ARTS The Michigan Daily Thursday, October 23, 1980 Page 7 CONFESSIONS OF A CLOSET FAN Heav By MARK COLEMAN Heavy Metal Rock-it's stupid, sen- seless music but it's just what I need. Crusing down I-94 in neat bumper to bumper 70 mph formation, jockeying with workaday daddies in their LTD's and Caprice Classics is impossible unless you're stoned. It's that numbing rush of oblivion that only FM radio (not drugs) can provide. - And hoo boy! does radio deliver. About half the time you've got to con- tend with the overproduced bombast of Styx/Jqurney/Supercramp ilk or *greasy garbage like J. Geils and the new Stones album or, worst of all, can- +dy-assed "New Wave" pipsqueaks like the Knack and the Kingbees. But the other half is golden molten metal lava, nusic that erupts from the strategically placed co-axial speakers in the back seat like Mt. St. Helens in the throes of orgasm. Van Halen, Ted theMet Nugent, Black Sabbath, and AC/DC are only the tip of this leather iceberg Detroit's FM radio (my compulsiv( button-pushing makes it impossible t( distinguish station from station) serve., the musical connoisseur a veritabh smorgasboard of gut-wrenching rocl and roll. The current roster include; bands like Krokus, 707, Shakin' Street Scorpions, Judas Priest, ant Whitesnake; not to mention glitzy gun] like Queen and the decaying corpse o Alice Cooper. Of course, all negative criticism o heavy metal is completely valid. Th< beat is lumberous and heavy-handed the melodies non-existent, thi musicianship mere melodramati powerchords and simplified Hen drixisms, the vocals a detailed study a the nuances of abrasion, the lyrics er dless encouragements to the listener t Party Down or get laid. Yes, heav Metal is repetitive, regressive and eve ai rock: repulsive, but at least it's honest. A band like Van Halen makes no bones about its raison d'etre: They're gonna live out their adolescent fantasies in the loudest, most obnoxious way available and anyone who wants is welcome to come along for the ride. This is music beyond interpretation. It transcends individual psychology by addressing primal hedonistic instincts that one usually must sublimate. Immersion in Heavy Metal brings a release; like drugs or masturbation it's totally selfish pleasure but it's ultimately therapeutic if you don't overdo it. The rock media began to tout the Heavy Metal resurgence this past summer. Frequently noted were the plague-like spread of Ted Nugent's popularity, the meteoric rise of Van Halen, and the rabid skinhead (English redneck) support for young bands like Def Leopard. Yet Heavy Metal never really came close to dying off in Michigan; thanks to the Detroit air- waves, it festered like an open sore that has now been infected and spread like gangrene. Detroit is the Heavy Metal capital of the Universe, and don't you forget it, mon: Where else in 1980 can you hear "Paronoid" and "Smoke On the Water" at least every other day? The musical history of this region is flowing with metal alloys; it's the bir- thplace of such seminals as Alice Cooper (and his criminally underrated original band, as well as latter day guitar slingers Dick Wagner and Steve Hunter), mainstream giants Grand Funk Railroad, the mighty MC5 (the first "smart" metal band) and scores of lesser known practioners that ranged from the subline (SRC) to the ridiculou (Frijid Pink). Let us not forget Detroit's (actually A2's) biggest con- tribution, Iggy and the Stooges, the greatest heavy metal band of all time. Top much has been written about these guys already (see Creem circa 1970-74). Suffice to say they coined the people? version of the "Minute Waltz." Another tape consists of a wordless piano fan- fare leading to the beep. Josephson has collected 21 items, in addition to about 15 "How-to" records. He hopes to produce a radio series from the material next spring, but he expects Vox Inhumana to be an ongoing project. "I pretty well have a lot of New Yorky kind of stuff," he says. "I'm looking for stuff from the South, Mid- west, foreign countries, subcultures like hookers, Nazis, anything that's unusual, different." Anyone interested in adding to Josephson's collection can write him at the Radio Foundation, Box 884, Ansonia Station, New York, N.Y., 18023. Josephson thinks the reliance on talking machines is a trend that will continue. Already, he says, it has affec- ted the way people behave. "I've noticed that there are people who act like machines, like the waitress in programmed restaurants where every choice you have has been decided on, with no exceptions, and they run through a list," he said. "I'm afraid Vox Inhumana is a precursor, leading up to 'Homo Inhuman'-inhuman man." Better term Raw Power and defined it in theirt music. Nugent may have perservered t and perfected his craft through the years, the Stooges exploded in a1 mushroom cloud of negative energyP whose fallout still lingers and glows. The punks picked up more on Iggy's at- titude than the actual music as the blaring, traditional metal sound of RonE Asheton's current group Destroy Alli Monsters will attest. Ted Nugent wowst arenas with the Wango Tango but thet Stooges did a bone-crushing dance with death that's lost none of its doomy in- trigue and immediacy through the years. That's not to say the current crop of metaleers is as blandy predictable and buffonish as Terrible Ted. Van Halen ii a band with real vision; their everything-including-the-kitchen-sink approach is glorious in its tasteless grandiosity and their lookout-mothers- we're-coming-for-your-daughters image so overstated it's hilarious. Ed- die Van Halen's inventive guitar work doesn't hurt, either. The Australian neanderthals AC/DC bring an irresistible wild-eyed en- thusiasm to their fairly standard metal fare, charging cliched pieces like "Highway to Hell" and "Too Much of losie" with an atmosphere of con- trolled anarchy. Guitarist Malcolm Young flails away on stage in a