POP
American sounds
DUNCAN FALLOWELL
America produces some good groups; or, if that should sound patronising, some very good groups. Nobody can play country rock like the Band, or jazz rock like Chicago, or jazz rock freak like Zappa, or southern swamp like Creedence Clearwater Revival, or white black blues like Canned Heat. Un- fortunately they leave me pretty cold: disap- pointed from the neck up and dead from the neck down.
The trouble is that they are so normal. There is nothing extra-terrestrial about them. I can see that the Grateful Dead are faultlessly professional. Jefferson Airplane, too: they can jam for hours on end with complete assurance; plug them in and off they go as creamily as a Cadillac. There is something very satisfying about a beautiful song beautifully played and I am not at- tacking competence per se. But it does seem that dexterity has sterilised many American rock bands into thinking that nothing else is necessary. Their emotional and musical stability, regardless of the length of their hair or studiously off-beat lyrics, leaves the music slightly anaemic, lacking a cutting edge. The consequence of dropping too deeply into one's 'bag' is claustrophobia and asphyx- iation : when Cream felt they were becoming automatic they wisely split up.
The history of American pop over the past few years is very much one of refining and perfecting its basic elements. They could never produce a Pink Floyd without sound- ing gauche. There are of course some ex- ceptions who, because they are kicking against a tacky pop ancestry, are extremely bizarre. The Velvet Underground, for ex- ample. I always seem to be citing them as an ultimate something or other and shall con- sider this band more fully when their fourth LP is released.
Blue Cheer, also, slid further than most. Billed as the 'Loudest Group in the World'—which says much for their stamina—they were, by critical yardsticks, appalling. Yet they generated a very personal kind of mad energy in which absolute criticism has no place. Now that they have attempted to tidy themselves up—as manifested on a new album—Blue Cheer (Philips, 39s 11d)—they are feeble beyond words. So it is with mc5. On Kick out the Janis (Elektra, 42s 6d) they took the clichés of rock and inflated them to monstrously ex- hausting proportions. They did other in- teresting things too, like defecating on stage. If a recent appearance at the Marquee Club is a guide they can still pack a sweaty omni- sexual punch. Otherwise, their records have gone the way of Blue Cheer's.
Also from Detroit, like mc5, is a new band and possibly the strangest of all. They are called the Stooges. Iggy Stooge, manic perverted goon and apotheosis of the 'all messed up an' outta ma mind' school, looks as though he might fail a Lionel Bart audi- tion only by the skin of his teeth. It is a surprise therefore to discover that on stage he is inclined to claw at his body until it bleeds, tear out hair, punch his face into pur- ple shreds, and generally abuse himself. On one occasion he skidded off the stage and crashed nonchalantly, into a stack of chairs, chipping teeth and splitting lips. The hap- pening was celebrated with a song called 'My pretty face is going to hell . . '. One may detect other words. 'I been dirt an' I don't care . . . I am you'—a catharsis indeed for the accumulating frustration of American youth; in the short term a release, in the long term who knows? At our very own Royal Court Theatre, we've recently had Stuart Brisley's puke-in. These must be, to put it gently, symptoms of dissatisfaction.
And the music? Iggy's vision of the most demented band ever induced him to seek out those least influenced by established rock, i.e. those who had never played a note in theirlives. And so were born Ron Asheton on guitar, Dave Alexander on bass, Scott Asheton on drums. The result? Well, it need hardly be said. Quite unlike anything else, which is some achievement these days.
On their first LP, newly released in Eng- land, The Stooges (Elektra, 42s 6d), the group display a degree of mind-concussing insensitivity which mc5 might have envied. In his calmer moments Iggy will stop knock- ing himself about and spit something into the microphone, and if he's feeling ex- ceptionally ethereal you may even catch the words. If nirvana can ever equal coma, then the Stooges are on their way to heaven.
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