Wayne Kramer should really need no introduction by this point. As a founding member of the MC5 in 1964, he was responsible for some of the greatest high-energy rock’n’roll ever produced and their legacy continues to be influential, both musically and politically, with virtually every new generation that comes along. However, the band never achieved the success they deserved and eventually fell apart in 1972. Kramer went through a rough time and ended-up serving a prison sentence for drug-offences. After his release, he briefly formed the band Gangwar with Johnny Thunders, and then during the Eighties was involved with various musical projects including the stage production ‘The Last Words of Dutch Schultz’. But it wasn’t until 1994 that he really re-launched his career, signing to Epitaph Records and releasing a series of acclaimed albums, including ‘The Hard Stuff’, ‘Dangerous Madness’ and ‘Citizen Wayne’. In 2001, Kramer reunited with the remaining MC5 members, Michael Davis and Dennis Thompson, to tour as the DKT-MC5, joined onstage by various guests including Mark Arm, Lisa Kekaula and Handome Dick Manitoba. In subsequent years, he has continued to perform and record as well as writing scores for film and TV. In 2018, his long-awaited memoir, ‘The Hard Stuff’, was published to further acclaim and, later in the year, he announced an ‘MC50’ tour to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the legendary ‘Kick Out The Jams’ LP.
As if this wasn’t an exciting prospect in itself, the announcement of the musicians who would be playing alongside Wayne on this occasion was a true bonus. Vocals would be handled by Marcus Durant, of Zen Guerilla, and additional guitar by Kim Thayil of Soundgarden, whilst the rhythm section would be Bill Gould of Faith No More and Brendan Canty from Fugazi etc. This was a pedigree that more than lived up to the MC5’s legacy and virtually guaranteed that the show was going to meet all expectations.
Fortunately for me, Brendan and Bill are both old friends and were happy to help me set-up an interview with Wayne. And so, on the afternoon of the show, I arrive at Shepherds Bush Empire nice and early, meet Brendan at the stage door and get taken through to meet Wayne. He has some spare time while the equipment is being loaded-in, so we get straight down to the interview.
As if this wasn’t an exciting prospect in itself, the announcement of the musicians who would be playing alongside Wayne on this occasion was a true bonus. Vocals would be handled by Marcus Durant, of Zen Guerilla, and additional guitar by Kim Thayil of Soundgarden, whilst the rhythm section would be Bill Gould of Faith No More and Brendan Canty from Fugazi etc. This was a pedigree that more than lived up to the MC5’s legacy and virtually guaranteed that the show was going to meet all expectations.
Fortunately for me, Brendan and Bill are both old friends and were happy to help me set-up an interview with Wayne. And so, on the afternoon of the show, I arrive at Shepherds Bush Empire nice and early, meet Brendan at the stage door and get taken through to meet Wayne. He has some spare time while the equipment is being loaded-in, so we get straight down to the interview.
Firstly, when had he first begun thinking about the ‘MC50’ tour and how easy had it been to put it together ?
‘Well, about two years ago I had the foresight to look ahead and realise that it was soon going to be fifty years since we recorded ‘Kick Out the Jams’ and that seemed like a good excuse for a tour. Plus, I’d already been working on my memoirs and it occurred to me that we could put the two events together, which would make a story in itself and probably be a lot of fun. I think we only ever played ‘Kick Out the Jams’ in its’ entirety once, while we were playing as the DKT/MC5… We did it at a club in Brooklyn, just for one night, and it was a big hit but for some reason we never did it again. So when I realised the 50th Anniversary was coming-up, I thought it would be the perfect time to do it… We could go out and play the album in its’ entirety, as it was recorded. The first thing I had to do was to find the players for it and I’m glad to say, I think I hit the lottery! My greatest dreams came true and I think I have a band who are world class. I’m crazy about this band… Everyone has their own relationship with the music of the MC5, as well as already being friends, so when I asked them if they thought this would be fun, they all said ‘Fuck, yes !’ The only exception was Marcus, who I didn’t already know at that time, but it’s been a great thrill and surprise to get to know him and play with him every night. If there was ever anyone who was perfect to sing this material, it was Marcus Durant ! He’s one of the best vocalists around at the moment and I think he’s got the right balance of being true to the spirit of the original recording and being true to himself. He’s found a way to be himself and still sing Rob Tyner’s melodies with integrity. He’s accomplished a remarkable feat.’
As Dennis Thompson is the only other original MC5 member still around, were there any thoughts of him being involved on this tour ?
‘There was, right from the beginning, but I knew that he wouldn’t want to do, and probably could not do, a full tour. But I hoped that he’d want to play at least some shows and, once the tour started coming together, I told him what I was planning and said that if he’d like to play some of the shows, I’d love him to do it. At first he said, ‘Yes, it sounds like a good idea’ and when it came time to get ready to do the shows, he said he was still in. But then two weeks later, he called-up and said he didn’t want to do it anymore. I said, fine, there’s no harm, and started making other arrangements. At which point he called back again and said, ‘Actually, I do want to do it…’ So, I said that’s great and we even started advertising that he would be playing those shows, but then he changed his mind again ! So, I don’t know what’s up with him, but I certainly invited him and wanted him to do it. He agreed and declined several times, but my standing-offer is that, if he wants to come and play, we’d all be thrilled to see him do it. But whatever he decides to do is alright with me.’
