WABX/CREEM MAGAZINE ROCK & ROLL NEWS

WABX/CREEM MAGAZINE ROCK & ROLL NEWS

There are really only a few things that an unknown rock group can do to gain attention that don’t come off like hypes. The one method that seems to impress even the most sophisticated tock fans, though, is for a group to gain the attention of a well-known star (i.e. Chris Farlowe by the Stones or any of the Apple acts) who will use his ethos to promote them into first line stars. In the past year Jimi Hendrix, more than any other first line star, has been promoting unknown acts which he personally liked. The first of these groups was the Soft Machine from England who toured for several months before striking out on their own. The next was the Eire Apparent, an Irish pop group utilizing a lot of electronic gimicks. Henerix produced their first album while Noel Redding and Robert Wyatt (of the Soft Machine) both played on it. Neither of these groups really

achieved stardom anywhere near that of their mentor. The Soft Machine were perhaps a little too far-out for the teenybops, while the Eire Apparent were just horrible. But the third group.Jimi found, Cat Mother, look like they are about as close to assured stardom as any group in recent memory.

Performing they reminded me most of the Buffalo Springfield, not because they looked or played like the Springfield, but because they took a similar approach to their music using.mostly original material

they blend all the styles that have influenced them into a style so distinctive that even when they are playing a medley of early rock songs they sound like Cat Mother, not like the people who originally recorded them. (Funny how, when a band comes on sounding like noone you’ve ever heard before, they are always quick to say who they’ve been influenced by. But all those bands who sound like people you’ve been hearing for years claim that theirs is an original sound derived from working together.)

But the very high degree of skill which Cat Mother brings to their music may work against them in the long run for it’s easy to listen to them but really hard to describe how good they are without sounding like a publicity hype. And good they are. But, had it not been for Hendrix’s support, they might have been left to the fate of many first rate bands who play steadily and gather good sized followings but after a few years realize that they can’t get any further because their own consistency has worked against them in the commercial market place. Now with the name Jimi Hendrix in big letters on the back of their album jacket they seem almost certain to be stars. It’s almost a pity that the system has to work that way, but then few groups deserve the recognition more than Cat Mother.

Cop control was so tight at the

Cat Mother-Jimi Hendrix concert that any attempt by anyone to get ' out of their seat was met by a barrage of flashlights and threats of immediate eviction.As at the last Hendrix concert when Charly Aurenger, our photography editor, was harassed by the rent-a-cops while trying to photograph Cat Mother, though this time he had a back stage pass. Two spectators jumped up from their seats and began to dance, they were literally chased out of the hall by the cops. They even tried to show their contempt for the music by parading back and forth in front of the stage with their fingers in their ears (or maybe they were just picking them). .

But anyway, Jimi answered their / attempt to stifle the energy of his performance with one of the most beautiful displays of crowd-psychology I’ve ever seen any rock star use.

Announcing he only had time for two more numbers Jimi did a brief dedication for which he said, “used to be a patriotic song,’’ then played the “Star Spangled Banner’’ as a guitar solo with some heavy riffs, lots of feedback and a few strains of “Dixie” thrown in. The Experience then broke immediately into “Purple Haze’’, at the conclusion of which both Jimi and Noel Redding thanked the audience for coming down. Much of the crowd stood and began to leave and the cops started to relax. The

wierdos were all gonna go home now. Then, as if it had been carefully rehearsed, the group broke into “Voodoo Chile (slight reprise)’’ and caught the efficient security control completely off guard. Too many people were out of their seats to be forced back and when many of them started running down on the main floor, the cops just freaked and rushed to the front of the stage to protect something, though I don't think they knew just what.

Getting .everybody up didn’t really prove anything but it sure scared the hell out of most of the rent-a-whatevers.

It started early last winter when

inmates in one of the cellblocks at Jackson Prison discovered that they were being treated to several hours of Dave Dixon’s Nightripper Show on WABX every Sunday (Monday morning) after 2 a.m. on their cellblock radio. The freaks in the block began to write Dixon letters telling about themselves, requesting songs, and asking people to write them. Soon the letters began to include requests not just for themselves but for friends in other cell blocks. The volume of mail steadily increased.

