Depravity and Corruption

Depravity and Corruption

TAKE IT OR LEAVE IT? I.A.

The Blue Cheer suck!

That will give you some idea of what this column is about. Hope to point out a few things, tell it like it is or should be, etc. If you like it how I write it, then congratulationsߞ if you don’t, then go and read road maps! Doesn’t “In a Gadda da Vida” sound like “Sunshine of your Love”? What ever happened to “Long Haired Boy” by Tim Rose? Richie Havens seems like a very nice, pleasant-type person. Tim Buckley doesn’t.

“Whiter Shade of Pale” prior to its release by Procol Harum appealed to Otis Redding so much that he wanted to release it as his next single. Apparently lost all interest when he discovered the Harum was white!

Read a really early edition of the Fifth Estate last week. You know-from the days before “peace” was a dirty, unprintable word.

WWLV-FM-Keener’s new call letters, really stand for We Want Lower Volume-For Music! Please take note, all you young, aspiring amplifier players.

Does MC in MC-5 stand for Mr. Sinclair? or Mr. Coltrane? or Mr. Cleaver? Or even Motor City?

Well, spring will be with us soon -so will Procol Harum: back with their same set taken from their same LP’s, played in the same dynamic, hard-hitting, joyous manner. Spring will probably be gone before they are.

Interesting to note that Dave Teagarden (Vanwinkle and Teagarden) played on an early Tiny Tim session. Well, / found it interesting.

Who has the legendary Blue films (stag movies) of the SRC?

Dan Carlisle will shortly reveal that his REAL real name is Merton Schwartz and that he isn’t really a Disc Jockey, and that his show is done by one of ABX’s multi-talented secretaries who used to be an Olympic barbed-wire hurdler until her tragic, voice-lowering accident. Still, it only hurts when she laughs or listens to CKLW.

Was Ed Sullivan born as obnoxious as he is or did he have to practice the technique?

Eric Clapton is the mystery voice on Zappa’s Only In It For The Money brainchild, “Nasal Retentative Music.”

Amazingly good reproduction of album sound by Spirit live!

A1 Kooper, writer of “This Diamond Ring”, plays keyboard instruments on Taj Mahal’s new album, as well as producing Don Ellis’ new album. He gets around!

Russ Gibb; man of a thousand personalities-master of none; is, quite suprisingly, a good person. Bill Graham, not so suprisingly, is pretty offensive!

Wonder if they’ll ever release “Wrapping Paper" by the Cream in this country, or the original Cream “Spoonful.” Both can be bought in Canada. Nice to see Aretha finally recorded “The Weight”. It’s difficult to tell nice guys like the Iron Butterfly how bad they sound. Doesn’t the Led Zeppelin album remind you of the Jeff Beck album, in particular, Page’s guitar work? What ever happened to the imminent release of Dylan’s “Yeah-heavy, an’ a bottle of bread”?

Did you know that WABX almost wasn’t? Next time you call to ask a request-please be nice. You’d be amazed how many people aren’t.

The Frost have signed with Vanguard and are presently cutting their album. Cuts are: Side one-Take My Hand, The Family, Sweet Jenny, Long WayDown To Mobile, and Mystery Man; Side two-Baby, Once You’ve Got It, Stand In The Shadow, Little Suzie, Killer Chicken Blues, and Who Are You?

When Jeremy Spencer (Fleetwood Mac) was young, he used to make cardboard guitars and get very uptight when they wouldn’t play.

“I Heard it through the Grapevine” by Marvin Gaye was recorded five years ago. Betcha didn’t know that! The single is Motown’s biggest seller ever. Gladys Knight and Pips come a close second with the same song.

Go out of your wat to hear “Side of a Hill” by Paul Simon. Call WABX-they have a tape of it.

Turn on to Garolyn Hester, “Astral Weeks” by Van Morrison,

“The Indo-Jazz” and “Handbags and Gladrags” by Chris Farlowe.

All of them are great. “Red Beans and Rice” from Brian Auger’s new album is their stage “showstopper.”