‘Well, about two years ago I had the foresight to look ahead and realise that it was soon going to be fifty years since we recorded ‘Kick Out the Jams’ and that seemed like a good excuse for a tour. Plus, I’d already been working on my memoirs and it occurred to me that we could put the two events together, which would make a story in itself and probably be a lot of fun. I think we only ever played ‘Kick Out the Jams’ in its’ entirety once, while we were playing as the DKT/MC5… We did it at a club in Brooklyn, just for one night, and it was a big hit but for some reason we never did it again. So when I realised the 50th Anniversary was coming-up, I thought it would be the perfect time to do it… We could go out and play the album in its’ entirety, as it was recorded. The first thing I had to do was to find the players for it and I’m glad to say, I think I hit the lottery! My greatest dreams came true and I think I have a band who are world class. I’m crazy about this band… Everyone has their own relationship with the music of the MC5, as well as already being friends, so when I asked them if they thought this would be fun, they all said ‘Fuck, yes !’ The only exception was Marcus, who I didn’t already know at that time, but it’s been a great thrill and surprise to get to know him and play with him every night. If there was ever anyone who was perfect to sing this material, it was Marcus Durant ! He’s one of the best vocalists around at the moment and I think he’s got the right balance of being true to the spirit of the original recording and being true to himself. He’s found a way to be himself and still sing Rob Tyner’s melodies with integrity. He’s accomplished a remarkable feat.’
As Dennis Thompson is the only other original MC5 member still around, were there any thoughts of him being involved on this tour ?
‘There was, right from the beginning, but I knew that he wouldn’t want to do, and probably could not do, a full tour. But I hoped that he’d want to play at least some shows and, once the tour started coming together, I told him what I was planning and said that if he’d like to play some of the shows, I’d love him to do it. At first he said, ‘Yes, it sounds like a good idea’ and when it came time to get ready to do the shows, he said he was still in. But then two weeks later, he called-up and said he didn’t want to do it anymore. I said, fine, there’s no harm, and started making other arrangements. At which point he called back again and said, ‘Actually, I do want to do it…’ So, I said that’s great and we even started advertising that he would be playing those shows, but then he changed his mind again ! So, I don’t know what’s up with him, but I certainly invited him and wanted him to do it. He agreed and declined several times, but my standing-offer is that, if he wants to come and play, we’d all be thrilled to see him do it. But whatever he decides to do is alright with me.’
Considering the fact that ‘Kick Out the Jams’ wasn’t a massive success when it was first released, it’s quite incredible that it’s now 50 years old and its’ influence is still relevant. It seems that every new generation has something to take from it…
‘Yeah, it’s kind of fascinating when you think of all the bands that have been around since then. You see them come and you see them go… mostly, you see them go ! I mean, how many thousands of records have been released in the last fifty years ? But, as you said, ‘Kick Out The Jams’ seems to find a new audience with every new generation. Obviously, you had bands like The Ramones, The Clash and The Damned from the first generation of Punk Rockers, and then you had bands like Fugazi, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam and Mudhoney from the Eighties… And now, here we are today, and we’re all still tapping in to that fundamental message of self-efficacy and self-determination . Unlimited effort equals endless possibilities !’
Your biography, ‘The Hard Stuff’, received a very positive response and one of the things that everyone seems to like about it is the very direct and focused way that you tell your story. How long did it take to actually put it together, because it seems that you had a very definite idea of what you wanted to say…
‘I think it was something that was inevitable, if I lived long enough, hahaha ! As you get older, you’ll gain some insight in to the human condition and hopefully you’ll be able to talk about it with some credibility. My problem was that I could never figure out how I could end the book, because I was never anywhere near stopping work or living or participating in real life. But then, five years ago, my son was born and that gave me an appropriate ending-place for my book-idea. I had one life that leads up to his arrival and, since I became a father, it’s as if I’m leading another life now, so it seemed to be the right place to end my story. I wanted to be able to tell the story of what it was like to be in the MC5 from the inside. I know a lot had already been written about the band and the bones have been picked pretty clean, but I also knew that I have a perspective that nobody else has and I wanted it to be on the record. But the MC5 only took-up a nine year period of my youth and a lot more has happened since then, so I thought that maybe, if I was honest and brave enough, I could write a book that might be useful to people who perhaps found themselves in the same kinds of troubles that I got into. Not that I’m saying I have the answers, but perhaps people can look at it and say, ‘he found a way out, so maybe I can find a way out, too…’ I hope that there’s some information in there that might be of benefit to people who read it.’
‘Yeah, it’s kind of fascinating when you think of all the bands that have been around since then. You see them come and you see them go… mostly, you see them go ! I mean, how many thousands of records have been released in the last fifty years ? But, as you said, ‘Kick Out The Jams’ seems to find a new audience with every new generation. Obviously, you had bands like The Ramones, The Clash and The Damned from the first generation of Punk Rockers, and then you had bands like Fugazi, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam and Mudhoney from the Eighties… And now, here we are today, and we’re all still tapping in to that fundamental message of self-efficacy and self-determination . Unlimited effort equals endless possibilities !’
Your biography, ‘The Hard Stuff’, received a very positive response and one of the things that everyone seems to like about it is the very direct and focused way that you tell your story. How long did it take to actually put it together, because it seems that you had a very definite idea of what you wanted to say…
‘I think it was something that was inevitable, if I lived long enough, hahaha ! As you get older, you’ll gain some insight in to the human condition and hopefully you’ll be able to talk about it with some credibility. My problem was that I could never figure out how I could end the book, because I was never anywhere near stopping work or living or participating in real life. But then, five years ago, my son was born and that gave me an appropriate ending-place for my book-idea. I had one life that leads up to his arrival and, since I became a father, it’s as if I’m leading another life now, so it seemed to be the right place to end my story. I wanted to be able to tell the story of what it was like to be in the MC5 from the inside. I know a lot had already been written about the band and the bones have been picked pretty clean, but I also knew that I have a perspective that nobody else has and I wanted it to be on the record. But the MC5 only took-up a nine year period of my youth and a lot more has happened since then, so I thought that maybe, if I was honest and brave enough, I could write a book that might be useful to people who perhaps found themselves in the same kinds of troubles that I got into. Not that I’m saying I have the answers, but perhaps people can look at it and say, ‘he found a way out, so maybe I can find a way out, too…’ I hope that there’s some information in there that might be of benefit to people who read it.’
