MC5 co-founder and activist Wayne Kramer dies at 75

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Wayne Kramer, founding member of legendary Detroit proto-punk group MC5 and one of rock’s greatest guitarists, has died at the age of 75.

The death of the singer-songwriter and political activist was announced on friday through their official social media accounts; no cause of death was provided.

In Rolling StoneIn the list of the 250 Greatest Guitarists of All Time, with Kramer co-located with Fred “Sonic” Smith, we wrote: “Forged in Detroit during the 1960s, the MC5 guitar tandem of Kramer and Smith worked together as the pistons of a powerful engine. Combining Chuck Berry and early Motown influences with a budding interest in free jazz, the pair could launch their band’s legendary, energetic improvisations into space while still keeping one foot on the beat.”

Formed in Detroit in the mid-1960s, MC5 (short for Motor City Five) first rose to prominence as a house band for left-wing rallies in the city at the time. After a performance outside the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1968, Kramer and company returned to Detroit and its Grande Ballroom in October of that year to record what would become their landmark album. Eliminate traffic jams.

The live LP, with its tagline “Remove the traffic jams, motherfuckers,” would eventually land on Rolling StoneList of the 500 greatest albums of all time. “Eliminate traffic jams he writhes and screams in the belief that rock & roll is a necessary act of civil disobedience. The proof: it was banned in a department store in Michigan.” Rolling Stone wrote about the album. “The MC5 demonstrated their leftist credentials the summer before recording the album, when they were the only band to show up to play for the Yippies protesting the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago.”

While MC5’s tenure was short-lived: the band only released two studio albums, in the 1970s. Back in the US and 1971 High hour Before their initial breakup, the group had a lasting impact on what would become punk rock, both in their overtly political lyrics and the explosive riffs of the Kramer/Smith tandem.

Following the demise of MC5, Kramer remained in Detroit and, although he remained musically active, he also found himself in trouble with the law. In 1975, he was arrested for selling drugs to an undercover police officer, resulting in a four-year prison sentence. Although he was released in 1979, the experience left an indelible mark on Kramer, who would later found and become executive director of the nonprofit organization. Prison guitar doors. The charity is named after the Clash song that inspired Kramer’s ordeal: “Let me tell you about Wayne and his cocaine deals/A little more each day/Waiting for a friend until the band does well/Then “The DEA locked him up.” musical instruments to those incarcerated as a means to rehabilitate them “through the transformative power of music.”

“In the end, (prison) may have saved my life, because I was traveling in a very dangerous world in Detroit, at the peak of my alcohol and drug use,” Kramer said. Rolling Stone in 2014. “But I don’t think prison helped me. “Prison time doesn’t help anyone, the way we approach punishment in the United States.”

Throughout the ’80s, Kramer bounced from city to city, working with artists wherever he landed, including stints with Was (Not Was) and Johnny Thunders. However, in the ’90s, the legions of punk artists who were indebted to Kramer and MC5 began to show their gratitude, and Kramer eventually signed to famed punk label Epitaph Records to begin his solo career in earnest.

Kramer’s first LP on the label, The difficult things, arrived in 1995 and featured guests such as the Melvins, drummer Josh Freese, Black Flag/Circle Jerks singer Keith Morris, Bad Religion’s Brett Gurewitz and many more. Kramer also remained politically active during the following decades, performing alongside Rage Against the Machine at the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver (a guerrilla show that mirrored the MC5 concert 40 years earlier), as well as playing shows in support of Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign.

“My life then wasn’t boring, and my life now isn’t boring either,” Kramer said. Rolling Stone in 1998. “I am motivated by the sheer terror of being an elderly person with no money or health insurance, and finding myself homeless and sick. That’s what gets me out of bed and motivates me to write new songs and keep going. “It’s not all fun and games, this is serious stuff.”

Last year, Kramer announced the upcoming release of heavy liftingthe first MC5 album since 1971 High hour and with original drummer Dennis “Machine Gun” Thompson alongside Tom Morello, Don Was, Vernon Reid and Slash. “At the risk of sounding grandiose, fate has chosen me to curate the MC5 legacy,” Kramer said Without cutting last year. “And to be true to the legacy, I have to stay connected to the core founding principles that the MC5 represents: that we have a working-class approach to art and that we continue to try to push music to reflect the world. that we live”.