Mit dem australischen Quartett Deep Street Soul hat sich das etablierte Londoner Funk- und Soullabel Freestyle Records nach Cookin On 3 Burners und Randa & the Soul Kingdom erneut Verstärkung aus Down Under für seinen Künstlerkreis geholt. Und Deep Street Soul ist nicht nur Name sondern auch Programm: mit rau bis schmutzigen Rhythmuseinheiten und äußerst schnell gespieltem heavy Soul hauen die vier Instrumentalisten ihre Hörerschaft ordentlich aus den Socken. Tonangebend ist dabei Monique „Mon Cherie“ Boggia an der Hammond Orgel – Unterstützung bekommt sie von Agostino „Sol Loco“ Soldati an den Drums und Papa „J“ Hunter am Bass. Gitarrist Matt Green macht aus seiner Vorliebe für die Arrangements der Rhythm & Blues Legende Steve Cropper keinen Hehl und so ist sein Spiel und der Sound von Deep Street Soul stark an den Southern-Flavor des 60er Jahre Outputs von Stax Records, insbesondere aber an Booker T. und seine M.G.’s angelehnt. Neben der dynamischen Neuinterpretation des Protopunkstückes Kick Out The Jams von MC5, bei dem die Ausis die New Yorker Sängerin Tia Hunter mit einspannen, besticht besonders Greenbacks mit einer überaus charismatischen Shirley Davis am Mikrofon. Die Stücke sind alle sehr kurz gehalten, dafür intensiv und von vielen Breaks durchzogen. Hier geht definitiv der Funk ab! Beeinflusst von Osaka Monaurail aus Japan und den australischen Vorreitern The Bamboos schwimmen Deep Street Soul nach der Nu-Funk-Welle und dem Retro-Soul-Tsunami in Europa und den Staaten definitiv vorne mit im asiatisch-australischen Raum.

Andreas Margara (11. Novemeber 2009)

Apparently Eddie Vedder and Trent Reznor have the same taste in cover songs.

I was lucky enough to see them both pay homage to MC5 with a little help from their friends Tom Morello  and Jerry Cantrell.

Pearl Jam w/ Jerry Cantrell

Trent Reznor w/ Street Sweeper Social Club

Who knew? Apparently the 2 great musical loves of my life both just loooove to “Kick Out the Jams’ . Watch Trent Reznor and Eddie Vedder pay homage to MC5 . Theyare not alone either. Tom Morello and Jerry Cantrell also join in to kick out the , motherf******  jams.

unbedingt bis kurz vorm Ende gucken. 3:30 – was für ein Move!

Il n’y pas pas tellement de premiers albums enregistrés en live qui s’érigent en monuments au fil du temps qui passe. Celui-ci en est incontestablement un, qui plus est peut se classer sans honte dans les 100 meilleurs albums, toutes époques confondues. MC5 c’est Chicago, ville qui non seulement abrite les fameux studios Chess, mais qui est nourricière de tant de talents qui expriment le côté pessimiste d’une Amérique, dont seuls les citoyens primitifs croient connaître la notion de liberté. MC5 est là pour leur dire le contraire, car c’est un groupe politisé à l’extrême, qui harangue les foules en criant haut et fort ce qui va pas. Cela leur valut pas mal d’ennuis et aujourd’hui ils en sont fiers. Bien sûr tout cela se reflète dans leur musique, parfois très violente, toujours aguicheuse, ravages guitaresques de Wayne Kramer, Fred “Sonic” Smith, harangues de Roy Tyner en guise de chant, basse de Michael Davis, batterie de Dennis Thompson, forment ce brûlot enregistré en 1968 destiné à entrer dans l’histoire. A l’évidence, il y a des prémices du punk, presque symphonique à côté de la vrai vague ultérieure. Et pourtant cette musique coule plus limpide qu’elle n’y paraît au profane de la première écoute. D’ailleurs les trois qui restent, Kramer, Thompson, Davis, je les ai rencontrés. Ces mecs sont cools, polis, courtois, attentionnés, et plus sincères que n’importe quel politicien. Il ne prétendent pas diriger le monde en votre nom, mais juste vous mettre en garde que notre bonne vieille terre mérite mieux que la violence latente qui la consume. Elle ne devrait se trouver que dans la musique, c’est la seule et unique manière de la trouver belle. Tout le reste est ce que vous en ferez…

Ecouter gratuitement et télécharger sur MC5 – Kick Out The Jams MusicMe.