It also comes across as being very well-balanced between the highs of the MC5 at their peak and the lows that you subsequently found yourself in after the band had dissolved. In many ways, it seems to focus more on the personal aspects of events and that makes it so much more compelling rather than just being a book that would be of interest to MC5 fans…
‘That was one of my concerns, because I didn’t just want to write a ‘rock-book’. Inevitably, in some ways it is a rock-book, but my hope was that it could be more than just that. I didn’t want it to be just about a guy in a band that becomes successful but then he gets into drugs and it all falls apart… What I was hoping was to tell the story of those highs and lows so that you could analyse them, understand why they happened and understand the effect they had on me. You know, how did the world around me affect how I was and how did I affect it ? And I didn’t want to pull any punches because nobody gets it right all of the time. Your mistakes are just as important because it’s possible that’s where you learn things. You don’t know anything until you’ve made a mistake. My underlying philosophical message over all these years, right from the MC5, was that if you go at something in full measures, even if you’re wrong, you’ll still come out in a better position. Even if you weren’t right, you’ll be able to look back clearly and say, well, that was where I made the wrong turn and now I can avoid doing that again. You can draw conclusions and that will be helpful for you.’
It’s ironic that some of the traits that originally fueled the creativity of the MC5 in their early days, such as anger and impatience, also became self-destructive elements later on in your life…
‘Oh, yeah, although that wasn’t all that fuelled the MC5. There was also plenty of ambition and a love and appreciation for the excitement of our art-form. We weren’t a bunch of guys sitting around a warehouse on the west-side of Detroit cleaning our shotguns and fomenting revolution… We were a crazed rock’n’roll band, smoking copious amounts of marijuana and laughing our asses-off at the world around us ! But there were certainly darker-impulses that would help to energise us in the early days which, unfortunately, became more of a problem later-on. Life just became more complicated for me… I’d started playing when I was 13 or 14 years old so by the time I was 24, I’d already been through the MC5. During that time, I’d achieved everything I’d wanted to do only for it to all go away. I’d lost it all and I was stuck saying to myself, What the Hell just happened and what am I going to do now ? I became very angry, very confused and very resentful. I was a very bitter young man and I paid the price for it. I took a very long time to figure-out what had gone wrong and to make sure that I never got into that situation again. Even after I’d been in prison, I continued for a long time trying to treat my misery by adding more misery to it… Jack Daniels and heroin are great ways to kill the pain, they’re really effective like that, but they also have very severe side effects of their own.’
‘That was one of my concerns, because I didn’t just want to write a ‘rock-book’. Inevitably, in some ways it is a rock-book, but my hope was that it could be more than just that. I didn’t want it to be just about a guy in a band that becomes successful but then he gets into drugs and it all falls apart… What I was hoping was to tell the story of those highs and lows so that you could analyse them, understand why they happened and understand the effect they had on me. You know, how did the world around me affect how I was and how did I affect it ? And I didn’t want to pull any punches because nobody gets it right all of the time. Your mistakes are just as important because it’s possible that’s where you learn things. You don’t know anything until you’ve made a mistake. My underlying philosophical message over all these years, right from the MC5, was that if you go at something in full measures, even if you’re wrong, you’ll still come out in a better position. Even if you weren’t right, you’ll be able to look back clearly and say, well, that was where I made the wrong turn and now I can avoid doing that again. You can draw conclusions and that will be helpful for you.’
It’s ironic that some of the traits that originally fueled the creativity of the MC5 in their early days, such as anger and impatience, also became self-destructive elements later on in your life…
‘Oh, yeah, although that wasn’t all that fuelled the MC5. There was also plenty of ambition and a love and appreciation for the excitement of our art-form. We weren’t a bunch of guys sitting around a warehouse on the west-side of Detroit cleaning our shotguns and fomenting revolution… We were a crazed rock’n’roll band, smoking copious amounts of marijuana and laughing our asses-off at the world around us ! But there were certainly darker-impulses that would help to energise us in the early days which, unfortunately, became more of a problem later-on. Life just became more complicated for me… I’d started playing when I was 13 or 14 years old so by the time I was 24, I’d already been through the MC5. During that time, I’d achieved everything I’d wanted to do only for it to all go away. I’d lost it all and I was stuck saying to myself, What the Hell just happened and what am I going to do now ? I became very angry, very confused and very resentful. I was a very bitter young man and I paid the price for it. I took a very long time to figure-out what had gone wrong and to make sure that I never got into that situation again. Even after I’d been in prison, I continued for a long time trying to treat my misery by adding more misery to it… Jack Daniels and heroin are great ways to kill the pain, they’re really effective like that, but they also have very severe side effects of their own.’
Do you think that when you went to prison, you were just there as a punishment, or was there any real attempt to help and rehabilitate you ?
‘There was an attempt. I caught the tail-end of an era when they tried to rehabilitate people within the American Corrections system. But while I was in prison, they told us that a big change was coming and that they’d be pulling away from rehabilitation towards the emphasis being on accountability. If you broke the social contract, you would now be held accountable for the loss of your liberty. Before that, the focus was more on rehabilitation and they did try to help. There were a lot of programs available to me and I tried to take advantage of them… I took College courses, I went to Group Therapy and I joined Study Groups on rational behaviour and positive mental attitude… But those were still the early days in terms of recovery and, of course, it had all ended by the time I left prison. Since then, prisons in America have become little more than warehouses for human beings. It’s only now that we’re starting to see a return towards the ideas of rehabilitation and helping people to change for the better while they’re in custody. It just stands to reason that, if most people who go to prison are eventually going to come out and go home, then if we don’t help them to change for the better while they’re in there, the prison-experience is inevitably going to change them for the worse. We ignore that at our own peril.’
