Gabba gabba, we accept you, one of us: A history of The Ramones in Ann Arbor

MUSIC BOOTLEG WASHTENAW

Flyer for the first Ramones concert in Ann Arbor, March 28, 1977.

The flyer for that first Ramones' first concert in Ann Arbor, March 28, 1977.

[Updated February 9, 2021, with photos and reviews from The Ann Arbor News].

The Blind Pig is a favorite club of many rock musicians, and the venue has hosted so many legendary bands over the years.

But The Ramones' love lay elsewhere in Ann Arbor.

Between 1977 and 1983, the New York City punk godfathers played Tree Town seven times—and every show was as headliners at The Second Chance, which is now Necto, 516 E. Liberty St. The Blind Pig was still a blues bar back then while The Second Chance was hosting numerous rockers, from Bob Seger (when the club was known as Chances Are) to Bow Wow Wow. In fact, during that period The Ramones headlined nearly as many shows in Ann Arbor as they did in Detroit (nine).

The first time they played Michigan was as the opener for Flamin' Groovies, October 17, 1976, at the Royal Oak Music Theater.

But The Ramones' first show as headliners in Michigan was a little over five months later in Ann Arbor on March 28, 1977, with Sonic's Rendezvous Band opening. There doesn't appear to be any audio or video of this show, but here are two excellent photos by legendary Detroit Rock City and Creem magazine photographer Robert Mathieu of Tommy and Johnny Ramone backstage with the Fred "Sonic" Smith, Ron Asheton, and Scott Asheton:

Friday Five: Laughing Hyenas

MUSIC FRIDAY FIVE BOOTLEG WASHTENAW

Laughing Hyenas, 1987

Jim Kimball, Larissa Strickland, Kevin Strickland, and John Brannon of Laughing Hyenas in a 1987 promo photo provided by the band's label then, Touch & Go Records.

Friday Five is where we celebrate new and recent music by Washtenaw County-associated artists.

This week, it's the Ann Arbor post-punk noise-blues of Laughing Hyenas whose discography recently came to Bandcamp.

In 1995, not long after the breakup of his pioneering hardcore band Negative Approach, vocalist John Brannon and his partner, Larissa Strickland, moved from Detroit to Ann Arbor and formed Laughing Hyenas, which drew equally from The Stooges, The Birthday Party, old blues, and pure noise.

While the Hyenas' music has been on Spotify and the like for a while, and Third Man reissued all their records on vinyl in 2018, the Touch & Go label's recent decision to put much of its back catalog on Bandcamp gives me yet another reason to relisten to this supremely powerful band. I also get to tell two quick personal stories I have about Laughing Hyenas lead singer John Brannon before the tales get pushed into the ever-increasing "FILE NOT FOUND" portion of my brain.

Bootleg Washtenaw: Repulsion live at Schoolkids Records, June 9, 1991

MUSIC BOOTLEG WASHTENAW

Repulsion at Schookids Records, 1991

An occasional series highlighting live recordings made in Washtenaw County.

On Repulsion's lone album, Horrified, the Flint-based grind-metal pioneers' sound is a muffled blur of blast beats, gnarly guitar, and grunted vocals. Same is true of the band's many demos, which is what Horrified was when it was recorded in 1986 and released as the Slaughter of the Innocent tape. That sort of audio is what you'll hear times 100 as featured in this June 9, 1991, in-store concert Repulsion did at Schoolkids Records, 523 East Liberty Street. But it's still wonderful to see the inside of Ann Arbor's most legendary record store once again. 

Horrified received its official release in 1989, and that's the record vocalist-bassist Scott Carlson is referring to when he points to the wall at Schoolkids and says, "The is from our album—up there" before the band rips into "Pestilent Decay."

June 9, 1991, was a Sunday and, before the videographer steps into the record store, he records a long line of people standing in the dark to get into the Michigan Theater. East Liberty was hopping that night. The sunset was at 9:10 pm, so this show was likely after Schoolkids closed for the day, but I'm not sure what event was drawing such a big crowd at the Michigan Theater. According to The Concert Database, there were no bands playing at the Michigan Theater that night—the previous show was Laurie Anderson on May 11 and the next one was  Kraftwerk on September 27—and City Slickers was the number one movie in the country that weekend, but I don't recall first-run mainstream films being a regular thing then for this venue. (Looking into it; will update if I find anything. Very important, you know.)

Update: The crack staff at AADL's Old News figured out it was Taxi Blues, a critically acclaimed 1990 Russian movie, but not one I would assume could draw such a big crowd. Also, the start time was 8:40 pm, and despite the darkened skies, the Google Machine tells me sunset that day wasn't for another 30 minutes. The East Liberty corridor is a tunnel.

While you should absolutely listen to Repulsion's badass Horrified if you want to hear one of the earliest examples of extreme metal, the main draw of this video for Washtenaw County folks is seeing the racks and racks of expertly curated LPs at Schoolkids Records. Check out the 39-minute below, but fair warning: Some cretin on the street who was there to see the band uses the N-word at the :27 second mark.