MC5 (Michigan, USA)
Kick Out the Jams
Elektra, 1969

Discovery: Pretty much everywhere, I just haven’t got around to listening to the whole album until now. From Monitor Mix to Live at Sin-é to the really bad guitar magazines I used to read as a young teenager. Everywhere.

History: I didn’t have any complaints about the fact list on Usher so here are (MC) 5 facts about this band:

1. MC5 is short for Motor City Five. It reflects their roots in Detroit (otherwise known as Motor City or Motown), vaguely resembles the name of a sports car and also echoes the Dave Clark Five, who were at the peak of their popularity in 1964–1965.

2. The track ‘Kick Out the Jams’ is included in the 2008 video game Guitar Hero World Tour. The guitar tracks were re-recorded but the original vocal track from Rob Tyner remains.

3. There was a lot of controversy relating to the title track, which starts with, “And right now it’s time to… KICK OUT THE JAMS, MOTHERFUCKERS!”. The record company executives wanted to edit it out of the album, while the band and manager John Sinclair were firmly opposed to this. “KICK OUT THE JAMS, MOTHERFUCKERS!” was originally printed on the inside of the album cover, but was soon pulled from stores. Two versions were eventually released, both with censored album covers, with the uncensored audio version sold behind record counters. Elektra dropped the band after the MC5 took a full-page ad out which consisted solely of a picture of lead singer Rob Tyner saying “Fuck Hudson’s” with the Elektra logo, after Hudson’s refused to stock the album.

4. Kick Out the Jams was recorded live at Detroit’s Grande Ballroom over two nights: Devil’s Night and Halloween, 1968.

5. On the TV Show ‘Friends’, Rachel Green wore an MC5 t-shirt in Series 9, Episode 18 – “The One With The Lottery”.

Review: The intro to this album is so dope:

“Brothers and sisters, the time has come for each and every one of you to decide whether you are going to be the problem, or whether you are gonna be the solution! You must choose, brothers, you must choose. It takes five seconds, five seconds of decision. Five seconds to realize your purpose here on the planet. It takes five seconds to realize that it’s time to move. It’s time to get down with it! Brothers, it’s time to testify and I want to know, are you ready to testify? I give you a testimonial: THE MC5!”

Anyway, this is just like an energy BOMB. It sounds awful and there aren’t really any songs, but it really doesn’t matter. It’s got a message and awesome guitar work and the delivery has “we don’t give a fuck” written all over it. I’m sure there’ll be days when filth like this (and I mean ‘filth’ in the best possible way) is all I want to hear, but I think it’s like a lot of punk music- you sort of had to be there.

Practical information: Kick Out the Jams

"Look upon my works ye mighty, and wonder how I get paid for this"

1. Jackson 5

They say you should never go back, and that is certainly true for me and certain parts of Glasgow. But a comeback at this level, at this age? Moreover, I can’t believe the tactical naivety of these jokers. You just can’t continue to play that formation when you are getting no movement whatsoever from the frontman.

2. Maroon 5

I feel that I have a special connection with this band. They got their name from a Dulux colour chart, and whaddayaknow, I decided on the exact same colour scheme for our bedroom, and Teddy Sheringham came round and helped me paint it. Funny story actually; I’d popped out to get some chips for lunch and when I came back my wife had loads of maroon hand marks all over her body, even though my wife was not involved with the painting. Dozy mare! Teddy had a fair bit on him too, so they took a shower. Well, as Teddy said, we should try to save water.

3. MC5

“Are you part of the problem, or part of the solution?”, the MC5 famously asked. Less famously, Glenn Hoddle asked me this question at Chelsea after our first training session. I didn’t understand the problem, but I figured that the solution probably involved pretending to be Irish. Begorrah.

