....okay, there are the riots. And headquarters of the people responsible for all those Calvins we see peeing on each other. Oh, and there's that extreme poverty, racial tension, and economic collapse that surrounds the city like a horrible cloud of insidious smoke. There's that, too. But in spite of all that shit (or maybe because of it), you end up with a by-product unparalleled in cities larger, richer, and arguably smarter.
You get music. Killer amazing music. You get Motown. You get Iggy and The Stooges and MC5 (that's Motor City Five, by the way). And then there's John Lee Hooker, Parliament-Funkadelic, Sonny Bono, Question Mark & the Mysterians, Bob Seger, Ted Nugent, and Alice Cooper; The Gories,The White Stripes, The Dirtbombs, The Von Bondies, J Dilla, and Eminem. See what I'm saying? Besides New York, Chicago, and LA, can you think of anywhere else that has given us so much and so varied a musical retrospective?
Now, enter Tyvjk (a.k.a. Tyvek a.k.a. TVK), and think messy garage art punk. Think hammers and nails eeking out a melody and four-tracks recording sporadically. These guys take that Detroit molten lava, throw it against the wall -- not in anger, but in pure joy -- just to see how it settles. They've been compared to The Velvet Underground and MC5, as well as Times New Viking and The Vivian Girls. I just think they're good old fashioned punk rock from the days before "punk rock" was a thing you needed to scream through or dress up as. They don't have a website yet (beyond their MySpace page); they've only released 7-inches (most notably on Sub Pop's singles club - TMT News). Hell, even John Waters is a fan.
Sounds like a good time to catch a show, if you ask me. They play tonight at the Most Wanted Fine Art Gallery in Pittsburgh, then it's off to Europe with Cheveu
04.10.09 - Düdingen, Switzerland - Bad Bonn
04.11.09 - Torino, Italy - Asilo Occupato
04.12.09 - Rome, Italy - Locanda Atlantide
04.13.09 - Italy - TBA
04.14.09 - Italy - TBA
04.15.09 - Zagreb, Croatia - Spunk
04.16.09 - Graz, Austria - Forum Stadtpark
04.17.09 - Praha, Czech Republic - TBA
04.18.09 - Hamburg, Germany - Beat Club
04.19.09 - Göteborg, Sweden - Utmarken
04.20.09 - Helsingor, Denmark - Musikhuset Elvaerket
04.21.09 - Germany - TBA
04.22.09 - Amsterdam, Netherlands - Occii
04.23.09 - Tournai, Belguim - TBA
04.24.09 - Paris, France - Fleche D’or (Pheromoans)
04.25.09 - Ris Orangis, France - La Ferme De La Justice (Aeroflot)