Blue Cheer is also the name of a type of drug. The drug has nothing to do with a HYPE-odermic syringe. The group has a connection.

Hope your conscience lets you sleep!

JAZZ ON RADIO?-

Richard Walls

Detroit is not a bad example if one is to go into the relation between jazz and the mass media (particularly radio, since that seems to be the only mass media that jazz has crept into.) In fact, it probably exemplifies what is a rather sickening condition.

There are only two outposts of jazz radio in Detroit, and one is horrible, while the other is too brief. The programming of the horrible one reflects the cosmic money-grub attitude. The most popular and long-lasting jazz station is WCIID, and nobody who’s really into the music bothers to listen to this station. Even to talk about

what goes on on this station is depressing. There seems to have been an original idea somewhere, an idea which was the epitome of funk, an idea of orgasm and pure ear/body pleasure. And WCHD plays every second-rate derivitive of that idea that has been released. An experiment — turn the radio on at random at WCHD and the chances are you’ll hear either a tired funky organ, or guitar, or some vocalist

trying to revive the 40’s slick blues. Funk, funk, and boring funk at that. Occasionally, usually on the Ed Love show, you’ll hear some good post-hard-bop jazz, but why bother to wade through the watered funk?

Bud Spanglar’s show on WDET is beautiful, though there is a problem inherent in playing the sort of music that he does. He plays mostly avant-guard jazz and it’s very adventuresome—the money demon does not seem to loom over Spanglar’s show (which can be heard on Saturday, 5-8 p.m. and Monday, 10:30-1 a.m.) You can be assured of variety and freaky sounds — he regularly plays the heaviest of the new jazz. The only problem is that most of the new jazz albums have to be heard in full in order to fully grasp the scope of the record—certain cuts can be misleading. And Spangler doesn’t always have the time to play complete records—though he tries, and often does.

There’s no other decent or indecent jazz show in Detroit radio. On TV, it’s non-existent, but TV eats it anyway._

ANATHEMA BLUES Richard Walls

This purports to be a brief introduction to jazz—not a dull fisting and enthusiastic prompting, like a Sears catalog, but rather, a brief exposure of at least one direction you could (can) direct the scope of your feelings. As a human being imbued with a certain amount of sensitivities (and thus needs), you perhaps need something different, something expansive, a] more subtle registration of each nuance of feeling in your life—something to reflect and fulfill the possibilities churning in your mind. Perhaps you need to listen to musicians who speak of unspeakable realization—who have taken the basic, simple thoughts and near thoughts of the profound and shaped them into melodic contours. Listening to it, you become familiar with your mind—the landscape of thoughts, not merely as a metaphor or image, but the actual ethereal landscape of thoughts, peripheral thoughts, subconscious ego, etc. You become familiar with this landscape listening to “good” jazz, listening to Shepp and Mingus, listening to Coltrane (though his bearty is so elusive—so explosive). And this metamorphosis, this profound expansion, is always unspoken. It is the music which speaks, you become the music, and words are mere conceits—extremely fragile attempts to spread the word—the feelings.

I’m not talking about all kinds of jazz, of course, only that music which shatters exterior thoughts until our meaningless suppositions about music le at our feet like so much broken glass. There’s another world of jazz, the world where the armageddon of the exterior fife is only hinted at—but even the hints are beautiful. Art Blakely and Horace Silver telling us to leave it, leave it! Here’s not only excitement, but rough drafts of the new landscape. You could find your soul in this music—in the sharp pain of Jackie McLean’s drug-heightened alto-or the free association meanderings of Ornette Coleman, who can make plastic sing. You could find your soul or lose it—no matter, the music will have breathed on the landscape of your mind; shown you the direction.

