Secret History of Rock. The Most Influential Bands You've Never Heard (12 page)

Between 1989 and 1992, Beat Happening released four full albums of new material. The first,
Jamboree
, was produced by members of the Screaming Trees and Steve Fisk (of Pigeonhead and Pearl Jam spin-off Brad). The record shows the band greatly improved as songwriters, though still unapologetically amateurish. Songs like the two-chord
Indian Summer
(covered at various points by Luna, Spectrum, Yo La Tengo, and Eugenius) and the irrepressibly cute
The This Many Boyfriends Club
are among the group’s most memorable works.

King Coffey, Butthole Surfers:

Calvin, Beat Happening, and K Records are incredibly influential on the U.S. scene as a whole. The entire K ethic was really a shot in the arm for the do-it-yourself thing, they really had their act together as far as putting out tapes, supporting the local scene, doing things on their own terms and own level. There was a vision and style very unique to K, best personified by Beat Happening. All their albums are just brilliant, very primitive and minimalist. Gibby [of the Butthole Surfers] and I have talked about doing a Beat Happening cover band.

Black Candy
, also released in 1989, was just as tuneful and perhaps a touch more polished than Jamboree, while 1991’s
Dreamy
is similar, but less successful. By 1992’s
You Turn Me on
(produced by Fisk and the
Young Marble Giants
’ Stuart Moxham), Beat Happening had been at it for nearly a decade and it showed in the band’s confidence and improved musical chops. Despite its relative polish, songs like
Teenage Caveman
and
Tiger Trap
have all the classic Beat Happening charm of their earliest recordings.

Since the release of
You Turn Me on
, the trio has not released any new music, though Calvin says the group has not broken up. Bret has played in the group D+ and owns a bookstore/cafe in Anacortes, Washington. Heather does set design and visual art in Seattle. Calvin, meanwhile, continues to operate K Records with his partner Candice Pederson. In 1993, K released Beck’s One Foot In the Grave, which Calvin produced and to which he lent his distinctive vocals. The following year, Johnson built an eight-track studio in his basement, called Dub Narcotic, and embarked on two new bands. The first, a loose garage rock group called the Halo Benders, features Doug Martsch of Built to Spill. The second is Dub Narcotic Sound System, a group centered around Calvin’s studio and featuring a revolving cast of collaborators. DNSS was among the first indie rock groups of the ‘90s to embrace and incorporate dub techniques into their music. While he seems confident Beat Happening will one day resurface, in the meantime Calvin keeps busy orchestrating new revolutions in independent music.

DISCOGRAPHY

Beat Happening
EP
(K, 1984)
; a five-song cassette-only debut, collected on both later compilations.

Three Tea Breakfast
(K, 1984)
; a second five-song cassette-only release, also included on the compilations.

Beat Happening
(K, 1985; 1996)
; the first full-length; later reissued with lots of bonus tracks as a compilation that’s virtually identical to the
1983-85
collection.

Beat Happening
/
Screaming Trees
EP
(K/Homestead, 1988)
; the band’s contribution consists of four tracks of electrified acid pop.

Jamboree
(K, 1989)
; their first proper album, and perhaps their best; featuring the often-covered
Indian Summer
and other classic Beat Happening material.

Black Candy
(K, 1989); a slightly darker, and nearly as terrific, follow-up to
Jamboree
.

1983-85
(K/Feel Good All Over, 1990)
; collects the first two EPs, the debut album, and assorted rarities onto one CD; made somewhat irrelevant by the expanded CD reissue of the 1985 debut.

Dreamy
(K/Sub Pop, 1991)
; a relative low point, though still full of catchy and worthwhile songs.

You Turn Me on
(K/Sub Pop, 1992)
; leaving off a good note, this record is full of strong and confident material.

TRIBUTE:
Fortune Cookie Prize: A Tribute to Beat Happening
(Simple Machines, 1992)
; Beat Happening covers done by Velocity Girl, Superchunk, Unrest, members of Sonic Youth, Tsunami, and others.

PSYCHOTIC REACTIONS AND GARAGE ROCK

Once the British Invasion of the mid-‘60s brought hard-rocking white-blues bands like the Rolling Stones, the Yardbirds, and the Who to the U.S., kids across the country convened in suburban garages and set out to imitate or else outdo their heroes through an irrepressible assault of power chords and wake-up-the-neighbors drum pounding. Though most were too awful to ever get heard, many of them did manage to cut a record or two before disappearing from sight. Most of these one-hit (or none-hit) wonders would today be forgotten were it not for great psychedelic garage compilations like
Nuggets
or
Pebbles
.