It’s certainly the biggest-failing of the so-called ‘War on Drugs’, for example. It tries to tackle the suppliers and users of drugs but doesn’t address the reasons why people get drawn to it…
‘It’s one of the biggest failings of American social policy in history, that’s for sure. And, as is often the case, as America goes, that’s how the rest of the world goes. When I went to prison in the Seventies, there were 350,000 people in prison across America. But today, there are 2.3 million and it’s still increasing, so you can clearly see that drug prohibition has not worked. Drug prohibition has killed more people than drugs themselves ever could. The whole policy has been incredibly destructive and it’s immeasurable, because the damage spreads out from the person who’s incarcerated to their family, their children and even the next generation. It’s been horrific and if I could have my way, I think there are some members of the political leadership that should be held accountable. They should be tried at The Hague for crimes against humanity ! But there are so many things like that which all come down to government policies. I live in Los Angeles and the income-disparity is obscene. It’s one of the wealthiest cities in the world and yet we have over 70,000 people who are living outdoors ! How are these things possible ? Well, it’s clearly the misplaced priorities of Capitalism. It may not be the best economic system, but I can accept it’s the best one that we have. But we also need to admit that it’s far from perfect and that we need a more enlightened government and citizenry, otherwise it’d going to continue to get a lot worse before it gets any better.’
‘There was an attempt. I caught the tail-end of an era when they tried to rehabilitate people within the American Corrections system. But while I was in prison, they told us that a big change was coming and that they’d be pulling away from rehabilitation towards the emphasis being on accountability. If you broke the social contract, you would now be held accountable for the loss of your liberty. Before that, the focus was more on rehabilitation and they did try to help. There were a lot of programs available to me and I tried to take advantage of them… I took College courses, I went to Group Therapy and I joined Study Groups on rational behaviour and positive mental attitude… But those were still the early days in terms of recovery and, of course, it had all ended by the time I left prison. Since then, prisons in America have become little more than warehouses for human beings. It’s only now that we’re starting to see a return towards the ideas of rehabilitation and helping people to change for the better while they’re in custody. It just stands to reason that, if most people who go to prison are eventually going to come out and go home, then if we don’t help them to change for the better while they’re in there, the prison-experience is inevitably going to change them for the worse. We ignore that at our own peril.’
It’s certainly the biggest-failing of the so-called ‘War on Drugs’, for example. It tries to tackle the suppliers and users of drugs but doesn’t address the reasons why people get drawn to it…
‘It’s one of the biggest failings of American social policy in history, that’s for sure. And, as is often the case, as America goes, that’s how the rest of the world goes. When I went to prison in the Seventies, there were 350,000 people in prison across America. But today, there are 2.3 million and it’s still increasing, so you can clearly see that drug prohibition has not worked. Drug prohibition has killed more people than drugs themselves ever could. The whole policy has been incredibly destructive and it’s immeasurable, because the damage spreads out from the person who’s incarcerated to their family, their children and even the next generation. It’s been horrific and if I could have my way, I think there are some members of the political leadership that should be held accountable. They should be tried at The Hague for crimes against humanity ! But there are so many things like that which all come down to government policies. I live in Los Angeles and the income-disparity is obscene. It’s one of the wealthiest cities in the world and yet we have over 70,000 people who are living outdoors ! How are these things possible ? Well, it’s clearly the misplaced priorities of Capitalism. It may not be the best economic system, but I can accept it’s the best one that we have. But we also need to admit that it’s far from perfect and that we need a more enlightened government and citizenry, otherwise it’d going to continue to get a lot worse before it gets any better.’
Just the idea that corporations are allowed to buy properties and keep them empty as investments, rather than allowing people to live there, beggars belief…
‘Well, Real Estate is one of the most corrupt operations around the world… so it figures that the current Chief Executive in America is a Real Estate businessman ! He just brought those ethics along with him !’
In the late Seventies when you were released from prison, the whole Punk Rock movement had happened and there was a lot of renewed interest in the MC5. Was there ever any thoughts of the band reforming around that time ?
‘It did come up but not until some time during the Eighties. Rob Tyner called me and it turned out that he and Dennis had been talking to a promoter who had got them all wired-up about the amount of money that the MC5 could make if they reformed. I personally didn’t believe it… I’d stayed involved in music over the years, continuing to play live and trying to make records, but I couldn’t see the interest in it at that time. I may have been wrong, but that was the problem I had with it. Also, I think there would have been difficulties in trying to get Fred Smith to co-operate, so in the end, it all went nowhere…’
But later on, you admit in your book, you realised that you’d underestimated the amount of interest there still was in Europe…
‘I probably did, yeah, because when I released my first album on Epitaph and did finally return to Europe, I was shocked by the amount of interest in the band. I didn’t realise that so many people involved in the Punk Rock scene had been listening to ‘Kick Out The Jams’… What did I know ? I’d been in prison during those years and when I came out, I had a moustache, I was blow-drying my hair and I was still wearing flares ! That was my bad-dude white boy look from when I was in prison, hahaha ! I remember that I came to London to play on some recording sessions and one of the guys looked at me and asked, Is that what people are wearing in the States ???’
You fell-out with John Sinclair for a while, after he went to prison, but it seems from what you say in the book that you reconciled quite naturally after your subsequent time inside…
‘Yeah, it all went pretty sour for a while but we eventually resolved things, almost without even talking it through. I’m very close to him these days and, in fact, I just saw him in Detroit last week. He was living in Amsterdam for a while but he’s been under the weather recently and hasn’t been able to travel. I was hoping that he may have been able to come over for this show, tonight, but he wasn’t up to it. I’d have loved him to be here… he’s a lovely guy, the very best !’
‘Well, Real Estate is one of the most corrupt operations around the world… so it figures that the current Chief Executive in America is a Real Estate businessman ! He just brought those ethics along with him !’
In the late Seventies when you were released from prison, the whole Punk Rock movement had happened and there was a lot of renewed interest in the MC5. Was there ever any thoughts of the band reforming around that time ?
