Category Archive

By Max Conroy

Living in Ann Arbor, it’s strange to have to purchase a European import that compiles a bunch of records recorded here, but I’m glad it’s available at all.  The name of the label, A-Square, is a nickname for the city of Ann Arbor.  It was created by Jeep Holland, a compulsive music and comic collector, DJ, manager, promoter, and manager of Discount Records, the store that Iggy Pop worked at as a teenager.  Holland would stock import records that no other stores would carry, British Invasion records, and get a feel for what area kids would respond to in the store and while DJ-ing events.  He met local musicians at Discount and eventually started promoting some of them.  In 1965 he began producing records exclusively as promotional material to get gigs for acts that he was promoting and put them out on his A-Square imprint. 

In five years, he put out records by approximately a dozen bands, including the MC5, the Rationals, the Scot Richard Case (SRC), the Up, and the Frost; all Detroit legends.  By 1970, for a myriad of reasons, including his domineering personality, poor business acumen, lack of payment from distributers, and changing times, he left Ann Arbor for Boston, leaving behind A-Square records and a wake of debt.  A lot of these records are very hard to find now, 40 plus years later, and the 45s have been the only way to hear most of these great bands.

A-Square (Of Course) was released this past May on Big Beat Records, distributed and marketed by the mega-reissue label Ace Records out of the UK.  The title comes from a button issued by the label that read A-Square (Of Course).  There are definitely some issues with this package, but the good greatly outweighs the bad.  First off, there are no Rationals tracks on it, which seems odd since they were the biggest act on A-Square and the label’s flagship act, but Ace intends on releasing a compilation of their work on A-Square soon, to be named Think Rational! (again from a button).  According to Scott Morgan of the Rationals, they’re still working on obtaining the rights to the masters.  Secondly, this is by no means an exhaustive collection of A-Square’s catalogue, which would require a multiple-disc release.  This collection contains 25 tracks by ten bands, 8 tracks by the Thyme and 5 by the Scot Richard Case.  More than half of the compilation is music that was never released originally, which is great if you’re looking for really rare stuff, but not if you’re looking to have high fidelity copies of the famous records that were actually released on the label.  Also, there are several bands that recorded for A-Square whose masters cannot be located and are not represented here; the Jagged Edge, the Children and the Gang most notably.

The bottom line, however, is that this anthology is filled with a ton of highlights and is most definitely worth the $19.  It contains an early MC5 single, Looking at You/Borderline, which has been released a ton and isn’t that rare, but is great to have in this context with fantastic documentation in the liner notes.  Apparently, Holland and John Sinclair didn’t get along that well for a variety of reasons, even though Sinclair managed the group and Holland was in charge of booking them.  According to the liner notes:

Jeep:  Sinclair went into United Sound and recorded that record with Danny Dallas, then just decided to use my label name.  He designed his own A-Square label, designed his own package and just put it out.  He finally got around to informing me as the record was coming out: ‘Oh, by the way, I put the record out on A-Square.’…My label was a success, and John thought it would get his record more attention… Danny Dallas told me some wonderful stories about that session.  He said they immediately turned their amps up as loud as they could go.  Danny kept trying to tell them, ‘You don’t have to do that.  Get a good sound and I’ll boost it in here.’  But no, John Sinclair came into the control room, looked at the board and went like this [sweeping arm motion] pushing every one of the faders up all the way.  Then he ate a big chunk of hash or something and lay down on the floor while the band played. 

Let’s just say that it’s not the 5’s best moment sonically, but well worth hearing and a great addition to this collection.  Also featured here is a rare live recording of the Prime Movers.  The Movers were a highly respected blues outfit in the Ann Arbor area at the time that never released anything.  The band included Michael Erlewine, the brain behind the All Music Guide, on vocals and harmonica and a young Iggy Pop on drums.  The track here is a cover of the Yardbird’s version of I’m a Man that was used as a tape that Holland took to New York probably around ‘66 to promote the band.  It actually features Iggy on vocals instead of Erlewine and might possibly be the earliest recording of Iggy singing.  The Up’s Just Like an Aborigine is a raw-as-hell protopunk gem and another massive highlight on this disc.  Everything else not mentioned here is good if not great, making this a must have for anyone even remotely interested in psyche, garage rock, the Detroit high energy sound, or Southeast Michigan culture.