traditional schoolboy's uniform (blazer and shorts) and these guys get extra points for the most blatantly tasteless album covers on the market. This list could go on indefinitely. The reformed Black Sabbath are as tough as ever, having jettisoned, Ozzy Osbor- ne and his idiotic mumbo-jumbo for Ronnie James Dio, a more straightfor- ward scream stylist. English youngsters Def Leppard are so energetic and engaging they're almost cute, for chrissaskes, while multi- nationals Shakin' Street pick up the tradition of women metal singers where than music Ruby Starr left off and also feature the Raw power got a heali clean, mean guitar of ex-Dictator Ross Raw power it's just t the Boss. And rumor has it that the "classic" British metal combo Deep Raw power honey jus Purple may yet be reunited in their w Machine Head-era incarnation. R Like it or not, Heavy Metal is here to Raw power I can feel stay, so why fight it? A couple of joints, T -e :-. a quart of Colt 45 malt liquor and a car DEPARTMENT OF THEATRE Al equipped with FM stereo are all you GUEST ARTIST SERIE need to experience our narcissistic culture at its most idulgent and 11 nn uninhibited glory. If it feels good, do it. ng touch oo much a on't quit DtR AD I cS DRA PLANT AUCTION AND SALE Monday Oct. 27-7:30 PM Matthaei Botanical Gardens 1800 DIXBORO RD. (South of Plymouth Rd.) Ann Arbor Chapter Indoor Light Gardening Society of America, Inc.- awakenin 6y Frank Wedekind Y t c2-25, 8pm 1^ Oct.26, 2pm in the Power Center Tickets at PT P. Call 764-0450 MasterCharge and Visa accepted WA r X X X L -----O .Y Members of the British rock group Judas Priest pose with a new musical in- strument designed for them by Harley-Davidson. "It's idle sounds a bit rough", said a band member, "but at full throttle it mixes right in on our up- tempo numbers." The voic It galls Larry Josephson to watch transistors, tapes and Taiwanese cir- cuitry try to talk to human beings. Yet the bearded, rotund, 41-year-old local radio personality is also fascinated, and he has setout to collect the sounds of the '70s and '80s-the mouthings of machines that answer telephones, play games, teach and tutor. "It was a perception of mine that we were spending more and more time talking to, or with, or at, or being talked to by machines of one kind or another he said. "I found more and more of my friends were getting those machines, and I couldn't talk to them-I could hear their messages.",, His project, "Vox Inhumana," is being funded with * $25,000 in grants from the National En- dowment for the Arts and the New York State Council on the Arts. The idea, Josephson said, is to chronicle the times the way Works Progress Ad- ministration photographers did in the 1930s. "I THINK we're entering an age where we're going to be using machines of all sorts to communicate with us-satellites, computers that you work on in your home. I don't like to think that, but it seems to be the way we're going," he said. Part of "Vox Inhumana" consists of what Josephson calls "didactic records"-recordings like "How to Pachanga," "How to Plan the Perfect Dinner Party" and "English for Greek-Speaking People." In "Train Your Bird in Stereo," a deep voice, accompanied by Hawaiian steel- .guitar music, tells budgie owners, "It is true that many birds will learn to 4 talk, even though they were not properly trained, but this is a terrible waste of pet potential." Josephson-who has a weekly talk show on New York's WBAI and submits commentaries to All Things Con- sidered, National Public Radio's daily news program-is also collecting tapes of talking toys, like computer chess, a spelling machine-"Spell calf. K-A-T. Wrong. Try again"-and the Executive Teddy Bear; "You're a born leader. You're a winner. Teddy knows." Vox Inhumana also includes "Dial- A's." There's "Dial-An-Atheist," -- -E Medical School e ofthe "Mount St. Helens Hotline" and "Egg . Basket," a project of a St. Louis woman who has rigged"a machine so it can collect callers' answers to a list of off-the-wall questions, "Do Sunday drivers walk Monday through Satur- day. If someone invented a new disease, would someone catch it? Who told you your first secret? Does everyone see the same color when they see red?" she asks. The heart of the collection, though, is the answering machine recordings. The use of these machines, Josephson suggests, is a measure of "technology and alienation, people living alone. Some of the tapes are rather elaborate. A Brooklyn man, Henry Sepoznik, changes his tape each week with a new edition of "Answering Machine Theater," complete with sound effects. On another, a normal, mundane tape is interrupted by the whine of a caller, who says, "Of God, I hate these machines. They're so impersonal and intimidating. . . all right, I've already wasted my dime, I'll leave my name, number 'and message at the beep." Others include music. One man croons that he's "Ethel's telephone." Another sings along with a 30-second version of A 1 * 0, edpseRAY CHARLES' THE RAELETTS RAY CHARLES ORCHESTRA Special Guest Ernie Krivda Quartet November12 Wed. 8:00 p.m. Hill Auditorium Ticits an Sate Box Office Michigan Union $8.50 7.50 6.50 reserved seats ickets' on Sale in Ann Arbor Discount Records Schoolkids Records in 'Yowsl.i Whorehouse Records in E. ansing: Discount Records and all C1TCoutlets. For intorinati Call: (313) 763-2071 Management Joe Adams Direction: Smadla AMisl ManagementInternatioalM L.A- Calif. 4213) 734-3113 design by/Jane Goldfarb C POETRY READING with, So! Lachman & George Tysh Reading from their works THURS., OCT. 23 7:30 P.M. ADMISSION: FREE Refreshments NOON LUNCHEON Homemade Soup & Sandwich 754 FRIDAY, OCT. 24 PERRY BULLARD: "Proposal 'A' for Equality in Education" GUILD HOUSE 802 MONROE (662-5189) I I I Announcing the low maintenance haircut. At Command Performance. It continues to help your hair hold its shape even as it grows. 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