liner notes excerpt from High Time, 1992 Rhino re-issue
So does the revolution end, like so many good ideas, not with a bang or even a band to play them out the door?
I wish I could tell you I bought this album on the day it was released some 50 years ago back in the summer of 1971, but unfortunately, I was much too young. But only a few years later I had become an aspiring rock hound, seeker of all things esoteric in rock ‘n’ roll. And so, on a hot tip, I managed to track down a copy of the MC5’s High Time at a soon-to-go-under import vinyl shop 40 miles over in the next city.
It’s one of the few albums I can connect to a particular a time, place, and feeling. But it certainly wasn’t nostalgia, because other than the occasional throwaway line in my rock magazines of choice, the MC5 were rarely mentioned – and even then it was usually in reference to their chaotic live 1969 debut Kick Out the Jams, or their intentionally stripped down and studious second effort, 1970’s Back in the USA. And it didn’t really seem directly connected to the punk/new wave scenes of New York and the UK.
But, if anything, it was probably the first album where I thought to myself, “I think I missed something important here.”
High Time opens with “Sister Anne,” a lyrical tribute to the hippest nun you could ever meet, complete with a traffic jam of harmonicas and lead guitars during the solo break, not to mention the street-corner Salvation Army that shows up during the fade out. It ends on “Skunk (Sonically Speaking)” which contains the lyric “The song’s been sung/The deed’s been done,” and an equally jam-tastic finale. And in between, there’s assorted commentary on teachers, parents, political ideology, religion, personal freedom, social responsibility, the war, the nuclear bomb, the future, and the usual rock ‘n’ roll concerns.
So, my question is this: Why is there no fanfare for the 50th anniversary of this release? As seems to be typical these days, I have no answer. But if you consider yourself at all a fan of high energy rock ‘n roll, it’s high time you seek out the MC5’s final revolutionary effort.
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