MC5, DJ Spooky, The Sun-Ra Arkestra at SummerStage July 30, 2005

Saturday, July 30, 2005
Beginning at 3:00 PM
Central Park SummerStage - FREE!

The MC5 were a band like no other. Even in the chaotic late ?60s, the Detroit group?s pro-dope, Black power and sex-in-the-streets rhetoric was outrageous, as was the band?s frequent calls for revolution. But far more important was the MC5?s music?a twin guitar, all-or-nothing attack that overwhelmed the audience with sound. The MC5 were a direct influence on punk rock and everything that came after. Though the band broke up in the early 70s, members Wayne Kramer (guitar), Dennis Thompson (drums) and Michael Davis (bass) have reunited to continue the MC5?s work.

As wild as the MC5 were, they looked like Young Republicans next to The Sun-Ra Arkestra. A pioneer of avant-garde jazz?of avant-garde everything, really?Sun-Ra claimed he was from Saturn, dressed his ?Arkestra? like ancient Egyptians and sometimes featured fire eaters in his act. He also played free jazz, explored world music and experimented with electric instruments years before anyone else. One of the MC5?s early gigs was opening for Sun-Ra, and Wayne Kramer has said that ?no other band affected me the way Sun-Ra and his Arkestra has. They opened the door to the New Music.? Led by alto saxophonist Marshall Allen since Sun-Ra?s death in 1993, the Arkestra continues to push the possibilities of sound. Sun Ra Arkesta returns to SummerStage having performed in 1986, 1987 and 1992.

No stranger to sonic experimentation, Paul Miller, a.k.a. DJ Spooky, will start the day off with a master?s class in the art of turntabilism. One of the founding members of New York?s ?illbeat? movement, DJ Spooky?s sets are post-modernism in action; adventurous mixings of hip-hop, dance, avant-garde jazz, punk, ska, dub, noise rock, world music and just about anything else ever put on tape or record. His collaborations with Arto Lindsay, Metallica, Sublime, Dr. Octagon, Thurston Moore, the Freight Elevator Quartet, Scanner, progressive jazz artists William Parker and Matthew Shipp, dub outfit Twilight Circus and many others have won him critical praise, and he has done more than anyone to establish the DJ as an artist in his (or her) own right.