The Up’s Just Like an Aborigine:

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.

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By Max Conroy

The enigmatic and visionary electronic ‘band’ The Silver Apples will perform tomorrow night at Scrummage University.  I don’t know anything about the venue and was handed a flyer for the show, which is a photocopy of a primitive pen and ink drawing, by a group of teenagers that I befriended at the Jandek performance in Ann Arbor. 

The Silver Apples formed in New York in 1967, consisting of Simeon Coxe III (Simeon) and Danny Taylor, drums.  The duo were in a band called The Overland Stage Electric Band prior to the Apples, where band members rapidly left the group as a result of Simeon’s incorporation of a 1940s vintage audio oscillator, leaving the two.  Simeon developed a homemade instrument, the Simeon, consisting of “nine audio oscillators piled on top of each other and eighty-six manual controls to control lead, rhythm, and bass pulses with hands, feet, and elbows”(from the liner notes of their first album).  They recorded a self-titled album, released in 1968 on Kapp Records that barely cracked the top 100 and the follow up, Contact, in ‘69.  They toured to support Contact and recorded another album in 1970, but it was shelved when Kapp was devoured by MCA.  This third record would eventually be released as Garden in 1998.  The band dissolved as a result of Kapp folding and lay dormant for the next twenty-five years.

The Apples were brought back to life in 1994 when a German label TRC began issuing bootlegs of their first two records, causing a long-awaited rebirth of interest in their music.  The original records eventually were officially reissued, they toured (Coxe and a multi-instrumentalist named Xian Hawkins), and released several singles and albums in the late 90s that received favorable press.  In 1999 their tour van was involved in an accident that broke Simeon’s neck.  He’s been recovering since, but will probably never fully recover the movement of his hands, so apparently his performance is a bit more direct now.  Danny Taylor died of a heart attack in Kingston, New York in 2005.  Simeon went back on the road as a solo version of the Silver Apples in 2007 and is supposed to still put on a good show. 

This music must have been totally unpalatable in the late 60s, but it absolutely presaged the future of music and the advent of electronic music, from bands like Suicide and Kraftwork in the 70s to Detroit to Radiohead.

Oscillations:

I Don’t Care What the People Say:

From Pitchfork:  Better bring some extra cash to these shows, as Mr. Silver Apples will be peddling both a tour-only ChickenCoop Recordings LP of remastered tunes entitled Selections and a new Gifted Children Records EP called Gremlins at the merch table.

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:

By Max Conroy

The Raconteurs played Saturday night at the Fillmore Detroit with the Atlanta-based garage punk revivalists the Black Lips.  All 2900 seats were accounted for, but the place didn’t seem overly packed at all.  This would probably have been a concert that I wouldn’t have thought twice about, seeing the ad in the paper or hearing about it on the radio, but a friend called me before getting tickets the day they went on sale.  What the hell, I’ll go; I like the rock and roll; I consider myself a fan of J. White even though at times I want to dislike the White Stripes.  I really like the Black Lips, particularly their 2005 record Let It Bloom, but didn’t know that they were opening until after I’d committed to the event.  No matter what you think about White’s music or his opinions regarding his music, he’s done a lot for rock and roll.  I can’t blame him for leaving Detroit either.  That said, I can pretty much take or leave the Raconteurs.

When I first heard that White was forming a band, I thought that it was a great idea: breaking away from the mold of a two-person ‘band’ where he most definitely calls the shots to working with three to four other extremely talented people, writing songs and collaborating in a super group, like they did back in the late sixties through the seventies.  I could really give two shits about Brendan Benson, based purely on ignorance, but drafting the rhythm section of the Greenhornes, bassist Jack Lawrence and drummer Patrick Keeler, made me have to take this band seriously.  I have seen these two play live probably more than any other group of musicians. 