Dixon would read several of the letters on the air each week and play whatever music was requested. The response continued to grow, to the point where something more than just a few hours of records were needed.

So on Sunday, July 13, WABX and Creem Magazine will present Jackson Prison’s first ever rock and roll concert. Already set to appear are the Savage Grace, Third Power, and the Wilson Mower Pursuit. Listen to WABX - Creem Magazine rock and roll news for more information.

In one ot the strangest turnabouts in concert booking ever in Detroit, the Led Zepplin were booked into the Ballroom, were booked into a concert appearance at Olympia the same night, cancelled from the Ballroom, then cancelled at Olympia, and ended up by playing two shows at the Ballroom.

Ron Sunshine, the booking agent who handled the whole affair, said when contacted by Creem that, whatever rumors may be circulating about what happened, there was no back-room dealing, and no secret arrangements, He said that his original agreement was with Howard Tyner to book the group into Olympia. Tyner paid a deposit and agreed to pay the balance of the advance one week prior to the date. When he failed to make the payment, he lost the contract. Then Russ, who had wanted the Zepplin from the beginning, picked up the date. Russ also attempted to get Tyner his money back, but could not do so because of the contracts.

Cant. Next Page

7 June 1969

(White Panther News Service)

MC5 bassist Michael Davis was arrested by Ann Arbor pigs in a bogus move June 6 and charged with “larceny.” Bond was posted in Ann Arbor but Davis was turned over to pigs from Oak Park and held overnight on an old traffic warrant which was dismissed in the morning. The band was forced to blow a gig at the new Eastown Theatre in Detroit but went on stage and jammed with Ron Asheton of the Stooges playing bass.

This latest fascist attempt on the MC5 went down as follows: the band, along with their record producer Jon Landau and Dennis Frawley of the White Panther Party stopped at the “Campus Corner” drug store in Ann Arbor on their way to the gig to pick up some camera film and assorted goodies. Wayne Kramer attempted to pay for the goods, including a pair of sunglasses Michael Davis was wearing, with a Si00 bill, but the pig behind the counter refused to accept the currency and pulled his baseball bat out from under the counter and laid it next to the cash register with a smirk. Wayne left his purchases on the counter and went across the street to another drugstore for change. Meanwhile,

Davis walked out of the door of the Campus Corner to the car, where the rest of the band (except Wayne and Fred Smith) were waiting. One of the clerk’s goons ran out the front door with the baseball bat

threatening Michael and sputtering something about Michael having stolen a pair of sunglasses.

When Wayne got back from across the street, the bill still not changed, Michael was being held in

the basement of the Campus Corner and the police had been called. When the police came they took Michael to the Ann Arbor City Jail and booked him, first on “larceny from a building” and then to a reduced charge of “simple larceny,” a misdemeanor. The band posted bond and Michael was released, except he was released to the Oak Park pigs, who had a traffic warrant for him for which no bond could be posted. Michael was taken to the Oak Park Pigsty and held overnight. He was released Saturday morning when the judge showed up and ruled that the bond Michael had posted previously would be accepted as the fine for the crime, whatever it had been.

Michael will have to face “larceny” charges in Ann Arbor, and the pig from the Campus Corner will surely face the wrath of the people as well as lawsuits from the MC5.

The MC5 began work on their first album package for Atlantic Records Monday, 9 June, at the new GM Recording Studios on Detroit’s east side, according to MC5 manager John Sinclair, head of Trans-Love Energies, the band’s production company. Producing for Trans-Love in their new agreement with Atlantic Records will be Jon Landau, who has moved out to the MC5’s country home in Hamburg, Michigan, to work with the band for the duration of the recording sessions.

