Grand Funk Railroad and Terry Knight are rumored to have just about settled their legal hassles by now, and may be able to go their separate ways without tripping over their subpoenas. It�s all part of somebody� history — as may indeed the whole Funk phenomenon be — but certain questions remain unanswered to this day. It was for purposes of laying to rest said gnawers that I conducted the following interview with Mark, Don and Mel last winter. Them was heavy days, the trio and their late captain having just hacked their ways out of each others� respective hair. One of the things that meant was that for the first time in their history Grand Funk were open to us press putzes for interviews; in fact, at the time I managed to corner �em they were most anxious to talk.

They were.noticeably relieved when I told them that I didn�t want to talk about Terry Knight. It seemed to me that there was no point in rehashing all the half-supportable charges and counter-charges, especially since Knight wasn �t available to answer.

I chose instead to talk to Mark, Don and Mel about the People. What People? You got me, Jack, it�s a pretty vague conglomerate. But I was crass enough to figure that Mark, Don and Mel probably didn�t know much more about; this grey unclaimed constituency than I did, so I waded rigfit in without worrying about stepping in a puddle of Roszak drool.

Which isn�t to say that GFR�s opinions on these People aren�t worth gleaning even if they ain�t got the foggiest notion what they�re blabbing about. Because both Terry Knight and the band themselves worked hard at building a (quasi?) political jacket for the group. Terry was the original �final voyage through a dying world� man; Mark, Don & Mel, meanwhile, became more overtly political in their lyrics and general ambience with each record, from �Paranoid� to �People Let�s Stop the War. � One supposed reason for their split from Knight was that he had refused to let them record certain topical songs they�d written, particularly about ecology, which was a subject big in their hearts even if they were rumored to have invested most of their earnings in oil.

I met and talked with Grand Funk for two hours in the living room of Mel Schachner�s relatively modest ranchstyle home in Flint, Michigan. They �re regular guys — friendly if a trifle suspicious of anybody from the press. And they were right to be suspicious — two days after I interviewed them a review appeared in which I panned the pus out of Phoenix and their whole attitude. What�s more, I didn�t really believe most of the things I said to them: I just wanted to see how they would respond to such questions. So in a sense the whole situation was a setup.

On the other hand, once I got there I was surprised at how I had misjudged and underrated them. There is an honesty to their stance - particularly Farner — even if it�s a bit muddled and they aren�t particularly articulate. Does it really matter anymore if anybody knows what they�re talking about? Nobody even wants to follow the honks hollering ��Don�t follow leaders, � so you might as well just dive in and accept it as far as you please. That�s what I did, and there was no pain at all. - L.B.

When Grand Funk started out, was there any kind of political idea behind it?

DON: It started just as a rock V roll band, and Mark got into the political thing more than anyone else, and he wanted to do things with his words and he just related to that onstage.

MEL: I think the thing that really ticked it off was travelling around, we started going to Pittsburgh and places like that, and seeing all this bullshit pollution. Remember how we used to talk about that? You get sick of seeing that stuff in fields and you feel like doing something about it.

MARK: I found an obligation to do something about that, that�s the way I feel. I think everybody�s obligated but they don�t feel that way. Most people are too busy trying to survive. They can�t think of nothing else but survival. And they rely on music. It�s like a faith. You gotta believe. And the things that I relate to and the things that I believe in are the things that I think other people should. You and me gotta sit down and talk certain subjects, because no matter what we talk about we�re gonna find things we agree on. And that�s the things that I try to pick out when I�m writing my material to put in the songs. It�s not anything too far left or right, I don�t think. I�m looking right up the middle, and trying to balance things out.

Do you ever feel like supporting any particular person or movement? MARK: I wouldn�t support anybody I didn�t know as good as I do Mel or Don. I wouldn�t tell anybody to vote for Nixon or McGovern, �cause I don�t know them cats. If they wanta come out to the farm and stay a few weeks. . . (Laughter)

Do you ever get the feeling that a lot of people feel it�s enough just to think that we're together, we're brothers and sisters, but they can't take it beyond that? MARK: In what realm of beyond?

In the realm of accomplishment, like you go to a pop festival and everybody says, Yeah, we're all in this together, and that's it. Is that where it ends? MARK: Unless it rains, like at Woodstock.

