If you think the Clash were political then think again as the MC5 lived and breathed trouble and conflict.

But...first and foremost they were a rock 'n' roll band with incendiary tunes and showmanship who influenced bands from Iggy to Motorhead to the Damned to the London SS and like rock 'n' roll bands they succumbed to its lifestyles.

In this feature we salute the mighty Motor City 5 - classic punk rock

Looking At You/Borderline (A Square 1968)

Oh yes indeedy! Produced by John Sinclair and arguably superior to the Landau produced version of the song on 'Back In The USA'. Guitars scream, feedback wails, controlled aggression and sounding like a volcano waiting to burst! The true sound of punk rock! Sinclair who produced it confessed he didn't have a clue about production and indeed it was released unmixed!

I wanted to make sure that all the high sound got in there because I noticed that when records were played on the radio, the high sounds tended to drop out...so I loaded treble onto 'Looking At You' to the point that the record was just about worthless for standard record players. John Sinclair Zigzag July 77

Kick Out The
Jams (Elektra)

"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 going to be the solution!"

Applause.

"It takes five seconds . . . five seconds of decision . . . five seconds to realise your purpose here on the planet . . . I give you a testimonial - the MCS!"

Zoooooooom . . . crunch. The 5 leap on stage and into "Ramblin' Rose" with the hardest, heaviest high-energy attack ever put on record. From there on in you're on your own, in Detroit's Grande Ballroom in the glory days of autumn '68 with the meanest, toughest, most militant no-bullshit rock and roll band ever to emerge from the American heartland.

Nine years on and the MCS still sound like they eat spotty little speedfreaks for breakfast, preaching "rock and roll; dope and fucking in the streets" with fundamentalist fervour, guitar energy that kills insects stone dead and a jagged ten tons - of - scrap - metal - at - two - hundred - miles - an hour attack that leaves you breath-less and exhilarated and picking mix exploded with, snarling. blistering guitars.

"Kick Out The Jams" is loud, proud rock and roll madness from an era when we thought that if we were weird enough, resolute enough, stoned enough and together enough we could make the establishment curl up and die by sheer good vibrations. Listening to the MCS, I can't believe we lost. The 5 were one hell of a screamin' fireball rock and roll band. There were Mike Davis (bass) and Dennis Thompson (drums) smokin' and stokin' in the rhythm section, Fred "Sonic" Smith and Brother Wayne Kramer on guitars. Listen, if Eric Bloom of the Cult plays "stun guitar" then Kramer and Smith played "instant disintegration
guitars". Along with Rob Tyner's hoarse, exhortatory vocals, it all welded together in a death-before-dishonour kamikaze slipstream of "total assault on the culture."

Apart from the Sun Ra adaptation "Starship", which is basic psychedelic nonsense redeemed only by its energy and the slow blues "Motor City Is Burning" (and in 1967 Detroit actually was burning -such were the, times), "Kick Out The Jams" is nothing but flat-out full-tilt rock and roll and it still remains a sine qua non of the genre.

This was their classic first album, recorded a year before "Back In The USA" and listening to these two albums it becomes apparent that on their own musical turf there was nothing in America to touch 'em. Mind you, at that time the Dead and the Airplane were considered to be more where it was at, and the 5 didn't stay together long enough to see their style of rock and roll become a dominant force. But hell, that's the breaks.

This reissue ain't -perfect. The spine says "MCS" instead of "MCS", John Sinclair's cele-brated rabble-rousing liner note has been omitted and WEA have used a censored mix that substitutes "Kick Out The Jams, Brothers And Sisters!" for the "Kick Out The Jams, Motherfuckers!" rant of the original mix. But it's great to have the MCS back where they belong: in the record racks and on the turntables.

Two more things. Thing one - if high-energy no-quarter positive-vibrations rock and roll is your shot, then there's no way you're not going to have a great time with this album. It still kicks ass on most
of the new rock and roll about these days.

Thing two - free Wayne Kramer!

Charles Shaar Murray NME 4.6.77

 

Motor City monsters re-visited NME 12.3.77

MC5 Back In The U S. A. (Atlantic)

I HEARD the MCS for the first time five days ago and I'm still coming down. Re-released by public demand (and a private plea from cuddlesome Charles Shaar Murray) "Back In The U.S.A." was the second album by these five boys out of Motor City, first released in 1970.

Originally the brainchild of White Panther leader John Sinclair, the MCS bit the hand that fed them by hooking up with rock critic Jon Landau and rejecting radical politics in favour of sex, violence and dancing. While not explicitly political, the songs here are as conducive to youthful dissent and rebellion as outright propaganda would be. "Back In The U.S.A." won't send you running to the library for a hot copy of Das Kapital, but it could just drive you to saluting your Army/Careers/Probation Officer with two fingers and a Bronx cheer.

Almost without exception these 11 tracks are little gems - hard fast and nasty, just one lasting longer than three minutes and most of them around the two and a half minute mark.

"Awopbopaloobopalopbam-boom!" and with the best loved bit of Esperanto in the history of the universe, rock and roll once more chooses to line up with the dragon rather than St. George. They tore up seats to Little Richard's original "Tutti Frutti", but you can tear up streets to this, as Rob Tyner's gloriously dumb voice pounds out a driving confirmation that bad boys have all the fun, calling up the essential innocence of rock and roll beyond all irrelevancies of talk.

"Tonight" (best rock title ever) is a haul-ass celebration of sitting in class getting juiced up with the sheer exhilaration of bands that make your ears bleed. With no plans beyond the next daybreak, the arrogantly acned guitars were made for each other and the pure dissenting harmonies are oblivious to all but their obsession - "Every day/Gonna hear them say/Got to get down in the U.S.A./ Tonight!"

The best song ever written about the wasteland between 12 and 20, "Teenage Lust", explores the adolescent dilemma of being hot non-stop "Surrounded by bitches who just wouldn't give it in/Who thought that getting down was an original sin/ Baby, baby, help me/I think I'm gonna bust/ l need a healthy outlet/For my teenage lust!"

Who could hold out against Wayne Kramer's guitar, with a desperation made relentless by frustration destroying all in its path, or Dennis Thompson, attacking his drums just like he'd do to that tight-assed chick if he ever got hold of her? On your feet or on your knees? You'll be on your face when this is finished with you. But boys are never as bad as you hope they'll be - the 4.12 "Let Me Try" is a love song in a true sense, with no phoney promises or dumb flattery but just a simple statement of intent. The drums are like heartbeats and decisively tentative guitars feel their way with painful ease around an aching piano melody.

Rubbing salt into the wounds inflicted by terminal teenage lust is "Looking At You", a screaming full-throttle "Death Race 2000" debacle that couldn't have come out of anywhere but Detroit, Murder City, which holds the dubious honour of the highest homicide rate in America. "Opened up my eyes baby/You made me realise all want to do/Is look at you!" It's a teeth-clenching speed-shake mangled-Luftwaffe killer that you could tear your-self apart dancing to, Kramer's guitar is as dirty as a dog fight; it's like being out of your head and playing tag with the traffic on a warm wild night. Listen-ing to it you can understand why they were too scared to leave Kramer free on the street.

Side Two opens with the butt-twitching "High School", a good-time number worthy of The Monkees (what higher accolade?) with insidiously innocent lyrics "They're gonna be taking over/You better get out of the way/Cos they're going to High Schoo/Rah! Rah! Rah!" The guitar riffs are as irresistible as a drive-in movie, all of it as dumb and beautiful as a sun bronzed cheerleader.

"Call Me Animal" is a brash open invitation which the parents of Young America no doubt responded to with enthusiasm. Heavy handed though it is, the guitars could blast through solid concrete and they'll yell at you to turn it down, so it serves its purpose.