‘It did come up but not until some time during the Eighties. Rob Tyner called me and it turned out that he and Dennis had been talking to a promoter who had got them all wired-up about the amount of money that the MC5 could make if they reformed. I personally didn’t believe it… I’d stayed involved in music over the years, continuing to play live and trying to make records, but I couldn’t see the interest in it at that time. I may have been wrong, but that was the problem I had with it. Also, I think there would have been difficulties in trying to get Fred Smith to co-operate, so in the end, it all went nowhere…’
But later on, you admit in your book, you realised that you’d underestimated the amount of interest there still was in Europe…
‘I probably did, yeah, because when I released my first album on Epitaph and did finally return to Europe, I was shocked by the amount of interest in the band. I didn’t realise that so many people involved in the Punk Rock scene had been listening to ‘Kick Out The Jams’… What did I know ? I’d been in prison during those years and when I came out, I had a moustache, I was blow-drying my hair and I was still wearing flares ! That was my bad-dude white boy look from when I was in prison, hahaha ! I remember that I came to London to play on some recording sessions and one of the guys looked at me and asked, Is that what people are wearing in the States ???’
You fell-out with John Sinclair for a while, after he went to prison, but it seems from what you say in the book that you reconciled quite naturally after your subsequent time inside…
‘Yeah, it all went pretty sour for a while but we eventually resolved things, almost without even talking it through. I’m very close to him these days and, in fact, I just saw him in Detroit last week. He was living in Amsterdam for a while but he’s been under the weather recently and hasn’t been able to travel. I was hoping that he may have been able to come over for this show, tonight, but he wasn’t up to it. I’d have loved him to be here… he’s a lovely guy, the very best !’
During the early-Eighties, you worked on a stage-production in New York called ‘The Last Words of Dutch Schultz’, which seems to have been quite successful. However, I don’t think any complete recordings of it have ever been released… Was it ever recorded ?
‘There were a few things which we recorded with Don Was. I think there were three or four songs which were eventually released on a 12” EP, although that hasn’t been in print for years. But I still have the rights to it and I would like to do something with it again, some time… It was a good chunk of work, maybe fourteen or fifteen songs, and all the musicians would also act in the performance, so it was fun. It took about six to eight months in the workshop phase and then, when it was ready, we started to perform it and we carried on for a couple of years. We had a residency at a club in Manhatten and we used to play there every Sunday night for quite some time.’
Did you come across the subject matter through William Burroughs’ book or had you heard about the transcript elsewhere (Dutch Schultz was a gangster in New York during the Twenties and thirties… William Burroughs wrote a screenplay based around the police transcript of his ‘last words’…)
‘I’m not exactly sure where I first heard about Dutch Schultz, although it may well have been through Burroughs. But I went to the library in New York and looked-up the original transcript… Basically, after he was shot, the Police had a stenographer at his hospital bedside recording everything he said, hoping he’d tell them who had shot him, but he was just rambling, making up these incredible phrases. When I first saw it, I just thought, damn, this is brilliant ! I mean, anyone who loves poetry would go crazy over it ! It’s just a couple of thousand words but it has this incredible, visionary, hallucinatory quality that goes from gangster intrigues through to childhood memories. I knew straight away that it was going to give me so much material to write songs around.’
As you already mentioned, during the Nineties you signed a deal with Epitaph Records and your career enjoyed something of a resurgence. In some ways, it was a very lucky break, as Epitaph were enjoying a lot of success at that point and Brett Gurewitz was a fan of the MC5, so everything came together…
‘Well, they say that you don’t get a second act in America, but it seems that I’ve had a second act and now I’m having an encore of the first act ! If you include the DKT-MC5, I’ve had three second acts ! But I guess the big difference was that, with the albums I was releasing during the Nineties, it was very much about my new music, even though I would still play some older songs live as well. I guess I’ve always felt that I couldn’t make the same record over and over again, and I think my natural, intellectual curiosity just wouldn’t allow me to do that. When I write new material it’s like I’m endlessly searching for something else to keep me going forwards.’
‘There were a few things which we recorded with Don Was. I think there were three or four songs which were eventually released on a 12” EP, although that hasn’t been in print for years. But I still have the rights to it and I would like to do something with it again, some time… It was a good chunk of work, maybe fourteen or fifteen songs, and all the musicians would also act in the performance, so it was fun. It took about six to eight months in the workshop phase and then, when it was ready, we started to perform it and we carried on for a couple of years. We had a residency at a club in Manhatten and we used to play there every Sunday night for quite some time.’
Did you come across the subject matter through William Burroughs’ book or had you heard about the transcript elsewhere (Dutch Schultz was a gangster in New York during the Twenties and thirties… William Burroughs wrote a screenplay based around the police transcript of his ‘last words’…)
‘I’m not exactly sure where I first heard about Dutch Schultz, although it may well have been through Burroughs. But I went to the library in New York and looked-up the original transcript… Basically, after he was shot, the Police had a stenographer at his hospital bedside recording everything he said, hoping he’d tell them who had shot him, but he was just rambling, making up these incredible phrases. When I first saw it, I just thought, damn, this is brilliant ! I mean, anyone who loves poetry would go crazy over it ! It’s just a couple of thousand words but it has this incredible, visionary, hallucinatory quality that goes from gangster intrigues through to childhood memories. I knew straight away that it was going to give me so much material to write songs around.’
As you already mentioned, during the Nineties you signed a deal with Epitaph Records and your career enjoyed something of a resurgence. In some ways, it was a very lucky break, as Epitaph were enjoying a lot of success at that point and Brett Gurewitz was a fan of the MC5, so everything came together…
‘Well, they say that you don’t get a second act in America, but it seems that I’ve had a second act and now I’m having an encore of the first act ! If you include the DKT-MC5, I’ve had three second acts ! But I guess the big difference was that, with the albums I was releasing during the Nineties, it was very much about my new music, even though I would still play some older songs live as well. I guess I’ve always felt that I couldn’t make the same record over and over again, and I think my natural, intellectual curiosity just wouldn’t allow me to do that. When I write new material it’s like I’m endlessly searching for something else to keep me going forwards.’
Around the same time that you, Dennis and Michael Davis decided to start playing together again as the DKT-MC5, The Stooges also reformed and the two bands eventually ended-up playing together again in 2006 at one of the All Tomorrows Parties events. That must have been a strange experience, nearly forty years after you’d last shared a stage together ?