The underground garage movement had a huge impact on later generations of rock – from punk to noise-rock to grunge – and although few of the individual bands had enough impact to qualify for inclusion in these pages, as a whole, bands like the Count Five, the Seeds, and dozens of others deserve credit for their part in shaping rock as we know it.

King Coffey, Butthole Surfers:

The
Pebbles
compilation, and before that the
Nuggets
compilation, opened the doors to the whole idea of punk rock.

For a variety of reasons, some American garage rock bands stood the test of time and have been rediscovered by later rock generations. The 13
^th
Floor Elevators, who stuck around long enough to release more than one record (and even scored a minor hit), are remembered as a quintessential psychedelic rock group. The MC5, by closely tying themselves to the larger student / anti-war movement of the ‘60s, also became a musical signpost of the time. Other groups, like the Stooges, are remembered in part because a band member went on to more mainstream success. But mostly, these garage bands stood out as the most extreme, colorful, and outrageous of their time.

A second, peripherally related, movement is the psychedelic underground, which has flowed across oceans and over decades. Though Pink Floyd has emerged as the most recognizable psychedelic rock band of its time, their original lead singer Syd Barrett left the group before worldwide success came knocking. In his solo work he assumed legendary status to his cult-like fans but otherwise languished in semi-obscurity. Barrett’s tripped-out heritage continued through the punk years of the ‘70s with bands like the Soft Boys, who in turn linked an entire community of American post-punk bands – from R.E.M. in Georgia to the Paisley Underground bands in Los Angeles – to the psychedelic rock tradition.

Steve Wynn, solo / Dream Syndicate:

The whole thing we came out of in L.A., called Paisley Underground, that was really a bunch of bands that liked ‘60s music and weren’t hearing it anywhere. Other bands like the Bangles and the Three O’Clock picked up on it even more than we did.

MC5

Wayne Kramer, MC5:

We knew the times were serious. We knew civil rights was a real important issue, that ending this war was real important. So there was no way to separate a political consciousness from rock and roll. It became exactly the same thing.

At their peak, in 1968 and ‘69, the MC5 were louder, harder, and faster than any rock band before. Though groups like the Who and Jimi Hendrix Experience could rival them sonically, none could match the MC5’s revolutionary bad-ass spirit. They were a product of late ‘60s counterculture, but the MC5 were not flower-power hippies. Their aim – ”total assault of the culture” – spoke of a darker side of the youth movement. Therefore MC5 has often been ignored in music histories focused on the “peace and love” aspects of the era.

The spirit of the MC5 can be heard in the muddy blues rock of the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, the free jazz-inspired noise of Sonic Youth, and the screaming agitprop of Rage against the Machine. Most significantly, the MC5’s mix of heavy electric blues and aggressive rock made them forerunners to both heavy metal and hardcore punk. Thus, they were an important reference point for bands like Dinosaur Jr. and Screaming Trees when metal and punk met in the early ‘90s as grunge rock.

Lou Barlow, Sebadoh:

I got into the MC5 when I was first in Dinosaur [Jr.]. We really slowed down a lot from when we were into hardcore. We hit this mid-tempo groove and stuff like MC5 really hit me.

Formed in the Lincoln Park area of Detroit in 1965, the Motor City Five (soon shortened to MC5) evolved from the Bounty Hunters – which featured vocalist Rob Tyner and guitarists Wayne Kramer and Fred “Sonic” Smith – when drummer Dennis Thompson and bassist Michael Davis joined. Right away it was clear they were the product of their hometown. “It was a really unique scene in that there were no dividing lines between color,” Kramer remembers. “The influences were all blending together and there was an esthetic developing, a Detroit sound, that combined the best of Motown R&B and white rock guitar of the Who and the Yardbirds, and then ultimately the free jazz movement.”

Thurston Moore, Sonic Youth:

The name Sonic Youth is a cross between Big Youth, a reggae toaster guy, and Sonic Smith, the MC5 guitar player. We wanted to bridge these two strains of influence, high energy Detroit rock and dub.