I’ve seen several incarnations of the Greenhornes, as a four-piece and a trio, and have seen them play with Holly Golightly several times.  One of my most profound dipshit, foot-in-mouth, moments was making some boneheaded comment about how the Greenhornes weren’t all that great to Holly Golightly while smoking cigarettes outside of Kraftbrau Brewery in Kalamazoo, and she basically said, “There are a lot worse bands out there.”  About ten minutes later, the Greenhornes tore the place apart.  I’d seen them open for Golightly a few nights prior at the Magic Stick and they didn’t exactly put their best foot forward, but every time that I’ve seen them since, they have been absolutely amazing; one of the best bands I’ve ever seen.  And so much of what made them so good was their impossibly tight rhythm section; Keeler, the definition of the jazz-influenced rock drummer, killing the skins, sweat flying everywhere, drinking whiskey; and Lawrence the silent rock carrying the rhythm, his expression is comparable to Elijah Wood’s character in Sin City:  blank, verging on scary.

I got the Raconteurs first record when it came out, but never really listened to it seriously.  I also had the chance to see them a Lollapalooza a few years back, but chose to see some other band that was playing there at the same time; it might have been Sleater-Kinney playing their last non-Olympia show.  The music seems fine, and I’m not sure why I haven’t taken the time to listen to their records, maybe there just hasn’t been enough time, who knows?  So this show was a good opportunity for me to really give their music a chance.

Upon entering the Fillmore Detroit, if you are a guy, you have to empty your pockets, hold all your shit for security to go through while they frisk you.  It’s been awhile since I’ve had to do this and was somewhat freaked out by it as I did have something that would be considered contraband, which I held under my wallet, hoping they wouldn’t notice.  They were some huge fellows and seemed very good at their job.  I made the mistake of wearing a green shirt that said ‘Boston’ on it with a clover.  The guy who was about to frisk me mumbled something, and it sounded to me like, “If I find anything in your pockets, I’m going to fuck you up.”  My stomach sank as I was holding onto my wallet and contraband, hands shaking.  I quickly ripped out anything else that I had in my pockets and explained rapidly what it was.  He could tell that I misunderstood what he’d said and repeated it: “I should fuck you up for wearing that shirt.”  That I could handle.  The Pistons were just knocked out by the Boston Celtics in the conference finals.  “Oh, sorry, man.  I totally didn’t think about it.”  “You should go home and burn that shirt.”  “Oh, I will.”  My hands were still shaking when I bought a round of beer five minutes later.

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By Max Conroy

Four years ago, I had the chance to see Bo Diddley play a concert at Fitzgeralds, a small bar on the outskirts of Chicago where they filmed some of the Color of Money, for his 75th birthday.  All I had to do was hop in my car or catch a train and go, but I got lazy and probably spent the night doing something very unmemorable.  Living in a thriving metropolis like Chicago numbs one to culture because you can do something great every night, all year round.  You have to pick and choose and I chose poorly here.  I was definitely into Bo Diddley at the time, and I think must have got a lot more heavily into his records shortly thereafter.  I didn’t read any reviews of the show and have no idea if he was good or not, but that would have been beside the point…it’s fucking Bo Diddley, man.  This ranks up there at the very top of my rock and roll regrets list, along with missing out on seeing Johnny Cash, pre-revival, in Kalamazoo and hearing about the last Pavement show in Michigan days after it had happened. I knew that I would never have another chance to see him live.

Bo Diddley died in Florida today of heart failure.  He’d had a stroke, followed by a heart attack a year ago and had been in poor health since.  He was 79 years old and one of the people that created rock and roll. 

When I realized, after years of seeing the name E. McDaniel listed as the writer of songs that were such blues and rock and roll standards that I thought that they must have been traditional arrangements and the name a ruse like Allan Smithee in the film industry, that it was in fact Bo Diddley, I gave him some serious listening attention.  A lot of people dismiss Bo Diddley as a one-trick-pony, and those people are missing out in a big way.  Sure, he did ride the wave of rhythm that he created on the track Bo Diddley for a long time, but the power and influence of that rhythm cannot be overstated.  EVERY garage band has used it, from Buddy Holly on.  But there was so much more to his sound than that rhythm.  He wrote some fantastic straight blues numbers and countless chugging rockers; take a handful of your favorite rock and roll records recorded in the 60s, flip them over and see how many times you see the name McDaniel.