‘It was fun ! It was very nostalgic and I’m not really someone who’s into those kind of retro things. I have a fear of going backwards, but that was fun and I think we all enjoyed it. I’d be happy to do more things like that, if the opportunity ever came up again. I don’t have a problem with doing things like that as long as it’s still done in the moment. I’d never want to do it just as a reproduction… this moment right now is all that we get, so this is what we have to get on with, right now. I can only ever do things right now !’
What’s happened with the MC5 documentary, ‘A True Testimonial’ ? I know you, Michael and Dennis had disagreements with the film-makers, but I read that the Court case was eventually resolved some time ago. How come it still hasn’t been made available on DVD ?
‘Well, I settled my legal issues with the film-makers ten years ago and I haven’t blocked the movie being released since then. As far as I was concerned, they were free to do whatever they wanted to do with it and I’ve heard from friends in the industry that they’ve made efforts to find a distributor. But I’ve also been told that they had some other legal challenges… nothing from me, but things that are down to other decisions that they made. So they may still have some other difficulties to overcome, but I’m certainly not blocking it anymore and I would be happy to see it come out. I never had a problem with the movie itself, it was only ever with the movie-makers and only after it was completed. I think it’s a good film… I don’t think it’s so-much a hard-hitting documentary as it is a love-poem to the MC5. In my opinion, they missed the two hard, salient moments of the MC5, the first being the politics of the band and how they lead towards the downfall of Richard Nixon, and the second being the eventual problems of addiction and alcohol abuse. I think those problems were involved in the deaths of all three original members who have gone now, but nobody talks about that in the movie. I guess it has a lot to do with family- pride or family-shame, as no-one wants to admit that their father or their husband was an alcoholic or a drug addict, but that’s how we all got into trouble in the first place. To me, the best way to work-through those kind of problems is to bring them out into the open and talk about them… Sunlight is the best disinfectant. I still really think that when Betty Ford (wife of US President Gerald Ford) came out and admitted that she was and addict and an alcoholic, that opened the door for millions of people to be able to confront their own problems. I’m very-much of the opinion that honesty is the best policy and I think that if you can tell the truth about who you are and what you’ve gone through, then it might be useful and it might help somebody else. But covering it up isn’t going to help anyone. Finding out that the problems you’re trying to deal with have also happened to other people and that you’re not alone is a huge thing, absolutely. Just realising that you’re not alone can be an important part of the healing.’
‘It was fun ! It was very nostalgic and I’m not really someone who’s into those kind of retro things. I have a fear of going backwards, but that was fun and I think we all enjoyed it. I’d be happy to do more things like that, if the opportunity ever came up again. I don’t have a problem with doing things like that as long as it’s still done in the moment. I’d never want to do it just as a reproduction… this moment right now is all that we get, so this is what we have to get on with, right now. I can only ever do things right now !’
What’s happened with the MC5 documentary, ‘A True Testimonial’ ? I know you, Michael and Dennis had disagreements with the film-makers, but I read that the Court case was eventually resolved some time ago. How come it still hasn’t been made available on DVD ?
‘Well, I settled my legal issues with the film-makers ten years ago and I haven’t blocked the movie being released since then. As far as I was concerned, they were free to do whatever they wanted to do with it and I’ve heard from friends in the industry that they’ve made efforts to find a distributor. But I’ve also been told that they had some other legal challenges… nothing from me, but things that are down to other decisions that they made. So they may still have some other difficulties to overcome, but I’m certainly not blocking it anymore and I would be happy to see it come out. I never had a problem with the movie itself, it was only ever with the movie-makers and only after it was completed. I think it’s a good film… I don’t think it’s so-much a hard-hitting documentary as it is a love-poem to the MC5. In my opinion, they missed the two hard, salient moments of the MC5, the first being the politics of the band and how they lead towards the downfall of Richard Nixon, and the second being the eventual problems of addiction and alcohol abuse. I think those problems were involved in the deaths of all three original members who have gone now, but nobody talks about that in the movie. I guess it has a lot to do with family- pride or family-shame, as no-one wants to admit that their father or their husband was an alcoholic or a drug addict, but that’s how we all got into trouble in the first place. To me, the best way to work-through those kind of problems is to bring them out into the open and talk about them… Sunlight is the best disinfectant. I still really think that when Betty Ford (wife of US President Gerald Ford) came out and admitted that she was and addict and an alcoholic, that opened the door for millions of people to be able to confront their own problems. I’m very-much of the opinion that honesty is the best policy and I think that if you can tell the truth about who you are and what you’ve gone through, then it might be useful and it might help somebody else. But covering it up isn’t going to help anyone. Finding out that the problems you’re trying to deal with have also happened to other people and that you’re not alone is a huge thing, absolutely. Just realising that you’re not alone can be an important part of the healing.’
Since the 1950’s, Detroit has managed to produce some of the best and most influential music of the modern era, from Bill Haley in the Fifties through to Motown, the raw rock’n’roll of the MC5 and The Stooges and more recently with the Techno scene and Rappers like Eminem. What do you think it is about Detroit that inspires such significant sounds ?
‘Well, Detroit’s reputation is as a working class town, although it probably isn’t so much now. But when the MC5 emerged, the cool places to be were New York, London and Los Angeles… certainly not Detroit, Michigan ! I think we resented that kind of condescending, elitist attitude because we felt that, musically, our ideas were just as valid as anybody else out there. We were as competent as anyone else and maybe even ahead of most people. There were very few bands that the MC5 would take a back-seat for… the Rolling Stones were good, The Who were good, there were a few other bands we respected, but mostly, we knew our ideas and what we were doing were just as good as anyone else and I think that made us push harder. We were facing a world that said, ‘Who the Hell do you think you are’, so we had to meet that head-on. I think that whole idea that nothing good, creatively, could happen in an industrial city has been fuel for Detroit artists to work harder. We have a tradition of honouring hard work… there’s a nobility in hard-labour and the traditon that if you work-hard, you can play-hard. You find your integrity where you can. Detroit is a very tough town to make anything happen, creatively, so if you can surface in Detroit, you’ll become kind of bulletproof and no-one else is going to hurt you too much.’
