Music Magg

by MARK GABRISH CONLAN Copyright © 2019 by Mark Gabrish Conlan • All rights reserved I just bought at M-Theory Music in Mission Hills a copy of the 1991 CD reissue of Kick Out the Jams , the early 1969 release by the pioneering Detroit punk-rock band MC5. I ended up at M-Theory last night because as I left work and walked towards the bus stop on Washington and Falcon, I heard hard-driving rock music. At first I thought it was either a record being played by a neighbor or one of those overwhelming car stereos, but as I approached M-Theory’s location at Washington and Goldfinch I realized it was a live in-store gig. The mini-concert was actually booked for two hours and I was just catching the tail end of it, but I heard enough to like the band instantly. They’re called Retra, and they’re a four-piece with a woman lead singer with a powerful, edgy voice and a simple guitar-bass-drums backup. The guitarist has a whole bar full of effects pedals (sort of a D.I.Y. version of t

by MARK GABRISH CONLAN Copyright © 2019 by Mark Gabrish Conlan • All rights reserved I watched last night’s two-hour CBS-TV special Aretha! A Grammy Celebration of the Queen of Soul. The name “Grammy” has become a brand not only for the annual awards show that supposedly showcases the best in recorded music (but has become woefully limited just to the kinds of music that sell the most records today — the Grammy Awards shows used to acknowledge classical, jazz and other non-mainstream musical genres , but no more) but for various “tributes,” including ones to the Beatles and Stevie Wonder. I’ve already written extensively about Aretha in a Zenger’s Newsmagazine blog post, “R.I.P. Lady Soul” ( https://zengersmag.blogspot.com/2018/08/rip-lady-soul.html ), and as much as I love Aretha and her music I did get irritated at the “first-itis” (my term for people paying tribute to someone who wrongly insist that the people they’re paying tribute to were the first people to do someth