There’s no denying that Wayne Kramer’s Detroit delinquents influenced countless groups who followed in their wake, but Callwood’s boundless enthusiasm gives the impression that they single-handedly invented the electric guitar. Can he really be serious when he suggests they’ve left behind a legacy to rival The Beatles or the Stones?
The author’s research into the band’s brief life certainly can’t be faulted, though. He’s secured the cooperation of every member still breathing, not to mention their wives, managers, label executives and musical contemporaries. What’s all too often missing, however, is reasoned critical appraisal or a sense of context. Callwood’s prose is littered with excitable adolescent fanspeak, and a tendency to describe the group’s sound as ‘raw’ every three or four pages.
It would have been interesting to read, for example, more about the dichotomy of one industrial city throwing up both an aggressive white rock scene (MC5, The Stooges) and the black pop sophistication of Motown. It’s touched upon, but only briefly, as if it’s an annoying obstacle that gets in the way of the blanket blinkered praise. A book to please the diehard fans, but it could have been greatly improved with a modicum of distance and detachment.