Bo Diddley, sadly, doesn’t get the respect he deserves, but I’m confident that his importance to rock and roll will be realized as long as people continue to look back and question what is rock and roll and where it came from.  Here are four examples that made me a huge fan of his.  I don’t think I’ll ever be able to listen to his music without thinking about that show at Fitzgeralds…

Bo’s Bounce:

Keep Your Big Mouth Shut:

I Can Tell:

Road Runner, from Beach Party: one of the best live records of the early 60s:

By Max Conroy  

The co-founder of the great all girl rock/metal/punk/raunch band L7, Donita Sparks, has just released her first solo record since the band’s break up eight years ago.  The amount of time between break up and solo effort might make some fans a bit skeptical as to the quality of her new material, but a lot has happened to the music industry in the past eight years, and it’s a lot more difficult to make a record these days when it’s on the artist’s dime.  Allow me to assuage any trepidation that you might have regarding this record because of how long ago 2000 seems.

I first heard that Donita Sparks and her new band the Stellar Moments were releasing a record not by Mojo or Pitchfork, but on Fresh Air with Terry Gross.  The review was by Ken Tucker, their music critic, whose reviews I greatly admire.   

I hadn’t thought about L7 for awhile, but they definitely have a place in my subconscious.  Bricks Are Heavy and Hungry for Stink are several albums that came out at that magical time for me, where development goes into overdrive and everything was confusing, troubling and magical; the junior high, early high school years.  They were big players in that soundtrack of those awesome, yet horrible times for me and most people that I can relate to now whether they realize it or not.  For example: a couple of years ago, I met a new friend and we were hanging out at his place; he was into psychobilly music and I was into protopunk at the time; the first record he put on was Bricks Are Heavy and it was the perfect choice…we both knew that we had a lot in common at that point.   

Natural Born Killers was also a polarizing experience for me when it came out; looking back on it, it seems like the A Clockwork Orange of my generation.  I can remember smoking weed out of a pop can with my two best friends on an outcropping in front of the movie theater before attempting to sneak into the film because we were underage.  Shitlist is still my favorite song on that soundtrack and the scene where Juliette Lewis puts the coin in the juke box and slices up that redneck while it plays, the most memorable in the film.

I also was lucky enough to have seen L7 on the ‘94 Lollapalooza tour at Pine Knob in Detroit when I was fourteen.  I was lucky enough to have some college-age neighbors that I grew up with who knew I was into music heavy.  When L7 went on early in the day, I remember looking to my friends and saying, “Those are some crusty bitches.  I wouldn’t mess with them.”  And that’s been my impression of them ever since; intimidation based on their hardcore stage presence.

Nostalgia in art and literature is regarded as something to be avoided at all costs.  I guess that it kills the ability to think in the present and clouds memories in a grotesque rosy hue.  But I’m a nostalgic person at times and all of this history came back to me as Terry Gross’ intro faded and the first notes of Need to Numb came through my speakers.  I had to stop what I was doing and listen.  It’s a straight ahead NY Dolls style rocker that convinced me right there before the review even began that this record has to be good.  Tucker’s review was laudatory and included clips of Creampuff, a take on the 60s girl group sound, and He’s Got the Honey, probably the most commercial song on the album; a good overview of the record.

A little while later, I acquired Transmiticate (the album title is a made-up word, combining transmit and communicate) and am quite impressed by it.  Make no mistake, it’s a departure from L7, but the evolved sound is an appropriate balance of maturity and the best of what L7 had to offer: fuzz and great hooks.  The album incorporates modern electronic effects, particularly on layered backing vocals, and the classic human/band feel beautifully.  The production by Ethan Allan is par excellance and the drums played by Dee Plakas, the only other member of L7 on the record, are fantastic, tight and big. The record successfully jumps tempos throughout and ends with a ballstothewall rocker, Into the Hi Fi.  If you are looking for new music that’s provocative, a fan of L7, or interested in supporting people out there that still give a damn about rock and roll, you should find this record.

