The Grande Ballroom Story - Louder Than Love

LOUDER THAN LOVE—
The Grande Ballroom Story (Trailer)

LOUDER THAN LOVE is the story of the Grande Ballroom—birthplace of the Detroit rock music scene. Bands like MC5, Iggy & the Stooges, Ted Nugent & the Amboy Dukes, Alice Cooper and many more got their start here. The Grande not only influenced Michigan musicians but inspired bands from all over the U.S. and Europe. Legendary acts like Led Zeppelin, Cream, BB King, Janis Joplin, Pink Floyd and the Who graced the stage at the Grande on a regular basis.

(The last we heard, the producer is still seeking distribution funding for this film.)

Freeform Radio Master—Dave Dixon On WABX

It was 1967 and, if we were lucky, once in a great while we might hear something cool on AM radio—Buffalo Springfield’s For What It’s Worth being a harbinger of what was to come. In the autumn of that year, Detroit’s WABX-FM began broadcasting The Troubador, an experimental show, for an hour each week.

For the first time we could listen to an eclectic mix of blues, rock, folk and jazz all within the same program. And in stereo, no less. Within six months the X was broadcasting similar programming for most of each day. For this listener, there was never any looking back at the limited, uneven, preformatted AM station offerings we had had to endure up to that point. (Remember the Zombies being followed by Percy Faith?)

As an impressionable 15-year-old music hound, I would frequently call and have lengthy conversations with the DJs while ostensibly doing homework. John Small, who soon moved over to WKNR-FM, was always very welcoming. Then ABX added Dave Dixon to its staff; he would go on to become the esteemed leader of the legendary "Air Aces."

Dixon had a “golden ear,” introducing attentive listeners to cross-cultural music on a world scale. Only on his show could one be exposed to such gems as Paul Horn’s Inside the Taj Mahal, Gandharva from Beaver & Krause, Richard Harris singing MacArthur Park and Harry Nilsson’s The Point (a complete LP side). In between, he might have mixed in a cut from John Mayall’s Blues From Laurel Canyon, some Savoy Brown (with original vocalist Chris Youlden), Cat Mother & the All-Night Newsboys and a track from Tim Buckley’s Happy Sad release. Toss in some Brian Auger Trinity (featuring Julie Driscoll on vocals) and Laura Nyro singing Eli's Coming for good measure. Not to be overlooked, Detroit artists such as Frost (Dick Wagner), the Amboy Dukes (Ted Nugent), SRC and the Stooges (Iggy Pop) would also be integrated into the mix.

Continued...
Often Dixon wouldn’t play an entire track. Instead he would seamlessly blend portions of disparate genres into a cohesive audio excursion that might last an hour, interrupted only for a FCC-mandated station ID break. His instrument was comprised of matching turntables, a mixing console and a headphone set.

I miss the days when I was INFORMED [about] new
music… even the music I didn't like I grew to appreciate
for its uniqueness. It was truly an education back
then… How will [this generation] expand [its musical]
horizons?? Surely not from corporate radio stations.

Smogboy, from At Detroit forum, 12/10/06

During his career Dixon was fired from more than one station, being labeled as gruff and argumentative. While that very well may be true, to this listener—and frequent caller—he always had time to talk about music, share what he knew, and be an encourager. This was perhaps most important, for I had started on a voyage of musical discovery long before Dave Dixon and WABX, and wondered why others didn’t seem to find music as important to their daily existence. Instead of snuffing out that desire, his unique ability as audio interpreter, alchemist and promoter fortified my quest to be ever on the alert for recordings of interest.

Today the closest one can get to freeform programming in this style rests with college radio stations having limited range, unless they're also streaming on the Internet such as WNMC in Traverse City, Michigan. While it doesn't quite match Dixon's artistry, the Internet's Radio Paradise does a credible job of filling the void left by the demise of freeform terrestial radio. (Albeit Dixon's shows were sometimes extraterrestial.)

Dixon left ABX in 1974. After 10 years in the Miami/Ft. Lauderdale market, he returned to Detroit, where for several years he played the same type of unique music mix on public station WDET as he had during those heady days of the “Air Aces.”

Listen to a 1990 Dave Dixon aircheck while he was on WDET:

After a few years doing a talk show on WXYT in Detroit, Dixon died at home in May of 1999 at age 60. His legacy is that of programming shows in the way that a painter chooses colors and textures, painstakenly and deliberately applying them on an aural canvas to provide much more than a fleeting impression.

Detroit Rock: Dick Wagner, Alice Cooper & Friends

Here Comes the Mystery Man

Several weeks ago I was listening to Radio Paradise when the station proprietor and chief musicologist, Bill Goldsmith, mentioned guitarist/singer/composer Dick Wagner in connection with Lou Reed. "That's interesting," I thought, thinking I might drop Bill a quick note about my Dick Wagner connection. One gets busy, though, and...

Fast-forward a week or so. Radio being what it isn't these days (no thanks to Clear Channel), I usually listen to NPR in the car and happened upon an immediately-identifiable voice—that of one Alice Cooper, progenitor of Kiss, Marilyn Manson, and the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Later, I remembered that Dick Wagner was Alice's guitarist and co-conspirator for many years.