Material tentatively scheduled for the album includes Little Richard’s classic “Tutti Frutti,” James Brown’s “It’s a Man’s World, ’ the rock & roll standard “Shakin' All Over," Chuck Berry’s “Back in the USA,” and original rnaterj#! by the MGS, including

Cont. to 27

In a year where groups have been breaking up right and left (Traffic, Cream, etc.) and personnel changes have been too numerous to even attempt to list, only two groups seemed to stand high enough on the ,rock pile to be invulnerable to such hassels. These of course were the Beatles and,the Rolling Stones.

It was with this in mind that I heard the news last Monday that Brian Jones had left the Stones and would be replaced by Mick Taylor.

Disbelief was my initial reaction, but that soon subsided because 1 knew .tiie.. reporl. was lru.eL And,.

after thinking about it for a while I realized how believable it was.

Unlike the Beatles, who had really ceased to be a group in 1966 when they stopped touring and became a business interest and artistic, musical commune in which each of the members pooled their talents and personality, the Stones never stopped being a “rock and roll band”, expanding their music together and though they never went through some of the changes many groups have in attempting to get it together (like moving to a secluded house in the country to practice) the_y managed to_get it

together better than anyone else. For, if you look carefully at the Stones, you find that this togetherness was not a forced creation of having to put up with each other in an inclosed space over a long period of time but rather the product of five people whose heads were together and whose heads continued to be moved in the same direction by Mick and Keith so that they stayed together. But, while Mick and Keith were the leaders and Bill and Charlie mainly back up men, Brian’s role could be described in no other term than

Cont. to 27

STONES Cont.

“integral background”, much the same role that David Crosby held with the Byrds.

Brian never contributed a song to the Stones’ repertoire but his instrumental contributions to the arrangements were often the dominant sound behind Mick’s vocals. It-was the music that was a virtual necessity that his head be completely in tune with Mick and Keith. Charlie and Bill could be replaced easily without changing •the character of the Stones, and, by the same token, they could easily adapt to any such changes without too much difficulty. But Brian, despite his somewhat background role., remained musically an individual, and, as such, perhaps the most crucial member of the group. They could not replace him and remain the same, they could not change unless he changes with them. Now he’s left them, it is rumored because Mick and Keith have gotten very deep into witchcraft and Brian just couldn’t, and his replacement will be John May all’s most recent ex-lead guitarist.

Mick Taylor joined Mayall, at the age of seventeen, right after Peter Breen left, and has played on his last three albums. He left to go out on his own after Mayall's last American tour. He comes to the Stones with a strong blues background but has yet to display any of the musical versatility that made Brian important to the group.

Mayall, meanwhile, has also reformed his group, this time without a lead guitar or a drummer. The group will consist of Mayall on guitar and organ, along with a bass, a tenor, and one other horn. The first American appearance Tor the group will be July 4, at the Newport Jazz Festival.

MC5 Cont.

“Call Me Animal,” “Teen age Lust,” “Human Being Lawnmower,” “Ice Berg Slim,” .and a Pharaoh Sanders song, “Upper Egypt,” with lyrics by Sinclair. The package will feature original artwork by Gary Grimshaw and notes by John Sinclair.

A single from the sessions will be released in July, and album production is scheduled to begin as soon as the tapes are mixed.

Taping will continue through the week and will be interrupted by a short east-coast trip, including dates at the Electric Factory, Philadelphia (13 June), Peekskill Palace, New York (14 June), The Ark, Boston (16-18 June), and Ungano’s, New York City (19-22 June). The MC5 then returns to Detroit for more dates and another -round in the studio before touring the west coast in July.

Free medical attention is now available on Monday evenings from 6 pm to 8 pm. (Stop in or call 831-2770 for further information) This is a temporary measure until quarters can be found for a permanent free medical clinic. Many thanks to the doctors and nurses contributing their time.

Open City has previously been contrating its efforts around the Switchboard. Telephone operators

have weekly meetings to discuss calls that have come in and all incoming calls are logged and each operator’s reply is discussed.

Of the fifty or sixty calls that come in daily, half of them are questions about draft or legal problems and the rest are either serious drug questions or serious cranks. The number is 831-2770 and operators can take calls from 10 am - 11 pm.