Much better is "The American Ruse", the essence of rock and roll meeting the dialectics of protest, propaganda to shake it down to, moving along as easy as greased lightning, Fred "-Sonic" Smith's guitar strangling the American Dream in a few bars of contempt and affection. Yet it's nevertheless gilded with harsh sweet harmony and searing optimism.

The compulsively manic "Shakin' Street" features Rob Tyner in a tireless monotone recalling the orphans of America blind to everything but rock and roll, and Michael Davis as anonymous and irreproachable as a bass should be. "Their mamas all warned them not to-come to town? It got into heir blood, now they gotta get down". On one level a no-nonsense rocker, it also comes across as slightly scary in its joyless determination to have a good time.

"The Human Being Lawn-mower" lacks the infectious-ness of some of the other tracks and doesn't make such a deadly fine point. Hard and fast though it is, it lacks the, precision of tracks like "Teen-age Lust"; it misses the jugu-lar, but it just about takes off an ear.

Meanwhile, "Back in the U.S.A." ends with its Chuck Berry namesake, the immortal celebration of America in a happier time as Kramer serenades his country with menacing affection, wringing more love out of a guitar than any orator could ever give. Unlike Presidents, guitars don't lie; while hamburgers sizzle on open grills and blacks sizzle in Watts - "I'm so glad I'm living in the U.S.A.!"

If any music sounds like suicide it's the MC5. It wouldn't be a shock to find inscribed on the label, "This record will self-destruct in five seconds". As it was, it took them five years.

Free Wayne Kramer.

Julie Burchill

Kick Out the Jams is of course a complete classic, capturing the MC5 in their full-on primal/political manner. Cut a few years later after Back in the USA and you find the MC5 stuck in one of the bleakest periods in American history: the revolution had failed to happen- Vietnam dragged on-Nixon had returned to power with the help of his "silent majority"-Watergate- Kent State...and so on...Add to that The MC5 had somehow not become the most popular, as well as greatest, rock'n'roll band in the world. Their peers weren't doing that well- The Stooges moving towards their messy end as the NY Dolls were moving towards their messy beginning. Roky Erickson ended up in a mental home where ECT-treatment would damage him. Sly Stone was moving towards Fresh before lapsing into addiction and mediocrity. The Velvets had split, Lou Reed going to work in an office before embarking on his solo-career etc. The idealism and freedom of the1960s was nowhere to be found...still the MC5 got on and made arguably their best LP.

Thanks to an NME-compilation in the 90s that featured Skunk (Sonically Speaking) I wanted to explore this album as well as Jams (which I knew from its 1991 reissue) and Back in the USA (which I bought as the cover was cool and it had a song called Teenage Lust on- which was very MaryChain/Larry Clark)- High Time is their most overlooked LP and a million times better than the pitiful hype-practioners heaped on people by the music press/record companies the last few years (e.g. The Von Bodies, TheKills, White Stripes, The Hives, The Vines...and so on). The MC5 were onto something & produced this LP which was rumoured to be the one that the band liked the best! (Wayne Kramer said as much in an interview with Uncut a few years ago...). Their primal rock is delivered efficiently over these eight-tracks, though Miss X sees the band veer off into ballad-territory and is worth buying the LP for (perhaps if they'd gone on longer they'd have produced a Clear Spot-type LP?). The majority of it is pulsing rock-though delivered by the tightest muthas on the planet and with a sensibility found in forward-thinking jazz of the time (Coltrane, Davis, Sanders, Monk, Mingus, Coleman...). The wild guitars of Wayne Kramer & the late Fred' Sonic' Smith are suitably mindblowing- this may have been a band towards the end of their brief, brilliant career, but they still played with the freshness you'd associate with the start of their career...High Time is one of the great rock albums of the 1970s and one I'd easily class next to Funhouse (The Stooges), New York Dolls, or The Day...(Rocket from the Tombs). An album this great really ought to be appreciated more-Nirvana? PAH! Primal Scream? REALLY! The Strokes? YOU MUST BEJ OKING...this is the real deal and a reminder that there was more to TheMC5 than Kick Out the Jams... Jason Parkes Amazon review