DON: That�s what it looks like. There�s no. . . the organization that started to get together, meaning we�re really brothers and sisters, just drifted away. MARK: A lot of people used that to impress people. I had a lot of phony people that come up to me, you know the cat�s just bullshitting all the way.

And the only people that really means it when they says it are a preacher.

DON: Yeah, like Martin Luther King. We need people like him to organize the mass and give them a direction.

Do you ever get the impression that people look to you for that sort of leadership, and how does it make you feel?

MEL: It seems to be more and more so that people are relating to us politically, as they used to relate to just to come to our concerts and get off. I haven�t myself really gotten much into the political aspect of the whole thing. I don�t follow politics, but I know what�s going on.

MARK: We�re just a warm up act for who�s gonna take over. (Laughter) We�re just getting �em up for it.

Was there ever a time - I don't know if this is true or not - that you said that when you got enough money, you were going to go to the White House and give it to Nixon and say, �Okay, this is what we think should happen �?

MARK: I never said that, who told you that?

Somebody at CREEM, about a year ago . *

MARK: Yeah, but it would take a lot of money,.I think.

MEL: Yeah, definitely. Nixon�s got a lot of money.

Do you think there�s any chance at this point of a revolution happening in America?

MARK: You know as soon as you start speaking out there�s gonna be someone out there to eliminate you, and that�s what�s stopping a big revolution in this country.

DON: People are scared right now.

We were talking about what it takes to become a political leader, and a big part of it is charisma, just like rock. So suppose you reached the point where they said, �We want you. " What would you doji

MARK: I would react with my cosmic mind. I�d just go and be whatever I was meant to be. I�ll cross a bridge when it comes, I ain�t jumping ahead. I�m always laying back and taking a look before I go. You gotta watch your back, because you think you�re going someplace man and you�re not careful enough, there are people all over who are talking about you and you�re finished.

Are you talking about in rock 'n' roll or personally?

MARK: I�m talking about everything, man.

How do you avoid that in terms of your own career? ^

MARK: I know what�s wrong and know also how far I can go. . .. and I am no fool, because I am not going to go any farther than the limit that I set up for myself.

DON: Everybody knows what�s beyond the limit. It�s just standing back and looking at what you know you can do.

*NOTE: There was no way at the time of verifying the accuracy of the story one way or the other (and didn 't matter anyway since it was great apochrypha in its own right), but I now have in my possession a tape of an interview with Terry Knight conducted by Richard Robinson early in 1971, where Mr. K. says substantially what was imputed above. I won�t drag it out to beef up this stew; I�m saving it for the Senate Hearings.

�A lot of phony people come up to me..,�

MARK: If you just keep doing that it�ll happen, it�ll come together, but it�s just gonna take a concentration,, it can�t let up at this point. There�s no communication anymore. A lot of older people are set in their ways, they gonna have to change if there�s gonna be a revolution. It�s gotta be the young, the mid-range and the older people, a concentration of all of �em. People aren�t ready for that, though, because a lot of people aren�t ready to accept long hair, and long hair isn�t ready to accept the bias of the old.

Which is where it�s always seemed to be. MARK: It�s coming together as time goes on. and man matures and civilization gets more established by the second. . . I can feel it�s just takin� off, you know, civilization. Well, not civilization so much as modernization, automation.' I think the whole fucking world is going too fast. It mav be hill, because of population growth and pollution. The more people the more pollution, it�s just two and two. So it�s gotta be something drastic, but it�s gotta be at the right time.

Obviously something is needed, but what is it? Is it enough just to have faith? Or can you see specific ways for this trend to be reversed, so people can start getting together as brothers and sisters again?

MARK: A lot of people realize what�s right and what�s wrong, but they still do what�s wrong. 'This happens in every society. The straight office men are crooked people, and that�s why things are so fucked up. People are too money hungry, and we�re gonna have to do away with that type of attitude in order to get it together.

How do you do away with it, though? Throw them in jail?

DON: There�s something missing in a society that breeds people like that. MEL: It all relates back to the Ten Commandments. If you follow the Ten Commandments you will be righteous and good.