4. Dave Clark Five

Some might see  having a drummer as the frontman as controversial, but I am fully behind it. I’m sure the politically correct crowd will be dead against it, but really, what is wrong with giving a central role to a lumpen clogger who will hit anything that moves? As I tried to tell Glenn Hoddle.

5. Ben Folds Five

I ask for one thing from people. Honesty. The name implies five members… FIVE. When I got Gabrielle Marcotti to count the band members for me he told me there were “three members, one two three. Goddamn it Tony, why do you call me over to your desk to do elementary shit like this?”.

Always joking, that Gabby. He don’t like it when I call him that. Anyway: Ben Folds Three, not Five.

When I was in Marseille, you were what you said you were. Like when I went down the docks, paid for my usual. Then reached down. AND…and…oh my. I had not thought about that in a while.

Pop Tarts Suck Report:

Click here to go to PTS to check Cheap Trick “Surrender (Budokan Version)”, Bob Dylan “Ballad of a Thin Man”, MC5 “I Want You Right Now”…plus more tunes from other genres Nirvana “Where Did You Sleep Last Night”, Johnny Cash “25 Minutes to Go”, James Brown “Night Train”

Here—with a shout-out to my brother Don, with whom (at the age of 15) I saw the MC5  in Chicago’s Lincoln Park during the 1968 Democratic Convention (when nobody outside the Detroit/Ann Arbor area [including us] knew who they were)—is an awfully good cover, from what might seem an unlikely source, of one of their “greatest hits.”

Jeff Buckley, “Kick Out The Jams,” live, Chicago, 1995

And here, courtesy, apparently, of the Department of Defense, is (silent) footage of the scene in Lincoln Park on August 25, 1968—the day the MC5 (who appear here fleetingly) played.

**********

lagniappe

Von Freeman, the now-86-year-old tenor saxophonist—he still sounds terrific—toward the end of his Chicago Jazz Festival set yesterday afternoon in Grant Park, after introducing two young musicians: “I was that age once—I just don’t remember when.”

We need more jazz like this: counterintuitive, surprising, innovative and tuneful as hell. Although capable of a gem like the long lyrical ballad Jelly, the album’s next-to-last track, Quartet Offensive also like their noise. On this new cd, the Baltimore jazz group prove equally adept at an MC5-style amalgam of gritty riff-rock and free jazz, as well as intermingling plenty of effectively haphazard improvisation within the strikingly terse, melodic architecture of their compositions. Much of this compares favorably with the excellent, melodic Boston free jazz outfit Gypsy Schaeffer. John Dierker gets a surprising amount of range out of his bass clarinet, adding unexpected textures in tandem with Eric Trudel’s tenor sax. Matt Frazao’s often heavily processsed guitar also adds a wealth of shades and frequencies over the often astonishingly minimalist, subtle groove of the rhythm section, Adam Hopkins on bass and Nathan Ellman-Bell on drums. Headphone music, most definitely.

The big riff-rockers are the opening and closing tracks here. The first works a raunchy funk-metal riff down into a guitar-and-horns freakout in the same vein as King Crimson’s 21st Century Schizoid Man, then winds its way back up. The last cut moves deftly from riff-rock to swing, sax and guitar effects bubbling like acid on cinderblock in midsummer until the insistent pulse of the horns brings the track back into focus. The single best track might be the langorous yet fascinating dirge Heavy-Light. An off-kilter conversation between Dierker and Trudel opens it, guitar entering mysteriously over the horns’ repetitive insistence, sax eventually rising overhead. Then a sunbaked guitar solo that morphs into a rippling firestorm as the effects pedals seem to gleefully fry themselves. Meanwhile, the rhythm section maintains the pace of a tortoise. But it’s a funky tortoise: he just moves at about a third of the speed that we do.