Finally… Hunter S.Thompson once said that, after Nixon, he had thought that politics in America could never get so bad again, but then you ended-up with George W Bush. And, of course, now you have Donald Trump ! What do you think about the way these things have come about ?
‘Well, Bush was bad but Dick Cheney was the real, dark force behind that Administration. My friend Adam McKay is just putting the finishing touches to a movie called ‘Vice’, which is all about Cheney. It’s going to be interesting to see how the world reacts to it, because Adam doesn’t pull any punches ! But, are we worse-off today with Donald Trump ? Well, we’ve lost a few hundred-thousand people to the opium-crisis in America right now but you can’t put that all down to Trump… He certainly should be doing something about it but he wasn’t responsible for it in the first place. And when you compare his term as President to the Sixties, when 50,000 young Americans and millions of Vietnamese died during the war in Vietnam, then Trump certainly hasn’t equaled that level of carnage… So, apples-to-apples, oranges-to-oranges, I’d have to say that Trump isn’t as bad as Nixon was… so far ! He still has two more years in office so he may still fuck things up and he certainly seems capable of it. There are parallels to be drawn… Involvement in another war in the Middle East, a criminal in the White House, a disregard for human rights and civil rights… But generally, I’d have to say that things aren’t as bad as they were during Nixon’s era and I can only hope that the pendulum will swing back towards a more humanistic and civilized sphere of leadership. What happened with Trump was a perfect storm of negativity. The Democrats had a candidate who was not-great, although I think Hillary could’ve been a fine President. Now, we have to find a new candidate that can beat Trump. But either way, he won’t be there forever… he’ll be gone in two years or in six years and, at the rate he’s going, he may not even last the two years. No one thought he would ever win but we didn’t know that the Russians were helping him. That’s the thing that really separates the Nixon-era from today. The Russians have skillfully undermined Western democracy with Trump’ election, with Brexit in the UK and with the anti-immigration movement all across Europe. So much of it has been orchestrated by the Russians and they’ve been very patient and skilled in the way that they’ve achieved it. I mean, I’m sure you were as shocked when you heard the Brexit result as I was when I heard that Donald Trump had been elected. But so much of it was down to a foreign state interfering in the domestic policies of a separate, sovereign country. That’s one challenge that we have today which we didn’t have in the Sixties, the Russian intent to disrupt the West. They realised that War is different now and that tanks and aircraft-carriers are passé. So they’ve found new ways of achieving their goals and I think they’ve even been pretty open about it. That’s the big challenge that we face now.’
‘Well, Detroit’s reputation is as a working class town, although it probably isn’t so much now. But when the MC5 emerged, the cool places to be were New York, London and Los Angeles… certainly not Detroit, Michigan ! I think we resented that kind of condescending, elitist attitude because we felt that, musically, our ideas were just as valid as anybody else out there. We were as competent as anyone else and maybe even ahead of most people. There were very few bands that the MC5 would take a back-seat for… the Rolling Stones were good, The Who were good, there were a few other bands we respected, but mostly, we knew our ideas and what we were doing were just as good as anyone else and I think that made us push harder. We were facing a world that said, ‘Who the Hell do you think you are’, so we had to meet that head-on. I think that whole idea that nothing good, creatively, could happen in an industrial city has been fuel for Detroit artists to work harder. We have a tradition of honouring hard work… there’s a nobility in hard-labour and the traditon that if you work-hard, you can play-hard. You find your integrity where you can. Detroit is a very tough town to make anything happen, creatively, so if you can surface in Detroit, you’ll become kind of bulletproof and no-one else is going to hurt you too much.’
Finally… Hunter S.Thompson once said that, after Nixon, he had thought that politics in America could never get so bad again, but then you ended-up with George W Bush. And, of course, now you have Donald Trump ! What do you think about the way these things have come about ?
‘Well, Bush was bad but Dick Cheney was the real, dark force behind that Administration. My friend Adam McKay is just putting the finishing touches to a movie called ‘Vice’, which is all about Cheney. It’s going to be interesting to see how the world reacts to it, because Adam doesn’t pull any punches ! But, are we worse-off today with Donald Trump ? Well, we’ve lost a few hundred-thousand people to the opium-crisis in America right now but you can’t put that all down to Trump… He certainly should be doing something about it but he wasn’t responsible for it in the first place. And when you compare his term as President to the Sixties, when 50,000 young Americans and millions of Vietnamese died during the war in Vietnam, then Trump certainly hasn’t equaled that level of carnage… So, apples-to-apples, oranges-to-oranges, I’d have to say that Trump isn’t as bad as Nixon was… so far ! He still has two more years in office so he may still fuck things up and he certainly seems capable of it. There are parallels to be drawn… Involvement in another war in the Middle East, a criminal in the White House, a disregard for human rights and civil rights… But generally, I’d have to say that things aren’t as bad as they were during Nixon’s era and I can only hope that the pendulum will swing back towards a more humanistic and civilized sphere of leadership. What happened with Trump was a perfect storm of negativity. The Democrats had a candidate who was not-great, although I think Hillary could’ve been a fine President. Now, we have to find a new candidate that can beat Trump. But either way, he won’t be there forever… he’ll be gone in two years or in six years and, at the rate he’s going, he may not even last the two years. No one thought he would ever win but we didn’t know that the Russians were helping him. That’s the thing that really separates the Nixon-era from today. The Russians have skillfully undermined Western democracy with Trump’ election, with Brexit in the UK and with the anti-immigration movement all across Europe. So much of it has been orchestrated by the Russians and they’ve been very patient and skilled in the way that they’ve achieved it. I mean, I’m sure you were as shocked when you heard the Brexit result as I was when I heard that Donald Trump had been elected. But so much of it was down to a foreign state interfering in the domestic policies of a separate, sovereign country. That’s one challenge that we have today which we didn’t have in the Sixties, the Russian intent to disrupt the West. They realised that War is different now and that tanks and aircraft-carriers are passé. So they’ve found new ways of achieving their goals and I think they’ve even been pretty open about it. That’s the big challenge that we face now.’