CAPTAIN BEEFHEART AND HIS MAGIC BAND Derek Lister

Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band are in the peculiar posotion at the moment of being well-known in England, and yet practically unheard of in their native America. They are bizarre to say the least, and make a very strange account of themselves by today’s wretched standards. (Beefheart was once arrested at London Airport because he insisted he was a pilgrim from the 21st Century). Yet, like the Soft Machine, they remain one of those elusive groups who just crop up every so often and dissolve again in clouds of mystery. They owe much of their present success in Europe to the foresight and the dogged persistence of the inimitable John Peel, who brought them from relative obscurity in San Bernardino County and introduced them to England. I first heard them there about two years ago when I was a fledgling in the struggling London underground, when Peel used to play them on his early morning pirate radio show, and later on those incredible hypes he used to pull on the BBC. The album then was Soft as Milk on the Buddah label. At that time, when you and I were just turning on to Country Joe, Doors, and the Airplane,

Beefheart had already gone back to basics and recorded a collection of heavy, pounding originals, like “Electricity”, “Abba Zaba”, “Zig Zag Wanderer” and “Sure ‘Nuff ‘n Yes, I Do.” Now, when everybody is going back to old rock, Beefheart has brought out a second album—Strictly Personal on Blue Thumb. The music they have evolved on this record is quite unique. Conventional song forms are thrown to the wind, and more eccentric and imaginative structures put in th eir place. The result is a vast rag-bag of sounds, disjointed images, shock effects and sheer audio force. It’s not easy music to get into. In that sense, they’re still a very obscure band, but there’s definitely a lot there. John Peel once remarked that he couldn’t explain the vibrations he got from Captain Beefheart. I know exactly what he means; they have a curious way of affecting people. It would do you well to see for yourselves.

1 Creem Office

1 Mixed Media 5704 Cass Avenue

2 Full Circle

3 4860 Cass Avenue Cambridge Bookstall

4856 Cass Avenue

4 THE MONKEY BOUTIQUE at 25 West Warren is the only shop of its kind located in the Wayne State area. It has an Indian atmosphere—a Taj Mahal entrance, raga music, and beautiful Indian clothes. Primarily it contains innumerable hip accessories—incense, water pipes, candles, strobes, leather goods, and jewelry. The actual boutique consists of hip clothing, old and new from sequined majorette dresses and silvered gladiator suits to the latest in bellbottoms. Much of the clothing is sewn from Indian material, from finely designed cottons and heavy, multicolored brocades.

5 THE POSTER PIT at 3924 Dix in Lincoln Park carries a large variety of psychedelic, rock and black light posters, the latest underground records, which are usually in stock the same day they are released, all types of jewelry, head accessories, black lights, incense, candles and strobe candles, books, original paintings, sunglasses and the usual stickers and buttons.

6 THE DEPOT HOUSE, at 416 S. Ashley in Ann Arbor, is presently the only non-alcoholic nightclub in Ann Arbor devoted exclusively to displaying area rock, blues and folk artists to the public on a regular

basis. The primary objective of the Depot House is to provide an outlet in the Ann Arbor community where people with creative desire and talents might express themselves to others with similar tastes. We also supply free facilities to several local non-profit orginizations to raise money to support various worthwhile projects of the free-thinking community. Westland, one light south of Ford Road. It specializes in books, handmade candles, trinkets, incense, original oils and blacklight posters, and personalized hand painted dayglo lampshades.

7 BELL, BOOK AND CANDLE is located at 1030 Wayne Road in

8 The Forty Thieves Afro-Asian Gift Shop, located at 11605 Linwood at Burlingame, specializes in exotic gifts and clothing from Morocco, Nigeria and Inda. They feature high fashion clothing sewn from hand woven and hand blocked fabrics from these countries. They also have a wide array of imported jewelry, ebony sculputure and Indian incense. The atmosphere in the shop intices the shopper to browse otbuv.