Or, the best song here might be the tongue-in-cheek narrative The Sheep Ate the Flowers, kicking off with a staccato guitar riff that works itself into a maelstrom of noise into guitar feedback that fades down until it’s mostly inaudible, then up to a hypnotic, circular, guitar-driven fusionesque vamp. Or it could be the self-explanatory O.D., kicking off with yet more staccato guitar echoed restlessly by the horns, followed by what sounds like a playful rip of the chorus from Steely Dan’s Josie – in 13. Sax and then guitar solos grow increasingly unhinged, to the point where at the end of Frazao’s crazed trip to the emergency room, the horns have to take over and comp and keep the restraints tightly knotted. There’s also a evocatively pensive ballad titled Gooodbye, Cavendish and the straight-up groove Yo Banana Boy with its thoughtful Wes Montgomery-inflected guitar and shapeshifting harmonies between the horns. The liner notes indicate that this album was recorded with help from the Peabody Office of Career Development and the Maryland State Arts Council: money well spent. One can only wonder how many other excellent groups like this are kicking around towns like “Ballmer.” Quartet Offensive’s next gig is a free show on September 12 at 9 PM at Windup Space, 12 W North Ave. in Baltimore with Brooklyn group Afuche.

De tempos em tempos surge alguma banda nacional que às vezes acaba nem fazendo muito sucesso por aqui, mas acabam estourando lá fora. Aconteceu com o Wry, Killing Chainsaw e outros. Normalmente essas bandas acabam não sendo das capitais Rio e São Paulo, mas os motivos que levam a isso eu não sei explicar.
Então essas bandas aproveitam da internet e com força de vontade resolvem aderir ao “faça você mesmo”. E nisso algumas bandas acabam se destacando ainda mais pelas qualidades de cada integrante. E nessa aparecem bandas como o Black Drawing Chalks.

A banda foi formada em Goiânia que possui uma cena muito legal graças a iniciativas da Monstro Discos e os festivais Goiânia Noise e Bananada. Ela é composta por 4 integrantes com idade entre 22 e 24 anos e todos trabalham na área de design. Os garotos possuem um estúdio de design chamado Bicicleta Sem Freio onde são os responsáveis pelos trabalhos da Monstro Discos e pela identidade do Abril Pro Rock de 2008. Isso também é visível nos materiais da banda que com todo esse empenho agrega mais valor ao trabalho, tornando-o mais atrativo.

Esse empenho e o fato das letras serem em inglês, faz com que eles acabem obtendo maior destaque não só entre as bandas nacionais, mas também no exterior! Assim o BDC conseguiu se apresentar no festival Pop Montreal no Canadá em 2008 e até deve começar uma turnê em solo americano no fim do ano. E acredito que irão acabar fazendo mais sucesso lá fora do que aqui no Brasil, como as bandas que citei no início do post.

Mas e a música? Bom, a música é fantástica! Me lembra muito bandas antigas como T-Rex e MC-5, que com o som simples conseguiram influenciar gerações e continuam o fazendo até hoje. É a típica música que você coloca no talo na festa, canta junto e balança a cabeça! E se você não gosta disso meu caro, não sabe o que está perdendo.

Confiram o myspace dos caras – que tem um header sensacional – e o clipe novo a seguir. Aposto que vocês irão curtir o trabalho visual. E se você gostar, dá uma passada no site do VMB e vota nos garotos que estão concorrendo como Rock Alternativo e Aposta MTV.

Novo clipe – My Favorite Way

Links
www.myspace.com/blackdrawingchalks
Entrevista G1
VMB 2009 – MTV

“……. it seemed at last that there were two musics progressing at one time before the seat of Illúvatar, and they were utterly at variance. The one was deep and wide and beautiful, but slow and blended with an immeasurable sorrow, from which its beauty chiefly came. The other had now achieved a unity of its own; but it was loud, and vain, and endlessly repeated; and it had little harmony, but rather a clamorous unison as of many trumpets blaring upon a few notes. And it essayed to drown the other music by the violence of its voice, but it seemed its most triumphant notes were taken by the other and woven into its own solemn pattern.”
- J.R.R. Tolkien (The Silmarillion)

How about that for a mythological origin of heavy metal music? In the real world the term “Metal” was first ascribed to music by the herald of the libertines, William S. Burroughs. His actual words were:

“…Heavy Metal People of Uranus wrapped in cool blue mist of vaporized bank notes – And the Insect People of Minraud with metal music”
- Burroughs, William S. (Nova Express)

Heavy metal was probably born in the first few notes of Beethoven’s 5th symphony, when the genius sacrificed melody for rhythm’s sake. This school of thought is one of the major influences behind the evolution of heavy metal. This, along with many other factors, shaped the coarse sound of early electric blues into the extremely creative and honest form of music, known today as heavy metal.