MARK: Not necessarily. The rules that should be set have been overlooked and covered with progress, with pavement, parking lots and roads. People are just walking ,over the rules that we were meant to live by. That�s what I was talking about earlier when I mentioned that I thought about a lot of different things than the next guy. But my cosmo mind is what I guess people relate to it as. . . yes, just a realization of nature, that we rely on it and the earth. That it�s just a big luscious fruit, and of course it would support the life, but the life is just taking from it and raping this planet. The mine stripping. . . 4/5ths of the world�s original forests are gone. The sea is 60% dead. Polluted. People think that with the meat contaminated we�re gonna rely on the sea. Well, the sea�s gettin� that way too. We�re just bitin� off our nose.

So do you have a vision of how to get back to the world as a pure fruit?: MARK: Yeah, but it would have to be so drastic. I�ve been around the world, and it�s all becoming industrialized. All these, shitty little countries around the world, they�re tryin� to be like America. America makes the rules and America is just turnin� out to be a piece of shit, far as the world is concerned.

What�s gonna be necessary in the freak culture to reverse this situation?

MARK: You know what�s gonna be necessary? For everybody to stop driving their car, for one thing.

Have you done that?

�There�s something missing in a society that breeds people like that."

"I don�t follow politics, but I know what�s going on.

MARK: No, because we ain�t ready for it. I stopped drivin�. . . You know, I�ve become tight with nature, I�m trying,to be more and I will be. ... I started realizin� that I was drivin� a car with a big fuckin� V-8 burnin� premium gas. I switched when I realized I was really doin� the worst by that. And I hope that someday we can go back to ridin� horses. That doesn�t even burn oxygen, because there�s not much oxygen left. We�re just gonna have to stop the whole society and turn it back. I hate pollution. What I believe in is no money. Just get together and build a house with a cat, and then he�s gonna help you build yours, y�know. That�s the way it was a long time ago.

So you're anti-progress? Antitechnology?

MARK: Not anti-technology, just antipollution. Anti anything that will put somethin� in the air I shouldn�t be breathin�.

So you�re saying that people should go back to being more organic, and grow their own.

MARK: Yes, definitely. People don�t realize they can do that. I mean, we moved out to our farm last year, and we grew us a garden that got us about halfway through the winter. Initially it was killer, we. got a lotta stuff in the freezer. We mulched, it wasn�t no work at all. You just spread a lotta hay and stuff over the ground and dig down somethin� and it just grows like crazy.

Yeah, but what about all the people that get off on livin � in the city,, even ridin � the subways. . .

MARK: They just need to be educated. That�s just the problem that surrounds the world. When everybody finally gets to the point that they all realize the same thing at once, there�s gonna be a big ark: crash! (Laughs.) /

CONTINUED ON PAGE 73.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 37.

Yeah, but burgers and rock �n � roll are like that, you know. What�re you gonna do, blot out the Burger Kings: �NO MORE!�?

MARK: Have spinachburgers. It�s just a lotta work. Our generation that�s growin� up right now is just downright lazy. I can�t speak for everyone, because I know there are a lotta people who just get out and work. I mean, if it wasn�t for those people that�re just so goddam lazy and livin� off the government, they wouldn�t be doin� that.

Then you �re anti-welfare?

MARK: No, I�m not anti-welfare, I�m just antLthe guy that can work just like I can, but he�s layiri� back because he�s a lazy son of a bitch and thinks the world owes him a livin�.

But don�t you think a lot of the energy and inspiration forgetting some alternative type of thing together comes out of layin � back?

MARK: No man, if you can�t think about it while you�re doin� it, that�s where you end up.

In a place like Marin County.

MARK: I don�t know where that is.

Well, I�ve seen a lot of people who sort of decided to go back to the land and get themselves a little plot where they can grow their own. After that, they don�t do anything else at all. They grown their own dope and they sit out there and toke down and feel good and that�s all.

DON: They grow their own food, too. For survival. They�re in a state of mellowness all the time.

MARK: Yeah, well, that�s where people gotta sacrifice, and if you can�t settle for something like that, you know... that to me would be paradise. If you believe in the earth as a life form and that it�s gonna support you as long as you live, you wouldn�t have any qualms about givin� up your car or ridin� the elevator or the escalator or any fuckin� thing. I mean, electricity can be created through natural forms, and you wouldn�t have to burn any coal or any fuel. The things that the electricity needed would be to service the whole public for free. Just for the necessities of living. Say heat for your house. When the wintertime rolls around. It would take everybody to work their ass off and not pollute. That�s what everybody needs anyways, to get out and sweat with each other. I believe the world�s gonna get it together one of these days. It�s either gonna get it together or it�s gonna get so ridiculous that people are gonna run around shooting each other.

EPILOGUE

Mark had been looking at me intently through red, half-lidded eyes, speaking slowly and deliberately the whole time. We had all smoked a little too much grass, though I doubt it would have come out much different if we�d run through it straight. Through the whole thing, there was no mistaking that Mark was, by common consent, the leader and spokesman — he even sat in a chair in the corner, above the rest of us, who sat on the floor. As his comments reveal, he obviously feels a great sense of personal puissance, and understandably so. I detected a slight smugness about him which I didn�t like — when he first said �cosmic mind,� I just stared at him and was on the point of saying �Are you serious?� when he resumed his rap — but on the other hand there is a lot of warmth in all three members of Grand Funk, the kind that wouldn�t necessarily translate into a heavy hubbub about politics but came across later when we stood around in the hall waiting forMel�s wife to finish cooking dinner, talking about cars, sheepskin jackets, things like that.

It could also be noted, for whatever it�s worth, that Grand Funk don�t seem heavily or assertively into Women�s Liberation — the interview really came to an end on the timetable of Mark�s stomach, when he hollered across into the kitchen: �Honey, I�m hungry as hell! When we gonna eat?� When we went in for the food he literally planted himself at the table, picking his fork up in his right hand and holding it, prongs up, until he was served. Every once in awhile as we were waiting he would drum the fist that was holding it on the table, and grumble again about how hungry he was. More dope went around during the meal, and by the time dessert was served Mark was heading for a nod. When we were all getting ready to go, his wife came up, put her slender arms around his plowman�s hulk, and almost cooed: �Mark... honey... c�mon, honey, it�s time to go... we gotta go home now... � as if, like a cranky child, he must be roused gently.

As for the other two Funks, Mel ate with the same characteristic air of rather sullen silence that he had shown all afternoon. Bassist to the fillings. He was typecast for one of them silent brooding Sinai prophet roles. Don was consistently polite, friendly, a gentleman, and the only member of the band who could ever concievably make Eleganza. A hair more sophisto, in other words.

The food was organic, of course, and after it was over Mel�s wife said to us: �Be sure �n� come back to see us, now. Don�t think it�s just an interview!�

I thanked her and assured her that I would, thanked them all again in turn .remembering to make it a power-shake adios (when we�d come in I�d faux pas�d with trad grip); then I left.

And it felt good! Boring, boring, boring! Humorless! Monotonous as their music! They haven�t talked much since, which is probably smart; when I got back to CREEM I walked in to find our publisher Barry Kramer quite coincidentally on the phone with Mr. T himself. So I grabbed it and yapped: �Boy, were you ever right! Those three are the dumbest dogs I ever interviewed!� Terry Knight chuckled bernusedly cross the wire from his Jamaican retreat�s perch atop a mound of aboriginies on loan from Howard Hughes, and told Barry: �That Lester Bangs is a smart boy; he�ll go /places in this world!�

How do you like that! Don�t patronise me! If you�re such a genius, how come you never had a nose job?

That was last winter. Grand Funk haven�t talked much since, but they�re in the studio with Todd Rundgren producing their new album right now, which means that it will almost certainly not have that patented Terry Knight asbestos oatmeal sound. Knight, of course, is amusing himself with Brown Bag Records, Limousine/Faith and the like, and by now has almost totally destroyed whatever credibility he might have had in the first place.

Meanwhile, Grand Funk just may have forded the hiatus and come up for breath with a whole new non-lend lease on life. Who gives a Yasgur heifer turd if they talk like farmers? Who ever said musicians were supposed to be verbal, anyway? You did and I did, because you wanna know and I like easy hustles. But we were wrong, and Grand Funk was right. Which slaps Victory right in their mitts.

They even beat out the Osmonds for number one spot in the Worst Group section of CREEM�s Readers� Poll, so don�t let anybody tell you they�re one iota less heavy, controversial and significant than they ever were. And now their organization tells me that even though they still eat organic foods they�re all buying fast new cars and getting ready for a big new tour with �Well, not into glitter, you understand, but... theatrics.� So don�t let Grand Funk themselves tell you they�re just rockin� Utopian soil-tillers. They�re crass as can be, they lied as much as I did, they�re rich chrome-plated consumers varooming down the highway in pursuit of the American Dream.