The Up - Killer Up! 1969-1972 (1995)

The legendary White Panthers garage band from Detroit!
This rare anthology of The Up features all their studio recordings, plus live material and extensive liner notes. Killer Up! also includes one song by poet Allen Ginsberg, from the split 7" released for the John Sinclair Freedom Rally of 1971. Produced by John Sinclair.

Exerpts from the liner notes:
"It's common to name the MC5 and the Stooges among the forefathers of what they call "punk rock," but it was their associates in a third band, the Up, who could more accurately be identified as the real precursors of punk. In fact, if you trace the punk-rock lineage back to the Ramones-and many do the connection- is even clearer, because the Ramones were really little more than a watered-down, cheapened clone of the once-mighty Up of Detroit and Ann Arbor".
"This determined quartet of "killer skinnies from the Murder City" were not as skilled in music and stagecraft as their stablemates in the MC5, nor as charismatic as their colleague Jim Osterberg (Iggy Pop) and his band The Stooges, but they dedicated every fiber of their being to playing high-energy rock n' roll that was designed to inspire their audiences to leave the square world behind and come and join the revolution".
"The Up were formed in the spring of 1967 by Franklin Bach (ne Frank Dedenbach), a denizen of Detroit's east side who had attended University of Detroit High School on the west side, enrolled at Wayne State University, and dropped out of college soon after becoming stage manager and announcer at the newly-opened Grande (that's "Grand-ee") Ballroom in October 1966, when the MC5 was its "house band" by virtue of the band's almost weekly appearances there from opening night on". "In Ann Arbor the Up replaced Vic Peraino with drummer Scott Bailey and continued to roll under the guidance of my brother David. We hooked up with my friend Jimmy Silver, who became associated with Trans-Love Production when we started managing a daring local group known as The Psychedelic Stooges. As with The Up, the MC5-the most popular of the three units-extended every effort to assist The Stooges in gaining an audience and, whenever possible, featured one or both bands on its own shows".
"By the spring of 1969 the MC5 had become a national recording act and the Stooges joined them soon after, but The Up continued to toil in the local rock & roll vineyards without ever securing a national recording contract. The Up issued a 45 single, Just Like An Aborigine b/w Hassan I Sabbah, on SunDance Records in 1970, and the 'A' side of another single Free John Now (b/w Prayer For John Sinclair by Allen Ginsberg) on Rainbow Records in December 1971, but no more of their music was to see the light of day until the issue of this album in 1995".
"The material finally released here includes both issued singles (including the Allen Ginsberg B-side of Free John Now, a 45 released and passed out free at the John Sinclair Freedom Rally at the Crisler Arena in Ann Arbor on December 10, 1971); a completely finished version of the Earl King/Jimi Hendrix tune Come On (Let the Good Times Roll) with additional lyrics by Frank Bach; several songs from a recording session at the Head Sound Studios in Ypsilanti, Michigan, found in a tape box dated only "1970-71"; and some tunes recorded "live" at the Agora Ballroom in Columbus, Ohio on a typical early 70s night in the Upper Midwest September 26, 1972".

The Up: Frank Bach (Lead Vocals), Bob Rasmussen (Electric Guitar), Gary Rasmussen (Electric Bass), Scott Bailey (Drums).

Gary Rasmussen later resurfaced in Sonic's Rendezvous Band.

1. Just Like an Aborigine [Mix 1], 2. Do the Sun Dance, 3. Free John Now [Mix 3], 4. Come On, 5. C'mon and Swim, 6. Hassan I Sahba, 7. Sisters, Sisters (Sisters Rising), 8. Together, 9. Train Kept a Rollin', 10. Just Like An Aborigine [Mix 2], 11. I Don't Need You, 12. Never Say Die, 13. Free John Now [Mix 1], 14. Allen Ginsberg: Prayer for John Sinclair.

Download - Rapidshare
Download - MegaUpload