A few weeks after hearing the review of Transmiticate on Fresh Air, I was presented with the opportunity to interview Donita in conjunction with her show here at the Magic Stick on June 11th.  I jumped at the chance, but was a bit cautious based on my teenage impression of L7.  I did some research and watched some interviews that she’s done recently and was happy to learn that she’s a seemingly normal person that probably wouldn’t put me on her shitlist and knock my teeth out if I mumbled the wrong question. 

Here’s my stellar moment with Donita Sparks…

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 By Max Conroy

My struggle lately has been that I have way too much music to listen to.  In the past year or so, I’ve had some incredible resources and have acquired more music than I could realistically listen to.  It’s obviously the result of some sort of compulsion that I have to collect things.  But records are meant to be listened to, and I feel guilty about having some of the best records ever made lying around where I’m only able to dedicate a cursory listen.  Also, my interests wax and wane like the moon, so I’ll have some records that I’ve just purchased and my interest in that genera of music will fall by the wayside, the record filed to be stumbled upon when my interest in that music reawakens.  I guess the solution is to make it a point to try and not acquire anything new.  Don’t worry, readers, I’ll have plenty of stuff to write about.

For some reason, last night I actually went through my CDs and pulled out a huge pile and pretty much froze because it was late, past midnight, and I wanted to listen to everything, but I didn’t want to be up till sunrise.  I’ve been getting back into rock and roll, from jazz fusion and soul and funk.  I had also just hooked my DVD player up through my stereo, so I wanted to be able to watch a bit of something before I went to bed, so I had to make a tough decision, but I sure as hell made the right choice.

Starship, The MC5 at the Sturgis Armory June 27, 1968 is, in my mind, the best document of the MC5 live.  Don’t get me wrong, Kick Out the Jams is a hell of a record, but it doesn’t necessarily represent the 5 accurately with regards to their live show at the time.  They knew that they were going to make a record and had to trim parts of the set, like Black to Comm and various jazz and soul medleys from their set to make a digestible product for the masses (I’m not saying they sold out to the man or anything, they do say ‘motherfucker’ in the first five minutes, before their most commercial song).  The sound on Starship is obviously from someone in the crowd, so this is how it pretty much sounded if you were standing in the Sturgis Armory.  A lot of people don’t realize that soundboard recordings aren’t necessarily the shit because they just capture the sound that’s pumped through the system and not what comes out of it. 

Where is Sturgis you ask?  It’s in southwest Michigan, not far at all from where I, and Cousin Justin, grew up.  The area now is probably a ghost town, but back in the day when muscle cars were king the place was probably still out of the way.  This show catches the 5 playing their set in all its glory in a small town and displays perfectly their mettle.  They didn’t care where they were playing or who to; when they stepped on the stage it was all over; they were going to destroy any other band that dared share that stage, no matter who it was, Cream or Led Zeppelin.

I had to put the headphones on for this one as it was late and I needed volume, so I recommend that you do the same.  Find your headphones and brace yourself…

Rama Lama Fa Fa Fa:

James Brown’s Cold Sweat:  Dig Dennis Thompson’s drumming on this track.

PS:  In my opinion the only other live performace by the 5 that rivals this is Thunder Express, a live set in a European studio.  Go figure, Cub Coda gave it two stars in AMG, haha.

 By Max Conroy

This past week has been one of the most eventful/busy of my entire life.  In seven days I saw Jandek, wrote about it, interviewed Donita Sparks, saw Blind Mellon in Flint, crashing that night in East Lansing, saw Solomon Burke in Detroit and motored immediately after to Grand Rapids to hang out with Uncle Fucker.  I got back to Ann Arbor last night around midnight.  I had a real good time, but I’m glad to be convalescing here on this beautiful Memorial Day.  In my travels to East Lansing and Grand Rapids, I picked up some great records at some great shops.  If you’re anywhere even close to Grand Rapids and like records at all, you have to go to the Corner Record Shop, just outside of GR.  It rivals Encore and is about to become an entirely analog recording studio and venue as well!  Another surprise is that Uncle Fucker dusted off the Telecaster this weekend in a moment of clarity, and I recorded some of it for you.  I have also edited some of what I recorded at the Solomon Burke show.  Featured here are Lay My Burdon Down, performed by the choir before he went on, and Diamond in Your Mind, the song that Tom Waites wrote for him on his first comeback album.  The choir provides an accurate representation of the enthusiasm of the crowd, along with a healthy dose of ecstatic joy in loving Jesus.  Diamonds is just a great song and was recorded by Burke recently, so it captures his sound now.  The third track is Uncle Fucker shredding All Down the Line, the Stones song.

