ANN ARBOR ROCK N ROLL REVIVAL 2009 DENIZ TEK ERIC POUILLE SCOTT MORGAN CHRIS TAYLOR AL KING

Ann Arbor Rock 'n' Roll Revival celebrates rich local music legacy

A multi-generational host of Ann Arbor musical royalty rang in the holiday cheer on Friday during a night of vintage, high-energy rocknroll at the Blind Pig.

It was a homecoming show in every sense of the phrase: 4 bands, spanning more than 4 decades, revisited their past catalogs, while fans from just as far back reconnected amid the strains of a common musical and cultural heritage.

An Ann Arbor RocknRoll Revival, indeed.

Put together local legends like Deniz Tek, Scott Morgan and Hiawatha Bailey and the musical sparks are sure to fly. The trio, joined by Chris Box Taylor on bass and Al King on drums joined forces in a headlining celebration of Motor City — and Ann Arbor — rock n roll that served as a reminder of a too-often overlooked page in Ann Arbors history.

Tek, the Ann Arbor native who moved to Australia to study medicine and ended up forming the seminal punk band Radio Birdman, remains a phenomenal guitar hero and on Friday, he stripped off mind-bending leads on his plexiglass guitar, while Morgan, still in full-throated, blue-eyed soul voice, revisited songs from the local canon, including gems from Sonics Rendezvous Band, the Stooges and Radio Birdman itself.

The band was clearly having fun despite persistent sound issues. But things really kicked into gear when Bailey, whose punk rock credentials date back to when he was a roadie for the MC5, joined the fray to belt out the Stooges nuggets, Now I Wanna Be Your Dog and Down in the Street.

Prior to the headlining set, Morgan and his aptly-named IrRationals revisited the should-be hits he sang with the Rationals back in the 1960s. Morgan is a true rock icon and his soulful vocals havent lost a thing, 40-odd years after crooning Respect and Barefootin as a teenage phenom. He was joined by a veritable whos who of Detroit rock luminaries, including Outrageous Cherrys Matthew Smith on guitar, producer Jim Diamond on bass, Dave Shettler on drums and Taylor on lead guitar.

Gorvette, a meeting of the musical minds between 1980s new-wave queen Nikki Corvette and garage rock guitarist Amy Gore were enjoyable during a set of amped-up, Ramones-meet-girl-group rave-ups, while Taylors Misfits-inspired band, Mazinga, set a suitably high-energy tone for what was a long and entirely enjoyable evening of something that seems to be lacking on the local music scene — loud, uncompromising rocknroll.

Will Stewart is a free-lance writer for AnnArbor.com.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• DENIZ
• TEK
• ERIC
• POUILLE
• SCOTT
• MORGAN
• CHRIS
• TAYLOR
• AL
• KING
• RETROKIMMER

[RamonePinhead]

The great Scott Morgan.

[DerBreezemeister]

Who's that guy with the Tele, asleep in the corner ...

[matthuzilla3]

thanks team! i was there and Pleaze post more from this night! thanks, jeff