In 1967 the MC5 met their mentor/manager John Sinclair and began on their path as a revolutionary rock band. Sinclair, an underground journalist, jazz critic, and leader in the radical White Panther Party, recognized the group’s untamed energy and set out to mold the MC5 into something of a trumpet call for youth revolution. “John was able to bring clarity,” Kramer says. “Things we knew on a gut level – this society’s fucked-up, this war is fucked-up – he was able to put into a political context. And musically as well, he opened the doors to our understanding of free-jazz.”

By the summer of 1968, when the MC5 fearlessly rocked for the riotous demonstrators at the Democratic Convention in Chicago (a concert the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and Country Joe canceled out on), the group’s reputation had spread and record companies started taking notice. Because they were known for particularly powerful live shows that mixed John Coltrane and Who covers with their own extended jams like
Black to Comm
, Elektra Records made the unusual decision to release a live record as their debut. Recorded at a Detroit theater in October 1968 and released the following year,
Kick out the Jams
was an audacious introduction. Though much of the group’s best material was left off, songs like
Motor City Is Burning
and a cover of Sun Ra’s
Starship
are representative of the MC5’s mix of political agitation and musical experimentation.

Van Conner, Screaming Trees:

MC5 to me are kind of the superheroes of rock. Every record totally kicks ass. They were so cool, like how the guitarists would get down on their knees at the same time in concert. When Warrant does it, it’s cheesy, but when they do it’s cool. I think that gave the Trees license to be a little bit stupid and tongue-in-cheek in our live shows, like, ‘Well MC5 did it, and they’re fucking cool.’

Though the album was well received and even made a showing on the charts, the opening track’s revolutionary call to arms – ending with the infamous charge to “Kick out the jams, motherfuckers!” – soon had the band embroiled in a disastrous controversy. Once word spread of the record’s profanity, many stores refused to stock it and radio stations avoided the group entirely. When the band released
Kick out the Jams
as a single, “motherfuckers!” was replaced with “brothers and sisters!” Still, the damage had been done. Elektra dropped the band soon after.

Chris Cornell, Soundgarden:

I could draw a comparison between us and the MC5, in terms of the things they sang about and the attitude they had. If I would think of Soundgarden strictly as an over-the-top rock band, the MC5 would’ve always been the band that I would’ve held up as the pinnacle. If you’re going to be a rock band, this is it.

Further compounding their troubles, by late 1969 John Sinclair was on his way to jail on marijuana charges (sentenced to nine years for possessing two joints). Though without Sinclair the MC5 were losing their initial focus, the band was nevertheless picked up by Atlantic Records to make a second album. With producer John Landau (a rock critic who soon after became Bruce Springsteen’s manager), the MC5 created
Back in the U.S.A.
, a more refined and song-oriented take on the Chuck Berry-styled guitar rock they loved. Although the album was a commercial flop, it was to be just as influential as the debut. “Where some didn’t care for
Kick out the Jams
because it was so over-the-top and raucous, many fans – especially in England, guys like the Clash, the Damned, and Elvis Costello – have all told me that
Back in the U.S.A.
was the yardstick for the kind of music they wanted to make. It was all concise, two-and-a-half minute pop songs.”

A third record, 1971’s
High Time
, attempted to synthesize the wildness of the first album with the studio refinement of the second. It also flopped, and soon Atlantic dropped the MC5 as well. In 1972, after a failed attempt to resuscitate the rapidly disintegrating group by seeking stardom in England, the MC5 went through a bitter breakup.

Though the MC5’s reputation in the underground grew steadily with the advent of punk, no one in the band was able to translate their notoriety into a viable career. It wasn’t until Rob Tyner’s death in 1991 that the remaining MC5 reconciled and played a benefit concert together. The years in between is mostly the stuff of rock footnotes: Michael Davis played with the
Stooges
’ Ron Asheton in Detroit’s Destroy All Monsters, and Dennis Thompson played in a band called the New Order (not to be confused with the better-known British group), while Fred Smith formed Sonic’s Rendezvous Band and married punk poet Patti Smith. He died in 1994.

The one exception, it seems, has been Wayne Kramer. After a drug conviction sent him to jail in the late ‘70s, Kramer cleaned himself up and returned to music. In 1995, three decades after he formed the MC5, Kramer began releasing solo albums on Epitaph, an indie label connected to MC5-inspired punk band Bad Religion. Sharp and vital, Kramer has proved himself a viable ‘90s rocker.