We have to end there as it’s now time for the soundcheck to begin, but I’m able to hang-out and watch the band run through a bunch of songs before eventually heading out to eat.
Back at the venue, the place is gradually filling-up and the support act, former Hanoi Rocks frontman Michael Monroe, takes to the stage with his band. I have to say that I was never a big fan of Hanoi Rocks, but I watch the set and it’s pretty entertaining. I can’t say that I’ll be rushing out to buy the back catalogue but Monroe certainly has a lot of character and completely throws himself into the songs.
By the time the headliners are due onstage, the downstairs area is pretty solidly packed and the main balcony is full-up as well. It’s a good turn-out for a Monday evening and a fine indication that the MC5’s reputation is still held in high esteem.
The band appear as the original introduction is played over the PA. Wayne is already prowling the stage, yelling the words alongside Brother JC Crawfords’ iconic call to arms. Then they blast into ‘Ramblin’ Rose’. Wayne may not sing it in the same vocal-pitch any longer, but it’s just as dynamic and a perfect start. The band are sounding so powerful already, throwing themselves into this with genuine looks of glee and enjoyment on their faces. Marcus Durant then takes his place at the front and the infamous introduction is intoned once more before the whole band erupt into ‘Kick Out the Jams’. In many ways this is the only problem with this set, that their most well-known song gets played so soon, but at the same time, I doubt if there’s anyone in this audience that’s going to be leaving early ! The set continues, maintaining the energy levels at each and every point. ‘Come Together’, ‘Rocket Reducer’, ‘Borderline’, Motor City is Burning’, I Want You Right Now’, ‘Starship’… There’s not a single wasted moment on the original album and this band perform it with total credibility. Marcus Durants’ vocals are, as Wayne said earlier, ideal for this job. He channels the spirit of Rob Tyner naturally and has the right voice for the task. Kim Thayil reproduces Fred Smith’s guitar sound with respect, never adding anything that shouldn’t be there even though he’d be more than capable of doing so. Bill and Brendan have really bonded as a great rhythm section, as I suspected they would, providing the powerhouse foundations for the overall sound. And Wayne… he leaps and dances around the stage in a manner that totally belies his age. At 70 years, he still has more energy than most performers that you’ll ever see, and is a pleasure to watch as well as hear. The set continues with selections form the ‘Back in the USA’ and ‘High Time’ albums, eventually closing with a raucous ‘Call Me Animal’. Unsurprisingly, the band are noisily called back and a three song encore kicks-off with ‘Sister Anne’ and ‘Let Me Try’ (both featuring Michael Monroe on sax) and a final, exhilarating ‘Looking At You’. The audience is left breathless but I’m sure would still have enjoyed even more. This really had been a perfect celebration of a great band and their legendary album, something that still grabs your heart and soul even after 50 years. I really hope we get another chance to see this band playing live, although the chances are that we won’t. If that is the case, then I’m just glad that I saw this show and know that, whatever the mainstream may think, we’ve been listening to the real deal !
Back at the venue, the place is gradually filling-up and the support act, former Hanoi Rocks frontman Michael Monroe, takes to the stage with his band. I have to say that I was never a big fan of Hanoi Rocks, but I watch the set and it’s pretty entertaining. I can’t say that I’ll be rushing out to buy the back catalogue but Monroe certainly has a lot of character and completely throws himself into the songs.
By the time the headliners are due onstage, the downstairs area is pretty solidly packed and the main balcony is full-up as well. It’s a good turn-out for a Monday evening and a fine indication that the MC5’s reputation is still held in high esteem.
The band appear as the original introduction is played over the PA. Wayne is already prowling the stage, yelling the words alongside Brother JC Crawfords’ iconic call to arms. Then they blast into ‘Ramblin’ Rose’. Wayne may not sing it in the same vocal-pitch any longer, but it’s just as dynamic and a perfect start. The band are sounding so powerful already, throwing themselves into this with genuine looks of glee and enjoyment on their faces. Marcus Durant then takes his place at the front and the infamous introduction is intoned once more before the whole band erupt into ‘Kick Out the Jams’. In many ways this is the only problem with this set, that their most well-known song gets played so soon, but at the same time, I doubt if there’s anyone in this audience that’s going to be leaving early ! The set continues, maintaining the energy levels at each and every point. ‘Come Together’, ‘Rocket Reducer’, ‘Borderline’, Motor City is Burning’, I Want You Right Now’, ‘Starship’… There’s not a single wasted moment on the original album and this band perform it with total credibility. Marcus Durants’ vocals are, as Wayne said earlier, ideal for this job. He channels the spirit of Rob Tyner naturally and has the right voice for the task. Kim Thayil reproduces Fred Smith’s guitar sound with respect, never adding anything that shouldn’t be there even though he’d be more than capable of doing so. Bill and Brendan have really bonded as a great rhythm section, as I suspected they would, providing the powerhouse foundations for the overall sound. And Wayne… he leaps and dances around the stage in a manner that totally belies his age. At 70 years, he still has more energy than most performers that you’ll ever see, and is a pleasure to watch as well as hear. The set continues with selections form the ‘Back in the USA’ and ‘High Time’ albums, eventually closing with a raucous ‘Call Me Animal’. Unsurprisingly, the band are noisily called back and a three song encore kicks-off with ‘Sister Anne’ and ‘Let Me Try’ (both featuring Michael Monroe on sax) and a final, exhilarating ‘Looking At You’. The audience is left breathless but I’m sure would still have enjoyed even more. This really had been a perfect celebration of a great band and their legendary album, something that still grabs your heart and soul even after 50 years. I really hope we get another chance to see this band playing live, although the chances are that we won’t. If that is the case, then I’m just glad that I saw this show and know that, whatever the mainstream may think, we’ve been listening to the real deal !