Early Rock ‘N’ Roll : The ‘Vanilla’ Rock

Since its conception in the early 50’s, rock had essentially been nothing but a sickeningly wholesome background sound of puppy love. It had neither the emotional depth of the soul-blues scene, nor the musical craftsmanship of the jazz maestros. It was only something to move your body by, thoughtless, intuitive. The critics were merciless; they ousted rock and roll from the holy temple of music, rock fans were literally pariahs. But they missed two extremely important qualities of rock music: it was unpretentious, and it was packed with unbridled energy. Any youth of any generation could relate with that and thus rock became the music it has always been since: for the young, of the young and by the young.

The first high priest of rock ‘n’ roll is undoubtedly Bill Haley. History hasn’t been kind to him. Elvis Presley and Buddy Holly are revered like saints, their music respected by writers and scholars as well as the record-buying public, yet Bill Haley – who was there before any of them, playing rock & roll before it even had a name – is barely represented by more than a dozen of his early singles, and not even recognized by the average listener, often treated as an anomaly that came and went very quickly.

The central event in Haley’s career was the single “Rock Around the Clock” topping the charts for eight weeks in the spring and summer of 1955, an event that most music historians identify as the dawn of the rock & roll era.

For all their energy and greasy hair locks, these rock stars were out there only to have a good time, they had no intention of bringing about any social revolution. The pioneers, who would bring forth socio-political angst through their music, were still in their grammar schools.

After Haley came the all-sweeping Elvis era, and everybody knows everything about that. He isn’t a personal favorite, so let us skip ahead to the first band that really showed us how a rock band can be as creative as the old masters of the classical era.

I am talking about The Beatles. Hold on! No need to hold up your moshpitting attitude and snort your nose! They surely have sung their share of sweet syrupy ballads, but the true talents of The Beatles hide elsewhere. You want psychedelic crazy lyrics? Let’s see you top ‘I am the Walrus’ or ‘Glass Onion’. You want progressive? ‘Strawberry Fields’ should suffice. With ‘The White Album’ they had produced the heaviest sounding album of that era. You thought Marilyn Manson was disturbing? Well the androgynous pseudo-demonic rock star took the latter half of his name from the serial killer Charles Manson, who, by the way, started his killing spree influenced by the track ‘Helter Skelter’ from ‘The White Album’. They certainly were no cute gargling boy band.

Other than being the premier proto-progressive rock band (topped only by Pink Floyd), The Beatles had also influenced a generation of musicians who would go on to establish the true form of heavy metal.

After The Beatles, came a band who would personalize the lunatic creativity of that age. They would put so much originality, so much psychedelia into their music; the face of rock music would be changed forever. Led by the moonstruck genius of Syd Barett (who was succeeded by the equally stunning duo Roger Waters and David Gilmour), Pink Floyd created something so unique, that even today it is impossible to assign them one genre, no matter how simply you interpret their music. Space rock, art rock, progressive rock, psychedelic rock………..it doesn’t end. Only one thing is sure, throughout the history of rock music, no one has yet surpassed the amount of ingenuity, talent and imagination that Pink Floyd had shown.

The Revenge of the Outcasts: Proto-Metal

As the rock ‘n’ roll music scene erupted across the world, its silly lyrical concepts alienated a certain group of youth. Their retaliation came with a type of music that focused angrily on dissident and alienated themes.

The first blasts of music which were nearly heavy metal in their aggressiveness were emitted by bands the likes of The Kinks, The Who. The Kinks’ “You Really Got Me” or The Who’s “My Generation” was controversial and abrasive enough for their time, making these two tracks the first proto-metal songs.

