Kick Out The Jams

"LEMME BE WHOM I AM!...YEAH!...AND LEMME KICK OUT THE JAMS!"

That demonically screamed phrase contains the four most important words ever uttered in rock'n' roll. Nobody said them better than the Motor City Five - a self-imploding Death Star of a group.

Record companies feared them like the plague and narrow-minded producers detested their 'out of tune' playing. Hence early singles like 'I Just Don't Know' are the sound of too many disparate egos and not enough communal resolution. At the other extreme, their most tuneful, accessible yet somewhat tame work appears on the jangly Back In The USA album.

Both elements are captured on The Big Bang - The Best Of MC5, and it's well worth investigating. When they hit the spot, MC5 were simply a new religion. The concerts recorded in Russ Gibb's Grand Ballroom in Detroit for the Kick Out The Jams album embody the sound of love and war dancing simultaneously. Tyner's introduction to 'Ramblin' Rose' is sacred - only Public Enemy's holler of "London England! Consider yourselves . . . warned!", and The Who Live At Leeds qualify as similar recordings beamed live and direct from heaven. Magic and genius.