A steering committee has been meeting regularly and it consists of people who in effect are Open City. Members are either chairmen of committees or are just active people.

They are Fred Barrie (stores), Dave Marsh (Legal Defense), Carmel Marks (Medical), Bill Boucher (Legal Aid), Jane Forrest (Nursery), Paul Flealy (Housing), Bob Faust (Free U.), John Martin (Nursery), Nancy Anger (Manager), Sharon Burke and Fred Frank (entertainment), and Harvy 0vsh insky and Nolon Shaw as co-ordinators. In the next two months. Open City’s assault on the City will cover about four projects, and most important being the establishment of a free medical clinic.

The medical committee has already established counseling sessions on Mondays and Wednesdays. These “sessions” are from 7 to 1 1 pm and involve medical people rapping either on the phone or at the switchboard office with young people who are bothered by drugs, school, family, etc. Sessions are informal and at no time is any medical advice given out.

These same people have recently banded together to make themselves available to hospitals in the city for emergency “bad trip” advice and counselling.

If this project succeeds, instead of a person who is high and in trouble getting handcuffed to a hospital bed or shot up with thorazine, doctors would call Open City people in to talk the person out of his trip.

The housing people, headed by Paul Healy and John Martin, have circulated a letter to theQandlords in the area inviting them to call the switchboard when they have vacant apartments. As it stands now, when people call in for jobs or housing, the operator tells them to send a selfaddressed stamped envelope and the caller will get his information through the mail.

The legal department at Open City has been either answering problems itself or forwarding calls to the proper attorney. Legal Self Defense (LSD) is taking care of emergency bail situation's, but according to David Marsh and Alan Gotkin, funds are running low and a benefit is being planned for June 10 at the Grande.

The entertainment committee is busy with the Hippocrates benefit and is in the process of booking the Sixth Street Theatre from New York.

Special thanks must go to Russ Gibb, Tom Wright and even Gabe Glantz for their full cooperation at the recent Open City Grande Benefit. Uncle Russ came through without charging a cent for rent of equipment. Tom Wright managed the whole evening’s festivities, and Gabe Glantz sat around and talked about the community.

Over a thousand people jammed into the Grande that night to hear Plum Wine, the Rationals, and the MC5. Eighteen-hundred dollars was collected at the door which went.in the bank or paid off debts for Open City.

A new coffee house managed by OpenCity will be opened in the Warren-Forest area just as soon as the people in charge of it find a large enough building. The Open City general store has the same problem with space, but money-and volunteer labor is being arranged.

The stores committee does need goods and community people who are into clothing, ceramics, etc.

Open City has needed and gotten the support of the community it serves. About the only problem now is getting enough money together to keep the switchboard open longer hours and finance the committees in their projects.

To that end people wishing to donate money to Open City can do so in this way. First, $25 donation allows the contributor free admission to all Open City benefits plus a free subscription to the Fifth Estate. With donations of over S5 the contributor gets a free Fifth Estate unclassified ad.

Queries should be sent to Open City. 4726 Third St., No. 5, Detroit, Michigan 48201.

Residents of tne three block section of Virginia Park from Woodward to the John C. Lodge Freeway have, through their block club, filed suit in Wayne County Circuit Court charging Sigma Alpha Mu Fraternity, whose house is at 689 Virginia Park with disrupting the neighborhood with loud rock and roll music at frequent parties.

The people of Virginia Park claim that such disturbances make it difficult if not impossible to carry on their normal activities. They have lodged their suit specifically at Sigma Alpha Mu though they have indicated that it is meant to include the other fraternities who have houses on the street.

A spokesman for the fraternity said that though they occasionally have parties with live bands the music is not as loud, nor are the parties as frequent as their neighbors claim.

The area on Virginia Park was once one of Detroit’s most fashionable neighborhoods, now most of the large houses on the tree-lined, brick surfaced street have been subdivided into small apartments and sleeping rooms, occupied mostly by college students and working class whites.