Lay My Burdon Down:

Diamond in Your Mind:

All Down the Line:

Stay tuned for the Donita Sparks and the Stellar Moments review and interview.

By Max Conroy

The deacon Solomon Burke played a free show in Detroit last night (refer to the previous post).  It was a fantastic show and one that I’ll remember forever.  He’s still got it to be sure.  A gospel choir performed Lay My Burden Down before he went on.  Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to stay for the entire show, but I saw a little over an hour of his set and caught a lot of classics: Cry to Me, If You Need Me, Down In The Valley, the Tom Waites penned Keep a Diamond in Your Mind, Sittin’ On the Dock of the Bay, and many others.  I recorded some audio of the show and will work on getting that posted.

By Max Conroy 

On Saturday, May 17th Jandek played a free concert at the University of Michigan’s Lydia Mendelssohn Theater.  The show was sponsored by WCBN-FM (88.3 on your FM dial), the student-run station of the University, booked by Brendt Rioux, and featured James Cornish on trumpet, Christian Matjias on harpsichord, and Biba Bell on vocals and improv dance.  Apparently this was the first Jandek performance to feature live improv dancing.  Jandek played hollow body bass and sang.  This is what’s known.

This is what’s unknown:  the identity of Jandek, the aim of his endeavors, and virtually everything about the production and meaning behind his music.  Jandek has put out fifty-three albums in thirty years.  The records range from atonal bluesy folk to thirty minute vocal-only tracks and some feature other musicians most likely (even though he does overdub tracks).  The lyrical content of his songs are most definitely poetic in nature, possibly autobiographical, and definitely surreal, causing people to speculate as to whether or not this is a sort of diary of a person suffering from mental illness or records to be enjoyed as such, art for art’s sake. 

There are only a handful of people who have ever spoken to or communicated with Jandek; and in these instances, the person is known only as a “representative of Corwood Industries.”  Corwood Industries is Jandek’s record label and in his only recorded interview, by John Trubee for Spin in 1985, featured on YouTube and as an extra on the Jandek on Corwood DVD, he discloses that he is the “sole proprietor” of Corwood, which has maintained the same PO Box in Houston since 1978.  All of his records and DVDs are purchased directly from Corwood/Jandek, cheaply, and none are sold to record stores or libraries. Jandek also mentions in that interview that at the time he was working as a machinist and living in Houston, Texas.  The name on the copyright information for Jandek’s records in the Library of Congress is Sterling Richard Smith, born in Rhode Island in 1945 (he mentions Rhode Island in several songs).  He originally recorded one record under the name The Units and sent his record to radio stations and record stores, and was forced to change the name when a guy whom he sent the record to in San Francisco threatened to sue him as that was the name of his band.  As a result he wanted to find a name that no one could possibly have, so he ended up speaking to a fellow named Dekker in January and came up with Jandek. 

The more that I research Jandek, the more his history or what he’s illuminated for us seems to be the creation of a highly intelligent, very sane person, very similar to the way a novelist comes up with material culled from his past, subconscious, and ability to tell a convincing story.  Before his days as Jandek, he allegedly wrote seven novels, which he burned after being rejected by publishers.  He tells Trubee that, “I put out a product, and that’s it.  I don’t want to get too involved.”  This smells like bullshit to me, but very good bullshit.

  Read the rest of this entry »

By Max Conroy

I’ve been attending rock shows consistently for the past twenty years and have seen a lot of great bands, the Stones a few times, Chuck Berry, the Pixies a few times, Tom Waits, the Ramones, The Stooges; trying to list them or rate all the shows would be futile, but I can safely say that last night’s Dexateens show at the Crofoot Ballroom was one of the best show I’ve ever seen.  I can only imagine what seeing them in Tuscaloosa, headlining, would be like.  They are the closest thing to rock and roll perfection there is: technical proficiency, great songwriting, swinging swagger, shit loads of chemistry, great records, it’s all there in spades.