(Not being an Alice fan back then, the interview was both fascinating and enlightening...did you know Alice personally knew the likes of Groucho Marx, who was a fan? I didn't either. Click the [Listen] button to hear the interview.)

My first personal encounter with Wagner was at a concert at the Birmingham (MI) Palladium, where a group of us were chatting him and his band up during a break. We had also seen his group, The Frost, in addition to ("Terrible" Ted Nugent's) Amboy Dukes, the Psychedelic Stooges (read: Iggy Pop), Bob Seger, et al., appear as warm-up acts all over SE Michigan. (Seger even performed at our surprise high school assembly one afternoon, debuting his Beautiful Loser LP).

From Dick we quickly learned The Frost would soon be recording their second LP, Rock 'N' Roll Music, live at the Grande Ballroom, Detroit's Fillmore-equivalent run by Russ "Paul Is Dead" Gibb. In fact, most of the aforementioned bands, including the MC5 and an earlier group that featured the Eagles' Glenn Frey, were in semi-rotation as opening acts at the Grande.

Shortly thereafter, I well remember pushing my way forward through the Grande's SRO crowd, then proceeding to scream my fool head off at the end of each song. It was a live recording, after all, and they had asked us to make it sound that way. Coming across these recordings not long ago, I swear I can still hear my distinctive "w-h-o-o-p"!

With minimal guidance from Grande artist Carl Lundgren (Gary Grimshaw was the other regular artist), it happens I also designed a postcard (now a collector's item going for $250 a copy), promoting an upcoming B.B. King appearance at the Grande, on which both Wagner's Frost and Iggy's Psychedelic Stooges are billed as opening acts. Imagine this handbill appearing as a part of a regular B.B. King exhibit at the Rock 'N' Roll Hall of Fame & Museum (true story)!

In visting Wagner's well-done website, one learns he moved to Phoenix a couple of years ago and once again is teamed up with Alice Cooper preparing some new material. Hoping to see the "Mystery Man" again soon!

Leon Russell, Frank Zappa, Iggy Pop & Friends

And So We Get Started...

This blog is about music...many genres of music, as it happens, though I'm not predisposed to country nor rap. I'm a bit old-school, but you'll find my tastes are all over the place—from John Coltrane to Hoyt Axton, Roy Orbison to Vivaldi, Diana Krall to Blue Oyster Cult.

That's not to say that I don't appreciate an occasional offering from an Alan Jackson or a M.C. Hammer (like I said, I'm a bit old school), but don't expect to learn anything about the latest alt rock by reading any of this. Once in a while I may let my fondness for some group like Porcupine Tree, the Doves, or Durutti Column be known, but unless I get tipped off by (the best thing to happen to Internet radio), or by my daughter, Brooke, I don't spend much time chasing that down. Sorry. There are only so many hours in the day in which to listen.

Rather, I'm writing this blog to hopefully broaden your own audio spectrum: to perhaps turn you on to some obscure piece of music that's really going to do it for you. Like anything recorded by Yulara. But I'm getting way ahead of myself.

Along the way, I intend to provide you with some historical background—as much as I care to, that is. For example, that the record companies originally told George Benson to, as the title of an unrelated Frank Zappa recording attests, Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar. They believed that no one would ever want to hear poor George sing and, thankfully, they were very wrong.

(Though you've probably heard George's rendition of The Drifters' On Broadway by now, check out his version of Leon Russell's This Masquerade. And now that I've mentioned Leon, were you aware that it was he who penned This Diamond Ring, a big Top 40 hit for Gary Lewis & the Playboys? And yes, Gary is the son of Jerry Lewis, the goonier half [?!] of the Martin & Lewis comedy team. It turns out that, way before Joe Cocker and Mad Dogs & Englishmen, ol' Leon was a L.A. studio musician playing with the likes of some guy by the name of Glen Campbell.)

See? That's the kind of historical stuff I'm going to be weaving through this blog. Along with ideas for some really cool segues (track mixing) you probably wouldn't have ever considered. We'll talk about gear, from semi-audiophile stuff all the way down to the smallest flash-based MP3 players—though it is not my intention to compete with the likes of Sound and Vision magazine or Engadget.

And I'll relate some personal stories, such as going on a school-sanctioned field trip to see/hear Cream the first time they played Detroit in 1967. Or having Iggy Pop (aka Iggy Stooge) lick my Kodak camera lens. Or catching an early Grand Funk Railroad (subsequently forced to shorten their name to Grand Funk) at an outdoor summer festival at Mt. Holly (near Flint, MI).

But wait! Did someone mention the blues? And jazz? Zydeco? Ambient/trance/acid jazz, et al.? And a whole lot of other stuff? Writing this on a PC holding well over 27,000 processed tracks stashed on 1TB RAID5 disk array (and easily twice that many that have yet to be "processed"), I think I've got the subject covered, though I know of a couple of guys whose collections dwarf mine.

Happy listening!