even, while arms cross in front of chest.
5) On next beat jump forward on left foot with right leg bent back, arms pulled back past body which is now turned slightly to right. This step is repeated until Breaker is prepared to go to the floor with footwork.
Footwork is where you get down on the floor and spin and then spin on your head. I will save that lesson for another day. Now for the lingo:
I know that I am biting (stealing) this info, but you need to chill (calm down). Your dis (disrespect) is doggin’ (overused). Be fresh (the hippest, the newest) and quit frontin’ (being irresponsible), homeboy/girl (companion or friend from the ‘hood). I ain’t jerkin’ (cheating) no squiggley (someone un-hip or nerdy). Let’s uprock (breakdance duel), word (affirmation)? Just try not to be wack (awkward, clumsy). Max out (a friendly term for parting with ease)!
You are now ready to impress everybody you know with your breakdancing moves and talk. You can thank me by buying more records! Max out!
jsREVIEW:
This is the album that Alligator Records was created to release— a smoking, gritty slide-guitar blues album that pretty much defines what electric blues is all about.
And what else is there to say? Taylor’s guitar has a squall to it that would sink ships, and the duo backing him (Brewer Phillips and Ted Harvey) are sharp and capable. They’re essentially playing Electric Delta blues, a rawer and more minimal style than the Electric Chicago blues played by B.B. King and T-Bone Walker. In that way, this album can be seen as a direct bit of music ethnography, tracing the rhythms and sound of the Dirty South as brought to the post-war North, a kissing cousin to Memphis and strangely removed from the Texas and even other Chicago blues of the time.
This is my favorite kind of blues, raw and rhythmic. While there’re a few quotes in these blues, there’s no cliche, and the ragged tones come across as unique where a lesser player might make them sound contrived. And this is one of the few albums where I can definitely say that the vinyl is better— the CD just doesn’t reflect the warmth of Phillips’s backing (which gives Taylor’s jagged riffs a fair contrast).
And “Give Me Back My Wig” is going on the very next mixtape I make, I promise.