A new type of music, which borrowed heavily from rock and roll and the blues, was gaining influence on the youth of those times, who were slowly getting tired of the stagnant ‘Summer of Love’ scene. The hippies had had their time in the sun; Vietnam was slowly ending, and with that, their protest rallies were growing shorter.

These early attempts came in three forms. One with a passion for deliberate coarseness, one leaning more towards a refined and artful sound and the last one bent on exploring various techniques of the instruments, especially the guitar.

The first group vented their anger with a blend of loud, distorted blues, which was pioneered by a chaotic band called Blue Cheer, who made grating, droning, grinding blues rock with the aid of deformed amplifiers and an ardor for crudity. They were the vanguard of a range of electric blues bands from Cream to Jimi Hendrix to ZZ Top, and inspired much of the loud rock which followed. They were followed up by an array of bands like Vanilla Fudge, Grand Funk Railroad, MC5, Golden Earring, Atomic Rooster, Cactus, and the legendary The Jeff Beck Group. Among these, the most historically important were Iron Butterfly and Steppenwolf because of their co-founding the term “Heavy Metal”, in terms of music. Steppenwolf’s biker theme “Born to be Wild” included the lines “Heavy Metal Thunder” and Iron Butterfly named their first album “Heavy”. Iron butterfly’s seminal work was their “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida”- a 17 minute long masterpiece with a menacing riff.

The second faction of people was the intelligentsia of this experimental music scene. Their progeny still are the creators of the most complex, beautiful and interesting music, clearly distinctive in their use of complex compositional structures, odd time signatures, and intricate and virtuosic instrumental playing. They were the creators of a genre called progressive rock, which eventually evolved into progressive metal.

The early form came from the psychedelic mind trips of The Beatles and the beautiful lunacies of Pink Floyd. In spite of their immense talent, the form they created lacked any resemblance with the modern progressive rock format.

The first progressive metal band whose sound we can still relate with the progressive bands of today was King Crimson. If one group is responsible for the whole progressive rock/metal genre, it is King Crimson. Led by guitarist Robert Fripp, their seminal first album ‘In The Court Of The Crimson King’, had sketched out a whole new way of musical experimentation for a generation of new musicians. New groups like Camel, ELP (Emerson, Lake and Palmer), Genesis, Yes, Rush took this genre to more exciting dimensions. Neil Pert of Rush redefined progressive drumming and took it to such technical levels that he has been recognized as the premier rock drummer by rock fans and critiques alike.

Finally, there was a cluster of bands who grew from the surf and garage rock traditions into a technique-oriented format, beginning with half-American Indian guitarist Link Wray, who, basically invented the power chord, and leading through surf guitar champion Dick Dale, whose breakneck speed of single-note staccato picking technique was unrivaled until it entered the repertoires of metal virtuosos like Eddie Van Halen.

By 1969, the influence of these artists had saturated the public consciousness, thus preparing them for the impact of three bands, who would embody the apex of hard rock and heavy metal: Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple.

There is a mysterious place in Lexington, Kentucky known as the Narcotics Farm. It was a prison / (voluntary) drug study center built by the United States Government in 1935. The building is still there, but is now a (boring) federal prison. Regardless, it has a most intriguing history.

According to a press release from Kentucky.gov,

“The facility was authorized by Congress in 1929 as a hospital, a treatment center for addicts who were convicted of Federal offenses, and a research laboratory established to find a cure for drug addiction…Patients at the Lexington hospital underwent a treatment plan, which consisted of drug withdrawal, psychotherapy, athletics, recreation, and work. Each patient was assigned a job in maintenance, food service, laundry, sanitation, or farming.”

Wayne Kramer, of the band MC5, spent time at the facility. He was caught selling drugs to undercover federal agents in 1975, and spent over two years in Lexington.

Kramer narrated and wrote the score for a PBS documentary called The Narcotic Farm (there is also a book by the same name), which premiered in November 2008.

