John Sinclair burst on the Detroit music scene back in the sixties best known as the manager of several influential bands in the formation of todays music, and for getting sent to prison on a marijuana charge.That got the attention of John 
Lennon..who eventually wrote a tribute song for him called,"It ain't fair ".He became successful not because the record companies thought his bands had a great sound, but because he had the courage to try new things and this became the hallmark of John Sinclairs career: setting trends and going with his gut feeling 
against all odds.   

The music he promoted was raw and revolutionary in every sense of the word.Unlike the hip and trendy Seattle scene today, the Detroit bands back then were not prepackaged and slick- marketed impersonations of one another..the MC5 with their gritty urban warfare mentality, the UP with bayonets on their guitars , Iggy Pop and the Stooges and the many others all had there special character and were spontaneous high-energy musical mind mutations. Motown is the most celebrated genre of Detroit music, but equally 
influential to the world of pop music were the rock n roll bands that made 
Detroit the center of the rock and Roll world for those 5 or so years. Much to the chagrin of myself, Benny E Jet and many others, the Rock n roll hall of fame in Cleveland makes the mistake of highlighting the motown scene at the expense of what we call the"Sinclair-Detroit- revolution", properly named because he is 
considered to be the godfather of the Detroit rock explosion. Rumours abound that an addition to the Detroit exhibit is in the works, and so the next pilgrimmage to Cleveland will hopefully be more fulfilling.   

"Rock n Roll, dope, and sex in the streets" was the proclamation and chant of John Sinclair's political party called the "White Panthers", that, at it's zenith ,had thousands of kids involved from the mid-1960's through the early1970's. He spoke of a cultural revolution in America where the kids would go,"...wild in the streets and take over Amerika.." They always spelled America with a "K" in protest. Many people today think that the religious right and Pat Buchanan started the rhetoric about culture wars and a fight for the soul of the country, 
and that people who talked about ulterior motives of rock n roll groups were just "ignorant bible-thumpers". Mr. Sinclair and many others on the Left were talking about culture wars and changing society through music and art 35 years ago. "Rock and Roll is a weapon of cultural revolution" he wrote in his article in the Ann Arbor based newspaper he founded called the Fifth Estate in December 1968." It is extremely important for urban groups to organize themselves around cultural forms like  rock bands...this will give you access to audiences of pre- revolutionary youth who are waiting to be turned on." He finishes by saying,"It's time to turn on, tune in and take over!" He understood the impact of reaching the youth of society, particularly through music, to achieve the end of a successful political movement. This is a lesson that others have also learned where you see Bill Clinton playing the saxophone live on MTV or when you see some elements of our society trying to make fundamental changes in the schools in furtherance of larger agendas. John understood this connection 
between indoctrination of youth and longterm success of a movement, and that it was critical to the success of his White Panther party. The stodgy Right-Wing could learn a lesson from Mr. Sinclair, but they probably can't get off their high-horse long enough to listen.   

John was also a trend setter in his application of justice and equality in society. Long before it became hip and trendy to support Gay rights, he juxtaposed the gay rights issue with blacks who were fighting for racial equality. 35 years ago, before the 1969 gay riots in New York that many Gay activists see as the start of the movement, John Sinclair was speaking about it with the passion that still burns deep in his 55 year-old sardonically sublime voice. He was a lot younger then, and he did what he thought was right despite the possible negative consequences to himself and the White Panthers. You have to love it when a person acts on the courage of their convictions, way ahead of their time and with no constituency backing .It is a refreshing and beautiful thing; especially in our current slick media age with it's politics based on focus groups, study commissions, and payoffs to the exclusion of conviction-based public policy.   

Some people feel that the reason that the MC5 didn't become financially successful like some of their contemporary bands was because of the political posturing that John had the MC5 involved with.They were in John words,"..the force ..and the revolution in all it's applications. There is no seperation." The one thing that became very clear was that the mc5 could not be seperated from the growing controversy regarding off stage troubles and Sinclair. Because of the 
obscene words they used on stage and on record albums, the dope bust ,and because of heat from the cops and what John Sinclair called,"the pig media", it became more and more difficult to get their message out to people that didn't have a negative preconception about the band and the White panther party. Ben E Jet remembers one gig that he did with the UP in Kennedy square where the F.B.I. was taking pictures of the crowd from atop a nearby building. The Sinclair lead White Panther party was raising the eye of the government and it's investigative agencies.The Michigan State police in a statement to the media called the organization," detrimental to the welfare of this country" Warden Perry Johnson of Jackson prison said Sinclair was a ,"threat to the security of this institution",and so it was that the Mc5 and other Sinclair managed bands became forever associated with the political arm of the movement. Music as a means to an end...Does Marilyn Manson have an end he is working towards?   

They were the opening act for many of the heavy -weights of Rock ; Led Zepplin, the Who and Cream. In a Rolling stone magazine interview in the very early seventies, Mick Jagger said that he was a mc 5 fan. The sex Pistols in the seventies spoke of their affection and admiration of the mC5. They were,in    many peoples eyes, the godfathers of Punk, Heavy Metal, and all other forms of hard rock. Many of the rock groups ,even today, look back at the mc5 as an 
influence on their music and in fact the bands best known hit song entitled "kick out the Jams brothers and sisters" has been redone recently in tribute to two of the mc5's members who have died in the past few years of natural causes. Take note you Generation xer's..they kept on fighting till the end and died of natural causes. We can all take a lesson from Rob Tyner,the lead singer from Detroit, 
Jesus from Nazareth, and Fred "Sonic" Smith, guitar player for the MC5 Instead of following the example of Seattle rock-star/ multi-millionaire Kurt Cobain who killed himself because he felt bad one day, look to these people as a model;everything in it's own time including death; Just keep on fighting the good fight until the decision about death is made for you, it will come soon enough...   

                                (to be continued)