RIP Brother Wayne

[cosmic-hearse]

One of the greatest to ever do it, RIP Wayne Kramer

[Goldentony]

love this stupid band so much, fucking hell! that Tartar Field video just builds and builds and builds and gets better doesnt it? the full thing from Ramblin' Rose to Lookin' At You just sounds like all hell falling down on you. Love watching everyone's confused and delighted faces laughing at Wayne dancing around like a twat and doing the James Brown and Rob Tyner delivering that "MOOOOOFUCKAAAAA"

the original '68 version of Lookin' At You perfecting atonal no wave a few years before everybody else - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdqcbG64iv8

[extraordinary walnuts]

Better even than the Stooges for my money, every live clip of the MC5 I've ever seen has been astonishing.

I love this Beat Club set, especially the version of Ramblin' Rose at  9:50

If they ever make an MC5 biopic, I want Nick Kroll to play Wayne.

RIP Brother Wayne Kramer

[NoSleep]

RIP Wayne, motherfucker. Specially love the first album by the band, inspired as it is by James Brown's Live At The Apollo.

Wayne on guitar, vocals and crazy dancing here:

Really liked his work on the TV series Eastbound & Down, although I think much of the music used was also curated by his wife, so between them they made a great soundtrack.

Better even than the Stooges for my money

The Stooges were signed up (on the strength of their set) the same night as the record label came down to see MC5. The Stooges were the support band and were in awe of MC5.

I was lucky enough to see the MC3/DKT in 2006 which was awesome, especially the Sun Ra inspired bits. Lisa Kekaula made an awesome substitute for Rob Tyner.

Rick Beato will not be featuring a tribute to this awesome rock'n'roll legend. Generally speaking they seem to be much better known and influential in the UK than in the US.

[NoSleep]

Fuck it: more from that same gig

Awesome

[Goldentony]

extremely funny that their first UK gig was in Worthing, less funny that the gig looked amazing and appartently Mick Jones and Billy Idol were there enjoying themselves

[Goldentony]

MC5 need a few proper reissues or a reorganising of what's available IMO, I don't think they'd get the Stooges treatment with every take of everything they ever recorded but Kick Out The Jams was recorded over a few nights and needs releasing in full, the original Lookin' At You that sounds like PiL is on some obscure comp of which there's a few with no particular rhyme or reason. Songs like Black To Comm aswell, stuck on some weird compilation of random live recordings

EDIT - BLACK TO COMM

This recording was made from a live radio broadcast made by a Flint, Michigan station of an MC5 concert in Saginaw, MIchigan on New Year's day 1971. There are numerous bootlegs of this concert, including the infamous "Fuck Hudsons" album

[Goldentony]

laughing at this - https://www.metrotimes.com/music/on-this-day-in-1969-elektra-records-drops-mc5-for-attack-ad-on-hudsons-11209335

Rather than making a deal or offering a censored version of "Kick Out The Jams" to get their record on the store's shelves, the MC5 took to a local anarchist paper and doubled down on their profanity. The band published a full page ad in Fifth Estate to voice their feelings towards Hudson's.

The ad contains a photo of the band performing live and is captioned, "KICK OUT THE JAMS, MOTHERFUCKER! and kick in the door if the store won't sell the album on Elektra. FUCK HUDSON'S!"

[NoSleep]

extremely funny that their first UK gig was in Worthing, less funny that the gig looked amazing and appartently Mick Jones and Billy Idol were there enjoying themselves

I thought their first UK gig was at the very first Glastonbury, and the onlookers were people like the Pink Fairies (who later recorded a live EP with Wayne) and Lemmy.

[Goldentony]

I thought their first gig was at the very first Glastonbury, and the onlookers were people like the Pink Fairies (who later recorded a live EP with Wayne) and Lemmy.

ah maybe? the Worthing gig is in 1970 with the Pink Fairies though, Phun City? sources might be dubious but it looks like it was a week after the gig in the above videos in Detroit and a few days before a London show with Humble Pie

[NoSleep]

They're not even mentioned as being there (September 1970). I'm trying to remember who was recalling it and it may have been Lemmy, so maybe the old memory cells had taken a blow since those days, or did they end up playing unofficially (my memory cells have seen better days, too)? need to find the account I read.

[kalowski]

Jesus, just how good is it when your guitarists are Wayne Kramer and Fred "Sonic" Smith?
High Time is one of my favourite albums by anyone, although their greatest song, The Human Being Lawnmower, is on Back in the USA.

[NoSleep]

This is my fave track by the band:

Maybe the best Jazz Rock track of all time. When the horns finally burst in (the band's free jazz buddies from Detroit) it's fucking heaven. (Bob Seger snuck in on percussion in there somewhere, too)

[kalowski]

This is my fave track by the band:

Maybe the best Jazz Rock track of all time. When the horns finally burst in (the band's free jazz buddies from Detroit) it's fucking heaven. (Bob Seger snuck in on percussion in there somewhere, too)

I'm not claiming it's good writing, but I wrote this last year about the track

Drums, drums and more drums. The "sonicly speaking" sounds thunder out at the start of this, Thompson's drums joined by an array of percussion for a good minute until Smith and Kramer hop on board with a great garage rock riff. It's more 3-chord stuff that the MC5 could do so well. This is the kind of music you can imagine just killing on stage. The drums rumble along non-stop and allow the rest of the band to open up properly. More dumb but fun lyrics carry the song along until out of nowhere a horn section appears, neatly bookending things after the horns of Sister Anne. These horns feel more free association, a touch of Albert Ayler's Music is the Healing Force of the Universe rather than the marching band sound. Funnily enough, Ayler started life off with a marching band sound which opened up to more freedom as time went by, and the horns on this album seem to do the same.

[NoSleep]

Have you seen MC5 - A True Testimonial, the documentary about the band? I can't seem to find a trace of it after looking for 5 seconds. Thankfully I grabbed it (a rip) a few years back, so I'm going to dig that out some time this week.

There's an extra about the making of Skunk which I'm keen to see again, where they interview Wayne as well as the horn players who were involved. Apparently the recording engineer took Wayne aside after the session and suggested he knew some "better" horn players who would do a more "professional" job, ffs. Wayne told him where to get off.

[Goldentony]

hoping that doc actually gets a release now, seem to remember it was Wayne who blocked it in the first place

[NoSleep]

Wayne claimed they had agreed that he would be the music producer for the film and they said this was not the case. And this happened about two years after its release, to make it more confusing.

Dunno if this will be resolved at this time, if Wayne's wife is still alive, as she will stand by his words, I would guess.

[extraordinary walnuts]

I already had a copy, but noticed the other day that archive.org has it as well. Highly recommended!

https://archive.org/details/mc-5-a-true-testimonial-disc-1
https://archive.org/details/mc-5-a-true-testimonial-disc-2

[NoSleep]

Archive.org are a lifesaver!
I also found a full DVD rip on Karagarga today.
I think you should find the story of Skunk somewhere on disc 2 of that pair on archive.org.

[NoSleep]

Wayne claimed they had agreed that he would be the music producer for the film and they said this was not the case. And this happened about two years after its release, to make it more confusing.

Dunno if this will be resolved at this time, if Wayne's wife is still alive, as she will stand by his words, I would guess.

His longstanding wife, Jodi, sadly, died in 2018, but two years later he got married to his longtime manager, Margaret, so all bets are off.

[NoSleep]

ah maybe? the Worthing gig is in 1970 with the Pink Fairies though, Phun City? sources might be dubious but it looks like it was a week after the gig in the above videos in Detroit and a few days before a London show with Humble Pie

Aaaah! Phun City was an outdoor event, so maybe somebody conflated it with Glastonbury.

https://ukrockfestivals.com/phun-city-menu.html

Looks like it was virtually organised by The Pink Fairies and their entourage.

[Goldentony]

"The whole thing was offensive and obscene in many ways and you would have been surprised at some of the people there. There had been university people from America, Oxford and Cambridge and ordinary decent people. They just wanted to do what they wanted to do and they did it. I just cannot understand it"

- Mr E.T Oates, chief public health inspector

[NoSleep]

Let me try to explain. But first, take this microdot.

[Mr Farenheit]

[NoSleep]

This video, by a 24 year old mega fan of MC5 (now my favourite youtuber), is absolutely wonderful, an act of pure love:

Includes great reviews of all three official albums.