From the website for the film and book,

“‘Narco,’ as it was known locally, was a strange anomaly, a coed institution where convicts did time alongside volunteers who’d checked themselves in for treatment. It became the world’s epicenter for drug treatment and addiction research. For forty years it was the gathering place for this country’s growing drug subculture, a rite of passage that initiated famous jazz musicians, drug-abusing MDs, street hustlers, and drugstore cowboys into the new fraternal order of the American junkie.

But what began as a bold and ambitious public works project was shut down in the 1970s amid changes in drug policy and scandal over its drug program, which recruited hundreds of prisoners to volunteer as human guinea pigs for groundbreaking drug experiments and rewarded them with bonus doses of heroin for their efforts.”

A source close to the farm recently shared with me that Buddy Ebsen (Jed Clampett) and Ray Charles, among others, spent time at Narco.

Gaye Blades- Bobby Is A Lover (2008)

Shellac- My Black Ass (1994)

The Warlocks- Shake the Dope Out (2002)

MC5- Ramblin’ Rose (1969) starts about 53 seconds into video

Necro- Your Fuckin’ Head Split (2000)

Enjoy!

Chris

•

•

When I was a young man trying to understand my place in the world, it was greatly informed by the culture around me in the streets of Detroit. I could either accept the Polish/Catholic/American working class heritage I was born into, or I could rebel against it by accepting the counter-culture vision that was alive in that day.

I chose to rebel.

That rebellion led to a local rock scene that was heavily politicized by Poet/Writer John Sinclair and the band he managed, the MC5. I believed that the youth of that day was going to revolutionize the world we lived in, by kicking out gross Capitalism, out dated religious values, corrupt politics, imperialism and wars overseas and the laws/social mores that no longer served the new enlightenment of the day. It was an amazing short lived mental/physical revolution that took to the streets in protesting against the Vietnam War, winding its way through the clothes we wore, music listened to, culture identified with and the means to change our every day awareness, well at least the socially legal acceptable means to do such things. It was youthful idealism that grabbed youth culture by the throat but sadly was eventually co-opted by the powers that be through advertising, mass media, political dirty tricks and drugs, not to mention growing a few years older and having to accept responsibility for ones own life.

Though I eventually saw the limitations of that particular cultural/political revolution, I wonder how much of that spirit stayed on by then personally turning itself inward instead of outward, going for spiritual revolution that took me to years of meditating and yoga, eventually becoming a Hare Krsna devotee? I somehow always believed that a large group of people could join forces and find a higher more noble vision to change a world of war, hate, prejudice, ignorance, sexism, racism and flat out distrust and injustice.

My last attempt at changing my consciousness and that of the worlds was through the teaching of A.C. Bhaktivedanta Prabhupada, as taught by ISKCON and Satsvarupa Goswami. My, my, how much of dead end that ideal change turned out to be, be it in the consciousness of myself or the world changing for the better, though both have changed much in that time.

I have no regrets looking back, for I feel I had to lead the life I lived to get to the point I am at now, though I do wonder what would have happened if I chose differently, like would I have had more financial security at this point in my life, would I have stayed closer to home and family, would have I eventually had a larger family, would I be more secure, smarter and on top of my profession instead of wallowing somewhere in the middle ground of it all, still experimenting, still trying to find my personal/professional niche?

•

•

"Two's Missing" by The Who album art with buttons

The Who album art for the 1987 compilation of hard-to-obtain tracks features a painting by Richard Evans with super-mod-buttons on guitarist Pete Townshend and an enormous “ELVIS FOR EVERYONE” button on rock’n'roll drummer hero, Keith Moon.  It’s probably 4-inches in diameter!

“Two’s Missing” includes the “Can’t Explain” rare b-side “Bald Headed Woman” complete with Jimmy Page guitar solo (“he owned the only fuzz box in the country at that time”),  Rolling Stones covers like “Last Time,” and the Martha & the Vandellas hit “Heatwave.”

I love to buttons in action on record covers, like the MC5, GG Allin, and Thee Makeout Party.  Do you have a favorite?

Click here to go back to BusyBeaver.net