The Crofoot seems like a decent place to see a show, even if it is way the hell out in Pontiac: decent sound, $3 Pabst, not so surly staff.  The Dexateens opened for the Drive-By Truckers, who are riding high on the acclaim of their most recent record Brighter Than Creation’s Dark.  It’s kind of an iffy thing to go to a show specifically to see the opening act because sometimes it’s obvious that no one there has heard of the band and could care less how well they play or what they sound like and also the opener’s set is usually short.  But the Dexateens have history with the Truckers and played a plentiful set, consisting of songs off of their last three albums.  I don’t typically jock musicians if I see them hanging around by the merch table after shows out of courtesy to them.  They’re people like you and me and probably appreciate adoration, but I don’t want to be ‘that guy’, the annoying fucker looking to suck as much blood from these people as possible to obtain fodder for their blog. 

But for me the Dexateens are different.  Their music blows me away and I respect the situation they’re in, playing music for the sake of the music, not for the pussy, not for the drugs, not for the fame, certainly not for the money but because they have to do this.  So after their blistering set, I raided the merch table, picked up their tour CD, a CD that’s one member, Elliott McPherson’s acoustic take on Kiss’ Destroyer album, a shirt, and Hardwire Healing, their only record I didn’t have on vinyl.  The dude working the table who apparently works at the 40 Watt in Athens, GA, offered to have the band sign it and gave it to their bass player Matt Patton who passed it around to the rest of the band.  I spoke with Patton for awhile, trying not to sound like a teenage girl confronting their favorite teen mag idol.  We did a shot of Jack, which I usually steer clear of because a whiff of it can make me aggressive, bordering on violent, and grooved to the Truckers’ cover of Alice Cooper’s 18.  I must say that he is positively one of the most gracious people I’ve ever met.  I also spoke with their guitarist and vocalist John Smith briefly who seemed real nice and happy to have some fans in the tundra.  Patton said that pretty much the only way they’re able to travel this far north is because of the Truckers letting them open for them and that they all have day jobs.  It’s truly a bummer that they aren’t getting rich off their shows and records, but that’s the way it is, so let’s pray to God that they can keep it up!

Oh yeah, I also snuck my digital camera into the show.  I apologize for the quality of the footage, as I had the camera held at chest level for fear of a roided up bouncer confronting me and smashing it or my face or worse yet kicking me out of the show.  Also, the sound is a bit muddy as it’s a cheap Casio digital camera.

by Max Conroy 

If you refer to my post about the jazz flute, you know that I’m just getting into soul/funk-jazz/fusion.  I’m crazy about the stuff.  It’s also allowed my formerly tepid interest in hip-hip to expand slightly.  It’s like punk rock for me; not the music of course but how I view it.  Some of my favorite music, proto-punk, is the music that led directly to the development of punk rock, but I really don’t like straight punk all that much.  I love the Dead Boys and the Sex Pistols, but both bands were badass rock and roll acts before they were punk.  I love all of this music that’s been sampled a ton or could be sampled if it hasn’t but can take or leave the hip-hop that’s made it famous, so far at least.  As my obsession has grown for the (I’ll call it fusion, to incorporate soul/funk-jazz) fusion over the past few weeks, I’ve purchased a shit ton of great records and thank God some of it can be found cheaply. 

I’d heard of the Ramsey Lewis Trio, but that was probably from hearing them mentioned by NPR DJs a split second, before I slammed the radio off in disgust before my appreciation of fusion.  I totally thought that they were venerated by jazzbos and that they were classic bop, but how wrong I was.  Justin hooked me up with a rough copy of the In Crowd, which is apparently an early soul-jazz classic.  After digging the album, I also noticed that reissues of it are advertized in Waxpoetics, and have noticed the record at numerous shops and online.  I thought that the record would be pricey, but since it obviously sold well for a jazz record and was on Chess’ Argo imprint, it’s insanely cheap.  Like you would pay three times what an OG copy would cost to get the reissue.  Dig the ‘In’ Crowd…

