The MC5

Featured below is one infinitely interesting film chronicling the history of Detroit-based band the MC5.

Springing up during a time of social turbulence in the late 1960s, and reflecting this in their look, their sound and their music, The MC5 were hated by the feds and and the hippies equally. They were huge in the Mid-west, and their gigs were wild, packed out affairs, but their albums sold poorly. They clashed too vividly with the Woodstock/Hippie/Free Love thing.

If only they'd known that their first LP, recorded live on Halloween 1968 at the Grande Ballroom in Detroit, was to have such a profound influence on the audience that one of those present would form a band in Sydney that would inspire an entire scene of independent bands all up and down the east coast of Australia less than 10 years later...

This film chronicles the music, the times in which it was written and performed, the bands radical political connections and police harassment the band suffered almost daily. It is truly fascinating and, at times deeply disturbing.

Oh, and the soundtrack will kick your ass. Kick out the jams.