Smokin’ O.P.'s

Bob Seger

Smokin’ O.P.'s

LP, Palladium/Reprise Records, P-1006 (1972)

^{Transcription and annotations by Lester Bangs Archive management.}

^[1]BOB SEGER

There is a great American songwriter living in Detroit, Michigan. He has been called such things as “the Fogerty of the Midwest,”^[2] although that’s not really fair, because he grew into his style and voice at the same time as Fogerty, with neither of them really having much knowledge of the other. He is like Fogerty in that his music is an expression both of his cultural roots and his feelings about growing up and living in America. But, Bob Seger is no backwoods boy - - his songs reflect urban rhythms, urban frenzies, alleys and freeways and cars and the eternal promise of a raw free life that rides the clatter and smoke in the most positive way possible. It should also be mentioned that Bob Seger is a great rock ‘n’ roller.

He has not, up until now, had much influence outside of the Midwest, although he has been one of the major shaping forces of the Midwestern rock ‘n’ roll scene, and has had national hits. He has had ten Top Ten records in Detroit in seven years, three of which have sold over 50,000 copies. One of them, “Heavy Music,” sold 66,000 copies in Detroit alone.

Another, “Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man,” was a massive hit all over America in 1968, and still often enjoys minor resurgences with flurries of requests coming into local stations when disc jockeys pull it out of the oldies pile. And this summer, “If I Were A Carpenter,” off the Smokin’ O.P.‘s album on Palladium/Reprise, has become a national hit even though it was originally pressed on a local label with limited distribution.

The real beginning lies in 1964, when Bob Seger’s first group, the Last Heard, emerged from the Michigan club scene to cut a record on the Hideout label called “East Side Story." It was only a local hit, but it has become a legendary rock masterpiece and collector’s item since then, and doesn't sound a bit dated today. Because Bob Seger was into what has since come to be defined as the “heavy” sound all the way back in 1964. Viciously propulsive bass lines, fuzztone, a gutteral rhythmic funk drone and a story as American as young love and death on the streets for a kid who could never quite make it across the tracks and took his guns to town instead.

Soon Hideout was picked up by Cameo/Parkway, and Bob’s next series of singles, if never quite breaking nationally, were equally as far reaching and hard-driving as his first. “Persecution Smith” was everything that Dylan and Mike Bloomfield had opened up in “Tombstone Blues”^[3] and the first Paul Butterfield album,^[4] simultaneously let loose and keyed up with the frenzies and political consciousness of the Midwestern rock environment. It may have been the only record ever played on the radio which mentioned, even if in passing, the fires in the streets of Watts, California during the mid-Sixties. And it was followed by “heavy Music,” which is one of the definitive statements of the style both in sound and lyric: Doncha ever feel like goin’ insane When the drums begin to pound Ain’t there ever been a time the band was puttin’ down I know you gotta dig it, I know you can’t stop ‘Cause the bottom comes on too strong Deeper! Deeper! HEAVY MUSIC!

That simple and that powerful. The phrase may or may not have been around before this, but in all the years since, through all the fuzz and freakouts, acid rock, ego jamming and rock ‘n’ roll revivals, there has never been a better example of the music at its purest than this. Unfortunately, certain program directors found their own significance in the word “deeper,” and the record was pulled off the air in many localities.

But Bob Seger was just beginning. Following a signing with Capitol Records, he made four albums for that label in the late Sixties, one of which, Mongrel,^[5] was his most complete, unified and sustained work to that date, and became a kind of underground classic.

During the past two years Bob Seger has continued to grow, and to marshall his incredible, seemingly endless energies. He has played all over the United States and in seemingly every town and club and ballroom in Michigan. He has worked methodically, picking and choosing the musicians for his new band, rehearsing intensively in preparation for what will undoubtedly be a new era of solid success achieved at last. He’s paid his dues, though he has the talent and assurance not to harp on the fact or bemoan his past obscurity. Simply, Bob Seger has worked a long time, has carved out his own part of The Rock,^[6] and is an accomplished enough composer that he no longer needs to prove himself. His new album, Smokin’ O.P.’s, spotlights his thoroughly individual interpretations of songs by friends, heroes and peers that have inspired him and directly or indirectly brought him to the place where he stands now, perhaps the greatest unsung rock hero of the Sixties, as totally ready for the Seventies as they, having finally caught up, are for him. But the real story goes beyond words: Just listen to “Heavy Music,” Smokin’ O.P.’s, and you’ll understand.

^[1] _{This Record Company promo biography, written by Lester Bangs in September, 1972, was not included with the Smokin' O.P.'s album when it was released in 1972.}

^[2] _{John Fogerty: Berkeley-born guitarist, vocalist, and principle songwriter for Creedence Clearwater Revival before following his own trajectory as a successful solo artist.}

^[3] _{"Tombstone Blues" is the second track on the 1965 Bob Dylan album, Highway 61 Revisited. Highly respected guitarist Mike Bloomfield, who played with many of Chicago's blues luminaries prior to his successful career as a session musician, is credited with the defining blues style of Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited.}

^[4] _{Paul Butterfield, American blues vocalist and harmonica virtuoso, released his first album, The Paul Butterfield Blues Band, in 1965.}

^[5] _{Bangs is mostly correct. Seger did make four albums for Capital Records, but only three were released in 1969 and 1970: Ramblin' Gamblin' Man (April 1969), Noah (September 1969), and Mongrel (August 1970). His fourth album, and his last with Capital Records, Brand New Morning, was launched a year after Mongrel, in September of 1971.}

^[6] _{The Rock: the rock music establishment}