HIppies vs. Punks: MC5

Culturally now we have bantustans. It wasn't always this way. Anything out of the mainstream from the middle 1960's until the late 1970's was called "Hippie." Today we call The Stooges and the MC5 proto-Punk bands. But back in 1969 and 1970 when they put out their first couple of albums they were considered by the overwhelming majority of Nixonian America to be nothing but a bunch of dirty, long-haired Hippies. Freaks.

Proto-Punk bands queer the pitch of Hippies vs. Punks. Earlier we briefly raised the possibility that rather than exterminating the Hippies, the Punks were Hippies who cut their hair and their guitar solos (Crass, who we will consider at length on a future Friday evening, for instance). There is no better example of an Uber-Hippie band being a Punk progenitor than the MC5. (Sonic Youth is partly named after MC5 co-founder and guitarist Fred "Sonic" Smith -- Patti Smith's deceased husband.)

The MC5 were radical, the gold standard of radical Leftists. John Sinclair, co-founder of the White Panther Party, was their guru for a spell. The White Panther manifesto is worth quoting here:

1. Full endorsement and support of the Black Panther Party's 10-point program and platform.
2. Total assault on the culture by any means necessary, including rock and roll, dope, and fucking in the streets.
3. Free exchange of energy and materials—we demand the end of money!
4. Free food, clothes, housing, dope, music, bodies, medical care—everything free for every body!
5. Free access to information media—free the technology from the greed creeps!
6. Free time & space for all humans—dissolve all unnatural boundaries!
7. Free all schools and all structures from corporate rule—turn the buildings over to the people at once!
8. Free all prisoners everywhere—they are our comrades!
9. Free all soldiers at once—no more conscripted armies!
10. Free the people from their phony "leaders"—everyone must be a leader—freedom means free every one! All Power to the People!

When I entered public school in 1970 I was in the first grade. My parents, who were liberal Democrats but not radical and certainly not Marxist, let me grow my hair long; it was past my ears but not quite down to my shoulders. Like every other seven-year-old kid I didn't like to get my hair cut and hated to have my shoes tied. When I got to Charles Wright Elementary I quickly figured out that I was the only kid there with long hair. Most other boys had military-style crew cuts. I was an outlier; subsequently, I fought constantly. The black kids in particular, sensing that I was not like the other white kids -- that I was vulnerable; that I was a reviled longhair -- liked to fight me; and what was unsavory about it was that compared to the crew-cut white yahoos they generally knew how to punch, and when they hit they hit hard.

This was the romantic life of a Hippie kid. Fighting. For the most part I enjoyed myself. I learned a few reliable moves, my favorite of which was the headlock (it ended things quickly and I didn't have to hit anyone).

What I was going through reflected the polarity of the culture nationally. It was a big -- much more blue-collar and homogeneous than today --  and violent country. Assassinations and riots were regular features of the political landscape. To be a Hippie in this environment was not to be a devotee of peace and love; it was more like being a Punk in a slam dance.

Keep that in mind when you look at this clip of MC5 performing "Kick Out the Jams." These were Hippies who kicked ass: