MC5 - High Time (1971)

High Time was the third and final album released by the protopunk band MC5, released in 1971. It was co-produced by the band and Atlantic Records staff engineer Geoffrey Haslam. After losing money on this and the group's previous album, Atlantic dropped the group, which broke up not long afterwards. Unhappy with the more cultivated sound of their sophomore release "Back In The U.S.A.", the MC5 returned to the barnstorming rock & roll that characterized their debut, "Kick Out The Jams", on their third and final album, 1971's "High Time". While JAMS was a live recording, HIGH TIME was created in the studio, but does manage to retain the rough and spontaneous edge of their debut. Unfortunately, the album didn't serve as the MC5's big commercial breakthrough (although it deserved to), and the quintet broke up in a shroud of bickering and drug abuse soon after.
The songwriting is once again experimental and unpredictable, fueled by the band's barely contained playing. While the songs are pretty obscure outside of the MC5's rabid cult following, almost all of them easily hold their own. Most of the tracks exceed the five-minute mark, such as the groovy "Future/Now", the anthemic "Baby Won't Ya", and the percussive album-closer "Skunk". The punk rocker "Poison" and the bluesy "Gotta Keep Movin'" are shorter but just as exhilarating. HIGH TIME is a criminally underrated early-'70s rock gem.

Track listing:
1. "Sister Anne" (Fred "Sonic" Smith) – 7:23
2. "Baby Won't Ya" (Smith) – 5:32
3. "Miss X" (Wayne Kramer) – 5:08
4. "Gotta Keep Movin'" (Dennis Thompson) – 3:24
5. "Future/Now" (Rob Tyner) – 6:21
6. "Poison" (Kramer) – 3:24
7. "Over and Over" (Smith) – 5:13
8. "Skunk (Sonicly Speaking)" (Smith) – 5:31

FLAC: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4
MP3 320 Kbps download or download

Personnel
* Rob Tyner – vocals, harmonica, maracas
* Fred "Sonic" Smith – guitar
* Wayne Kramer – guitar
* Michael Davis – bass
* Dennis Thompson – drums

MC5 - Back in the USA (1970)

Since it was impossible to top the in-concert exuberance of their debut, KICK OUT THE JAMS, the MC5 re-emerged with a more refined sound for their sophomore effort, 1970's BACK IN THE U.S.A., their first studio record. The music is comparable to other Detroit proto-punk rockers of the same era (The Stooges, Alice Cooper, etc.). As with the aforementioned peers, raw garage rock serves as the main ingredient for most of BACK IN THE U.S.A. Producer Jon Landau may have lessened the volatility of the MC5 as compared to JAMS, but the band was equipped with another great set of songs.
Recording information: GM Studios, East Detroit, Michigan. Producer: Jon Landau. Engineer: Jim Bruzzese. Additional personnel: Danny Jordan (keyboards).
Two covers bookend BACK IN THE U.S.A.--an uptempo reading of Little Richard's rock & roll standard "Tutti Frutti" kicks things off in fine fashion, while the album-closing title track was originally done by Chuck Berry. The original material ranges from the abstract "The Human Being Lawnmower" to the heartfelt soul ballad "Let Me Try", a surprise highlight. Nervy, high-octane rockers bristling with pure adolescent energy--"Teenage Lust" and "Call Me Animal", among them--balance politically charged tracks like "The American Ruse". BACK IN THE U.S.A. may have been the MC5's most conventional album, but it is still an endlessly listenable rock & roll classic.

Tracklist:
01. Tutti-Frutti
02. Tonight
03. Teenage Lust
04. Let Me Try
05. Looking At You
06. High School
07. Call Me Animal
08. The American Ruse
09. Shakin' Street
10. The Human Being Lawnmower
11. Back In The USA

FLAC: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3
MP3 / 320 Kbps download or download



MOTOR CITY FIVE Personnel:
* Rob Tyner - vocals
* Wayne Kramer - guitar, backing vocals
* Fred "Sonic" Smith - guitar, backing vocals, lead vocals on "Shakin' Street"
* Michael Davis - bass
* Dennis Thompson - drums
* Danny Jordan - keyboards
* Pete Kelly - keyboards

MC5 - Kick Out the Jams (1969 - FLAC)

Brothers and Sisters! I want to see a sea of hands out there! Let me see a sea of hands! I want everyone to kick up some noise! I want to hear some revolution out there Brothers! I want to hear a little revolution! Brothers and Sisters, the time has come for each and every one of you to decide whether you are going to be the problem or whether you are going to be the solution! (That's right!) You ...must choose Brothers, you must choose! It takes five seconds, five seconds of decision, five seconds to realize your purpose here on the planet! It takes five seconds to realize that it's time to move, it's time to get down with it! Brothers, it's time to testify and I want to know, are you ready to testify? Are you ready? I give you a testimonial...

