Scott Morgan’s Powertrane with Deniz Tek & Ron Asheton

“Ann Arbor Revival Meeting” LP

scum stats: first 500 on red vinyl

It is seldom that live shows I witnessed are properly released on record, so the fact that I was in the crowd for this show and it’s finally out on vinyl puts a smile on my face.

Short story: the Mooney Suzuki had flown in to Detroit to finish the mixing of their album “Electric Sweat” and were staying at my mom’s house (where I was living) over that weekend.

Upon picking them up from the airport, they’d asked if there were any good shows happening while they were in town. I’d mentioned this show (one I wasn’t previously planning on attending) and they LIT UP excited and hell-bent on attending.

I was easily swayed. The gig was memorable (I got to meet Ron Asheton backstage afterwards), so much so that I went home and immediately reviewed it in a piece that went nowhere. Unpublished for 17 years. Until now.

The piece ain’t perfect (maybe I imagined them playing “Future/Now” by chance?), but I’ve got nothing to cringe over. I was 19 years old. No ragrets.

I’m giving away a free copy of a red vinyl copy of this sucker to the post in the comments I like best. Write about something you did in the early 2000’s (or earlier) that DOES embarrass you. Turn your cringe into colored vinyl.

DENIZ TEK w/ SCOTT MORGAN’S POWERTRANE, featuring RON ASHETON 11/10/01 Blind Pig, Ann Arbor, Michigan

Detroit expatriate Deniz Tek didn’t need have a cake for his birthday celebration this night. All he needed to do was show-up. Scott Morgan and Ron Asheton and 200 hundred-some people, most too young to have ever seen RADIO BIRDMAN, the RATIONALS or the STOOGES live (Tek, Morgan, and Asheton’s former bands, respectively) were the guests. With only a few days to practice, his backing band overcame a few miscues and provided the concrete backbeat that they were enlisted for. Tek electrified the audience with his intense demeanor, seeming as if his entire future depended on what amounted to a pick-up gig. The set mainly consisted of Tek’s solo material and Radio Birdman songs, but the occasional MC5 song (“Future/Now”) and Sonic Rendezvous tune (“City Slang”) seemed to be surreptitiously slipped in by Scott Morgan. After a brief break backstage, the band returned with Ron Asheton. The all-star line-up tore, no, ripped, no, shredded through the Stooges back catalog. As Asheton fingered the first notes to “TV Eye” the crowd erupted. Twenty years of pent up energy was released in a cosmic explosion of power chords and Detroit dirge. “So this is what rock and roll was like?” I thought to myself, having been born after the STOOGES, MC5, and RADIO BIRDMAN had all played their last shows. I’d gotten mine, finally, as did the rest of the crowd. “Down on the Street” featured Hiawatha from the Cult Heroes on guest vocals. As if being the only black member of the White Panthers wasn’t enough, Hiawatha oozed with cool, maintaining the cocksure attitude I can only imagine Iggy had when he originally sang those notes. Next was the anthem of leering punks everywhere “I Wanna be Your Dog”. Had we waited our entire lives just to hear this song? I had, so had others, we celebrated in spilt beer, pushing, shoving, and any other form of testosterone bonding that can occur without taking off any clothes. The crowd had turned into an atom smasher and no one was complaining. We had arrived, as had our leaders, and the celebration was the chunky boogie of “1969”, the first track off the STOOGES self-titled debut album. The show closed with Tek’s signature song “New Race” and was somewhat marred by the fact that two hyper-fans took it upon themselves to jump the stage and sing along. I cringed at the tackiness, but felt better when I saw one of the guys realize what an idiot he looked like as he emotionally broke down after the show.It seems that rock journalists have overused the term “sonic” to the point where it’s lost it’s meaning. But the vibe, the air in the room, it was, simply put, sonic. Deniz Tek plays the guitar that Fred “Sonic” Smith used in the MC5. ‘Nuff said. A line-up of this caliber would draw thousands in Europe, a continent that continually seems to be beating us to the cool that we produce in southeast Michigan, while the club in Ann Arbor held less than 500. You weren’t there? Your loss. Once in a lifetime. I was. I’m set. Now I can die.