9 THE GROOVE SHOP is located in Detroit on the east side, near Grosse Pointe at 18435 Mack. It’s a head shop-record store that deals in newest releases and takes special orders. They carry strobe candles, incense, pipes, posters, post cards, rings and other jewelry. The shop has a psyche-atmosphere (black lights, flashing colored lights). A nice place

to vis it as well as shop. 10 TI HE PLUM PIT is in East Detroit at Te n Mile and Gratiot. It’s mainly a cloth ing store with a head shop in back, They sell all kinds of fashions to ti ickle your fancy as well as poste rs, pipes, sun glasses, candles, black lights, and lots of far out jdoth es—denim bells, corduroy bells, paisle y bells—the latest in fashion for you c the east side. 11 VI LLAGE PUB, 136 Brownell, Birmi ingham. TI re club began as a “member’s only “teen club for the Birming-

ham-Bloomfield area and continues as a non-profit teen center, run for and by the teen of basically the same area. Membership subscriptions are five dollars a year, and entitle the member to use the snack bar and recreational facilities during the week, and to take part in the various sport and cultural programs offered. Weekend engagements of national and local groups are open to the public at three dollars per person and a two dollar charge for members. Local groups are provided as both headline and backup groups with the national or “name” groups. The stress is on entertainment, and booking is handled in such a way that the appearance of good local groups may always be expected.

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Paraphenalia is an avant-gard boutique, for aware people who know what’s happening. Our young designers are in tune with today’s fashion trends. We provide a relaxed, casual shopping atmosphere, and display clothing in the $20-$ 120 price range. Paraphenalia—downtown at 519 Park and in Birmingham

at 574 North Woodward—are the only outlets in the Detroit area for our special label. Come down and see our exclusive line of clothing for today’s woman.

13; The Hyperbole Inc., 1482 Randolph, three blocks east of Hudson’s downtown store, on Harmonie Park is a high fashion dress boutique eatering to young women con-' sciously seeking groovy, yet tasteful, ways of expressing themselves, offering clothing that will co-ordinate and accessorize, creating complete works of art. As spring approaches and our spring colection arrives, plan to visit frequently behind the wall.

14 DETROIT REPERTORY THEATRE

UNDERGROUND or Experimental Cinema .

Art Gallery

Beyond that Jazz

15 Downtown Bookstore

861 North Saginaw/Pontiac

16 Chessmate

17126 Livernois @ McNichols

17 Global Books

4415 Second

18 Classic Book Shop

1515 Broadway

19 Circle Book Store >

215 South State Street/Ann Arbor*

20 Centacore Books

1229 South University/Ann Arbor

21 Discount Records

300 South State/Ann Arbor 2 2 Books Unlimited

Cass & Forest

23 Snug Restaurant

Second & Canfield 24 Taj Mahal Indian Restaurant

Cass & Canfield

25 Vaughns Bookstore

12123 Dexter

2 6 Fifth Estate Office

1107 West Warren

2 7 Body Shop

943 Plum, 515 Park, & 802 S. State /Ann Arbor

2 8 Carnaby House

14400 Gratiot

30 Classic Record Shop

19544 Kelly Road

31 Gas Company

290 W. 10 Mile

3 2 Grande Ballroom

8952 Grand River at Beverly 3 3 Hideout/Silverbell

4385 Bald Mountain Rd./Pontiac

34 Harmony House

John R& 1-75

35 Something Different

12 Mile & Northwestern

36 Climax Boutique

924 Monroe/Dearbom

3 7 Four Winds

13800 E. 8 Mile

3 8 Gulian’s

7614 Second

3 9 Adler Schnee * 5

240 E. Grand River

40 Raven Gallery

29101 Greenfield @12 Mile/Southfield

41 Absolute Zero Coffeehouse

388 N. Woodward/Birmingham

4 2 Crow’s Nest East

31059 Harper/St. Clair Shores 43 Crow’s Nest West

Joy Road & Middlebelt/Westland 4 4 Arthur

Washington Blvd @ State St.

45 Hideout No. 3

870 N. Main/Clawson

46 Rappa House

96 E. Fisher Freeway

47 Artist’s Music Center

14357 Harper

48 A2 Booking Agency

521 North Division/Ann Arbor 4 9 THE RAG DQLL SALON