WCBN's Radio Rama Lama Fa Fa Fa offers up Sproton Layer and Ramones rarities

MUSIC BOOTLEG WASHTENAW

Sproton Layer

Left: Sproton Layer guitarist-singer Ben Miller cuts vocals for a Sproton Layer song in the basement of his Ann Arbor family's home, 1969. Right: Trumpeter Harold Kirchen, drummer Laurence Miller, and bassist Roger Miller rock the Little Theatre at Pioneer High School in May 1970. Photos courtesy of Sproton Layer.

Frank Uhle's Radio Rama Lama Fa Fa Fa on WCBN 88.3-FM always features a treasure trove of vintage rock 'n' roll and punk, and he's one of the great historians of 1960s and 1970s underground Michigan music. Uhle also re-released the ultra-obscure and totally rippin' lone 7-inch by Ann Arbor 1960s garage rockers The Beau Biens, which we talked about in-depth here.

Because the pandemic has kept DJs from going into the WCBN studio, the station is rebroadcasting a lot of shows, though some hosts are broadcasting live from their homes while others are preparing their programs there and uploading them.

For Radio Rama Lama Fa Fa Fa, which airs 10 pm Mondays, Uhle has been digging into his vast archive of shows, as well as his personal collection of rare recordings (plus photos and other memorabilia), to produce programs that offer a little bit new, a little bit vintage, and a whole lot of fun.

For his October 26 show, Uhle put together a collection of Ramones recordings from December 4, 1979, that includes a WCBN interview as well as a portion of their show that night at Second Change (now known as Necto). Uhle wrote the following on his Facebook page:

Bootleg Washtenaw: Vulfpeck live at The Blind Pig, April 24, 2015 (plus a new LP)

MUSIC BOOTLEG WASHTENAW

Vulfpeck at The Blind Pig, 2015

An occasional series highlighting live recordings made in Washtenaw County.

Vulfpeck began in 2011 as students in U-M's school of music. Last year the band sold out Madison Square Garden, which you can watch here.

Between those extremes, the jammy funk band regularly played The Blind Pig, and the enthusiastic live-music guy known as DSA was there to document it with five cameras and a multitrack recording direct from the soundboard. The gig sounds and looks great, and Vulfpeck, as ever, has a lot of fun.

Now based in Los Angeles and sundry other locales, Vulfpeck also released a new album, The Joy of Music, the Job of Real Estate, on October 2020.

Check out The Blind Pig concert and stream The Joy of Music, the Job of Real Estate below:

Bootleg Washtenaw: Wipers, July 7, 1987, at The Blind Pig

MUSIC BOOTLEG WASHTENAW

Wipers

An occasional series highlighting live recordings made in Washtenaw County.

You may not know the music of cult group Wipers, but you've definitely heard songs by one of the group's biggest fans: Kurt Cobain.

In fact, you may even know two Wipers tunes through Nirvana covers: The 1992 tribute comp Eight Songs for Greg Sage and the Wipers (later expanded to Fourteen Songs ...) featured Cobain & Co. covering "Return of the Rat," while the Nirvana tour EP Hormoaning from the same year featured "D-7." Both songs come from Wipers' 1980 debut, Is This Real, which Sub Pop reissued in 1993.

The Wipers' tour that brought the trio to The Blind Pig on July 7, 1987, was for their fifth album, Follow Blind. The group would record one more record, 1988's The Circle, before calling it quits for six years. With the buzz created by Nirvana, Greg Sage reconvened the band for three more albums in the 1990s before stopping again—still a cult band.

Like Cobain, Sage was a left-handed guitarist who mixed distorted chords and dexterous lead lines. But where Cobain dealt with huge dynamics, Sage tended toward a nervy slow burn, with his hazy guitar sound—achieved through tube amps he built himself—providing a noise bed to support his wailing but distant vocals.

Wipers started in Portland, Oregon, but Sage has lived in Arizona for some time now, where he runs a recording studio and the Zeno Records label, which sells all the Wipers' albums plus two Sage solo LPs.

The Blind Pig recording sounds like an audience tape rather than from the soundboard, but it's pretty good quality.

Setlist and audio:

Bootleg Washtenaw: Nirvana, April 10, 1990, at The Blind Pig

MUSIC BOOTLEG WASHTENAW

Someone recently uploaded Nirvana's April 10, 1990, show at The Blind Pig to YouTube for the umpteenth time with the bad audio and wonky video.

Why bother when there's the version above, which has been online since 2012 and it sounds pretty good? It also boasts the following: "New Custom 2-Camera Mix/Deshaked with synced Audio (Aud1 JWB remaster)."

"Deshaked" is a shaky but accurate technical term, and for that alone, I'm entering this version of the video onto the record as the definitive edition of this bootleg.

Tracklist: