Detroit Rock City (30 page)

Corey Rusk, the Necros. Rusk was a driver of the hardcore movement that Detroit predictably did better than anyone else. Touch and Go Records founder Tesco Vee passed the baton to Rusk, who took the label To Indie Valhalla. (Davo Scheich)

The Laughing Hyenas, Kevin Monroe, John Brannon, Larissa Strickland, at Staches, Columbus, Ohio, 1989. Monroe: “A guy came out to look at this house we were renting in Ann Arbor, he was thinking about buying it. He said the owner told him we were a cult.” (Jay Brown)

The White Stripes, Jack and Meg White, backstage at the 40 Watt in Athens, Georgia, September 1999, opening for Pavement. The headliners loved the Stripes enough to give them a bonus of $500, which covered the minivan they had to rent for the weekend. (Photo courtesy of Ben Blackwell)

Human Eye: Bottom, left to right: Brad Hales, Johnny LZR. Top, left to right: Timmy Vulgar, Hurricane William Hafer. (Lindsey Muliolis)

The Go, John Krautner and Bobby Harlow, at the Beechland Ballroom in Cleveland, second US Tour, 1999. Harlow: “If you take young guys with shaggy hair and tight pants and baby faces and leather jackets and put them in front of teenagers I think that it just kind of works.” (Keith Marlowe)

Mike E. Clark's mom bequeathed him $500 on her deathbed so that he could take some classes in audio production. He's the go-to producer for Insane Clown Posse. Kid Rock is lucky to have him. (Photo courtesy of Mike E. Clark)

The Dirtbombs ending their set at the Detroit Institute of Arts, October 2006. The show was a party for the film
It Came From Detroit
, which documented the Detroit music scene in the late nineties. Pat Patano, Mick Collins, Ben Blackwell, Ko Melina. Obscured by Patano, Troy Gregory. (EWolf)

The Dirtys play the Shelter, 1996. Joe Burdick: “We eventually realized the backlash of all the shows we had played in Detroit and all the shit we had broke. We had destroyed the whole back room of the Magic Stick doing body prints in the dry wall. We had to give up our whole pay that night.” (Amy Cook)

Bantam Rooster at Zoots. Eric Cook, drums, and Tom Potter, guitar. Potter: “Girls didn't even have jobs then, except for being secretaries. In our day and age women can have real jobs cause I've lived off plenty of them.” (Amy Cook)

Rachel Nagy, Detroit Cobras: “They were trying to find singers and nothing was working out. I was always there, watching the
Simpsons
and drinking beer and passing out. Finally they got me drunk enough that I could get up and sing.” (Jay Brown)

Demolition Doll Rods, Margaret Dollrod, Dan Kroha. Margaret: “We had a number one single in
Rolling Stone
magazine. Nobody ever knew about it because we never went around going, ‘We're in
Rolling Stone
.'” (Jay Brown)

Jim Olenski (
Cinecyde, guitarist
):
I went to this party in late '77 in the basement of an apartment building off of Jefferson on Grand Boulevard. In the basement we saw these white kids, late teens, early twenties. One of them was Mark Norton, and he was putting on these rubber gloves and wearing a garment bag. He was getting ready to play with his band, the Ramrods. They were great. They had originals; they were doing songs off of
Raw Power
, and doing them well. It was like brothers-in-arms. I couldn't believe it: there was someone else who's doing it because Gary and I had already pressed a 45. No one would buy it.