Kick Out the Jams is the first album by Detroit protopunkers MC5, released in 1969. It was recorded live at Detroit's Grande Ballroom over two nights, Devil's Night and Halloween, 1968. In 2003, the album was ranked number 294 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. (However, the original Rolling Stone review by Lester Bangs was unfavorable, calling it "ridiculous, overbearing, [and] pretentious".)

The album contains such songs as the proto-punk classics "Kick Out the Jams" and "Rama Lama Fa Fa Fa", the spaced-out "Starship" (co-credited to Sun Ra because the lyrics were partly cribbed from one of Ra's poems), and an extended cover of John Lee Hooker's "Motor City is Burning" wherein Rob Tyner praises the role of Black Panther snipers during the Detroit Insurrection of 1967. The album is generally regarded as one of the best live rock and roll records: critic Mark Deming writes that it "is one of the most powerfully energetic live albums ever made...this is an album that refuses to be played quietly." The album has gained a considerable cult following in recent years.


01. "Ramblin' Rose" (Fred Burch, Marijohn Wilkin) – 4:15
02. "Kick Out the Jams" – 2:52
03. "Come Together" – 4:29
04. "Rocket Reducer No. 62 (Rama Lama Fa Fa Fa)" – 5:41
05. "Borderline" – 2:45
06. "Motor City Is Burning" (Fred "Sonic" Smith credited with writing the song although it was written by Al Smith) – 6:04
07. "I Want You Right Now" (Colin Frechter, Larry Page) – 5:31
08. "Starship" (MC5, Sun Ra) – 8:15


Download links: Part 1 Part 2

Personnel
* Rob Tyner - Lead vocals
* Wayne Kramer - Lead Guitar, Backing vocals, Lead vocals on Ramblin' Rose
* Fred "Sonic" Smith - Rhythm guitar, Lead Guitar, Backing Vocals
* Michael Davis - bass
* Dennis Thompson - drums
* Brother J. C. Crawford - spiritual advisor

Alice in Wonderland (1903)

The first-ever film version of Lewis Carroll's tale has recently been restored by the BFI National Archive from severely damaged materials. Made just 37 years after Lewis Carroll wrote his novel and eight years after the birth of cinema, the adaptation was directed by Cecil Hepworth and Percy Stow, and was based on Sir John Tenniel's original illustrations. In an act that was to echo more than 100 years later, Hepworth cast his wife as the Red Queen, and he himself appears as the Frog Footman. Even the Cheshire cat is played by a family pet.

With a running time of just 12 minutes (8 of which survive), Alice in Wonderland was the longest film produced in England at that time. Film archivists have been able to restore the film's original colours for the first time in over 100 years.

Music: 'Jill in the Box', composed and performed by Wendy Hiscocks.

This restoration was supported by The Headley Trust and The Pilgrim Trust.

R.I.P. Ken Russell

Henry Kenneth Alfred Russell (3 July 1927 – 27 November 2011) was an English film director, known for his pioneering work in television and film and for his flamboyant and controversial style. He attracted criticism as being over-obsessed with sexuality and the church. His films often dealt with the lives of famous composers or were based on other works of art which he adapted loosely. Russell began directing for the BBC, where he made creative adaptations of composers' lives which were unusual for the time. He also directed many feature films independently and for studios.

He is best known for his Oscar-winning film Women in Love (1969), The Devils (1971), The Who's Tommy (1975), and the science fiction film Altered States (1980). Classical musicians and conductors held him in high regard for his story-driven biopics of various composers, most famously Elgar, Delius, Liszt, Mahler and Tchaikovsky.

British film critic Mark Kermode, attempting to sum up the director's achievement, called Russell; "somebody who proved that British cinema didn't have to be about kitchen-sink realism—it could be every bit as flamboyant as Fellini. He now makes very strange experimental films like Lion's Mouth and Revenge of the Elephant Man, and they are as edgy and out there as the work he made in the 1970s".