I also recently picked up Ramsey Lewis’ Sun Goddess for cheap.  The cover alone is worth the money, but the music could have been sold in a paper bag and it’d still be sweet.  It’s ten years after the In Crowd and the funk had dropped in the meantime, and it’s obvious on this record, that Lewis was hip to it.  Check out Sun Goddess, Livin’ For the City (the S. Wonder jam) and Jungle Strut…

On the Blue side of things; some Blue Note records from the periphery of their dark days can be got fairly cheaply too.  Some of these records sold very well, which makes them easy to find and cheap, but not bad at all.  For instance, Donald Byrd’s Black Byrd (the best selling record in the entire Blue Note catalogue) and Byrd’s Best are about $10 records; the cover of Black Byrd, depicting a black wedding or hoedown of some sort, ca. 1890 is worth it, and the music’s funky as can be, slightly dated, but that’s a large part of the appeal for me.  I recently acquired Grant Green’s Alive! album, which is a live gig recorded in a small club with Idris Muhammad tearing the place up on drums, for $10.  I’m not as much of a purist as the Cousins and will pick up a reissue or a comp here and there, and found a Grant Green record that was part of the Blue Note Breakbeats series for under $10.  Sometimes on these records, as with every record, there are bum tracks, but it seems more common for jazz records to me, so a comp with six of the most notable tracks by someone can be a good thing.  But I don’t necessarily think that’s true for Grant Green; I’m willing to bet that anything he did in ‘70 and ‘71 with Idris Muhammad on drums is good throughout.  Ronnie Laws‘ Pressure Sensitive must have also sold a shitload because it’s everywhere and it’s cheap.  One of my dad’s buddies gave me his record collection when I was about fifteen.  There were about fifty or so records, all early 70s stoner rock…and Pressure Sensitive.  It’s like the fusion Frampton Comes Alive, but way cooler.  Here are Grant Green’s Sookie Sookie (the Don Covay song) and Ronnie Laws’ Nothing to Lose…

Fullfreight banjo benefit concert!  This Saturday from 5-10!  At the Corner Brewery!  The lineup is here.  I’ve already told you about this, so this is a friendly reminder that it’s coming up.  I’ll be there if Ella is down. 

by Cousin Geoff: 

Detroit’s Roostertail Club, overlooking Lake St. Clair and Belle Isle on the upper turn of the Detroit river racetrack, was established in 1958 by Joe Schoenith.  The club was super hot in the 60s where garage bands and soul groups would play to crazed, dancing young hipsters, and quickly became one of the most well-known and exciting places to be.  The Roostertail hosted such performers as Tony Bennett, Eric Clapton, The Rolling Stones, Aretha Franklin, local soul and garage acts who were making a splash on the national scene, and all the big Motown groups.

The Four Tops recorded a legendary live album there in 1966 in the new glassed-out upper deck, but they weren’t the first band to grace the new digs.  That honor would go to the garage/house band The Four Sharps, who put out their lone single on Gale Recording Enterprises in 1965.  Soul singer DeAnne James recalls the Four Sharps, (via this Soulful Detroit thread):

“The first band in the upper deck was the Four Sharps’ Russ on guitar, Frank Bias on drums, Ronnie Godo on organ and I can’t remember the bass player. I was the feature vocalist (DeAnne James). that was the summer of 1965. We traveled to Chicago to find a replacement band and found a trio playing at a record hop in the suburbs. Tom and Jerry Schoenoff paid for the trip to find the trio. The Roostertail was only a couple miles from where I lived and the brothers treated me great. The place was beautiful. I have great memories of the Roostertail…”

Following this someone mentions that they have the 45, U-44/Doin’ The Roostertail, on Gale Recording Enterprises, and the songwriting credit is given to R. Sweets.  She replies:

“That’s Russ Sweets. My goodness I sang backgound on u-44….”u-40 forty four.” I think that was the number of the race boat that Jerry Schoenoff (owner) raced in the Hydroplane races during the 60’s. Gale was the name of the corporation that started the Roostertail. The father of the twins owned Gale Electric…that was the money source I believe. You guys are incredible.”

I was also excited to read in the thread someone else thanking the owner of the 45 for providing info on a virtually unknown label and record.  Luckily I was able to find a copy to be able to share with you.

listen to Doin’ The Roostertail: